#which is good because the thing both his owner and I were dreading were GI stasis from stress

[a-polite-melody]

I missed the action, but Walnut is now taking a rest after making a nice hole in his litter box hay!

[sage-nebula]

So . . . against my better judgment, and also because of @kcgane‘s prodding, I did end up applying for the Wild Fyre Keith zine as a writer. I figure there’s probably still a slim chance I’ll get in anyway, so there’s probably not much risk, but either way, I applied.

That said, I’m sharing the samples I applied with to see what you guys think my chances are. None of them are Voltron fics (instead they’re one Yu-Gi-Oh! and two Pokémon fic samples---and before anyone groans, don’t worry, there are no card games even mentioned in the YGO sample), because I haven’t actually written any fics for Voltron before (I’ve only thought about it), but I figure that the point shouldn’t necessarily be the fandom, but rather the writing quality. So maybe take a look, and let me know what you think? (I’m also including links to the whole fics in case anyone is interested in these fics after reading the excerpts.)

Excerpts / samples below:

Sample #1:

Matsumoto let out a low, impressed whistle. "Well, serves me right for doubting you could pull it off," he said. He leaned forward to grab the bottle of alcohol—what kind it was, Jounouchi couldn't tell—on the table, and slid it across the surface toward Jounouchi. "Here's to you, kid. Have one, on me."

Jounouchi didn't bother to hide his disgust. "Pass," he said.

Matsumoto looked at him in open surprise, and Hirutani spared him one acidic glare before he looked to Matsumoto with an apologetic smile. "You'll have to forgive my boy," he said. "He hasn't yet learned how to speak to his betters."

My 'betters,' Jounouchi thought disparagingly, as Matsumoto laughed. Show me someone who's better and I'll show you how I talk.

Then again, he thought, as Matsumoto and Hirutani moved on to another topic, while Matsumoto was a petty bastard with yakuza dealings and Hirutani was a backstabbing, blackmailing, drug dealing, sadistic, equally as petty asshole, they weren't the only ones he had a habit of mouthing off to. His stomach twisted as he thought of Yuugi's face that day two months ago when he'd ended their friendship, and his throat felt thick when he remembered how earnestly Yuugi had looked at him not a half hour ago, how he again harshly told Yuugi to stay out of his life even as Yuugi had the misguided notion that Jounouchi could—or should—be "saved." Yuugi hadn't known about the hard drive in Jounouchi's pocket, hadn't known about the money he'd stolen despite the fact that the hard drive was the only thing he'd been sent after. He hadn't known that, however much he viewed Jounouchi as a worthwhile friend, as someone good, Jounouchi was anything but. Yuugi was selfless, kind, and honest. He was everything Jounouchi could never hope to be, and yet, even before he had fallen right back into Hirutani's toxic spiral, Jounouchi didn't think he'd ever really shown Yuugi the gratitude he should have for that second chance.

Jounouchi lit his cigarette and took a drag. Maybe Hirutani had a point after all.

". . . look forward to future dealings," Matsumoto said, and Jounouchi looked up in time to see him reach across the table and shake Hirutani's hand. Both of them had stood up while Jounouchi was lost in thought, and Jounouchi figured that he was probably expected to as well, as a form of "courtesy" or "politeness" or "etiquette" or whatever. He leaned back further on the couch and exhaled the smoke from his cigarette.

Matsumoto looked over at him. "I also look forward to seeing what you continue to bring to the table, Joutou-kun. I'm sure we can expect great things."

"Sure," Jounouchi said. He supposed Matsumoto's definition of "great" differed from his own.

Hirutani walked Matsumoto to the door, and Jounouchi frowned as Matsumoto nodded and exited the lounge without Hirutani. It occurred to him only as Hirutani shut and locked the door that Matsumoto was the owner of the bar. Wasn't this backwards? Shouldn't they be the ones getting the hell out of his place?

Hirutani turned and leaned back against the door, and his eyes were narrowed in seething rage as he stared down at Jounouchi on the couch. Jounouchi knew that look, and he suppressed a groan as he let his head fall back on the couch and shut his eyes.

His thoughts were torn between god fuck, here we go and I don't care, I don't care, I don't care, I don't—

"Where were you tonight?" Hirutani asked. His voice was quiet, level, but it held all the tension of a suppressed spring. Jounouchi tapped his foot in a rapid beat against the floor to try and channel his excess energy, and took another hit off his cigarette before he answered.

"You know where I was," he said as he exhaled. He ashed his cigarette over the floor. The ash tray was all the way across the table; too far to reach for some near-yakuza sleaze's lounge. "I was getting that hard drive thing for Matsumoto."

