[Pokémon] Feral Game (PG-13)

Disclaimer:
All rights to Pokémon, the species names of such, Team Galactic, Cyrus, and all other general game and/or animé data are copyright Nintendo, The Pokémon Company, Game Freak Inc., and all other applicable parties involved in their creation.

All original characters not covered above are copyright myself.

Copyright Notice:
This fanfiction is created by the user Syrynn, and is not to be redistributed or reprinted on a different site without my express, written permission. Please report any violations to me via the PM system, and I will check into them. If there is indeed an infraction, I will address the moderators of the site to politely come here as proof that this work belongs to me.

Story Rating:
This story is rated PG-13 for language, violence, and thematic elements.

So, without further ado... I present...



For ease of reading, I give you this handy, link-filled table of contents.
Chapter One: Experience Points the Way
Chapter Two: Vial Intentions
Chapter Three: Beak-on Of Hope
Chapter Four: Double Idiocy
Chapter Five: Ear-ie Happenings
Chapter Six: 'Morph to Me
Chapter Seven: Pidge Over Troubled Waters
Chapter Eight: Heads or 'Tales
Chapter Nine: Shocked and Loaded
Chapter Ten: Alone No More
Chapter Eleven: Light in the Darkness

((Subsequent chapters will be updated here for quick accessibility.))

Chapter One: Experience Points the Way

A young man, no more than seventeen, lay inside of a wrought-iron cage, with solid bars about a quarter-inch apart lining it. His skin was a slightly pale shade of tan, proving that, while he typically bronzed himself under the sun, his recent incarceration had caused his complexion to fade back toward its natural state. His head was a mess of untamed, crimson locks that looked as though it had been rolled through every sort of dirt imaginable for months without care. He breathed lightly as he slept, and his chest heaved slowly with each passing second. He was a captive in Team Galactic's headquarters, and sleeping was about the only thing that passed time with any reliable speed.

The young prisoner wore a pitch black jumpsuit, one size too small for his five-foot-seven body. He looked as though he was cursing his captors for giving him the tight and itchy clothing, but it was certainly better than being stripped to nakedness. He had a somewhat thin, yet moderately muscled build that required him to wear a large size in clothing. It was fortunate that many of the Galactic employees shared his clothing size, as the prisoner's garb was nothing more than the Galactic uniform painted a pure ebony and sewn together crudely. Obviously, prisoners received nothing more than hand-me-down clothing, and were lucky to even have that.

The cell containing the youth was about six-foot-two in height, and five-four in length. The width measured an even two feet, and comfortably fit the prisoner inside. It wasn't too comfortable, though, as it housed no furniture, or anything else for that matter. Going to sleep meant doing so on the cold, metallic ground, and often left captives in pain, or halted their rest altogether. It was the barest of lives, and the only food given to the prisoners was a small ration of bread once daily, usually around nine in the evening. Water was given with each food ration, and was put in a small bowl that was only allowed to be used for two minutes. It was then taken away until the next night, when the process repeated itself.

The surroundings weren't any more cheerful than the lifestyle. The basement was dimly lit, and smelled of toxic waste and body odor. Not all of the odor was human, and most of it was considerably vile, though most of the prisoners ended up adjusting to it. It was barely possible to see anything inside unless an employee happened to be down there on a matter of business. The grunts usually carried candles, which didn't help matters much, but the higher officials were allotted lanterns and flashlights, which was a considerable aide to a prisoner's sight. Only the highest of the scientists and leaders had the key to the light switch near the stairwell, and seeing one of them in the filth was rarer than seeing a shiny Pokémon.

A faint light flickered on and off in the dark, dank distance, and the youth stirred softly, finally opening his eyes and stretching his arms. His blue eyes blinked as they adjusted to the waking world, and his arms tensed up as he stretched to ease his muscle aches, groaning with each pop he heard.

"Well, well, well... look who's finally up," a voice suddenly spat through the dankness.

"Huh?" the young man asked hazily. "Are you talking to me?"

"Yes, I am," the reply came back. "So, how long have you been here?"

The teenager looked over in the direction of the strange voice. He shrugged his broad shoulders and replied, "About a week, I'd guess." As he shook his head, his untamed red hair fell backward behind his ears. He stared at the iron bars of his cage and put his head in his hands, looking either exhausted, ashamed, or a combination of the two.

"You'll never make it out," the voice said suddenly in a gruff tone. "I've been here for... well, I believe about twenty-one years. I'd wager my last coin that you've been alive for less time than that. Unfortunately, they took all my coins and bills when they threw me in this stuffy old prison trap. I can't remember what I was even doing here when I got captured. I don't remember my true name anymore. This dank hellhole took all that I held dear, including my memories..."

The redhead looked up and nodded. "Legendaries alive... well, I remember my sister Kyra had called me over here to discuss some monetary problems she'd been having. Then the next thing I remember, I woke up in this cage. My name's Dylan... Dylan Jones." He nodded softly and looked at the ceiling of his makeshift cell. "Speaking of money, you'd win that wager you made. I'm only sixteen years old." He chuckled softly and showed a half-smile. His teeth were barely faded, with a near-perfect alignment. Only the space between his two front teeth seemed to be off.

"Dylan Jones..." The voice was silent for a minute as its owner seemed to be pondering. "You can call me Shade," it finally replied, adding a deep groan in the end. "That's what the guards and scientists seem to call me, at least. I don't know why you're here, but I hope you'll tough out your incarceration. In a cell with nothing to do, I'm surprised I never fell over dead from the pure boredom."

"Shade..." Dylan uttered suddenly.

"Yes?" came the reply.

"Since when did Team Galactic have such an elaborate prison scheme?"

"Hmm... Dylan, I'm not one hundred percent sure," Shade answered hesitantly. "I believe this is an old, underground facility of theirs. Only the high-ranking officials and inmates will ever find out about the history of the dungeon that we're entombed in. When Team Galactic was founded forty years ago, they originally built this place to store highly dangerous experiments and incurably wild Pokémon.

"Ten years later," Shade went on, "most of this large room was destroyed in a fire caused by one of the loosened experiments. History has forgotten who he was before Galactic got their mitts on him; now we only know him as 'Pyrus.' The only prior history of Pyrus that is certain is the fact that he was once a human being.

"His species and all other attributes are a mystery to even Galactic officials. They never kept records of anyone they experimented on, just in case the police ever found their hidden laboratory. After the fire was quelled by alert guards, the surviving experiments and Pokémon were moved to a warehouse about a quarter-mile north of here. In the chaos of the moving day, Pyrus fought his way past the guards and up the stairwell.

"Upon weaving his way to the ground floor, he outfoxed the greatest mind of the Galactic force: Cyrus. Disguising himself as a grunt, he was ordered by Cyrus to leave for the day and get some rest, as 'tomorrow our plan will swing into full force.' He willfully obeyed, and upon his exit of the Galactic hideout, no one ever saw him again... and this basement has since been all but abandoned."

"Wait," Dylan said, a little confused. "How did he escape without someone noticing him being an experiment?"

"No one is completely sure," Shade explained. "It's said that either his disguise was simply incredible, or that Cyrus slipped up really badly. I'm not going to try and doubt Cyrus, so I'll go with the disguise theory. And, technically, the correct term for his experiment type is Pokémorph."

"What's a Pokémorph?"

"A Pokémorph is a being that has the DNA of both a human and Pokémon source. The helices combine in a very complicated fashion, and the outward appearance reflects this unusual union by displaying the traits of both DNA donors. The most complicated one I've heard of involved two Pokémon donors and a single human. This is actually a fairly common method of punishment for non-compliant Galactic employees. In fact, it's estimated that as many as twenty-three percent of the experiments in the warehouse are former Galactic grunts."

"And are we in this warehouse now, or are the prisoners?"

"No, we're in the basement of the official headquarters building, like I said before. Apparently, you and I are a special case to be mocked and ridiculed by all the employees that pass us by. The warehouse was actually recently refurbished, about a month ago, and now houses most of the biological assets of the organization. The prisoners are now said to inhabit a storeroom in Veilstone City, the same city where Cyrus was unceremoniously killed by a wild Ampharos. That's a long, sordid story that I don't even feel like going into right now.

Dylan whistled in awe at all of the information he had just taken in. "So, we're in a former experimental facility?" he asked.

"Yep," came the answer. "Well, yes and no. Some experiments took place here, but this place mostly housed the finished products of the experiments, not their actual performances."

"That means that I might be exposed to mutated DNA strands at this very moment?"

"Yes," Shade responded with a conceding sigh. "I've never known Team Galactic to wash any of their holding cells, cages, or other equipment in this lower floor. For all we know, your very chemistry might be changing as we speak."

Dylan seemed slightly unnerved at this and settled uneasily into a sitting position, wondering just how much of Shade's story he could trust...

Hm...I find this to be a rather interesting story actually. I'm surprised it hasn't had more views than it did. So on to my first review for the first chapter (I would totally read the second chapter but I tired as mess).

First off, I find that you are a very descriptive writer. You are great at establishing the essentials and much more. Everything from explaining the jail cell, to bars, to the lightning, etc. was done quite well for my standards honestly. I truly enjoyed imagining everything happening within the well described setting that you provided. I enjoy that. :D

So for the next thing, I want to give you a compliment on general storyline basis. You covered a lot in the first chapter; base storyline, main character, background story line, and setting. That is something that I will do. XD I found the whole Pokemorph thing to be an intriguing concept as well. Besides, I've always wanted to do a story where the main character is captured somewhere or in jail.

The only real minor issue (if you can could this as an issue because I do it too) is some run on sentences. Some of your sentences stretches on a bit in length. Don't take this wrong, I'm not saying it's often. It's only a couple I found too lengthy. You have a good length to most of them to explain the sentence. I like that.

Overall, I am going to keep reading your story, so keep up the good work.

((Thank you very much for your kind words! I'm really looking forward to hearing from you again, as well as any other person who wants to give me feedback.

Back to the story...))

Chapter Two: Vial Intentions

The second floor of the H.Q. building was a more biological sort of place, at least in a sense, than the basement was. Beakers of fluids were spread out over a long table, ranging in all colors from a strong red-orange, to a royal purple, and even a light cerulean. A strong, burning stench filled the area, as this was the room where Pokémon and human extracts were taken and boiled to their simplest, liquid form. In this form, the DNA was highly concentrated, and could be used for experiments, or as simply a reference material for future use.

This was the main laboratory, and it housed both established scientists and mid-level grunts who displayed an aptitude for the sciences. Most of the grunts filled up jobs requiring them to take the substances and put them in vials. Several of the grunts up for promotion packaged the sealed vials within cardboard boxes for shipments to the warehouse, a dangerous job that left no room for error. If the vials shattered in the boxes, the fluids would leech through the cardboard and onto the floor, posing not only risks of workplace accidents, but also unwanted contamination.

A blond woman, appearing to be in her late teens or her early twenties, sat at a station with empty vials. She had locks of hair that looked like inverted wheat growing out of her head, draped down as finely as an upper-class curtain hanging over her face. She idly fiddled with a small, glass-coated vial of fluid, and sighed sadly as she stared at the orange substance inside. She then sealed the vial with a small piece of cork, making it airtight and safe for future handling. A frown began to form on her face as she looked at her dark-skinned coworker, no more than eighteen in appearance, who was sitting about five feet to her right, packaging finished vials.

"Chell, I've finished another batch of DNA samples," the blond woman stated with a groan, placing the vial into a flat-bottomed cardboard divider filled with identical, sealed vials. The glass nestled unevenly inside, as if she didn't care how it looked. She pushed the divider toward her coworker impatiently.

"What do you want, Kyra, a medal?" Chell replied abrasively as she turned toward the blond woman, catching the divider as it slid, and straightening the contents as she carefully placed it on top of another divider inside the topmost box. "We've got more vials to fill so we can send them off to the warehouse. Get back to work." She sealed the box, which was now filled to the top, and labeled it 'Fire Types.' Her handwriting was very neat, signifying that she took her work more seriously than her compatriot. Her short, walnut-colored hair shuffled as she adjusted her rose-tinted glasses, worn strictly as a fashion accessory. Her hazel eyes cast a reproachful stare beneath the spectacles, seeming to pierce the soul. After Chell had made her point, she turned back toward the nearest empty box, putting it on the table in front of her.

Kyra sighed softly at the unkind response she had received, and shook her head. "Chell, don't be like that," she said sadly, with a blink of her jade-colored eyes. "I'm not in the mood for this today." Chell and Kyra normally got along somewhat well, but things weren't really too happy and energetic between the two of them. They had been working together for about four months, and Kyra had been Chell's mentor, of sorts, while the teen had gotten used to the workplace. However, Kyra showed a little resentment toward Chell, who had surprisingly passed her in the corporate ladder.

Chell surpassed all expectations with her cool, level-headed attitude. She showed high aptitudes for biology, and proved her battling skills with a third place finish in the Sinnoh Pokémon League ten months before. After the League finished its championship match, Chell retired, much to the shock of her fellow competitors, to return back to her home in Floaroma Town. She spent six months living peaceably with her Pokémon, and all seemed decent.

Then, one day in late February. Kyra dropped by Floaroma on an errand to pick up Gracidea flowers for an experiment. She noticed Chell feeding her Arcanine some unusual-looking food. After she asked Chell what she was doing, Chell explained that she made food based on the personalities, type, and biological aspects of each Pokémon she encountered. Kyra was impressed, and recommended to her that she stop by the H.Q. building north of Jubilife, tucked away in a forested nook next to the Ravaged Path.

A day later, Chell showed up with a smile on her face and hope filling her heart. She was hired after about a ten minute interview with the president of Team Galactic, who immediately saw promise in the seventeen-year-old. She was accepted into an entry-level position in the laboratory, and rapidly worked her way up, racking up promotions like she had formerly collected wins as a trainer. Within three months, she had passed Kyra on the ladder, despite being four years younger. She was a prim and proper employee, the type anyone would want on their workforce. However, she had a dark side to her, and she often assisted in experimental injections, relishing every minute of it.

Remembering these facts, Kyra seemed a little miffed as she filled another vial with the orange liquid. She groaned as she lamented the fact that even after nearly two years of employment, she had never really been used to her fullest potential. She knew exactly why, as she began to recall her clumsiness and slightly sub-par intelligence.

"Something up?" Chell queried, genuinely concerned.

