Yeh, Sorry For Misunderstanding.

Work (mini-fic)

- Down, down, slightly left, slightly forward, down, down... - motor-mouthed Levi into comm, dubbing his vocal commands with gestures with handheld signal beacons. Above his head, Cherie, controlling Alva’s personal airship “Kamiya”, slowly descended, trying to place the huge pile of cargo, which was now hanging on external mount, right into designated zone.

- Down, down, half’o’sec’o’thrust right... Perfect! - screamed Levi. - Disengage electromagnet, drop Raleigh and take our baby back home.

- “Our” baby? - sounded the cabinet minister’s voice in the comm. - Well, it’s not that I’m that against you two using my airship when I don’t need her, but, if the costs for flight, not counting energy for engines, exceed two million, you will be the ones paiyng them. However, if you want to take her for a private flight for your honeymoon...

- Boss? - sounded confused Cherie in the channel. - What do you mean - “honeymoon”?

- Ah, I suppose, I’m rushing the events, - replied Alva in somewhat sarcastic voice.

- How did you know? - asked Levi, already knowing the boss’s answer.

- I know you two much more than you think. Me, being a cabinet minister, arcane researcher and pretty much a father replacement for prince, does not mean I do not monitor condition of my two most important henchmen.

- Well, thank you for putting us in such a high regard! - happily said Cherie, repositioning the airship. - Raleigh and “package” on cargo platform. Levi - he’s under your responsibilty now.

- Acknowledged! - replied her colleague, walking to the lowered platform, on which young prince stood near the heavy metallic briefcase, obviously designed for transporting hazardous materials.

- Monsieur Levi? - wondered boy. - And where’s the minister Alva?

- Cabinet minister is very busy now, - said henchman. - He plans to perform a test today, and I need to deliver this cargo to him now.

- What kind of test? - asked him curious prince.

- New power source. Let’s go, no need to hold boss and Cherie waiting, - finished this conversation Levi, taking the briefcase and walking inside the Flying Fortress. Curious Raleigh followed him, and Cherie, after retracting the platform and closing the ramp, took the airship back to the port.

-                                                                                                                              -

- Here, boss! - said Levi, giving a heavy metallic briefcase to the Alva and leaving the room at once, closing the blast door in process. The cabinet minister carefully placed it on the table, grabbed tongs, dressed himself in a full hazmat suit and only after that opened the briefcase. In it, there lied several strange crystals, glowing faint blue.

- Unown shards, power source of the Kingdom’s future, - whispered Alva, carefully picking them with tongs one by one and loading into special holders in a strange-looking device. After he was finished, he installed the safety cover on the device and placed the tongs aside, but remained in the hazmat suit. Shortly after, he placed the device on small cart, opened the blast door and rolled it into the main engine room, which was loaded with terrifying amounts of equipment, installed on the new platforms near the central catwalk, above which the main power distribution core was suspended.

- Preliminary ignition cascade... operable. Secondary ignition system... operable. Secondary distributors... operable. Emergency power-bleeding system... operable, - mumbled arcane researcher, checking the machinery. - Looks like I can install the power source now.

- Minister Alva? - suddenly sounded child’s voice. Alva turned around and saw Raleigh, coming to him from the side of the steam condensers and coolant storage.

- Prince Raleigh, I strongly advise you to leave at once, - replied man, looking at the young prince. - The power source is very dangerous to handle without sufficient protection.

- Understood, understood, leaving... - muttered Raleigh, turning around and backtracking. Arcane researcher nodded to no one in particular, then opened a heavy reinforced hatch on one of the bigger machines, took the device, placed it in the connection port inside, closed the hatch and only after it exhaled quietly, being proud of himself. According to the data, showed on the nearby sensors, the power source was installed correctly, so, the second stage of the test was about to begin...

-                                                                                                                              -

- Please, Raleigh, be careful, - said Alva, guiding the young prince through the mess of cables and tubes, which covered floor of this corridor of the Flying Fortress in a thick layer.

- Boss, we’re ready! - screamed Cherie from the control room. No one was quite sure, how she has managed to get here from the dock so quickly. Apparently, it was one of her “girly secrets”.

- Understood, we’re almost there! - replied cabinet minister, right before he and Raleigh entered the room itself.

Even if Nikola supposed this room to be elegant in some way, it was anything but this now. Entirety of the floor was covered in tubes, cables and wires of nearly all kinds, the bridge was perma-raised and fixed in this position now, with an aluminum ladder placed to provide access, everything was cramped with a new machinery...

- Boss - need any help? - asked Levi, bending over the safety rails.

- Yeah, help me to get prince up there, - mumbled Alva before, along with Levi, getting Raleigh on the bridge, then getting on it himself.

The bridge - originally, pretty spacious - was even more cramped, than the rest of the control room. The layer of cables and tubes here was so thick, it worked as a floor by itself, the secondary consoles and equipment racks obstructed most of the view on the main screen, the original singular seat was removed in favor of modified office chair... Well, at least, now, before both of the primary control consoles, there were normal seats. Though the right one was so surrounded by additional control panels and indicators, it looked like it was in some kind of a strange cockpit.

- Raleigh - stay there. Cherie - on standby, - started to give orders Alva, trying to get into the “cockpit”, while his henchgirl sat before the left primary control console and, unbeknownst to him, invited Raleigh to sat on her knees, to get the better view. - Levi - activate the preliminary ignition cascade!