"After that," Hirutani said. "You were forty minutes late. Where were you during that time?"

"On my way here," Jounouchi said, and it wasn't a lie, either. Aside from that little backtracked detour in the park . . .

"And that's all you did? You came straight here?"

Two months ago, when Hirutani had first pulled Jounouchi back into his gang, he'd told him to never ask questions he already knew the answer to. It seemed to Jounouchi that Hirutani was making himself out to be something of a hypocrite now, but he had a feeling that it wasn't going to be to his benefit.

"Yep," he said.

"And that blood on your hand," Hirutani said, and he nodded toward Jounouchi as his eyes flicked toward Jounouchi's right hand. "That came from nowhere, did it?"

Jounouchi followed Hirutani's gaze, and dread dropped in his stomach like a sack of lead at the sight of the blood smeared across his knuckles. He hadn't even thought about the blood that had poured from the nose of Yuugi's mugger in the heat of the moment, hadn't even considered that some of it had gotten on him, hadn't even thought about it because it wasn't like it was the first time he got blood on him . . .

"It came from the guy," he said finally, and he tried to focus on the staccato rhythm he was tapping out with his foot, or the fact that he'd almost finished with his cigarette and kind of already wanted another. "You know, that business dude I had to get the hard drive from. I told you I knocked him out."

Hirutani raised his eyebrows. "You didn't wear gloves?" he asked, and Jounouchi had to stop himself from squeezing his cigarette hard enough to crumble it in his fingers. Shit. "You left prints?"

"No, I wasn't dumb enough to leave prints. I had gloves on for that. I . . ."

"You what? You took off your gloves in the car, knocked the man out, put them back on to steal the hard drive, and then took them off again?" Hirutani asked, and Jounouchi really hadn't needed him to spell it out to realize how stupid it sounded. He took another drag of his cigarette. "You're a piss-poor liar, Jounouchi. I'm only going to ask you one more time. Where were you between getting that hard drive for Matsumoto and coming here?"

Jounouchi allowed himself a brief moment of bitter reflection on the fact that, despite apparently being a piss-poor liar, he'd managed to fool Anzu, Honda, and Yuugi well enough two months ago. On reflex, he reached up to run a hand through his hair, but stopped himself short when he realized it was a waste of time given how short it was now. He settled for raking his nails against the back of his neck instead.

"Fine, you caught me," he said. "I got in a fight in the park. Happy?"

"With who?" Hirutani demanded.

"Why does it matter?" Jounouchi shot back. "I got what you—what Matsumoto wanted. I ditched my gloves, coat, and the hat I wore in the water off the docks." Which sucked, because even if he wouldn't miss the hat, that winter coat and those gloves had been the only ones he owned. Winter was going to suck ass this year. "Mission accomplished, no evidence to tie me to it. So I got in a fight on the way back and was a little late. So what? Shouldn't matter so long as I got the job done."

Hirutani crossed his arms, his nostrils flaring. It was a warning sign, but one that Jounouchi didn't care to heed. "When I want your opinion on what does or doesn't matter, I'll ask for it. And don't," he snarled, as Jounouchi leaned forward to grind his used up cigarette into the table, "put that out on the table, you fucking dipshit. Use the goddamn ash tray."

"Oh sure," Jounouchi said, as he pushed himself up off the couch to walk over to the end of the table. "You'll pass coke off on middle schoolers, but god forbid I put my cigarette out on the coffee table. Nice to see you've got your priorities straight."

"One of us has to," Hirutani said, and Jounouchi rolled his eyes as he ground his cigarette into the bottom of the ash tray instead. "Now answer my question. Who did you fight in the park?"

"My god, you sound like a jealous chick," Jounouchi said, and he pushed his voice up a couple octaves. "'Where were you tonight? Who were you with?'" He crossed his arms to stop himself for reaching for another smoke and gave Hirutani a caustic look in the face of the livid glare he was receiving. "If you're gonna act like my clingy girlfriend, at least buy me dinner first."

For all that Hirutani had pitched a fit about the prospect of Jounouchi putting his cigarette out on the coffee table, he had no qualms about stomping on it himself. With speed that belied his size, Hirutani bounded over the coffee table and shoved Jounouchi back against the wall.

"Watch your mouth," Hirutani snapped, and Jounouchi forced a laugh as Hirutani growled, "Last chance, Jounouchi. Who did you fight?"

"Last chance before what?" Jounouchi asked, and as Hirutani's lips pulled back in a soundless snarl that told Jounouchi he was about to reach for his knife, Jounouchi heaved an exasperated sigh. "Why the fuck does it matter? Why do you care? It was just a random asshole in the park whose face I decided to break. It's not a big deal."