"Oh, for Pete's sake," Kyra responded abrasively, shaking the very nerves of her coworker's foundation. "Chell, can't I get a thought in my head without you thinking something's going on?" She threw up her hands in exasperation, the orange polish glistening on her fingernails.

Chell stood up and sighed, her four-nine body seeming like nothing compared to Kyra's five-three frame. "I don't believe you, Kyra," the brunette replied firmly, yet with a touch of compassion. "Tell me what's really happening."

"I told you, nothing's wrong!" Kyra flung her hand forward as she yelled, and in her haste, she tossed the vial at Chell. The glass hit her coworker in the face and broke into thousands upon thousands of miniature shards. Chell's face ended up covered in her own crimson blood, along with the orange DNA fluid. Fortunately, Chell's glasses blocked most of the shards that headed toward her eyes. Although they were now pretty much shot, they ended up saving her eyes, and most importantly, her vision. The brunette threw her glasses to the ground in disgust, growling in ire.

"****!" Chell yelped as she stomped toward Kyra, her arms also covered in the liquid's splash. "I ought to kick your ass, you no good-"

"Oh gods..." Kyra interrupted as she looked at Chell, on the verge of tears. Kyra looked down and noticed that several hundred shards had flown off in her direction, and now lay at the base of her blue boots. Just above her socks, several shards had cut into her skin, leaving a red, rash-like mark on her leg. Kyra dusted off the bottom of her black lab dress and examined her wound carefully.

The sound of someone clearing their throat caught Kyra by surprise. She looked up to find an imposing man staring at Chell with a sneer on his cold, unforgiving face.

The boss of Team Galactic didn't go by any name. Most of the workers just called him 'Boss,' or, at least, the smart ones did. His six-ten stature towered over every other Galactic member. His black tuxedo was a sign of his power, as he was the only one allowed to wear a suit in the facility. Boss had a heavy-set build that brought fright to the workers' faces as they had to look up to even see what emotions he was possibly trying to feel. Boss tapped his right foot, the laces on his leather shoe bouncing slightly with each tap. "Chell Davies, did I just hear you swear at Miss Jones?" he snarled with rage. "Look at me as I'm- oh, Lord Arceus above!" He cried out as Chell turned around, revealing to him her blood-soaked face. "What happened here!?" Boss growled, his teeth gnashing together. "Tell me, now."

"It's not my fault, Sir," Chell snapped as she stared daggers at Kyra. "This unacceptable excuse for a human being just tossed a filled vial at me for no reason!"

Boss wheeled around and got right into Kyra's face. "Miss Jones!" the man boomed angrily. "What the hell was going through your mind!?"

Kyra backed away uneasily, her lips quivering nervously. "It... it was an accident, Sir," Kyra admitted. "My arms were going forward and the vial just... slipped out..."

Boss bought the explanation, but he was absolutely furious nonetheless. "Thanks to your little stunt, Miss Davies is now infected with Pokémon DNA! You've just endangered her greatly, and you should be lucky I'm feeling kind today. Otherwise, I'd fire you on the spot!"

His tone calmed down as he looked back toward Chell. "Miss Davies, since the shards cutting you were so small, we can't really do anything about removing them. I'd at least suggest going up to the nurse's station to get your face cleaned up, and let her treat your cuts. Unfortunately, as far as your infection is concerned, our only vial of antidote is in the basement, along with Dylan and Shade."

"Why's Dylan down there?" Kyra questioned with a raised brow.

"Considering you performed a double injection on him, he's a potential candidate to go completely feral," Boss reminded her with an annoyed groan. "Either that, or he'll be another unsuccessful taurform attempt."

"Taurform?" Chell chimed in, blinking hesitantly. She looked down at her arms, which had been spared from most of the splash, but still had small splotches of orange on them. "I thought we stopped trying to make those."

"We did," Boss conceded. "After over two hundred failures, all resulting in the experiment's death, we scrapped Project Taurform back in March. I never thought we'd be talking about that debacle in the middle of June... but we have to now, thanks to Miss Jones bungling up that injection."

"Today's the fourteenth," Chell observed. "I guess if I had to estimate, since Kyra injected Dylan on the third, by now he'll either be dead, or have morphed." Chell sighed sadly as she walked to her left about twenty feet and hit the 'up' button on the elevator. She was heading to the fourth floor to get treated for her injuries at the company nurse's station. The elevator car arrived, and Chell stepped on, pushed the '4' button, and watched the door close in front of her. As the noise of Boss screaming at Kyra was slowly drowned out by the shutting door, Chell thanked her lucky stars that she could still see after the sordid incident with the vial...

Chapter Three: Beak-on of Hope

As Dylan sat in pensive thought, he found his eyes wandering to the right, gazing at a small, pigeon-like bird. Dylan immediately recalled that this creature was called a 'Pidgey.' The bird had a small, vermilion beak, and Dylan noted that this beak shade was unusual for the species, which normally had a pinkish or purplish mouth. Its feet were the same hue of red, and each foot housed a trio of sharp, opal-tinted talons on the front, with a single extra talon on the back for a more favorable hold on tree branches and the like. The wings, underside, brows, and belly were all a creamy beige color, with the rest of the body holding a sienna tinge to it. Its sand-colored eyes blinked slowly at the human as it carefully hopped over.

"Dylan, what are you looking at over there?" Shade questioned, a leery undertone pervading throughout the query.

"It's just a Pidgey," Dylan answered with a passing wave of his hand. "Mm, she's a beautiful one at that. She's got this amazing cinnabar beak, and her talons look as sharp as steak knives. I'm surprised that she isn't covered in contest ribbons, as pretty as this little birdie is."

The Pidgey cooed lovingly at Dylan's vehement praise. "Thank you," she trilled with a longing sigh, "but my beak is actually vermilion, not cinnabar."

Dylan furrowed his brow at the bird's response. "As far as I recall, vermilion and cinnabar are both pretty much the same shade," he explained with a hint of confusion. "In fact, vermilion used to be obtained directly from cinnabar, if I recall accurately. Therefore, by all technicalities, either way should be correct."

The pigeon ruffled her feathers and nodded. "Well played; that's indeed correct,' she sang with a happy blink of her eyes. "Wait, why aren't you freaking out?"

"Why should I be?" The teen seemed even more confused now. He didn't really understand what he was supposed to be freaking out about, if anything at all.

"I'm a talking Pidgey!" the bird crowed with a flap of her wings. "Doesn't that, you know, frighten you!?"

"Not really," Dylan admitted. "I mean, yeah, back when I first met a talking Pokémon, it was pretty freaky. But ever since then, I've essentially come to expect it whenever I run across a Pokémon anywhere I go. See, I believe that almost any Pokémon possesses the ability to speak the human language. It all boils down to two things. First, if the creature doesn't learn it at some point, it won't happen. Additionally, even if the Pokémon does learn our language, not many of them will want to use it around humans. Remember, humans are fickle and easily amused."

"You're a human," Pidgey cawed with a chuckle.

"That's not the point," Dylan continued. "I never was much of a trainer, so I simply gathered the Pokémon that appeared to resonate the most with my emotions. Unfortunately, because of our nature, many other humans don't take the time to appreciate the beauty of the earth, and all the creatures that inhabit it. It's a shame that we don't, because there's so much that we've still got to learn. Certainly, the fact we still don't know all the secrets of the Pokémon universe attests to that."

"Arceus above; you sound like a clone of the professor," the pigeon jested.

Dylan chortled uneasily, nodding sadly. "Touché, my avian friend. You have to admit though... what I said holds true."

"Doesn't make you sound any less like a geek," the bird laughed. "And call me Pidge, love; you're being way too formal with me."

"Fine, but don't call me 'love' again. Deal?"

"All right, then. What should I call you?" Pidge cooed happily, giving Dylan as close to a smile as her beak would allow.

"Dylan will be just fine," the redhead replied, returning Pidge's 'smile.'

"Okay, then Dylan it is." The bird preened her chest feathers, then turned back to Dylan and cawed, "You said you met a talking Pokémon before. When was that?"

Dylan pondered for a minute or so, and finally answered, "It was when I was eleven. For my birthday that year, Dad gave me a Cyndaquil, and a set of three Poké Balls. He explained that each time I attempted to capture a Pokémon, I had to throw one of the capsules at the Pokémon I wanted to catch. If it was successful, it officially belonged to me... at least, those were his words. I told him I didn't feel right calling myself a Pokémon's owner, so much. I said that if I caught a Pokémon, it was a sign that I was the correct person for it to travel with."

"Okay, hold up, Dylan," Pidge interrupted, putting her left wing to her beak. "Don't you get all spiritual with me here. Okay, fire hair?"

"Anyway," Dylan continues, ignoring Pidge's intrusion, "If it was unsuccessful, the Poké Ball would shatter into invisible shards, never to be seen again. Therefore, Dad instructed me to use them carefully, but assured me that I could purchase them at a Poké Mart if I ran out. After his final lesson, he bid me goodbye, and I began my way with my Cyndaquil, who seemed like a perfect partner for my journey.

"She was a bright little fireball, a mouse-like Pokémon with a long snout and a happy grin on her face. She had navy blue fur, with a cream-colored underside. Each of her back paws held a single, ivory claw, with her front paws having no toes at all. They looked like little cream puffs, and wiggled lovingly as I held her for the first time. Her small body bristled with energy, and the top of her back flared up with light flames, warming the Pokémon up even more as I hugged her passionately. I named her Almette, after my mother, who was killed in a car accident a week before my ninth birthday. That's enough ruminating over her, though, so I'll get back to the story.

"As the sun began to set that evening, I made my way to the entrance of Route 201, and a small cat approached me on his hind legs. He was the color of light sand, with darker, bay-colored 'socks' on the hind paws. A tail flowed behind him, the bay tip curled into a small, lollipop-like spiral. His ears were a jet black, and he had amber eyes, flanking just beneath a golden coin emblazoned into his forehead. I didn't realize that he was called a 'Meowth' until I saw the coin charm. I looked at him a little strangely, as I had studied in school that Meowth usually walked on all fours. He called me a 'twoip,' for some odd reason, and stated that he didn't like my staring.

"At once, I was fascinated with the reality of a Pokémon being able to talk, and a bit unnerved at the same time. Immediately, I asked him how he knew how to speak. He replied that he learned a long time ago, along with learning bipedal movement, to impress a female Meowth that he was in love with. His expression saddened as he finished by saying she thought he was a freak after all that work he did.

"Then, he went on and told me a long-winded story about two idiots named Jessie and James, who I assume he had traveled with in his younger years. I recall that he indeed looked a little old, as his fur wasn't quite as vibrant, and his eyes seemed a little droopy. He continued to tell me that his 'moron companions' constantly got him in trouble, and kept causing the three of them to be blasted toward the stratosphere in heavy explosions. He yapped about wasting 'eight of his nine lives' with them. Finally, he explained how he finally ditched the 'dimwitted duo' in Pastoria City by hiding in the Safari Zone.

"After about two more hours of berating Jessie and James, or what seemed like that much time, he finally shut up and lay tiredly at my side. I was perplexed, to say the least. I stayed with him and put Almette down, so she could frolic at my side. I then petted Meowth for a few minutes, and smiled warmly as I listened to his sleepy purrs. He seemed glad that I had listened to his tales, and I watched the sun set beneath the trees, gazing in awe at its rainbow of colors.

"After the sun left our vision, Meowth growled cutely, and asked if I had ever owned a Pokémon. I told him that I had no intentions of being an 'owner,' so much as a 'friend,' of Pokémon, and he meowed approvingly. He admitted that Jessie and James were at least good for that, as they had never forced him into a Poké Ball while he worked with them. He then confessed that he longed to know what it was like to just be friends with a human, in a stress-free environment, and wondered if I would take him along on my journey.

"At first, I declined his offer, but then I realized that this was my chance to listen to a Pokémon tell his story in his own words, in a way I could understand. I then allowed the cat to travel with me, much to his delight. We traveled for about three years together, and I kept a daily journal of our events, told from each of our perspectives. Things were wonderful, even though Meowth seemed to get a little more weary with each passing day."

"A week after my fourteenth birthday, Meowth passed away due to his old age. I buried him back in Twinleaf Town, next to my old swing set in the backyard. I left him the journal, so that he would be able to take it with him to the afterlife, and recall his experiences with the souls of those whom he cared about. Who knows? He might have met that Meowth from his kitten years up there." As he finished his tale, Dylan looked up at the ceiling of the cage. He began to wonder if he was ever going to get out of the H.Q. again, and a tear glinted against the corner of his right eye.

Noticing the tear, Pidge sighed adoringly and hopped closer to the bars of Dylan's cage. "That's a beautiful tale, Dylan," she crowed with a longing sigh. "You must have a wonderful soul inside you. Will you pet me? I want to feel the warmth exude from you."

Dylan's brow raised curiously, but he nodded with a gentle grin. "Well, you put it pretty strangely, but of course I can pet you, Pidge." Dylan reached his right hand out as he spoke, rubbing the Pidgey's neck softly. The bird trilled happily, rubbing her beak into Dylan's ring finger.. Some of the cinnabar hues leaked like pigments from her beak, and soaked into the teen's hand. He didn't notice it as he yawned, his petting strokes growing slower until he stopped completely.

Dylan eventually slumped with his back against the bars and looked at Pidge with a satisfied expression. He then fell to the left, and curled up into a ball on the floor, much in the manner of a Meowth. His breathing slowed and he began to go back to sleep. Pounding footsteps echoed through the barren walls of the basement, signifying the usual hustle and bustle of the workplace above...

Chapter Four: Double Idiocy

Two hours had passed since Kyra's mishap with the vial. She just now had finished sweeping and mopping the floor to remove the shards and DNA concentrate spilled in the area around the table. Thanks to her bungling, packaging on the second floor had completely ceased until the area had been decontaminated. Since Kyra was already infected with Pokémon DNA, she had no need for any protective gear. The elevator door opened, and Boss strode through with Chell by his side.

The brunette's face was cleaned splendidly by the nurse, who always prided herself on a job well done. She had washed Chell with water, and given her entire face several quick dabs of hydrogen peroxide. The peroxide disinfected the surface of the small cuts and abrasions, and though the wounds were hardly visible, the damage was real. Chell was infected with Pokémon DNA, which served as a double whammy brought about by Kyra's mistake.

"The place looks clean," Boss noted, a half-smile forming on his lips as he and Chell approached the woman carefully. "Then again, since it's already three-thirty in the afternoon, I expected no less, even from someone like you." Boss put extra emphasis on the last word, implying a deep disdain for nonsensical people like Kyra.