- Acknowledged, preliminary ignition warming up, - replied the henchman, sat on the central seat and started to flick switches and turn knobs on the nearby panels in order, which would seem somewhat chaotic to the uninformed observer. After roughly a minute, he said, - Preliminary ignition cascade ready!

- Commence the preliminary ignition!

- Acknowledged, preliminary ignition commencing, - lazily said Levi, flicking open the safety cover and pressing the button.

Deep inside the Flying Fortress, in the main engine room, one of the machines finally hummed to life. Unown crystal shards, stimulated by arcanotechnological devices, glowed, trying to open the breach between dimensions and never succeeding in it, but giving away lots of energy in process, which was instanly harvested by the human creation.

- Preliminary ignition successful, crystal reactor is now at two percent, - reported Levi. - Commence primary engine ignition?

- Wait, power distribution normal, power-bleeding normal... - mumbled Alva, then replied, - Yes, commence primary engine ignition!

- Primary engine ignition commencing... - Levi tried to raise the power of the crystal reactor and route it into the Fortress’ main power distribution core. - So far, so goo...

At that moment, siren sounded, while the power monitoring display showed, that core, instead of activating and routing energy through the entirety of structure, remained locked and just accumulated energy, which could’ve meant explosion in this situation.

- Emergency shutdown and power-bleeding! - screamed Alva and Levi at the same time, each doing their own part in preventing a solid chunk of the wall, surrounding Azoth Kingdom, getting into the sky the wrong way. Thankfully, well thought-out contingency protocols and machinery helped to do it quickly, putting this crisis to end.

- Well, boss, I think your tech-paranoia has a very good basis, - mumbled Levi, trying to recover from this. - What do we do now?

- For now - let us just finish the second external power transfer line, then re-activate the reactor and share some of the energy with Kingdom - as much as safely possible, anyway. For later - we need to find and get the Soul-Heart, or this Fortress will stay locked on the ground forever, - replied the minister.

- And what do I do? - asked Cheri, helping Raleigh to get back to the floor.

- Go relax somewhere, I guess. Or you can try to help us to finish this power line. What’s your Pokemon today?

- Alakazam.

- Great. Your majesty?

- I think I want to see it.

- No problems. Just please, use the protective clothes, - finished his talk Alva, powering down most of the control equipment.

“Sometimes, I hate Nikola. He was genius, but a crazy one. Even with a new power source, we still need a Magearna to unlock the Fortress.” - thought the cabinet minister, crawling out of the “cockpit” and walking through the bridge, before getting down by a ladder. - “Well, I still need to make Azoth Kingdom a better place. For now, the better power source will do fine.”

Because he needs to create scientist’s persona around himself, so it’ll be easier for him to get required materials and machinery. He’s scientific genius after all, so, why not?

Took the Tomodachi Life personality quiz for Jirarudan and he ended up with Confident Designer and told he should have an office and a lab coat.

……what.

I was thinking about pre-movie Jirarudan, when Hikokyuu still was only a dream, but post-movie Jirarudan could’ve bribed nearly everyone (he can get money by selling objects, which’ve survived crash landing, even if this is painful, because he can recover them later, even if by dirty means) into cleansing his reputation and start saving money for a new, more advanced airship, which’ll be far better in every aspect, especially in weaponry and internal security system.

Took the Tomodachi Life personality quiz for Jirarudan and he ended up with Confident Designer and told he should have an office and a lab coat.

……what.

Survival (mini-fic)

Even before she has broken the protective shell of her egg, she could feel something wrong in the world around her. Unlike what it was supposed to be, environmental Aura streams were heavily distorted and plain wrong. Still, she knew that she couldn’t remain here anymore, so, a single strike of organic-metal spike broke a thick calcium shell, allowing small Emmanation Pokemon to enter the outside world.

She looked at herself. Not that she was completely sure, but wasn’t it supposed to be three fingers on her hand, not a four and a fifth opposed one? Could the Aura of this place do something to her? And... why she was thinking so clear for something barely hatched?

Suddenly, her “dreadlocks” felt something angry. Something, that was very interested in freshly broken eggshell and sure, that, whatever has hatched from it, wasn’t far away and would make a pretty good snack. She tried to “fade out” her Aura and took a refuge in ruins, full of sharp metal parts and unsure floors, made of concrete (she was still not sure, where from she knew all that, not nothing of it mattered right now).

She passively Aura-”looked” at her previous resting place and saw a big Pokemon, which radiated hunger and agression, take a look at all sides (literally, because it had three big compound eyes) and then, angry, devour what little was left of eggshell and small flying Pokemon, which has just happened to get near at the wrong moment, while cutting the second one in half with a short swing of razor-barbed tongue. When he left, she carefully returned and, feeling very hungry, finished the agony of what was left of the flying Pokemon and made sure the body won’t go to waste.

At this moment, she couldn’t guess it, but it’ll become her style of life for several next years - find the nearly- or freshly dead Pokemon, cut some of them with self-invented Aura attack and quickly consume it, before real predators or scavengers come nearby. While she had fur color far from being camouflage one, she has managed to make up for it with Aura - she could let world’s streams flow right through her, preventing anyone, who relied on Aura in receiving what was happening around, from detecting her, while also silently using her inner Aura to distort the light, silence the sounds and nullify the smells. She became the stealthiest being in this part of world.