Kyra shrugged her shoulders as she took the broom and mop to the decontamination chamber and put them in, shutting the door in front of them. As she pulled the chain outside, the two tools were instantly besieged by a solid jet of water that cleansed them of the fluids moistening them. After a good two minutes, the water stopped, leaving the soaking broom and mop inside. Kyra opened the door and removed them, leaving them standing up just outside the chamber so they could air-dry.

"Is it three-thirty already?" Kyra asked lightheartedly. "My, how time flies when we nearly blind our friends and are forced to clean up the mess afterward..."

"Cut the crap, Kyra," Chell snarled as she bared her teeth, which revealed her metallic braces. Chell had been enduring the contraptions on her teeth for six years, and hated them with a fiery passion. "Can we just go get the antidote vial? I want to get this stuff out of me!"

"Yes, could we please go to the basement now, Miss Jones?" Boss agreed. "Let's get moving before the effects become irreversible."

Kyra agreed that now was not the time for talk, and the three headed to their right, in the opposite direction of the elevator. They came to a dark, gray door, and as Boss pushed the jutting handlebar, they found themselves in a stairwell. The trio headed down each metallic step in a simple, methodical fashion, sticking together the whole way. Two flights later, as they reached the entry door for the basement, Kyra looked over at Chell and apologized sadly for her mistake. Chell forgave her, albeit with an angry glare, and turned the rusty knob to her right, pulling it toward her to reveal the dank basement.

Boss fumbled through his left coat pocket, pulling out a diverse ring of keys. He fiddled around until he felt a key with fifteen small, triangular teeth. The flickering bulb provided just enough luminescence for Boss to find the keyhole for the casing on the wall, which Kyra and Chell both knew held the light switch. Boss inserted the key and turned it to the left, opening the case, and he then proceeded to flip the switch inside upward..

Instantly, the entire basement lit up. The empty walls were revealed to be a putrid shade of olive green, enough to induce vomiting in a queasy individual. Two cages sat in the distance, and Kyra recalled that these contained Dylan and Shade, the only two prisoners held in the basement. Why exactly Shade was here, no one really knew. He was kind of an enigma, and few had even gazed upon his true form.

"Okay, so the antidote vials are in the safe in the back, right?" Kyra asked, the stench beginning to overwhelm her.

"Vial," Boss corrected, "and yes, it's back in the rear safe, past Dylan and Shade."

"There's only one vial?" Chell queried, growing uneasy in these uncomfortable quarters.

"We made a single vial of antidote for emergency purposes," Boss explained. "Since Kyra caused you to become infected, her punishment is to be denied the antidote, and become a Pokémorph due to her own incompetence."

Damn, Kyra told herself angrily. I should have seen this coming from a mile away.

Boss led his two employees toward the cages, drawing a menacing hiss from Shade's cell. Instantly, the man wheeled on the hissing creature, smacking the cage walls with his fists and yelling a string of obscenities at him. Inside, Shade snarled uneasily and reluctantly shut up.

Shade was a curious Pokémorph. His body was scaled and serpentine, with four short, stubby legs extending from it, blanketed in coal-colored fur. His paws had three glistening ebony talons, and barely seemed able to hold the Pokémorph's weight. His tail flowed naturally from his body, appearing to be part of one solid string of scales and bones. A sword-like spade jutted from the end of the tail, and it was half-red, half-black.

Golden hexagons formed a natural pattern on his back, with violet scars crisscrossing every which way on his belly. His face was a pure white, and housed blood-red eyes that could paralyze a skittish opponent with fear. Solid, crimson fangs jutted forth from his mouth, and silently seethed with a deadly poison.

"So Shade, we meet again." Boss was very casual in his opening line, giving the morph a chance to be civil.

"Piss off, you overgrown bastard," Shade hissed with a menacingly cold stare. He was rarely, if ever, civil with Boss, and with good reason. Boss was the very man who made Shade into what he was.

Shade used to be a normal Seviper, and he lived freely inside Sinnoh's most famous peak, Mount Coronet. About twenty-one years prior, while on a trip to Snowpoint City, Boss encountered the snake just inside the entrance coming from Celestic Town. He caught the Seviper napping, and Shade failed to escape the Poké Ball thrown at him. Boss later took him back to the H.Q. building for further study.

Upon his return, Boss was presented with a wolf-like Pokémon as a gift from one of his grunts. The creature had a sickle growth jutting upward from the right side of her head, and was covered in silky white fur. She had a jet black, scimitar-shaped tail, and three sharp claws on each of her four paws. Just below her chin, a large 'bandana' of fur puffed out, giving her a majestic appearance. She was an Absol, and her beauty and natural strength made her a prized catch for Team Galactic.

Boss promptly cut off about two inches of the wolf's mane, and put it through the boiling process. The DNA was injected directly into Shade's bloodstream, where the helices interchanged themselves until Shade was roughly fifty percent Seviper, and fifty percent Absol. He gained four Absol legs, though the serpentine strands shrank them to an almost-vestigial size. Shade struggled mightily to walk at first, but through constant physical therapy, he overcame the size disadvantage, and gained all the mobility of a normal Absol. However, this didn't mask the resentment that he held over being experimented on without his consent.

"Shade, Shade, Shade," Boss chided, having grown immune to the serpentine creature's tongue over the years. "You can at least show some manners toward me. After all, I am trying to extend the favor."

Shade shook his head, the morph less concerned about manners than he was about his anger. "Yeah? Well, stop trying then. You're not going to make it work."

Meanwhile, Kyra and Chell looked into Dylan's cage, noticing that the teen had fallen asleep. Kyra seemed a little worried, as she covered her nose to shield the fumes from ravaging the inside of her nasal passages.

"Hey, look up top, Kyra!" Chell exclaimed with a smile. "What a lovely Pidgey."

She saw that Pidge had been sitting on top of Dylan's cage the whole time, keeping an eye on the state of affairs in her vicinity. They had no time to marvel at the bird, however. They looked back at Dylan and watched him lay nearly motionless for about forty-five seconds.

"I hope he's not dead," Kyra groaned, a hint of worry crossing her face.

"Looks like he's just asleep," Chell stated sadly, as she saw Dylan stretch his left leg out in his slumber. "Not a single sign of transformation or death. I'm disappointed."

"Yeah, it's really weird," Kyra confessed with a sigh. "It's been almost two weeks since he got here."

"I know, and that first day is when he drank that six-ounce beaker of corn-shaded DNA concentrate."

"What do you mean, six-ounce beaker!?" Kyra snapped suddenly. "I injected him with a double dose by accident, and now you're saying what I did had little bearing on him anyway?"

"Hey, he thought it was lemonade," Chell countered, with a quick chuckle. "He drank it before I had time to even think straight. Besides, if he's that dumb, he deserves whatever happens to him."

"Are you two done running your mouths about old news?" Boss chimed in. "I'd like to get Miss Davies her antidote, if you don't mind."

Kyra and Chell looked at each other, nodded, and followed Boss to a silver-plated door. A plate with a twelve-key pad was screwed into the wall to the right, and as Boss quickly pressed in keys in an indeterminable order, the safe clicked and swung open. The two women jumped back to avoid getting hit, and marveled at the sight within. A lone, corked vial sat on a pillow atop a large, wooden two-by-four, which nestled in perfect balance on a stone column two feet high.

Kyra bolted toward the glass container, but she tripped and knocked the column out from under the board as she fell to the concrete floor below. The two-by-four folded backward over the column, batting the pillow away. The three could only watch helplessly as the vial flew against the far wall, smashing on contact into an indefinite number of glass shards, which rained over the board like diamonds falling from the sky.

"Damn it!" Boss screeched in rage. "I have had absolutely enough of your idiocy!" He snarled rabidly as he grabbed the two-by-four and pounded Kyra in the back of her skull, knocking the woman unconscious. As Boss dropped the board and grabbed Kyra's limp and motionless body, he then instructed Chell to leave the basement. While the brunette ran toward the stairwell, Boss dragged the body with him, laying it between Dylan and Shade's cages. As he began to walk away, he noticed Pidge on top of Dylan's cell.

"You won't tell him, will you?" he asked, motioning his head toward Dylan. Pidge met his query with a happy trill, as if to assure him that she would indeed keep her beak shut about the situation.

"Excellent," Boss continued, a dark smile growing on his cold, unforgiving face. "I should be more concerned with your presence here, but I suppose even they need a little cheer once in a while. I don't want them killing themselves; we've done too much work to lose them in such a barbaric manner."

Boss then walked calmly to the stairwell door, and went through without any further fuss. As his steps clanged against the stairs, the door closed behind him, causing Shade to breathe a heavy sigh of relief. Pidge cawed uneasily as she eyeballed the Pokémorph, her eyes closing gently as she prepared to take a quick nap.

Meanwhile, Dylan's hair began to form jagged spikes, as if it was being statically charged by an unknown electrical force...

Chapter Five: Ear-ie Happenings

Back on the second floor, Chell had taken her spot back on the assembly line, packaging the dividers into the cardboard boxes just like before. With the glass and contaminants Kyra had missed fully cleaned by the janitorial staff an hour earlier, it was again safe to resume work. As she labeled a box containing violet concentrate, a bell clanged throughout the level, signifying that it was five P.M., and that the workers were allowed to go home for the night. The employees on the line all smiled in relief, glad to have gotten another day of work over with. Most of them headed to the elevator, forming a group to go down to the ground floor.

Chell, however, had a different plan. She trudged to the stairwell door, opening it with a heavy sigh and heading upward. Four flights of stairs later, she had reached the sixth floor, which was the top level of the H.Q. building, and housed Boss's main office. As the brunette opened the door leading out of the stairwell, she looked around inside the hallway leading to the room housing her supervisor.

Fancy paintings and archaic scriptures lined the beige walls around Chell, most of which she had no chance of reading, even with her high intelligence levels. They seemed to be written in a dead language, one that was rarely, if ever, seen anymore, much less used. She eventually reached an ashen door flanked by a tangerine orange arch, and rapped on it with a few quick smacks of her fist.

"Come in," Boss invited warmly from the opposite side. He sat in front of a brown, cedar desk, his figure even looking somewhat daunting as he sat. Chell obliged, opening the door, then closing it as she passed under the arch. She plopped down into the nearest chair, a warm, white leather recliner that seemed to conform its surface to her body, and she felt a soothing joy fill her as she slumped against the back.

"Comfortable, Miss Davies?" Boss joked with a gentle smile. Chell nodded happily, and as she recalled the reason she came to her Boss's office, the brunette sat up straight and shook her head.

"Boss, could you remind me exactly what Project Taurform was about?" Chell queried with a concerned grimace, her left hand tapping the recliner's arm.

"Project Taurform was a three-year project that we began as an attempt to create Pokémorphs capable of having incredible stamina, high agility, and superior adaptability," Boss began with a sigh. "Basically, what you begin with is the basic anthropomorphic Pokémorph, or one that uses bipedal motion. These original morphs proved to be our first success with genetic experimentation thirty years ago, and while a Pokémon-like human that could walk on two legs and speak our language proved useful enough, it wasn't exactly what we had been shooting for.

"While the original morphs were a nice start, they didn't take advantage of all the different traits provided by the original and Pokémon host. We wanted a Pokémorph that had the best of both worlds, to put it bluntly. Taurforms were my brainchild, and came to me out of the blue three Januaries ago as I spoke with one of the lead scientists about Shade's condition. I surmised that if an anthropomorphic Pokémorph was fused together with the quadrupedal body of the original Pokémon, it would combine the advantages of both of these beings, while covering for each others' disadvantages as well.

"Immediately, the scientists took flight in attempting to realize my vision. We tried over and over, using every feasible species from Rattata to Glameow, but none of the experimental beings survived long enough to fully fuse together. We were devastated, because we simply couldn't understand what was wrong. Then, after three years and over two hundred failures, we realized that we were basically throwing away our resources, so we scrapped the project. You came in well after our final failure had been sealed, and right before we officially canceled the funding."

Chell nodded and crossed her legs casually, seeming a little lost. "So, taurforms basically have a humanoid upper body, like an anthropomorphic Pokémon, and the lower body of the four-legged form of the species?"

"Yes," Boss acknowledged with a smirk, "that was the intention. They were to have the lower body built for speed, stamina, and power, an upper body with the dexterity and intelligence of a human, and the powers of Pokémon built in. These slaves would be perfect for both work and battling, and could be ridden like steeds for transportation. Unfortunately, because of the resounding failures we experienced, none of those points really matter."

"Maybe someday, Boss." The brunette smiled as she slowly arose from the recliner, approaching the desk carefully. "I do have one other question though."

"Ask away," the man replied as he twiddled his thumbs.

"As you recall, I was infected with the DNA of a Fire-type Pokémon. So, how long until I become a Pokémorph?" Chell seemed to be desperate to hear that she wasn't going to be experiencing the transformation at all, even though that obviously wasn't going to be the case.

Boss frowned pensively and shook his head. "It's hard to say either way, Miss Davies. Each person reacts differently to the Pokémon DNA breaking down the bonds of the human DNA and replicating itself into the cellular structures. In fact, there's no telling whether you'll even live through the changes affecting your body. It all boils down to your reactions, and whether you're strong enough to handle them."

While Chell certainly didn't like the answer she had received, she nodded and thanked Boss kindly for his time. She left through the door in which she had entered, and headed back to the stairwell. She traveled down a single flight of stairs, exiting through the door leading to the fifth floor, which happened to be the technological center of the H.Q. building. As she entered the computer-filled laboratory, she sat at a workstation, and began to enter her biographical data into the machine...

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Dylan's hair, formerly an untamed mess, seemed to be gaining more and more definitive spikes to it, his locks beginning to look like a frightened porcupine's quills. His feet began to sprout crimson fur as the toes began to fuse together, until there were only three left on each foot, which formed pads underneath as they turned into paws. The growing fur soon flattened itself into a thin, even coat on his legs, and his hands and fingers also began to become furry like the lower appendages.

Dylan's nose began to shrink until it was nothing more than an ebony dot, his face growing somewhat outward to form a fox-like muzzle around it. His eye sockets elongated about an inch, and his pupils dilated until they covered about eighty percent of the each eyeball. At the bottom of each eye, a small pool of blue collected, though Dylan's closed eyes prevented this from showing immediately. Long, kite-shaped ears sprouted out of the top of his head, drawing seething grunts from the teen.

About two hours after the original spikes had formed in Dylan's hair, this jagged fur now covered all over his body, including underneath the jumpsuit, which began to rip at the seams from the extra bulk. A white starburst mane formed around his neck to confirm that he was now a Jolteon Pokémorph. Shade stared curiously at Dylan's new form, and looked up at Pidge, who had remained asleep despite Dylan's grunts.

However, the teen's transformation was far from complete. After the mane finished taking form, Dylan's jumpsuit tore at his waist, and two small, paw-like appendages revealed themselves underneath the fabric. Slowly, the new body parts grew until they were as long as Dylan's original legs, and about half the thickness. The four legs righted themselves in their owner's sleep, and the Pokémorph now sat with his front legs straight out in front of him, and the back legs folded so that he sat on his hindquarters. He had no tail; instead, the fur on his rear jutted out into spiky, triangular forms over each side of the rump. The lower half of his jumpsuit had come completely off, leaving the creature wearing just the top half of the piece of clothing. The bottom of the now shirt-like garment was tattered in uneven frills where the lower half had torn, and essentially looked like a long-sleeved shirt.

The changes now leaving Dylan as a taurform Jolteon, the first of his kind in the world. Shade's eyes grew wide as he stared at newly formed morph, and he blinked in disbelief. Pidge rustled her feathers in her slumber, mumbling incoherently as she cooed softly. She was clueless about the situation, and frankly, she was better off that way.

In his current position, Dylan's height from the ground to the top of his head was four-six. His length from the tip of his front paws to the back of his flank was four-ten. He had some clear space away from the bars lengthwise, and, being about thirteen inches wide, he remained able to fit in the cage without too much trouble.

Dylan yawned and stretched his arms out, his new ears folding back as his mouth opened widely to reveal small canines, signifying that the creature was either carnivorous, or omnivorous. He blinked uneasily as he rose to his feet, now standing at a height of six-one. The ear tips touched the ceiling of the cage as they returned to their normal position, and Dylan looked over at Kyra's body.

"Hey, sis, I don't think it's nap time," he chided with a soft grin crossing his maw. "You might want to wake up before your boss finds you sleeping."

"Unbelievable," Shade yelped with widened eyes as he listened to Dylan pester the unconscious woman. "I never thought I'd see the day..."

"What are you talking about, Shade?" Dylan questioned, with a perplexed tone to his voice.

"Look down at your feet," Shade commanded with a stern hiss. The snake-wolf was fierce in giving his order, and, with no hesitation, Dylan obeyed. He was greeted with the nasty surprise of having red, Jolteon paws staring back at him. He screamed in a medium pitch, backing into the rear of his cage with his four legs awkwardly fumbling beneath him, causing him to fall flat on his rear. As his body settled underneath him, Dylan glared at the four legs and two arms dangling before him, and narrowed his eyes angrily.

"What the hell happened to me!?" he snapped with a ferocious growl, staring in the direction of Shade's cage. "I'm a monster!"

Pidge had been awoken by the sounds of Dylan's screech, and she hopped to the floor to see what the commotion was about. Her beak dropped in amazement as she took in the Jolteon-taur's full form, which lay resting against the bars. "This is incredible..." she cawed unsteadily. "He had said that it was impossible, but here before me sits the proof..."

"You know something about this, Pidge?" Dylan asked with quivering ears.

"Inadvertently, on attempt two-fifteen, he is created..." the bird replied in almost a monotone trance. "The experiment that never should have been... becomes the one that succeeds where others failed..."

"Gee thanks, Pidge; you're a load of help." Dylan wasn't in the mood to listen to any cryptic hints or weird remarks about his predicament. It was understandable, considering the now-taurform had never even heard of the genetic sciences before Shade had explained them to him. Instead, he was now forced to learn about it firsthand, having become a 'freak of science,' as his mind had so eloquently put it...

((Author's note: Hopefully I explained the taurform concept well enough for you, but if not, I can easily take questions through either the PM or VM system. ^^))

I'm going to give you some advice that was given to me. Try not to post chapters too quickly, maybe one every three days. I know what it's like wanting to post a chapter as soon as you've written it to see what people think, but it can intimidate some people to the point of them avoiding your fic completely. Allow some time for people to review each chapter before posting the next one. You know?

I'm Not Your Hero said:

I'm going to give you some advice that was given to me. Try not to post chapters too quickly, maybe one every three days. I know what it's like wanting to post a chapter as soon as you've written it to see what people think, but it can intimidate some people to the point of them avoiding your fic completely. Allow some time for people to review each chapter before posting the next one. You know?

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Yeah that is what got people not reading my fan fiction. XD I'm still trying to figure out the medium because if you update too little people won't take you serious either. XD

Syrynn said:

A young man, no more than seventeen, lay inside of a wrought-iron cage, with solid bars about a quarter-inch apart lining it. His skin was a slightly pale shade of tan, proving that, while he typically bronzed himself under the sun, his recent incarceration had caused his complexion to fade back toward its natural state. His head was a mess of untamed, crimson locks that looked as though he hadn't had a haircut in months. He breathed lightly as he slept, and his chest heaved slowly with each passing second. He was a captive in Team Galactic's headquarters, and sleeping was about the only thing that passed time with any reliable speed.

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I love how you describe the tone of his skin here. Very skillful. xD The part in bold kind of... I dunno. :\ It's just not the way I'd describe his hair. I'd probably say something more like his hair had grown long, looking messy and ragged. Perhaps you could even say that it is dirty, seeing as he's a prisoner and all. I don't know, I think it's just me. :X

Syrynn said:

The young prisoner wore a pitch black jumpsuit, one size too small for his five-foot-seven body. He looked as though he was cursing his captors for giving him the tight and itchy clothing, but it was certainly better than being stripped to nakedness. He had a somewhat thin, yet moderately muscled build that required him to wear a large size in clothing. It was unfortunate that many of the Galactic employees shared his clothing size, as the prisoner's garb was nothing more than the Galactic uniform painted a pure ebony and sewn together crudely. Obviously, prisoners received nothing more than hand-me-down clothing, and were lucky to even have that.

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Wait! Why is it unfortunate? Wouldn't he be happy that they shared his clothing size, 'cause that way he'd have clothes that fit him.

Syrynn said:

The cell containing the youth was about six-foot-two in height, and five-four in length. The width measured an even two feet, and comfortably fit the prisoner inside. It wasn't too comfortable, though, as it housed no furniture, or anything else for that matter. Going to sleep meant doing so on the cold, metallic ground, and often left captives in pain, or halted their rest altogether. It was the barest of lives, and the only food given to the prisoners was a small ration of bread once daily, usually around nine in the evening. Water was given with each food ration, and was put in a small bowl that was only allowed to be used for two minutes. It was then taken away until the next night, when the process repeated itself.

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So, is he in a cell or a cage? If it's the latter... well, that would be a very funny looking cage. :\

Syrynn said:

"Well, well, well... look who's finally up," a voice suddenly spat through the dankness.

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Love this. xD

That's all that I could find. And, aside from those 'slip-ups', this is a very intriguing story. I'll have a review of chapter two as soon as possible. :)

I love how you describe the tone of his skin here. Very skillful. xD The part in bold kind of... I dunno. :\ It's just not the way I'd describe his hair. I'd probably say something more like his hair had grown long, looking messy and ragged. Perhaps you could even say that it is dirty, seeing as he's a prisoner and all. I don't know, I think it's just me. :X

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Hehe, thanks! And I fixed his hair description, since I didn't think it seemed all that appropriate, either.

Wait! Why is it unfortunate? Wouldn't he be happy that they shared his clothing size, 'cause that way he'd have clothes that fit him.

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Whoops, I'm silly. *slaps the extra prefix out of there*

So, is he in a cell or a cage? If it's the latter... well, that would be a very funny looking cage. :\

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It's a cage, though I tend to use the words interchangeably. It's meant to look funny, and a later chapter explains this quirk.

Love this. xD

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Thought this would be an appropriate way to introduce Shade.

That's all that I could find. And, aside from those 'slip-ups', this is a very intriguing story. I'll have a review of chapter two as soon as possible. :)

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Thanks again for your time! I hope you liked two through five as much as you did one, and keep on reading please!

(Author's note: This chapter may be a little quirky, but bear with me.)

Chapter Six: 'Morph to Me

Chell sat in front of the small workstation, basking in the dim light of the fifth floor as the sound of whirring fans filled the air above her. She looked with saddened eyes at the monitor, which now read 'Davies Anklet Engraving Complete. Remove from Box 1' in solid white text. She then pulled a small, black cell phone out of her pocket. It showed '11:00 PM' on the display, and the brunette shook her head softly upon finding this out. There goes my night off, Chell thought, emitting a disappointed sigh. Oh well... I had to get this done before my transformation, or else Boss wouldn't have let me continue working.

As she reassured herself that she had made the proper choice, footsteps echoed in the distance, and Chell turned to her left to see the stairwell door opening. Boss strode into the laboratory, a regretful frown cast over his face.

"Miss Davies, what are you still doing here?" Boss queried, adjusting his sleeves worriedly. "Your shift ended over six hours ago; don't you want the weekend off?"

Chell nodded and walked to her right, using her left hand to grab a small, metallic hoop from the box-shaped cabinet in front of her. "Of course I want the weekend off," Chell said with a half-smile, her eyes casting a look of despair at the hoop in her hand. "But with my potential transformation into a Pokémorph imminent, I wanted to stay back and make sure this anklet got finished, so I could be identified easily."

"What do you mean?" Boss asked, his left eyebrow raised in puzzlement. "We only make the anklets for the Pokémorphs we create to be our slaves or test subjects. Are you saying you want to become one of these?"

"Not at all, Sir. I just realized that I'm going to continue working for you, as long as I'm alive after this is all said and done. So, I made the I.D. anklet to be worn over the left foot, and not the right, like our slaves. I intend to come right back and resume production; after all, I can't let Kyra's idiot move doom my entire life, can I?"

Boss laughed heartily with a pleased look on his face. "You have a point, Miss Davies," he admitted, wrapping his arm around the brunette in a proud gesture. "Miss Jones at least got it right by inviting you out here to work with us. I knew from day one that you'd prove to be a great employee. Actually, it's great that you're here, since I need someone to come down with me and feed Dylan and Shade."

Chell nodded hesitantly, and politely walked out from under Boss's arm. "Sure thing, Boss, but isn't Matthew in charge of doing that?"

"Normally, yes," Boss told the brunette plainly, "but Mister Rodin had to attend his father's funeral, and he wasn't able to make it back in time to do his usual task."

"Right, right... well, you can certainly count on me." Chell's smile faded a bit, as she seemed disappointed not to have a little off-time to reflect on her day.

Boss gave Chell a satisfied grin and walked with her to the door. "I know you're a little ticked off at not being able to take some time off tonight, but I truly appreciate you staying after. I'm definitely impressed with your work ethic, and it's truly commendable that you're willing to go the extra mile for us here at H.Q."

As they walked down the stairs, Chell couldn't help but notice the soft billowing of the breezes up and down the narrow passageway, almost as if her senses were beginning to heighten...

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Dylan growled harshly as his ears twitched wildly, his senses beginning to hit a state of overload from the sudden change in form. "Shade! Pidge!" he rasped angrily from inside his iron prison. "I'm not sure what happened, but one of you knows! Just come out here and tell me the truth!" Shade just lay in his cage, snoozing quietly as could be. Dylan's ears flattened as he softly added, "Please?"

Although she was still scared and confused, Pidge reluctantly hopped back over to Dylan's side and trilled gently. "I really don't have any clue what's going on, Dylan," she spoke softly, her beak quivering in disappointment. "All I know is that Team Galactic tried two hundred and fourteen times to make a being like you, but failed each time. They said that you weren't even supposed to live a day after you drank that beaker of Jolteon DNA."

"Jolteon DNA?" the taur questioned as his front paws kneaded the air uncertainly. "Are you freaking serious? I don't know why I thought that was lemonade... but I drank it, and next thing I know, I'm down here in this piece of crap room. You're saying I'm basically half-Jolteon now?"

"Half?" Pidge cooed with a little chuckle on the end. "No, dear creature; your genetic composition is closer to two-thirds Jolteon than just half. Quite frankly, you're lucky to be alive, as when there is a disharmonious balance such as that, usually the body cannot survive."

Dylan scrambled uneasily to his paws and groaned regretfully, a scowl forming upon his muzzle. "And another thing... why the hell do they want to trap us in such small cages? Are we supposed to be like wild animals or something, or is it just torture?"

"Team Galactic tailors each of their cages, old and new, to each new Pokémorph that they create, leaving just barely enough space for a slight factor of mobility. Even before the transformations finish, the estimates for completed size prove accurate ninety-eight percent of the time. And the two percent that they're off, they've overestimated, so fixing these mistakes becomes a breeze."

Dylan nodded and bent downward, resting on his lower stomach, his paws tucking neatly underneath him. "I may just be crazy," he observed, "but I really think you had something to do with me becoming who I am now. While I can't put my paws on it... you've-"

The Jolteon-taur's conjecture was cut short by the flipping sound of a light switch, illuminating the room with a near-blinding luminescence, and the slam of a door. Boss and Chell had returned for a second look at everyone before they went home for the night. They walked slowly toward the trio of creatures, Boss inaudibly whispering something Chell's ear before she walked ahead of him. She seemed fairly nonchalant as she passed by Dylan the first time, but quickly found herself doing a double take halfway to the rations closet.

"Boss, I don't believe it!" the brunette cried with a wide grin on her face. "We did it!"

"Did what, Miss Davies?" the man snapped as he turned back toward his worker. When he lay eyes on Dylan, he hugged Chell excitedly and began to shed tears of joy down her clothing. "I can't believe it..." he cried happily. "We had three straight years of futility... and now we've finally done it."

Dylan seemed more than a little confused at this outburst of emotion. "What are you talking about, 'three years of futility?'"

Boss shook his head as he broke away from Chell, and suddenly stopped his tear flow as easily as his eyes were faucets. "Never mind; it's not important for you to know." He looked back at Chell with a beaming grin on his face. "This is amazing, though!" he continued. "How come this one survived when the others didn't? It's just mind-boggling, and I have to know!"