Today was the day she got busted.

Despite all her Aura-based cloaking, despite all of her stealth attemps, one of the local Pokemon has managed to find out about her and, what was the worst, find her.

Now it was chasing her.

Her left leg hurt really bad from getting chemical burn from one of the spits. Because how it wasn’t coagulating, it was, probably, base, instead of acid (she never bothered to think about where from she was getting all of this knowledge - it sorta just happened to somehow get into her head in the least apropriate times). She knew she would be able to use Aura to heal it later, but right now, she couldn’t do a thing about it.

Now, she has managed to drive this to unfinished abandoned building, complete with metal sticks sticking out of walls and just laying here and there.

Suddenly, she tripped on one of those sticks and fell over, quickly trying to get back standing. She succeeded, but situation had already got from “bad” to “really bad”. 

Riolu saw, how a big, angry and strong Pokemon leaps at her, opening a huge maw with lots of sharp teeth, and, not understanding, what she’s doing, rose a big metal stick above her head, while closing eyes and cutting herself from Aura reception.

A monstrous squeak and dying roar of pain nearly destroyed her ears, but, somehow, she was still alive. After waiting for several more seconds, she slowly opened her eyes and looked at what have just happened.

The Pokemon, which wanted to eat her, jumped straight at the thin metal stick and got skewered on it. From what she could tell, he jumped just right to get his heart pierced, so it was of no wonder he died so quickly.

She could feel something strange, something building up in her. The death of this monster - the same one which has nearly killed her several years ago - made her feel some sort of a relieve and... Pride, for what she has done?

On this thought, she felt suddenly getting overwhelmed with some sort of a light, her body getting warped and changed. When it was over, she looked herself over, noticing the dense yellow fur and bio-metallic spike on chest, muzzle getting sharper, feeling the second set of Aura sensors, more power... and a huge hunger. The food was right here, impaled on the metal stick. After so many years of scavenging, she simply couldn’t let such a great fresh carcass go to waste.

After the meal time was over, she noticed something strange in herself. A strange emmanation, which have been present in her since her hatching here, has finally made it’s presence clear. It was dark, cruel, calculative, remorseless... but it was exactly what she needed to survive here, so, she completely embraced it.

Before finally leaving this place, she used several of her “Aura Cut” attacks to chop herself a decent part of this metal stick (”rebar”, as the name for it has suddenly appeared in her mind) and sharpen one of the ends of it. She couldn’t explain, but she felt it’ll help her great time in the future. She couldn’t help but wonder, why does it fit in her five-fingered hand so well.

A quick Aura-accelerated charge with rebar set before her - and prey’s heart gets pierced, ending the fight before it had ever began. A second decisive strike - and it’s mate dies with severed spinal cord. Since she has become Lucario, she finally stopped being a mere scavenger and became quite a death player here herself. While she still was not an apex predator here, she haven’t lost her stealth skills (in fact, she has continued at ever-enhancing them) and always knew when to fold her plans. However, she still never risked approaching groups of humans with firearms. While human bodies were fragile and could be destroyed with aa single maxed-out Aura Sphere or similar attack, their guns, loaded with something they called “Ripper rounds”, could quickly (and very painfully) kill most of the local Pokemon. Attacking humans was just not worth it, especially after how they’ve firebombed a place from air, after one of the mightiest Pokemon here had killed fifty humans.

She knew it was a trap.

Somehow, whoever stood behind those Pokemon and co-ordinated their doings, has lured her into this very narrow valley and locked her in it.

She stood proud, clenching the sharpened rebar in her left hand. Lucario knew, that it may be not of much use here, but she wanted to be ready to give her all.

Suddenly, she felt a human presence getting stronger behind them. It definitely was a woman, which, for some strange reason, wanted to see the fight with her own eyes (not without backing herself up with some Protects, several additional Pokemon guards and a firearm, of course).

She concentrated her Aura sense on this human woman... and saw something very dark in her soul. This darkness, while different from the one which gave the Lucario her power, was still somewhat familiar. This darkness brought understanding. There was no use in fight, because like has no need to fight like.

- I surrender, - sent a peaceful Aura message Lucario, while slowly lowering the rebar. - I sense no need in fight.

- Why is that? - asked human woman in somewhat defiant voice, but deep inside, the dark power in her soul became interested.

- Because you bear darkness, as do I. Even if they are different, like does not need to fight like. I think we can achieve something greater if we allow our darknesses to work together.

- Hm. You tell truth. Readings of my sensors tell me, that you are different from the normal Lucarios and your abilities are almost on par of those of the low-level Legendaries. Do you know, why is that?

- The darkness of this land has touched me. Changed me. Gave me the bliss of power, - replied Lucario, feeling some strange pride rising in herself.

- Yeah, you are the only introduced Pokemon I know who has managed to survive on border between Tunguska and real Soris, - said the human woman. - So, to Pokeball stage we go?

- I do not know what do you mean, but I’m ready, - replied Lucario, seeing, how human tosses the small spherical device with strange markings towards her, how this device opens, how her body slowly, but painlessly, gets warped and twisted in all ways possible and some, that are essentially impossible, then everything settles down and calms, then disturbance arises again - and she stands before human once more.

- Absolutely no resistance! - wondered human, looking at Lucario.

- Why should I resist something, that will allow me to unite my path with other bearer of darkness and help me achieve something greater? - calmly asked her Aura Pokemon.

- I’m happy about it, actually. So, do you understand, that from now onwards, you will obey all of my orders?

- I most certainly do.

- So the darkness in our souls will become one and open a path to something greater?

- Absolutely.

-... You’re the strangest Pokemon I’ve ever met. Anyway, nice to get you in my team. I assign you tactical designation “Blue Rapier”.

- I thank you for that. And... how should I call you? Mist...

- No, not this crap! - objected human, then gave the Lucario an evil twisted smirk. - Simpy “K” or “Commander” would suffice.

The problem may be not with phone itself, but, instead, with battery charge controller. Try rebooting your phone and make sure there are no energy-heavy apps running, such as a Pokemon Go, Pokemon Duel or like it, and, if this fails, try to turn phone off and let it charge for a while before turning it back on and checking progress. If there is no charge buildup, swap charger for another compartible and if this fails as well - there are, probably, big problems with the battery.

There’s something wrong with my phone. It’s plugged in, says it’s charging, but loses battery.

There’s a small mistake about the Battle Pyramid - it has 5 rotors instead of four. The fifth one is hidden on the down side of the main hull of the Pyramid and can be observed during the crash scene.

Also, it isn't a dex entry, but I'd be curious to know what your thoughts are on possible flight systems for the airships we've seen in the series, in particular the Hikoukyuu, Megarig, and Battle Pyramid.

I’ll be honest–I’m not all that familiar with the anime. That being said, this question is so interesting, I just have to tackle it. I did, after all, run a whole week on Pokémon Flight–it only seems fair that I cover the man-made airships too.

The Hikoukyuu

The “Flying Palace” makes its debut in the second-ever pokémovie, Pokémon 2000. I had actually seen this one before I watched them for this post, although that was probably at least 8 years ago. The Flying Palace is the airship of the evil Lawrence, who seeks out to selfishly “collect” Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres.

The only flying mechanisms it seems to have are the tiny propellers attacked to the top and bottom of the craft–roughly 40 in total. It also has about 20 propellors along the sides.

Propellers work using Bernoulli’s Principle. Basically, they are shaped in a way that air must travel farther to go over them than under them, creating a pressure difference, and thus creating an upward force.

As far as I can tell, the propellers on the sides do absolutely nothing to lift it into the air. In my opinion, they are more likely wind turbines, harvesting the air rushing past and turning it into energy, to power the engines or supply electricity for Lawrence’s unecessarily large holograph machine.

You have to understand, this thing is massive. Quoting Bulbapedia, the Flying Palace is “about the size of a small city” and likely weighs at least 100,000 tons (200,000,000 lbs). To fly, the propellers must generate at minimum that much, or about 5 million pounds of lift per propellor.

Now, without even touching the math I can tell you without it that this is already incredibly ridiculous and there’s no way this thing could fly. Even if I considered the lessened gravity of the Pokémon Universe. It must use some other mechanism to fly.

I could say that it is actually in orbit above the pokémon planet, but we see multiple shots of the ship close to the ground, and it even crashes at the end of the movie.

I could say that it has some magnetic mechanism helping it out, but a field of that magnitude would serious mess up anyone near/inside the ship (since we are mostly made of water, a polar molecule), let alone destroy his equipment.

Yeah, no idea how this thing flies.

The Megarig

The Megarig (and its smaller sister ship, the Mecha Giratina) appear in Giratina and the Sky Warrior, piloted by the antagonist Zero and auto-piloted by the program called Infi.

The Megarig doesn’t fly, but rather appears to hover–more on that in a bit, but the more prominent feature about the MegaRig is that is possesses the ability to freely hop between the distortion realm and back through portals, much like Giratina.

To dimension-travel like it does, the Megarig must use some kind of wormhole. There are technically several different, totally acceptable mathematical models of wormholes. The problem is, in the realm of physics we currently understand, there is no form of energy good enough to keep the wormhole stable for more than a few microseconds.

There are several hypotheses that there is an energy–they call it “Exotic Matter”–that we don’t know of yet that could stabilize a wormhole. The Megarig is able to harness this, and create stable wormholes to jump between dimensions freely.

And, energy is energy. Because Exotic Energy does not interact with our bodies or any form of matter we currently have (like a magnetic field would), it makes a near perfect candidate for the Megarig’s hovering.

The Battle Pyramid

The Battle Frontier is great. The Battle Frontier in the anime is possibly even better. In the anime, the Battle Pyramid is a giant, flying hunk of metal that is constantly changing location. The location is only given to those who have defeated the other six challenges, and is the Frontier equivalent of beating the E4.

It flies through giant turbines attached to the pyramid. It reminds me a lot of Marvel’s helicarrier, recently in the Avengers films. Four massive turbines, one giant hunk of metal.

I’m going to assume that the Pyramid is about the size of the Great Pyramid of Giza, so about 140 meters tall and 230 meters each way along the base. The Great Pyramid (made of limestone) has a mass of around six trillion (6,000,000,000) kg, which I will also assume for the battle pyramid (made of some kind of metal).

I’m following this process, which took data from Boeing to see how big the rotors would have to be for this thing to fly. Even for Earth’s gravity (g=9.8 m/s^2), These propellers need a radius of around 6,000 meters to fly. I don’t know about you, but those propellers don’t look thirty times longer than the base of the pyramid to me.