"Ugh, will you shut up?" Shade hissed, his eyes now wide open, as he was jolted awake by all the commotion. "You're more annoying than that stupid Kyra lady! Someone should smack you over the head with a two-by-four like you did to her, if you can't shut your stupid mouth!"

"What?" Dylan hissed as Shade covered his mouth with a paw. "You belted my sister over the head with a wooden plank!? I swear, if I ever get my hands on you, I'll choke the life straight out of your neck, and that's a promise!" This little tirade even shocked Dylan, as he had never been known for being angry, nor did he usually make such specific threats towards others, no matter how evil they were. His fur stood even more on end than before, if that were possible, as his internal electricity began coursing through him in a rush like nothing the taur had felt before.

Boss laughed slyly, a smile cutting at the corners of his mouth. "We'll see about that, my six-limbed beauty," he chided with a false kindness. "For now, I need to leave. Miss Davies, let's leave our little taurform and snake-wolf hungry for a while, to think about their blatant disrespect. I'll be on my way, so I'll see you tomorrow,. If you could just close up shop down here, you may feel free to go back to your home whenever you feel up to it." He walked over to the stairwell door, opened it up, and began to head up the single flight of steps leading to the ground entrance, the door beginning to swing shut behind him.

Pidge flew over to Chell, and landed on her left shoulder. "Dylan... Shade... I'm a little worried about that man," she trilled with an uneasy look on her face, turning back with a tinge of remorse. She whipped her head back upon the door's slam beginning to echo through the empty space.

"Wait... what?" Chell blurted out, stopping dead in her tracks. "That's Dylan?"

"That's what he told me his name was," the Pidgey sang with a ruffle of her wings, "so I think that's it, unless he lied to me about it."

Chell pondered for a minute, and shrugged her right shoulder with a sigh. "Somehow I thought he was someone different," she confessed, "but I think this may explain why we finally succeeded where we failed before. I'll need to confirm my theory with Boss before I can make any suggestions about going forward, though." She sighed softly and sat down, leaning on the front side of Shade's cage. She closed her eyes peaceably, as Pidge hopped on top of her head to follow suit. The Seviper morph sniffed Chell curiously, and nodded as though she wasn't as bad as she seemed. His mind still held a slight doubt about her, though, and he backed away slightly.

As Dylan watched the three next to each other, he turned his attention to Kyra. She had been motionless for hours now, but the Jolteon-taur sensed that she was still alive. The blond's eyes cracked open at a snail-like pace, seeming to be barely able to even move themselves. "Uhh..." she groaned groggily, looking over at the Jolteon morph. "Where am I?"

Dylan's ears perked, and he gave Kyra a toothy grin. "Sis!" he yelped excitedly. "I'm so glad you're alive!" He let out a celebratory jolt of electricity, accidentally sending it straight into Kyra's chest, which promptly electrocuted her, knocking her unconscious as her breathing stopped and her heart stalled instantly from the voltage.

"No... this can't be..." the Jolteon morph wailed as his ears shot back in despair. "Kyra, wake up! I can't lose you like this! Kyra!" Dylan tried to reach his arms and paws out between the bars, but they were slightly too thick to fit. "Kyra, please, I didn't mean to hit you!" he cried regretfully, as Shade looked on with a bittersweet smile.

"Dylan, she's gone." Shade spoke in a wavering, yet gentle tone, as though he was trying to keep himself from laughing or celebrating. "I know it was an accident, but there's nothing you can do." Not that there's any reason I should care. I'm glad that wench is out of the picture.

Dylan looked at his sister, and hung his head in shame at his latest deed. In a matter of hours, he had gone from being a normal human being, to a taurform Jolteon guilty of committing murder. As he stared on at the scene before him, tears rolled down his face, sparking slightly as the electricity coursing through his fur sizzled fervently. "Damn it, I just want to be a normal human," he whispered as Shade stared at Kyra's lifeless corpse. "This form has been nothing but trouble for me."

"You're wrong," Shade stated with a soft hiss. "You can't judge this new form of yours just from one accident. Give it time, Dylan; you'll find use for it yet."

The Jolteon-taur sighed and nodded as he kneaded his front paws on the ground. He's right, a voice in Dylan's mind told him with a passionate confirmation. We'll get out of here eventually, and when we do, you're going to make up for that murder of yours.

Chell barked softly in her sleep, as small dog ears began to grow at the top edges of her head. A cream-colored tail began to flow out from behind her uniform, waggling softly, which prompted Shade to bat at it with his front left paw. Chell's arms began to grow stripes of orange and black fur, and, as elongated canines shot out of her mouth, her breathing began to become a snarly snore...

((I really strained and broiled over this chapter. Writer's blocks hurt.))


Chapter Seven: Pidge Over Troubled Waters

As Dylan looked on at Kyra's corpse, he bowed his head in a moment of silence, reflecting on just how frail life was. His ears folded back in shame, as he began to feel the consequential guilt and sorrow accompanying murder. While he wasn't suicidal after the debacle, he wondered how long he could go before the pain overtook his body.

His front left paw grabbed the iron bar before him out of instinct, each of his front paws having a fourth, thumb-like toe on it, which made them act sort of like pseudo-hands for grasping things. His eyes closed, and he sensed his exhaustion from all the emotional exertion. He lay down on his left side, leaning against the bars as his forepaw's grip loosened.

"I'm scared," the taur admitted in a soft voice. "First I drink that beaker, then I get stuck down here, and finally I morph into a scientific oddity that probably defies all biological laws and viewpoints. As if all that weren't bad enough, I've killed my sister, and I'm venting my feelings to a freaking bird."

Shade sighed derisively and shook his head, playfully gnawing on the Arcanine tail in front of him. "So?" he snarled through the fur in his mouth. "What's wrong with talking to birds? I do it all the time."

Dylan didn't really have an answer to that question, so he simply decided to change the subject. "You know, Shade," he began. "I'm actually kind of wondering if you have any ideas about how we could get out of this place. Even though I'm sure I'll probably be a freak in the outside world now, I want to get back out there and find a way to change back."

Shade nodded and smiled, releasing his grip on Chell's tail. "Now you've got my attention, Dylan. I've actually kind of formulated a plan with Pidge over the time she's been here, and it involves harnessing the powers of a third being. Now that you're here, and electrically charged, we have everyone we need to execute our little escape. With the little birdie asleep, I might as well run over what we've got."

Dylan's ears perked up, and he grinned in approval. "Take me through it," he growled with a hint of happiness. "This stupid cage is starting to piss me off." He crackled excitedly with electricity, sparks shooting freely from his hands.

"Take it easy, thunder boy; I'm getting there," the snake-wolf laughed. "You need to save all that static for a later part, anyway. Now, Pidge is asleep. What we need to do is wake her up and have you inadvertently insult her, causing her to insult you back. Out of your new Jolteon instinct, you'll attempt to electrocute her, but she'll dodge, naturally. Once that's done, one of the night guards upstairs will come and explore all the commotion, see Kyra dead, and take her away."

As Dylan took all this in, the morph knew he was missing something in the equation. "You know," he began, "that's great and all, but how does this get us out of this dump?"

"You ask for one last goodbye, before they leave. If they fall for the ruse, they'll open the cage to either let you out to do so, or open it to fit Kyra in. The moment that door opens, you nail the guard with some Thunder, and start dashing. By now Chell should have woken up, and she'll likely chase you. You're still faster, by virtue of your species, so just keep running and you'll be fine. Get far away from this dump and try to find a safe haven. I think we're near Jubilife, and if I recall correctly, it's south of here."

"And you? How am I getting you out if I'm too busy escaping?"

"Never mind about me, Dylan," Shade said with a dismissive wave of his head. "First you need to get out and atone for your murder. You won't do it locked up in here. Get Pidge awake, and the rest should fall into place. Mess this up, though, and you'll likely end up impaled or locked in a full body cast for life. Hope you're ready, because once you start, there's no going back."

"I don't really have a choice, do I?" The Jolteon-taur seemed extremely reluctant to even think about doing anything he was just told, but his instincts told him to just go for it. It's now or never, he told himself. Let's get moving.

"Pidge!" Dylan snapped at the bird. "Wake up!"

The Pidgey jolted awake at Dylan's voice, and squawked wearily. "What could you possibly want from me, Dylan!?" Pidge crowed angrily, her eyes narrowing. "Can't a woman get some shut-eye when she's exhausted?"

"Huh?" the taur replied, somewhat confused at Pidge's statement. "You're not a woman..."

That triggered it. Immediately, Pidge trilled with disgust and flapped her wings angrily. "Burn in hell, you ignorant freak of science!" she cawed in complete detest.

That, in turn, was the final cog in the puzzle. Dylan sent a furious Thunderbolt at Pidge, who attempted to dodge, but found herself unable to fly out of the way in time. Her body filled up with furiously crackling electricity, and her heart began to pump at an alarming rate. She contorted and screeched in pain, looking as though she would explode at any moment. Luckily, her body held out, though she seemed to be within an inch of life. Her eyes began to cloud over, and she fell to the ground, sizzling with the leftover sparks that hadn't finished coursing through. A cough emitted from her beak, and she was gone.

"Well. That wasn't part of my plan." Shade was pretty disappointed with how that debacle turned out, and his tail shook sadly as he frowned. "At any rate, it should get the guard down here. Just go the same as before, and don't you dare screw up."

"Got it." Dylan's resolve was hardened, but he began to shed tears over Pidge's death. She trusted me, and I killed her... do I really deserve freedom after what I've done?"

The taur found himself at the crossroads of a tough dilemma, but before he could think about it any further, the sound of approaching footsteps interrupted his train of thought. Dylan quickly shook off the emotional rust, as the door opened and the brightness of the ceiling lights flooded the rooms

"What the hell happened down here!?" a female voice yelled from across the basement. As the woman closed in on him, Dylan took time to notice that she was carrying a rapier on her pink lab coat in a black hilt. Her black pants were ragged and worn from years of wear and tear, coming down to black leather boots that ended just below the knee. Looking up, the taur saw a brunette's face, somewhat discomforting, yet in a paradoxical manner, almost reassuring. Beneath half-moon bifocals, her green eyes blinked as she took in Dylan's own appearance and gave him a half-smile.

"Well, looks like we've encountered a gorgeous new addition to our Pokémorph library," she uttered with approval. Her voice was pretty average in tone, with little wavering, but somewhat deep compared to the female norm. Dylan sensed that she could be all right, but he kept his guard up.

"Um... thank you, ma'am?" he answered with a slight hesitation, hoping he didn't offend this woman, as he remembered about Shade's 'impalement' remark.

Thankfully, the woman laughed and smiled happily, reaching into her pockets for a key ring. She pulled it out and thumbed through the keys to find the correct one. When she did, she put the key in the keyhole on Dylan's cage and turned it. The door swung open, and Dylan just looked at her. "Come, my Jolteon-taur," she commanded. "I wish to test your abilities immediately."

"Yes, mistress," the taur replied as he padded forward, his Jolteon instincts guiding his first four-legged steps. He was still scared, but being free without needing to attack anyone else suited him fine.

As Dylan got completely clear of the cage, the woman petted the morph behind his left ear. "Good boy," she remarked casually, as Dylan found himself in a strange situation now that he was being shown affection. Did he want to push her advances away, or let the Pokémon in him embrace the new attention? He opted to just accept the woman's petting, which proved to be a good guess.

"You needn't call me 'mistress,' my dear," she added softly. "You may just call me Raquel." As if by an unrecognizable force, she looked over at Kyra and rolled her eyes. "Kyra, you dolt," Raquel groaned. "I told you Boss would kill you off if you didn't perform." It was as if she knew that it was going to happen.

"Boss didn't kill her, Raquel," Shade hissed as Raquel looked at him for a brief moment. "And wait, how come he gets to be free of the cage and I don't?"

"Because, you little snake-wolf," Raquel chided, "We already know all about you. What we don't know is what taurforms are capable of. Seeing as this one is the first taur we've been successful with, I want to test this one out."

Chell yawned groggily, now an Arcanine morph. Since she slept through the changes, it wasn't really so painful that she woke up during the transformation, but her body felt stiff for a moment. "Raquel?" she asked, suddenly noticing Dylan out of the cage. "Raquel!" she shot out, her fangs bared. "What are you doing with the taur outside of his cage?"

"Testing him out," Raquel replied, rubbing the top of Dylan's head and walking toward Chell. "We need to see what he can do."

"Not at four in the morning! Are you insane?" Chell's tail wagged as she felt her body heat up. "Wait until daybreak at least!"

Now, Dylan told himself. The Jolteon-taur bolted toward the stairwell, throwing the door open as he leaped several steps with his four legs, reaching the first floor in about four seconds. The main door was in sight, and Dylan ran full force through the glass panes, completely smashing through it with his speed. The taur knew some glass had pierced several parts of his body, but he ran through the pain, heading south like Shade had instructed him.

The shattering glass broke Raquel and Chell from their argument. They looked over at where Dylan was standing, and he was gone.

"Dylan!" they both screamed, as they raced to the stairwell. Before they got there, one of the other night guards flung the door open and breathed heavily. "He's escaped!" the man said, his body shaking within his standard-issue white shirt and black pants. "I couldn't stop him; he just wrecked the front door and from there, it was all over!"

"See what you did, Raquel?" Chell barked angrily, her furred finger poking the brunette in the chest. "Now Boss is going to fire me and it's all your fault!"

"My fault?" Raquel spat back in defense. "I was doing fine until you woke up and shouted at me to put him back! If you had just kept your muzzle shut, Dylan wouldn't have escaped! Boss will have your hide for this, and I think some new Arcanine skin boots would look nice this summer!"

As the two stood arguing and the man attempted to quell the issue, Shade sat in his cage and grinned with bared fangs. "While that wasn't too orthodox, I have to commend the kid for making his break when he did. Hope he'll be all right out there..."

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Dylan found a secluded bush about a minute into his dash, and dove into it. He was thankful no humans or Pokémon had seen him, and curled up to get ready of sleep. It was a little awkward, but by folding his upper body over his hindquarters, and curling his lower body into sort of a ball, he found himself somewhat comfortable. It was better than trying to fit comfortably in a cage, so the taur had no complaints. He worried about Kyra and Pidge, shedding tears as his eyes slowly closed to give way to his desire for sleep. Tomorrow was a big day, and he would need all the energy he could spare...