But okay, my estimate for the weight was pretty big. A flying pyramid is probably not made out of heavy limestone blocks, but more likely some light material, closer to aluminum or carbon fiber. So, let’s work backwards here. The radius of the propellors look about ¼ the length of the whole thing. Let’s call it 60 meters. With that, the propellers can generate as much as 550,000 kg of thrust. As long as the Battle Pyramid weighs less than that, it can fly.

If it was made from Carbon Fiber, which has a density of 1600 kg/m^3, it might be able to meet this criteria. But only might.

Thanks for your question!

HELLO ALL!!! It has officially been a whole hecking year!!! To celebrate, I’m holding a small give away! I want this to be a thanks to you guys for sticking with me, and also all of the new followers that made returning to this blog feel like a warm welcome! There’s a whole 430 of you…..that’s a lot……….

Rules are super simple:

Must be following @ask-another-clone! This is a thanks to my followers after all!

Ya get two entries, one reblog and one like!

Let’s keep it to PokeAsk blogs

I will be picking 3 winners. If the winners do not get back to me within 24 hours your spot will be redrawn

Winners will get a drawing of their character similar to the refs for the blog! 

Again, I really just wanna thank you all for sticking with me. I know there’s been a couple of changes since I came back, mainly the switch to 50/50 art/text, but I really appreciate how that hasn’t stopped people from following. I hope yall enjoy Dren’s story as it progresses! Thank you so much ;w;

Giveaway will end June 25, 2020

Business (mini-fic)

- Approaching designated randevu point! - announced Cherie, carefully pulling engine control throttles and making the Azoth Kingdom-built airship descend.

- Still nothing, boss, - reported Levi. - All radars give clear picture. By the way, the lateral turning motor of the main parabolic radar broke once again, looks like short-circuit. Any ideas why?

- Levi, did you forget to apply varnish? -  asked him Alva in exasperated voice.

- No, boss, I’ve triple-checked this before we’ve gone flight. You know, it’s kinda uncomfortable, when your main radar loses ability to turn and can only scan the last direction. Good thing it stopped at zero-zero.

- Then no ideas, beside obvious humidity build-up somewhere.

- There we are! - announced Cherie, flicking switches and putting the engines of the airship to hovering mode. - Anchored and ready!

- If not for your words and sensor readings, I’d have never noticed it, - said Alva in pleased voice. - Great piloting.

- Thanks, boss, - replied somewhat shy Cherie, checking the ship’s systems. - Everything’s normal, no scratches or like this, our girl is healthy’n’good.

- Besides the main radar. Sixth time already, - murmured Levi, then began to announce. - All radars...

Man’s voice faded when a huge signature suddenly appeared on all radars. Outside of the ship, a big airship, somewhat similar to the classic “Hunt-3R″, but bigger, with sleeker lines and more visible weaponry, de-cloaked and landed less then 300 meters from the airship of cabinet minister, two bow-mounted autocannon turrets aimed near the bridge.

- This ship looks like she was built by “Kirasawa Shipyards”, - finally managed to squeeze out a word Levi.

- But she wasn’t, - objected Alva, who was already studying the newcomer. - “Kirasawa”, most of time, puts external hangars and cargo containers, which often have more height that the ship herself, on the sides of main hull, while this one has containers half the ship’s height mounted between main hull and external engine pods. Also, bridge is too small and too deep into hull, and I never saw any ship from the “Kirasawa Shipyards” with that much weapons - those two turrets are definitely just part of point defence system.

- Boss, you know a lot! - said impressed Cherie

- I need to. After all, our kingdom continues to lose position on the airship market, and “Kirasawa Shipyards” is just after the corporations in the list of competitors. It’s like this ship was purposely built to fool those who know too little to think it was built by “Kirasawa”, but to let those who know style of those shipyards understand that it’s not... - Alva made a strange motion, as if shrugging something off. - Anyway, here they are, so I’m going in. Levi - open the hatch and prepare the elevator, Cherie - stay here, keep engines warm and ready. I feel far from good about this...

- Yeah... - replied Levi, remembering seeing records of the cabinet minister’s talks with this Hunter. While Hunter J, who has mysteriously disappeared not so long ago, was somewhat scary on her own, K...

                                                     ***

- So, cabinet minister of the Azoth Kingdom, huh? I’m happy to have such a client! - said woman with a jet-black hair, slowly moving across her small quarters, presumaby onboard of her ship. Levi couldn’t explain it, but something in her made him feel wrong and, from what it seemed, Alva too. For most of people, it would’ve been impossible to spot, but Levi knew his superior for long enough to notice he was nervous.

- So am I. Miss K, - Alva took an opportunity, trying to direct this talk into where he wanted it to go, - I want you to give me Pokemon from this list.

Cabinet minister quickly pressed some keys on his personal terminal, sending a message to her. Woman sat down on chair, reading the message without any hurry, then slowly rose from it and said:

- So, perfect stats; does not matter if Shiny or not; abilities, that work great together if those Pokemon fight side-by-side; some Egg moves; does not matter, if bred or hunted and all capable of Mega Evolution? Am I witnessing revolution, that is about to happen?

- I knew it’ll be obvious... - replied cabinet minister. - Sort of. Some of them will be needed for other, non-political purposes. And, if this info gets out...