Chapter Eight: Heads or 'Tales

The hours of the night gave way to the morning sun over Route 204. Several Starly chirped and chattered excitedly at the dew-soaked blades of grass. The gray-bodied birds clawed at the ground with their orange feet, digging their talons into the dirt in synchronization. Their beaks, nestled against a white facial mask of feathers, flapped away as they called to each other about any findings they uncovered in the soil below. They were looking for a morning meal to satiate their hunger, as the sun beamed overhead.

One of the Starly called out loudly, catching the attention of the others in her group. She had found a Wurmple nestled deeply within some of the greens, and began to forage for more of the small, pinkish worms they commonly ate. The tiny bug cowered pleadingly as two of the other Starly closed in on him, as he began to plead his case. The birds cawed in a sort of laugh, denying the insect of any chance he had of making it through the morning. They pecked at the caterpillar greedily, piercing his skin with fiercely pounding beaks. The bug screamed in sort of a wail as he was torn apart by the birds, his blood splattering the grass with a crimson hue against the emerald blades. The Starly each took half of the corpse, happily downing their share before someone else decided to steal it from them.

Dylan continued to sleep wearily in the bush, still exhausted from the escape the previous night. In the middle of the night, a Shinx had encountered the taur, and seemed confused at the unusual appearance of the large being. The blue cat was at odds with herself about this creature, but in the end, tolerance prevailed. She nestled up against him, purring softly as she sensed the Pokémon spirit within his body.

When she woke up to the sounds of the Starly, she gently pawed at Dylan's side in an attempt to awaken him. The taur stirred lightly, and looked over at the cat groggily. He turned toward the Shinx and gave her a half-smile, his ears twitching hesitantly.

"Hi," he said casually. "How are you today?"

{You know human language?} she queried with a puzzled look on her face, her yellow-tipped tail waggling uncertainly. {Don't meet many of those around here.} Her words were in Pokéspeech, and to most humans, it was just a compilation of her saying 'Shinx' multiple times in a row. Strangely, however, Dylan found himself understanding the meaning behind the Shinx's words.

{Sorry, is this better?} the taur found himself saying in Pokéspeech, even though he had no recollection of ever learning to speak it. Must be another instinct, like when I understood her, he reasoned. Thank the legendaries for that, at least.

{Yeah, this is better,} the cat replied, smiling as her yellow eyes blinked with a sense of relief. {Where are you from, hon? I've never seen such a weird critter as yourself before.}

{It's a long story, so I'll just say I escaped from that big Galactic building over there,} the morph explained, pointing north as he rose to his feet. {I won't bore you with too many details.}

{I guess that's all right. Anyway, my name's Rayla. What's yours?}

{Just call me Sunstorm.} Dylan didn't feel like giving the cat his real name, no matter how trustworthy she seemed.

{Well, Sunstorm, It was nice to meet you. I better go try and hunt myself some Starly before I get too hungry. Take care, you hear?}

{Sure, Rayla. Good luck with your hunt!}

{Later, cutie. Oh, and you're nice and warm, by the way.} She winked as she darted off into the east, her tail fluttering happily with each step. Dylan's heart warmed as Rayla left, as the cat seemed to leave a good impression. She's a nice little Shinx, the taur told himself with a grin. She's probably a young adult or an older cub. Those are the ones that don't seem to get scared or put off too easily.

"I'm telling you, you're making a huge mistake."

Dylan's ears perked up as he listened to an annoyed female voice coming from the south. He ducked back down under the leaves of the bush, hoping he hadn't been seen by anyone else other than Rayla. A Starly flew over to him and chirped cutely, his belly happy and full of the half-Wurmple he had just finished chowing on. The morph patted the bird on the head, much to the avian's delight. The bird hopped on top of Dylan's head and watched with him as a human female approached.

She seemed to be no more than sixteen, with a fair complexion, and a thin, sleek-looking frame. A blue bandana housed her flowing, jet-black hair, tidily kept as it cradled the sides of her head. The teen's hazel eyes gleamed as the sun's rays hit them at just the right angle. Her nose didn't really stand out as different, nor did her ears. Overall, she was above-average in looks, and both creatures could easily appreciate her appearance.

{She's hot, dude!} the Starly chirped teasingly. {Think you'll try to score with her?}

{Shut up, bird; she'll hear you!} Dylan seethed, keeping his voice low. {She can't see me like this! She'll freak out!}

{All right, all right!} the bird replied, fluffing his feathers. {Relax, thunder fox; I was kidding. At any rate, odds are that she wants a human lover.}

{Don't remind me,} the taur answered with a half-smile. {You're not freaked out by my appearance?}

{I don't see a reason to be put off by you,} came the bird's answer. {Well, it's halfway weird, yet halfway awesome. I'm kind of torn over how I should feel about your form.}

{Huh, go figure,} the Jolteon morph reasoned. {That Shinx that slept by my side last night wasn't, either. She even went so far as to say I was cute.}

{Sounds like you met Rayla, then. That Shinx will fawn over any Electric-type, especially anyone who's different from the norm. You fit the bill, huh, Red?}

{Red?} Dylan questioned, looking at his fur. It seemed overnight, the morph's fur had taken on a crimson hue, similar to the one on Pidge's beak. {Well, I guess it was bound to happen. Zapdos knows I've already had a ton of stuff happen lately, so why not add another thing to the list?}

{Cute dress that chick's wearing,} the Starly chirped, pointing his left wing back at the human.

Dylan looked back, and saw the teen wearing a casual blue dress, with short sleeves reaching halfway up her arms. At the end, black, fingerless gloves housed her hands on both sides, the leftmost clutching a cell phone in its grasp, held up to her left ear. The right hand lay against her side, nestled on the hem, which fell right at the middle of her kneecaps. Her black, leather boots went from the ground, to just an inch below her kneecaps. At her waist, she carried a single, well-polished Poké Ball against a small, black pouch attached to her white belt. It seemed to speak volumes about how well she cared for the Pokémon inside.

As the taur finished summing up the human's looks, she spoke again, this time even angrier.

"After all of that heavy recruitment, and all of the training I did, you're going to reject me!?" she snapped, her eyes narrowing in discontent. She pressed the speakerphone button hastily, and scowled, her right hand grabbing the Poké Ball angrily.

"Miss Daniels, the man on the other end began, "This wasn't my decision to make. Management made it very clear that we had found a more suitable candidate during your training phase. I wish we could keep you, but you're not the right person for our company."

"You've got to be kidding me," she said, rolling her eyes. "I swear, it's like you don't even care whose feelings you hurt, as long as you find someone with the right connections."

"Miss Daniels... please, don't be angry with us. Our background check found that you don't fit in with the group of people we need at our company. Believe me, if it was only up to me, I would keep you, no doubt."

"That background check of yours is bull****! I don't hold any of the values my father does. I treat everyone I can with respect if they don't cross me first. What you're doing is completely unfair. Have a nice life, dirtbag." With that, she hung up her phone and stuffed it angrily in the small, left-hand pocket of her dress. "Those idiots have no class, leading me on like that for six months."

"Go, Kuroi!" she muttered, tossing the Poké Ball out of her right hand. A pitch-black Ninetales appeared once the capsule hit the ground.

{Here I am!} the nine-tailed fox sang cheerily upon leaving the Poké Ball. Her tails flitted happily from side-to-side, and she rubbed against her trainer's leg. The human smiled, and she sat down on the ground, sighing softly.

"It's not your fault, Kuroi," she sighed with affection. "Do you feel like running around for a while, girl?"

{Do I ever!} came the response. Kuroi yipped happily and darted off toward the bush containing Dylan and the Starly. Autumn watched her with a smile for a few seconds, then lay down and closed her eyes. Her breathing slowed as she began to nap in the sun, which prompted Kuroi to sniff the air curiously.

{You two, in the bush!} she barked with a waggle of her ears. {Come out here!}

{Well, we're screwed now, Red,} the Starly tweeted with regret. {You may want to step out, because she'll just maul you if you don't.}

{It's just as well,} Dylan replied with a nod. {Since her human is asleep, I won't have to worry about that little problem.} The Jolteon-taur stepped into the open and looked down at the Ninetales in front of him. {You called me, miss?}

{I did,} Kuroi explained with a smile. {My, you're most definitely unlike any Jolteon I've met before. Can you speak human as well?}

"As well?" the morph replied in human speech. "You can too, then?"

{Yes, though I prefer to keep it under wraps around Miss Autumn. She's very unnerved around unusual beings. I would suggest you hide again if she begins to wake up, but you're safe for now.}

{Her name's Autumn, huh?} Starly chirruped. {Hey, Red, at least now you can hit on her from afar, eh?}

Dylan's ears shot back and he growled angrily. {Can it, beaky, or I'll let off some static,} he whispered.

{Your name's Red?} Kuroi asked with a tilt of her head. {How cliché.}

{No,} the taur answered quickly. {My name's Sunstorm, and it's wonderful to meet you, Miss Kuroi.}

{That sounds a little more proper,} the fox cooed happily. {I see you overheard Miss Autumn call me out of my Poké Ball, then.}

{Yeah,} Dylan admitted with a half-smile. {She's beautiful, to be honest with you.}

{I love Miss Autumn to death,} Kuroi said, returning the Jolteon-taur's smile. {She's a wonderful person, and I would love nothing more than a like-minded male to come by and take her in his arms. It's hard for her to have to deal with everything on her own, so I stay around to help her cope with the stress. It's not a perfect life, but we make do with what we have...}

Starly chirped happily as the trio began to chat about their lives, Dylan staying far away from the story of his internment at the Galactic H.Q. Building. He didn't think Kuroi or Starly would really enjoy hearing him talk about it, and it depressed him greatly to even remember the subject. While they talked like a group of old friends, despite being relative strangers, Autumn lay napping in the grass to the south, unaware of the other creatures around her...

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Chell awoke at around ten that following morning, her tail slashing through the air fervently. She remained angry at Raquel for inadvertently giving Dylan an escape opening, and refused to go home that night. She had slept in the basement next to Shade's cage, and growled as she got on her hind legs.

"Shade," she yipped uneasily, "Do you want to come help me find Dylan?"

"No way in hell," the snake-wolf hissed with a furious lashing of his head. "I'm not letting you capture him and keep him locked up in a cage anymore."

"No, you're misunderstanding me," the Arcanine morph replied calmly. "I want to find him before Raquel does, and I don't think I can do it alone."

"Go on," Shade beckoned, a hint of trust seeming to form in his voice.

"If Raquel finds Dylan, she'll kill him. I can't let him die, or else I'll feel horrible about keeping him down here in the first place. That was the whole reason I caged him up, is because I knew Raquel was going to murder him and analyze what made him survive the taurform process. I convinced Boss to give me the only key, because Raquel would look for anything she could and make more taurforms. I don't want a world filled with thousands of morphs being forcibly enslaved by Team Galactic."

"So why did you join the team at all? You realize you basically signed up to help run an evil empire with a hell-spawn for a boss, right?" Shade's eyes narrowed and he shook his head in disdain.

"I figured it out after my first two days, Shade. What was I going to do, though? I signed a five-year contract out of high school, and I think one of the clauses involved murder if I tried to quit before the term was up. I had to fake my way through, and just hope I could find a loophole or a way out. Once Kyra started making mistakes, I tried to take the fall, but I never fooled Boss once. He always told me I was his best employee. The disturbing thing is, I'm the only one not even trying to be a hard worker."

"Basically, you just sat around and pretended to work, and it turned out better than anyone else's real work?"

"Yes! Please, Shade, I can't find Dylan alone. I need all the help I can get to beat Raquel to the punch."

Shade growled angrily and shut his eyes. "All right, fine," he said with a disgruntled sigh. "But I still don't trust you."

"Fair enough." Chell grabbed her keyring, thumbed through the keys, and found the key to Shade's cage. She put it in the keyhole, opened the door, and watched as Shade sidled out warily. He hardly viewed Chell as a valuable ally, but teaming up with her was a chance at freedom, and a risk worth taking...

Oh wow. You certainly did not lie when you told me to knock myself out!

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I'm not a liar. But you should know that now. :)

It is a most interesting tale you've spun.. My impression was that in comparison to the other chapters, the first one was a bit dull - though from there you got me hooked, and I could not stop reading.

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Well, if any chapter's going to be the weak link, I'd prefer it to be the first one. At least it means the tale's progressing nicely, then, yes?

I can't really point out any misspellings and the likes, but I have a few reactions that I'd like to share with you.

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Um, okay. I'm listening. ^^

Despite several attempts at trying to imagine what Dylan must look like as a Jolteon-human, the only image that is popping up in my head is that of a centaur with jolteon ears. I would just like to get some clarification on this topic, because I find it rather frustrating not being able to know exactly what he was intended to look like (and as you've probably noticed, English isn't my first language, so at times I'm having trouble understanding all of your describing.

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Woof. Well, that's a pretty inaccurate assumption. But, if you're stuck picturing a centaur with Jolteon ears, I think a sketch reference will be nice and helpful to you.



This is what a female Ninetales-taur would look like. To get Dylan's Jolteon-taur form, imagine this as a male, with Jolteon features as opposed to Ninetales features. I don't have a commission for Dylan's Sunstorm form yet, sorry. Hopefully I will someday!

Which brings me over to my second point - your descriptions are amazingly good! I can picture almost everything that's happening bar the pokemorphs, and that is quite an accomplishment.

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Wow, thanks! That's really what I've been going for the whole time, to make it visual like that. It really makes the story worth reading when it can be put so vividly.

I love the plot so far, but even as amusing as I find it, I'm a little puzzled about how brittle people seem to be in this world of yours - and I ended up being pretty shocked myself when I realized that Kyra was indeed dead.

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Yeah, Kyra dies early, but she's going to serve a greater purpose later in the story. And not everyone's physically brittle like that, but it's hard to really survive being electrocuted like that after you've been hit with a headshot from a two-by-four! She's lucky she even survived that first blow.

Actually I didn't realize until after her death that she was Dylan's sister, perhaps you could make that become a little clearer to the writer? (It might simply be the case of me accidentally skipping a line though)

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You missed a line, and I'll go ahead and point out which one it is.

((From Chapter One))

...well, I remember my sister Kyra had called me over here to discuss some monetary problems she'd been having...

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Hopefully that clears things up.

On the other hand, the way you presented Dylan's feelings afterwards were impressive - I merely sat there and pondered upon what I would've done in a similar situation, and my conclusion was overall that my mindset would be evenly matched to that of his.

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Yeah, I figure a lot of people would react that way, you know?