- No need to worry, I never tell anyone about the details! - said K with somewhat menacing curved smile. - Contract privacy is contract privacy, no matter what. Also, I’m not into politics, as long as they don’t touch me. So, what about payment?

- Twenty millions total, ten - now, ten - after getting Pokemon.

- Fair enough. I’ll give you coordinates of the randevu point in two weeks. K out, - finished the talk woman and cut the channel. Alva opened a drawer, grabbed a small bottle of Azoth-produced “Cog Oil” whiskey, poured himself a shot and took it in a single long gulp. From what Levi saw in this recording, minister was still nervous about this K. Something in her was just plain wrong, but neither he, nor Cherie or Alva could point out, what exactly.

- It’s not like we have other options, - commented cabinet minister, stopping the video and shutting down his terminal. - She’s our best option now - both in price and quality.

- So, cabinet minister Alva, I suppose? - said one of the K henchmen, when Alva approached her airship, still feeling uncomfortable of CIWS turrets and her henchmen, which’ve already released their Pokemon to establish defense perimeter around her airship. - Commander K will be there very soon.

- Good, - replied cabinet minister, taking a closer look on the ship. Even now, he could see several characteristic coverings of missile tubes and two retractable machine gun turrets near the opened frontal hatch. For all of her worth, this ship could be easily classified as a full-fledged heavy assault ship. Considering, what kind of team was now guarding the airship, the implications were far from good.

- Glad to see you, - sounded beautiful, but, for some strange reason, scary voice. Alva turned back to the lowered frontal hatch and saw a woman with jet-black hair slowly walking down to him, carrying a small case.

- Same, Miss K, - said Alva in gentle voice, then pointed his staff at the case. - All of them? Loyalty imprinting?

- Of course to both, - responded Hunter, opening the case and presenting it’s contents to cabinet minister. Inside, there were 15 standard Pokeballs, lying in small holders.

- May I commit a small test right now? - asked her Alva, gently closing the case and taking it from her hands.

- If it does not mean injury or destruction of my property, - replied K, pointing to a small clear zone next to the starboard of her ship. Cabinet minister travelled to this spot and, surrounded by K’s henchmen, released the Pokemon one by one, then pulled his own Pokeball out of many pockets of his coat and added his own Gengar to this team.

- You can easily assault a palace and dethrone the king with team like this, - commented one of the henchmen.

- But they are not for it, - replied Alva, changing a grip of his staff and passing two fingers above the small dark-violet stone, embedded in the unusually shaped pommel. - Mega Wave!

- ... Can you sell a device like this to me? - asked amazed K, looking at 16 Pokemon, which were all Mega-Evolved at once. - I can pay up to a billion for a such a gadget!

- Not yet, - said cabinet minister, passing the fingers above the stone again, reversing the effect, then taking out two wristbands with similar dark-violet stones out of another pocket of his coat and unleashing the second Mega Wave with one of them. - They are fragile, dependant on Master Stone - one per several devices, have limited worktime until shutdown, require some time to relax between activations to prevent malfunctions, often need repairs... In short, there are still many problems with them. However, once I iron those problems out, I might consider putting them on sale - our kingdom will really benefit from it.

- Then I’ll wait, - responded K, seeing, how Alva, after three Mega Waves and successful testing of all devices, returned his Pokemon back into Pokeballs. - By the way - do you really need to say words when activating them?

- Yes, you need to, - replied violet-haired man, putting most of the Pokeballs, bar the one with his personal Gengar, back into the case and closing it. - I’m sure you won’t like it to suddenly activate just because you waved your hand the wrong way!

- Of course! - let a somewhat scary laugh Hunter. - So, what’s about the second part of payment?

- Right now, - said Alva, taking his PDA out of one of his pockets and tapping the polarized touchscreen, contents of which were invisible to anyone bar cabinet minister, several times.

- I see, - murmured K, looking at her own PDA. - However, I thought we agreed on ten millions! Of course, it’s pleasant, but...

- But I do appreciate the great quality of the Pokemon you brought to me and want to give you some bonus for such a nice work! - replied cabinet minister, giving Hunter a gentle nod and taking a case with Pokeballs in his hand. - Goodbye, Miss K.

- Goodbye, cabinet minister Alva, - said she, ordering her troops to return to the airship with a simple gesture and walking back to the frontal hatch. - I hope that some time later, you will be my customer once more.

- ...And I surely hope not to, - whispered Alva, once his was back aboard his airship.

- Boss, the K’s ship has gone flight and cloaked once again! - sounded the Levi’s voice in the intercom.

- That’s great, - replied minister, putting the case with Pokeballs on the wall bench and taking a seat on it himself. - Levi - close the hatch. Cherie - lift off and take us back home. I’ll be on the bottom deck for some time.

- As you wish, boss, - replied his two trusted henchmen. With hydraulic whirr, the cargo platform collapsed and hatch started to close, while airship started to to gain altitude. Alva spent nearly half of hour like this, but, after it, focused and took a trip back to the bridge, where Levi and Cherie were already waiting him.

- We’re glad to see you, - greeted him Levi. -"Chancellor Cocktail”, the one you like, in the cupholder. Temperature optimal and everything.