This is definitely something I will continue to read.

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And I also hope it's something you'll continue to critique. I'm glad for all of your help. Thanks a ton for reading/reviewing!

((Author's Note: Holy crud. It's been way too long since I updated this. Well, between the flood, writer's block, and apathy I've been experiencing, I managed to get this done finally. Sorry for taking so long. :())


Chapter Nine: Shocked and Loaded

As Kyra woke up, she found herself in quite the unfamiliar environment. Wherever she looked, large, orange and red flames swirled like angry cyclone, sizzling the young woman's hair with each time the fires neared her. Quickly, she found her hair charred a deep ebony shade, and tried to brush the ashes off her head. But, it had turned out that no ashes ever came in contact with her, nor did her hair burn off! The flames had transmogrified her former shade into a permanent black, as if by a sinister, dark force.

"Where the hell am I?" she wondered aloud, brushing at her uniform idly. The fabrics billowed with each swipe her arms took, but soon it too had been etched with the charcoal blackness, just as deep and despair-filled as her hair. Her skin was untouched, and would remain so, but... what was the purpose of being forced to wear black? Soon, it hit her. The flames... the blackness and unforgiving heat... the ominous aura surrounding the barren landscape... they were all the clues she needed to figure out the mystery.

"Oh, hell," Kyra growled, flopping to the floor and sitting on her rump. "Some inferno; I don't even see the head honcho here! Stupid Houndoom overlord better show up soon." Then, a voice broke the woman's lament, chilling her despite the permanent, volcano-like atmosphere.

"Kyra Jones... you've finally fallen..." it cried, a dark, unwavering monotone, deep in pitch and unforgiving in its sounds. "I assure you... I'm much worse than any Houndoom you'll find here."

Kyra turned around, and was greeted with a second nasty shock. Unlike the legends she had learned in both school and folklore, the ruler of Hell was no Houndoom at all. In fact, it was the last Pokémon anyone would want to meet, at anytime, or anywhere...

* * * * * * * * * * * *

It was probably two hours later before Dylan and the other members of the trio decided to call off the chat and just relax in the company of their newfound friends. Starly perched himself nicely on the Jolteon-taur's shoulder, letting out a satisfied chirp as he stared at Kuroi along with the morph. The Ninetales vixen nodded and padded over to Dylan, nestling her body against the feral half of the taur. He immediately allowed the femme to blanket herself in his statically-charged coat, finding her touch favorable as he stroked the vulpine's ears in response. She purred softly and nosed his hand with a quick lick.

{Sunstorm...} she began, looking with her soft red eyes up at the morph. {You're quite nice, you know that?}

Dylan nodded and ran a finger under Kuroi's neck, scritching gently and mewing softly in response. {Hehe, thanks, Kuroi,} he replied, as the taur beamed with the apparent acceptance. Starly fluttered in front of Kuroi's belly, beak rubbing affectionately into it.

{Mmm... Sunstorm... this just makes me wish you were a human that much more,} the Ninetales purred as she ran a paw into Starly's feathers to pet the bird. The trio looked like a big set of lovebirds, one nestled into the other, by this point. Dylan's face grew hot with a bit of embarrassment from all the affection going around, and the Jolteon-taur sighed a little, just now realizing what Kuroi had said.

{Kuroi... I'm sorry I'm not human. Even if it is just because you want me to be with Autumn.}

{Oh, I know,} the fox replied with a hum in her voice. {That's not completely what I meant by that, though.}

{Really?} The taur flicked his ears curiously, as he ran his finger up the Ninetales's cheek. {Well, what did you mean, then?}

{I mentioned that Miss Autumn is easily scared of unusual creatures.} Dylan also recalled this, and nodded in response. Upon seeing this, Kuroi added, {If she saw you, I have no doubt she'd turn tail and run, and we'd never see you again. And... considering how sweet you are... I would miss that.}

{I'd miss you too...} Dylan said with a smile. {There's something magical about you... I mean, you're so beautiful...} He leaned down and kissed Kuroi on the maw, blushing white as he drew away and his ears shot around like hyper children. Was that him talking... or was the Pokémon within taking over his impulses?

{S... Sunstorm...} The Ninetales barely broke above a whisper in that response, ears as far forward as they could go. {I... um...} She was at a loss for words. The sudden kiss had caught her so off guard, that she couldn't move or even gather her thoughts. Starly whistled hotly after that, breaking them both out of their trances.

{Holy crap!} the bird chirped, wings flapping maniacally as he tweeted up a storm. {You go after the lady and kiss the fox! You're some kind of flirt, Red!}
Dylan's eyes widened as he blushed even whiter, mewing apologetically as he stumbled over his thoughts to form an apology. The Jolteon-taur was having a harder time than Kuroi trying to make the next statement, and the avian taunting him only gathered greater delight in that fact.

{Man, I wonder how that girl would take you making out with her Ninetales!} he said with another storm of chirps and cheeps. {Dude, you're gutsy!}

Meanwhile, Autumn stirred in her nap, yawning and slowly sitting up as her eyes opened groggily. She spotted Dylan, Starly and Kuroi in the distance, and smiled to herself.

"Looks like Kuroi's found a Jolteon friend!" she grunted, still half-asleep as she rubbed her eyes. "Mmm, he's bigger than usual... maybe she'll convince him to join-" Suddenly, it hit her. This wasn't just a large Jolteon at all that Kuroi had found. It was a morph, one of her biggest fears and hatreds! Immediately, she screamed and started running off to the south. In her haste, she dropped Kuroi's Poké Ball.

{Oh, for the love of Entei...} Kuroi muttered, racing off after her owner. {Sorry, Sunstorm... guess she found us...}

Dylan's feral side took over. {No,} he yelled to the Ninetales, the taur grabbing the dropped capsule and matching paces as he soon neared the running teen. {I'm not losing you over some stupid fear!}

Out of pure instinct, he shot a wave of electricity at Autumn, hitting her and causing her to collapse to the ground, awake but tethered to the spot in paralysis. She yelled and seethed with anger, turning red and yelling curses at the taurform in front of her.

"Miss, please..." Dylan yipped in desperation. "I just wanted you to... have this back." He tossed Autumn the Poké Ball, still pristine despite having fallen out of the case on her belt. Autumn managed a weak smile, still spasming a little despite her raging anger.

"Thanks," she said with a cold, calculating tone, blinking once at Dylan as she kept attempting to move again. Soon, the taurform was reaching in her backpack, almost having a perfect purpose to his methods.

"What the hell are you doing!?" Autumn spat, eyes narrowing as she struggled to try and stop the morph. "Get your ****ing hands off my stuff or I'll choke the life out of your body, you filthy freak!"

Dylan heeded none of the female's threat, finding a small vial and unscrewing it, then dumping the contents into the protesting human's mouth. Soon, she could move again, and she grabbed Dylan by the neck, squeezing hard as she could.

"Enough!" Kuroi yelled, in human language. Immediately, both taur and teen looked back at the Ninetales, panting with exhaustion and scowling at each other.

"That's better," the vixen said, licking her paws and spouting small embers at her trainer's feet. Autumn jumped back and made to slap the Pokémon, but one look from Dylan made her reconsider and drop her hand.

"Okay," Kuroi continued, fiery eyes staring at the morph and narrowing to mere slits. "Sunstorm, I want you to apologize to Autumn for not only scaring her, but then having the gall to paralyze her!"

The taur nodded and looked at Autumn, extending a furry hand to her. "Look, Autumn, I'm sorry," he said, smiling softly and offering a sort of peace to the teen. Autumn kicked his front legs out from under him, causing Dylan to fall flat to the ground as she punched him in the face.

"Serves you right, you douchebag freak of science," she spat, as blood flowed from the Jolteon-taur's nose and he whimpered a bit. "See if you ever touch me or my Ninetales again after that. We're leaving, Kuroi," she finished, snapping her fingers and walking away.

"Sorry," the vixen lamented, turning away and following her trainer as they went south toward Jubilife. Kuroi's heart began to hurt more and more with each step that she took away from Dylan, a tear forming at her left eye. But, just before they got out of sight completely, a yell stopped both Autumn and Kuroi in their tracks.

"You heartless *****!" the Jolteon-taur cried out, struggling to his feet and flattening his ears against his head.

Autumn whipped around and stomped back toward Dylan, slapping him across the face again. "Shut your degenerate mouth, cretin!" she yipped, as she let fly with a second slap for good measure.

This time, he was ready. He ducked below the slap and stepped back. "You know, you've got issues, lady," he growled, eyes closed as he charged with static, ready to shock her again if the need arose. "I try to be nice and civil, bring back Kuroi's Poké Ball, offer an apology, and you go and kick me, slap me, and try to break my nose? Ever hear of something called manners!?"

Autumn shook her head, quivering with a mix of fear and anger. "You... don't deserve manners," she uttered, falling to her rump and shaking. "It's... you... that's destroying my world..."

Dylan's ears flew back, and he sat down on his feral belly, right next to the human. She didn't try and hit him, mostly out of fear of his electricity. Before it was pure adrenaline fueling her beatdowns. Now... she was out of it. The energy highs had left her, and apprehension became the main emotion deciding her actions. She leaned on the Jolteon-taur, crying into his upper chest as he patted her on the back.

"Autumn..." Dylan said with a regretful look on his face, ears low as they could be. "I... I'm sorry..."

The human quivered with the pats, her fingers rubbing into his legs warmly. "Y-you... morph... I hate you..." she said, actions betraying her words. She found Dylan a source of comfort, and his fur to be wonderfully soft and inviting. "I... want you... to die..." she spat, despite nosing his belly and hugging him even tighter.

The Jolteon-taur sat there with a confused look on his face. Part of him wanted to demand an apology, yet... most of him was content to let the female wear herself out crying into his body. The formalities could always wait; she didn't seem in any mood to listen to him anyway. Kuroi sat at their left side, watching the drama unfold. Why do I always have to be the one to knock sense into that girl's head? Kuroi wondered, the vixen sidling next to Dylan and leaning on his fur...

Chapter Ten: Alone No More

Noon broke over the skies above Galactic Headquarter building between Floaroma and Jubilife. Just to the north, Raquel dotted at the ground with her weapon, humming happily. The brunette seemed to be planning her routes and passages carefully, as if looking for someone, or something.

There's no way he's going toward Jubilife, she reasoned as her rapier glid across the grassy surfaces, rippling the blades with a cascading brush effect. It's too populated, and those new laws about Pokémorph ownership loom too far over his head to be ignored. Even he can't be that stupid. She walked back into the building as she sheathed her sword in its hilt, brown hair dangling with a carefree sway. Her eyes blinked slowly and mysteriously as she spotted Chell and Shade making their way toward the exit doors she now stood in front of.

"Halt, Davies!" she yelled, stopping the Arcanine morph dead in her tracks, Shade jumping into the canine-femme's arms. "Where do you think you're going?"

"Finding Dylan," Chell growled angrily, her ears flattening back and her tail waving forcefully. "You can thank me later for doing your dirty work, but I've really gotta get going." She attempted to walk past, but Raquel stuck her sword in the way and shook her head. The pair of morphs wasn't going anywhere, if she could help it.

"And does Boss know you're taking Shade with you?" the self-appointed sentry queried, perking as the tall, looming man lumbered into the entryway.

"Miss Davies has my full permission to take Shade on her hunt for our Jolteon-taur specimen," he stated with an authoritative smile. "He is the last remaining witness to everything that happened right before the escape, including the death of the bird."

"Is that so, sir?" Raquel asked, a little curious at the statement. "And when was this decided without my input?"

"How quickly you forget, Miss Welch," the man grunted, frowning a bit as he walked over to the Arcanine-morph and looked back at the brunette he was correcting. "You're merely a commanding officer in our labs and disciplinary committee. I run this whole place, and that means I oversee you. Ergo, I'm not required to submit my decisions for your approval, despite what version of 'manners' you operate under."

Raquel clenched her fists as she growled low, a sure sign of her disapproval of the explanation. Her hand wandered to the sheathed sword at her side, grabbing the hilt and readying a quick slice.

"I wouldn't if I were you, Miss Welch," Boss said as he perked his eyebrows at the human. "I'm much more capable of countering sword strikes than you would think. Anyway, it should be interesting to find out the full truth about the Pidgey's demise."

"Pidge's death was an accident," Shade lied, his tail lashing defensively around Chell's arm as she cradled him. He purred and nuzzled into her furry neck, eyes narrowing as he stared daggers at Boss. The truth was evident in his eyes, though if the man missed the clues, the morph could get away with it.

Boss was neither scared of, nor interested in, fortunately, the snake-wolf's stare. Instead, he found it rather amusing. He smiled mirthfully and petted Shade's neck, despite the morph's numerous attempts to scratch and bite him. His hand pulled back without a mark, and he rolled his eyes, waggling a finger. "Tsk, tsk, Shade. I think you should be more grateful I'm letting you go outside for once. Already you seem to be attached to your partner in this field study."

This drew a soft red out around Chell's face as she nodded happily. "Boss, I'm sorry Dylan escaped. I should have been more attentive to him instead of spending time arguing with Raquel. I'll get him back safe for you, sir."

Boss nodded and petted Chell's fluffy neck fur, stroking her cheeks and reassuring her that he wasn't mad. "Well, though you were in the wrong, Miss Davies," he said in an unusually soft-spoken voice, "at any rate, this gives your Arcanine self a chance to get out of this cramped building. Go run around, romp, do what big fiery dogs do. Just don't forget you're still my employee first and foremost."

The Arcanine-girl blushed a much deeper red underneath her creamy white fluff as she was showered with pettings and compliments, barking happily to the fellow morph before addressing her superior. "Sir, I really need to get going now. Dylan could be long gone by now, and the more I piddle around and socialize, the farther he's going to get. I'm going to head south and see if anyone's found a trace, though I doubt he's dumb enough to show himself to any humans."

Boss nodded and scritched Chell's ears proudly. "You can never tell. Pokémorphs do some strange things after they've been transformed, and taurs are likely to get into even more odd situations. Well, be safe, Miss Davies, and be careful that you heed the new laws regarding morphs, okay? The last thing I want to do is come bail you out of prison."

Chell sighed at the ear attentions, nodding and purring to Boss a bit. "Laws, sir?"

"Aye," the towering male said with a quick smirk. "Legislation in Jubilife recently passed laws saying that any Pokémorphs not partnered with a human are considered threats to society and subject to captivity, execution, or both. No more than two morphs can claim the same human for an ally, so be careful who you turn to. There's no telling who's already taken until it's too late."