- Do you think of me like some kind of an alcoholic? - asked him Alva, placing the case and staff near his chair and then taking a seat, though not before ensuring, that control is all transferred to Cherie.

- No, boss, but we do see, how do you feel after speaking with... her, - shuddered woman.

-... You know what? You’re damn right! - replied minister, taking a shot. - Nice. Who was one preparing it?

- Me, boss, - said Levi. - Cherie couldn’t bring herself out of her seat all the time you were ashore.

- Levi, I just wanted to get out of here ASAP! - told him Cherie. - I’m sure none of us wanted to be there anymore than needed. Those autocannons and goons...

- Uh-huh, - said her co-pilot. - Cherie, by the way - would you like to try to pilot the assault ship of this K?

- Nah, I won’t exchange our little “Kamiya” for anything, - nearly purred woman, gently stroking the surface of the pilot’s station, - She serves us well and I’m used to her. Even her little cargo bay doesn’t mean anything - “Traveller-4″ class can take three time it’s own mass into air on external, and our girl was upgraded by our boss to be able to take four times her own mass.

- And the main radar breaks every two damn weeks after this damn second scanning run, when this damn Volcanion hit us with Steam Eruption, - grunted Levi. - Boss, I was outside and fiddled with it - yep, short circuit in secondary control scheme. I've replaced it and the corresponding circuit breaker, but this is a temporary solution. I think I know how to rework it, so it will at least break once in two months instead of every two weeks. Do you authorize me to do it once we are back home?

- I do, - replied Alva, making some notes in his PDA. - By the way - after we return to Azoth Kingdom, I give you two weeks of vacation and then you start training with MWDs and your new Pokemon.

- OK, boss! - said Levi and Cherie at the same time, then Levi continued. - About the Pokemon, boss - are you really happy with your purchase?

- I am, but I don't want to do business with people like that anymore, - murmured the minister before falling asleep from lack of sleep beforehand and today's stress. His henchmen exchanged looks, then continued piloting ship like if nothing happened, alllowing Alva to silently snore right on the bridge.

Weird dream is still weird

A week ago I’ve had a weirdest dream so far. This time, it wasn’t so random, so I can somewhat diverge between two plotlines of it - “Deus Ex” line and “Pokemon” line, altough there were some intersections. There is nothing really special about a Deus Ex line (aside from the part that Gunther likes to sleep in a thick socks, what I’ve learned from his computer and which I’ve found in his hightstand), but it left overall impression that it was somehow tied to the Pokemon world through conspiracies and stuff (which was confirmed later).

The real fun begins when we get to the Pokemon line. First of all, there was a moment, when some N/Cilan-like guy was introducing himself to the protagonists somewhere near the ruins with game-trailer like overall feel. The guy himself wasn’t interesting but the place, when he was doing it, was, because this ruins were actually Hikōkyū’s wreck! What is even more interesting, that control tower and main body were mostly left intact, but one of the rings was gone as were the antigravs (though theirs remnants might’ve just got buried under the ground - Flying Palace was lying almost on side).

The second best moment was like an a “fly-around” shot in the movies, but now camera was flying between the rings of an airship, which could be easily called “Hikōkyū 2”. Why 2? Because it had a different sets of a propellers, some of the horizontal-propulsion props were also installed on the rings (unlike original, where all of them were mounted only on a main body of the ship), vertical-propulsion props were installed on the very short spindles and some of the additional propellers were gathered in the tight clusters. During the camera’s passing, all of the props were working hard, so, it left an impression that the Lawrence III (of course) was going to do something special, although not necessary linked to the Legendaries or Pokemon altogether.

The final moment was me (as an Adam Jensen), someone other and a Pokemon Trainer (protagonist from this dream game) inside a huge room, which was pretty similar to the Flying Palace’s (first one) exhibition hall, although far smaller. My impression (and an Adam’s map) confirmed, that this room was, in fact, one of the “Hikōkyū 2” rooms, and it was on one of the lower floors/decks. Our small team started to move out in hope of meeting Lawrence III and asking him some questions (Adam - about Illuminati and such, Trainer - don’t know, but definitely not something like Misty asked - overall, it felt like he wanted to get a few tips from the Collector, third person - no data) and, at this very moment, I awoke.

Memory, part 4 (mini-fic).

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Accessing “GY-PLFU-LOG-1″ datafile…

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Goncharenko Yevgeniy, personal bioresearch log.

Third stage.

07.01.425 AFE, 22:49

I’m very worried about Liya. For this entire week, she remains depressed after what happened during the celebration of the New Year. I know, I might’ve been a little harsh, but I never... Could it be linked to her empathic abilities? I think I need to investigate that. In meantime, I think I’ll try to contact Biganskiy Sergey and ask him to install new firmware in our terminals. I’m fed up with those glitches. Also, the amount of work during this time was insane. Wish I could spend more time with her...

[Attached files: personal observation and log datafile, general health monitoring datafile, optical and thermographic photos, full biological screening record datafile, Liya’s personal terminal activity log datafile]

Compulink system deactivated.

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- Liya, - said human, exiting the cleanroom’s airlock and dressing into the normal suit.

*Yes?* - replied apathetic human-disguised Latias, who was sitting on the nearby bench.

- Arcanists contacted me again, inviting us to excursion in their sector, subsector 4-24. The way to it lies through the monorail transport system, which passes through the decent part of the facility. I know, it’s mostly tunnels, but there are some nice places to see.

*Ah.*

- Come on, it’s not like we have something better to do for the rest of this day, - tried to cheer her up human, but it barely had an effect, so he continued. - Look, I know, I may’ve been a little harsh back during the New Year, but...

*But I’ve felt how you’ve felt! This horryfying feeling of helplessness, thoughts drifting apart and overall - I’ve felt every last moment of it! And it was me, who’ve cause you to suffer it!* - lashed Liya out, then dropped her head in her hands, starting to cry. - *It all was me... Why did I have to activate that beacon?*

- Liya, please, understand - I was less angry for what’s happened to me and much more scared about what could’ve happened to you! After all, - Yevgeniy’s voice dropped, - you’re the only one, whom I can call “child”.

*Why?* - replied confused Eon Pokemon.

- Because I’m infertile and can’t have kids normal way. I’ve poured more than a decade of research in creating you and making sure the usual biological problems won’t haunt you, like they haunt me, - said microbiologist in even more grim voice. - You may not be the Ultimate Lifeform, but it still counts, I guess. You’re stronger than your normal cousins, smarter, faster, have greater endurance, thrice the normal lifespan, which, considering your power, is astonishingly long, and so on, and so on. I just want you to be safe, after all I’ve done to you.

Latias remained silent, tears forming in her eyes. Being empath, she felt every last of his feelings behind those words. He truly, absolutely cared about her and wanted her to just be safe and happy.

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-... And here’s our prototyping lab for robots, - said the arcanist, gesturing at several three-dimensional printers and automatic assembly machines. - It can create robots up to ten on ten on ten meters in size. So far, there were very few robots, which don’t fit, so, they were forced to be manufactured in parts and assembled elsewhere.

*And what were those robots?* - asked him Liya, who was slowly, but surely regaining her interest to life.

- Barely anything worth mentioning: automated excavator and tunneling machine, UAV... Huh, there’s, actually, a pretty interesting one - the Imposer, a levitator-lifted heavy unmanned aerial fire support unit. Two frontal Ion Driver Cannons with great firing angles, one rear Ion Driver Cannon with similatily great angles, airburst charge launcher and underslung Matter Distortion Cannon, protection - Light Screen projectors and pseudo-matter barriers. It’s placed in the Hangar Five right now.

- MDC? Isn’t it, like, one of the greatest power hogs created? - wondered microbiologist.

- It is. In fact, the Imposer lacks the suitable energy source right now and needs a thick cable, connected to the local power distribution hub, to stay powered. Of course, our Division works on it, but the project is still in the very early stages. If you want to know more, ask about the D-type Power Drive. OK, so, now you can proceed to the firing range number five, where our newest more-or-less finished creation will be tested.

*Okay,* - agreed Latias, walking together with her “father” towards the next zone. While she was forced to spend a lot of time here in the human-like form, she didn’t mind it much.

The firing range itself looked... bland. A well-protected balcony, where they’ve stood, and a high, long concrete tunnel, on the far end of which the target was placed.

- Warning, combatron’s firing arcane cannon, clear the range! Repeat, combatron’s firing arcane cannon, clear the range! - sounded announcement from the loudspeakers.

*Combatron?* - asked puzzled Latias. - *What’s that?*

- Heck if I know, - replied scientist, looking at the test range. Mere seconds after announcement, an uncanny-looking and definitely arcane tech-based six-limbed robot jumped on the range, switched to bipedal walking mode, then it’s cylindrical head started glowing bright blue and opened somewhat like a backwards flower, then...

-... Wow, - whispered microbiologist, looking at what was previously meter-and-half-thick cube of solid reinforced armor concrete, but now was reduced to molten slag, along with two meters or so of normal concrete and rock behind it. - Such power in such a small platform.

- And it drains arcane energy like no tomorrow, especially on this mode, - responded Chugun, who has somehow managed to silently get close to them. - On full power mode, combatron can only fire the Assault Beam Cannon three times before fully depleting weapon power supply, it needs some time to cool down between shots... Prototype problems, you know.

- I doubt it’ll have to fire all of the shots, - said Yevgeniy, looking at what remained of the range again, then pointing on combatron. - Are those deployable blades on upper limbs or what?

- Yep, those are advanced cutter blades, which can be enshrouded in arcane energy to enhance cutting abilities! - proudly said full-fledged mechanical Pokemon, while combatron reverted to hexapedal locomotion mode and left the range.

- So, true killing machine. Nice. What is the purpose of it?

- Protection of our colonists and researchers, helping them in recon operations... 

- I know, I know, - waved his hand human. - Is the excursion over?

- For today - yes. Thank you for your visit!

*Bye*, - replied Liya, while she and Yevgeniy took a direction to the monorail station. For what it looked like, the amount of passengers today wasn’t exactly staggering, so Latias will be able to return to her true form during the transit.

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Accessing “LPT-LOG-1″ datafile…

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Goncharenko Liya, personal log.

08.01.425 AFE, 20:37

Today was a good day. The excursion in the Arcane Science Division Sector was interesting and fun, father’s and mine terminals are repaired an everything, in general, is nice! This revelation, though... I never knew about how much work father put into me and how he can’t have children of his own kind. That’s very sad. On the brighter side of things - I’ve felt, how much I worth to father, so, I’ll try to never fail him again!

Compulink system deactivated.