The Arcanine morph paused and took all of the information in, ears folding back a bit as she lamented the loss of her complete independence. "I swear I'll get Jones for this... both of them if I have to."

Boss took that as an understanding of her orders, and looked at Raquel one last time. "Miss Welch, I want you to hit Floaroma up north."

Raquel gave her commander a calculated smile, hand at her side. "No problem, Boss," she snapped with a quick, approving salute. "I was actually headed there anyway."

"But for the love of all that's holy, please, don't whip out that rapier at everyone you see. Again, prison, bail outs, you know the drill. I don't want it and I won't tolerate it. Davies, Welch, if either of you get imprisoned, you're fired. Am I clear?"

"Yes, sir," came the replies from both females. Raquel's was a little more confident, and Chell's held a reserved, yet hopeful tone to it.

"Good. When you find Dylan, bring him back here immediately. I need to have a little 'talk' with him as well..." Upon stating this last command, he walked away, leaving his two most trusted employees (and Shade) to their tasks...

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Though it only took fifteen minutes for Autumn to let loose all her tears, frustrations, and anxieties into the Jolteon-taur's fur, it felt like an eternity. Dylan was worn out from having to fake his smiles, pet the teen's hair, and heed her Ninetales attention at the same time. Multitasking is not my forte, the morph quipped silently to himself.

Finally, Autumn sighed and lifted her head up to look at Dylan's face, Kuroi mewing a bit as her trainer at last seemed to show signs of semi-acceptance. Quickly, that faded into a bit of disgust as the female opened her eyes and jumped back with an annoyed frown. "Urf, how long was I touching you!?" she yelped, cringing as she brushed the crimson fur off her dress. "You really need a haircut."

Dylan flushed a hot white as his ears flattened to the sides, the taur growling low as his eyes blinked with an injured expression. "So sorry I didn't transform into something pre-groomed, your Highness," he spat, proving himself more than capable of returning fire with his ammunition of sarcasm.

Autumn giggled at this defensive remark and petted at Kuroi, the Ninetales vixen purring and rubbing into her hand with an occasional lick. "Aw," she cooed, hugging the vulpine to her side, "A bit defensive, aren't we, then? Well, I suppose morphs have the right to have feelings, if not manners. What are you, one-third human or something? So you can have feelings, but not manners or emotions. Sounds pretty logical."

"So you're saying that I'm less of a person than you?" Dylan queried, brow furrowed at the teen. The indignity of it all stung like a Beedrill's sting, but he did his best not to show it.

"Pretty much," she answered, boxing at the taur's left ear with a quick fist and giggling at the morph's quick head dodge. "Hehe, you're sharp, I'll give you that." She smiled and extended a hand out to Dylan. "Autumn Daniels. Got a name, there, Jolteon-boy?"

Dylan took the hand rather begrudgingly, shaking it gently and letting it slip out of his grasp before responding. "You can call me Sunstorm," he explained, eyes widening a bit as he sensed that despite her rough edges, the femme might not be too bad of an ally to have on his escape.

"Sunstorm," Autumn repeated, bristling at the gentle static flowing through her as the Jolteon-taur touched her. "Well, nice to meet you, even if you are a freaky, gigantic beast of science and burden."

"I resent that," the morph retorted, ears flitting up and down as he thought of an explanation. "According to the ones back at Headquarters, I was called a 'taur,' or something like that."

"...taur, huh? Well, this sucks; they said they were decades away from completing that..." Autumn took out a pad of paper and a pencil, noting what Dylan had just said, and describing him in detail with lists, rough anatomical references, and personal thoughts.

"What are you writing about?" the taur asked with a quizzical look on his face. He seemed interested now that Autumn had finally shown him some kindness.

"You, Sunstorm," the teen replied with a smile. "I need to get these notes written down so I can present what I've found. By the way... are you going anywhere in particular, my Jolteon-taur acquaintance?"

Dylan nodded with a focused stare, forcing out a half-smile as he motioned his front right leg to the south. "I'll go anywhere except the Galactic building up north. Raikou knows I don't need to be there again. Why do you ask?"

Autumn looked pleased with that answer, hopping on Dylan's lower body and petting into his back fur. "Well, since I'm going south, you're in luck!" she explained, Kuroi licking at the morph's front legs all the while. "You can take me to Jubilife City, Sunstorm. I have a meeting with a group of friends to get to in an hour, and since your little escapades wasted my precious time, your speed and footwork can help me make it up. They should be quite interested in meeting you, anyway, so it just makes it that much better."

"Excuse me!" the taur yipped, grunting a little as he was sat upon. "I'm not a common steed, you know." Still, manners dictated that he should accept the task at hand. Despite the shame it may have presented, both now and later, it was a fairly safe bet. A soft nod of agreement and a happy mew was all he needed to take the job. "I suppose since we're close to the city anyway, it can't hurt too much to take you. Please pardon me if I'm a little slower than you hoped; I've never carried passengers before."

"Oh, well... that's just fine, Sunstorm," the human responded, flicking the morph's twitching, nervous ears with a grin. "But the more time you spend gabbing with me, the longer it takes to get to Jubilife!"

"Miss Autumn," Kuroi stated quietly, "we just came from Jubilife. Wouldn't we have just been better off not coming out here in the first place?"

"Maybe," Autumn explained, leaning down to poke the vixen's nose with a thin, somewhat firm, finger. "Recall we left several hours ago, though, Kuroi. And besides, if we had just stayed close to the base, we never would have met this handsome taur in the first place." The last comment caused Dylan to purr even more and dig at the ground with his front left paw.

"Um..." Dylan began, blushing a faded shade of white as his paw rustled the earth beneath, drawing up small clumps of the soil, "Shall we get going?"

"Absolutely!" Autumn exclaimed happily, kissing the Jolteon-morph's ears as he blushed even whiter. She giggled at his weakness for compliments, wrapping her arms around his chest for balance. "When you're ready, Sunstorm. Kuroi, I want you to follow along and make sure he keeps on course, okay?"

"Yes, ma'am!" Kuroi purred, saluting with her front left paw and smiling. She was accustomed to the drill, so etiquette was second-hand to the vixen.

"Good girl!" the human said, stroking at the taur's cheeks as she kicked her right leg into his side. "Don't worry, I'm not going to use you as a slave or anything," she whispered into Dylan's large, red ears as the morph shivered a bit. "Just let me milk the act for a while longer, in case anyone's watching. It's mostly the laws driving the charade, anyway; most folks won't like you, but I think you're okay. Stick close and do what I say, and things will go just fine."

After the teen's statement, Dylan blushed so hotly that he looked practically identical to an albino. He nodded with an embarrassed purr and begain to pad south along the dirt road, his crimson hues slowly restoring itself. She may be a weird one, the Jolteon-taur mused with a thoughtful smile as he picked up to a slow trot, but I think she's just the type of pick-me-up I need...

Chapter Eleven: Light in the Darkness

Kyra looked up at the entity addressing her. It had an ebony hourglass body, one that was flowing and graceful like a ballerina's. But the underlying grace held no favorable signs. Its white, ghostly head covered the right side of its face. A beady blue eye lay exposed on the left side, with a gaze that pierced through all illusions and could chill even the strongest person to the bone. A blood-red scarf of what appeared to be teeth dotted the creature's neck, as tatters of black extended from its shoulders. Its right arm extended out to the young woman's side and touched her right cheek, a disturbing yet odd feeling of lukewarm contact.

"So, Kyra Jones," it repeated, nodding as its eye blinked lazily and it floated closer to engulf the human in a hug, "At last we meet."

Kyra drew herself into the being's hug with great hesitation, a little bit of a nervous whimper escaping her as she wrapped her arms around the strange new creature. Her body instantly warmed, as though by accepting the embrace, she had turned on the thermostat. A broken smile dotted at the corners of her mouth, as her hair was stroked by one of the being's hands.

"Yes, that's it," the creature said with a nod. "Embrace me, for I embody what you have become. I am Darkrai, keeper of the darkness within all creatures. Some may call me a legendary Pokémon, a harbinger of nightmares. You may call me 'Master,' for it is here you spend your eternity."

"M... master?" Kyra stuttered, a worried glance shooting back at the Pokémon. "Oh no... I'm a pawn of the devil now..."

"Pawn? Devil?" Darkrai laughed happily at this, for it seemed he had a much more fitting plan for the female. He licked her face, causing the human to blush profusely and nestle deeper into the hug."No, my child. I do not use the damned as you humans have put it. I serve merely as the watcher of the Underworld, punisher of the wicked, and the male Yin to the feminine Yang of Mistress Cresselia of the Eternal Plains."

"Okay, wait a minute," Kyra snapped, drawing back a bit as Darkrai fumbled his hands to hold her off the ground. "You're saying I'm not doomed to do your dirty deeds or something like that?"
"Correct. You are merely doomed to be down here forever, and watch the virtuous lead fulfilling lives as you reflect on your misdeeds of the past."

"So... why do I have to call you 'Master?'"

"Dear child, do you honestly expect me to sit back and let you address me by improper titles? I may not enslave you, but I certainly enforce the basic tenets of etiquette." The Pokémon stroked over the human's head as she fidgeted a bit, obviously ill-at-ease in Darkrai's arms. She sighed and looked up into his beady blue eye, and shook before taking a soft breath and preparing to address her desires to the Pokémon holding her.

"Master?" she began, eyes narrowing a bit as she nearly gagged at that word alone. "May I please get back on the ground?" Her heart began sinking like a ship as she finished her query. It was bad enough she was in hell, but the kicker of the dark ruler being gentle and reassuring was too much. Worse yet, being forced to use manners to get anywhere in her eternal prison was like having two beds of spikes crush her slowly but surely. Darkrai nodded and let her put her feet down, then stroked under her chin. Kyra swore that the Pokémon smiled at her before he looked away.

"Very good," he said with a satisfied purr crossing his speech. "We have plenty more to learn, but... it feels awkward, you being a human and me being a Pokémon. We will fix this." The human felt her body lifting off the ground, shivering and whimpering as she saw Darkrai turn around and scan her very spirit with that all-telling eye. Her limbs began to paralyze themselves, partially out of fear, and her eyes closed forcefully. Darkrai chuckled and spoke several phrases in an archaic language, one not understood by any except the legendaries and those they allowed to know the secrets.

The human's limbs begain to quiver as they sprouted black fur, though Kyra didn't feel any pain because Darkrai began numbing her senses of pain and touch. She cried out of fear as her eyes opened and she saw her arms bending, shrinking, and thinning into legs of some sort. Her fingers fingers began fusing into three separate digits, becoming malformed into paws. Another yelp crossed the frightened female's maw as her legs shrunk inward and formed, and her toes began to also mutate into paws, and she fell to the ground on all fours, shivering and crying out forcibly.

Darkrai nodded a bit as the woman's nose and mouth began to form into a dark muzzle, nose turning a glossy ebony as her teeth begain to chisel at themselves and shrink, two canines sharpening out on both the top and bottom jaws near the front. Long, tubular ears extended out of the top of her skull as her human ears swirled back inward and her eyes seemed to crackle, forming indented sockets that now held small, aquamarine-shaded peepers within. A few blinks escaped the transforming female's new eyes as a long tail jutted out of her hindquarters, looking like one of her ears, except about double the overall dimensions.

She was an Umbreon now, except she was missing the trademarked rings of the species. This was intentional, as Darkrai deliberately gave her the fur color and eyes to mark the female as his own. By now, Kyra was only three feet tall at the head crest now, with six-inch ears and a foot-long tail. As her master began to restore her feelings, she pawed at the ground curiously and emitted a low "Bree" from her maw. The Umbreon closed her eyes and smiled softly, hopping into Darkrai's arms again and nuzzling his neck crest.

"You're welcome," the large Pokémon sang, stroking at his new pet's ears and cheeks gently. "This transformation was a necessity if I was to get any cooperation from you, after all. Too many bad memories flood your human self, and by making you a Pokémon, we free those memories and you start anew."

{Thank you, Sir,} Kyra barked in Poké-speech, licking Darkrai's face with a gentle purr. {I feel... free.}

"As was the plan, young one. Now, to properly thank me, I do have a small favor to ask you."

{Yes, what is it?} Manners didn't hurt the Umbreon Kyra nearly as much as they did the human Kyra. She smiled and wagged her tail, her right paw reaching up into Darkrai's shoulder.

"I can tell you had a world of regrets that you left behind. You show honest despair and hope that these can be fixed. Kyra, I make you a deal. I will tell you who killed your human self, and let you make a decision on what to do to him. If I judge your decision to be honest and kind, I will let you live a second life on Earth, though you will be an Umbreon in both this new life and after. If you are dishonest with me, or threaten revenge, I will assure you an eternal place in my torture chambers. If you decide to pass on this knowledge, I can only let you live an eternity of mediocrity as my personal pet. Do you accept these terms?"

{Those are fair terms,} Kyra replied, sighing and looking up at Darkrai happily. {I will accept the knowledge you have of my killer.}

"Knowing full well my terms, you still wish to know this information?"

Kyra paused for a minute, then nodded. {Yes,} she answered finally. {Please tell me.}

Darkrai returned the nod, giving off the feeling of himself smiling to the Umbreon in his arms. "All right then. There is no going back from here. You either get a second chance or eternal torture from this stage." He sighed sadly, then continued, "Your brother Dylan killed you."

Kyra stopped purring, and looked as if she was about to double over with laughter from the information given to her. {...my brother killed me? You must be yanking my tail. He couldn't hurt a Beautifly!} she barked, smirking and holding back giggles.

"I assure you I am quite serious, Kyra," Darkrai said, very matter-of factly. I know not the methods, nor the reasons, but he was the last one to touch you with anything before you passed away. Take from that what you will; I only give you the facts. Now, my question: if I send you back up to Earth, what will you do about this?"

{I... I don't know,} Kyra explained honestly. {I'd need more information before I could possibly decide. There has to be a reasonable explanation for what happened. My first step, if I found him, would be to ask him.}

"A good answer," Darkrai stated, "but not one that lets me choose immediately. I think I will keep you under my arms for a while longer... while I mull over my decision." He cuddled the Umbreon in his arms as she purred and licked over his cheek, the dark ruler trying to come to terms with both the answer that was given, and a decision to have eternal consequences...