"I care because you chose to piss away your time doing that instead of your job," Hirutani said. "You had one job—"

"And I did it," Jounouchi said, glaring right back in the face of Hirutani's furious scowl.

"And you did it halfway before you decided to piss off picking fights in the park, supposedly for no reason. You were told to get the hard drive and get back here. You did half of that—"

"Did you not see me hand over that hard drive when I walked in? Because if not, you could have fooled me from the way you were staring at me nearly the whole goddamn time—"

"When you walked in, forty minutes late. What part of this is too difficult for you to wrap your head around? Your job was to get the hard drive and get back here on time—"

"Because Matsumoto seemed real broken up that I got here late—"

"God damn it, that is not the fucking point!" Hirutani slammed his fist into the wall beside them. Jounouchi didn't flinch. Hirutani glared at him, teeth bared, before he shut his eyes and scrubbed his hand down his face, breathing through his teeth. "Do you have any idea what that looks like to a man like him?" he asked quietly. "Do you understand what it is that I'm trying to do here? What it is that I did here tonight?"

"I get that it's more of your usual bullshit," Jounouchi said. Hirutani opened his eyes to glower at him.

"Now that I've done this for him, he owes me a favor," Hirutani said, his words careful and deliberate. "I can cash in at any time. More importantly, he knows that I'm reliable. If he needs a service again, he can deal again to get it done. In return, he'll owe more. Those totals will stack. With more credibility comes more power. And given the influence he has, that is credibility and power that I can use." Hirutani narrowed his eyes. "Do you see now? Do you see what it is that I've done? Do you see what it is that you could have easily fucked up with the stupid ass way you decided to act tonight?"

Jounouchi gave him a flat stare before he pushed past Hirutani to head to the other side of the room. Space. He needed space. Room to breathe. "I see that you're going on about your accomplishments when you didn't actually do much," he said, and he made his voice as casual as he could given the way adrenaline was making his pulse spike. "All things considered, I'm pretty sure I'm the one any favors should be owed to."

Hirutani snorted. "Nice joke."

Jounouchi turned and raised his eyebrows. "Uh, excuse me, but who's the one that actually went out and got the damn thing? Because I'm pretty sure that was me."

"Who's the one that sent you?" Hirutani fired back. "Who's the one who knew that you'd be the best man suited for the job? Who's the one who is in charge?" Jounouchi bit his tongue to keep himself from replying, and in his silence Hirutani said, "You can fight, but that's all you've got. You're nothing unless someone with brains comes along to be your handler, and that someone is me."

Jounouchi was far from the smartest guy in the world, and he both knew and had accepted this fact a long time ago. But he still balled his fingers into fists as he glared at Hirutani and said in a low voice, "I can handle myself."

Hirutani scoffed. "Yeah, you handled yourself real well when you swaggered in here forty minutes late," he said, and Jounouchi rolled his eyes. "You handled yourself real well when you decided it was a smart idea to give Matsumoto a dumbass alias when he asked for your name—"

"He's yakuza," Jounouchi said. "Or near enough."

"That didn't seem to matter a whole lot to you when you were mouthing off and ignoring him in equal turn," Hirutani said, and Jounouchi scowled at the coffee table. He didn't have a real response to that. "It didn't seem to matter when you were a stupid enough pissant to refuse the drink he offered you—"

"I don't drink," Jounouchi said sharply, because even if there was truth in that maybe he should have watched his mouth a little better to avoid bringing the yakuza down on his head, he wasn't about to chug booze for them. "You know that."

"What I know is that when a man like Matsumoto offers you something, you don't say no," Hirutani said, and Jounouchi held his ground as Hirutani stalked a few paces toward him. "You don't have the luxury of refusing someone like that. If he says drink, you drink. For that matter, if I say drink, you drink. I brought you in as my number two, but—and here's a refresher since you seem to keep forgetting—that means that I am still your boss. So if I decide to have you toss back a couple beers—or if I want you to have a drink with Matsumoto—guess what?" Hirutani took another step closer, and Jounouchi crossed his arms to keep from slugging him. "You're going to do it."

Jounouchi scoffed. "The fuck I am," he said, and fury flared in Hirutani's eyes. "I won't even drink soda around you after the roofie incident, much less—"

Hirutani rolled his eyes. "That was one time—"

"One time is enough, asshole!"

"—and it was almost a year ago. Get over it." Hirutani gave him a cold look. "Or don't. I don't really care what you think, Jounouchi. I care what you do. And what you're going to do is whatever I tell you to do, no questions asked or backtalk given. Are we clear?"

The appropriate answer, Jounouchi knew, as his heart worked double time to pump adrenaline into his muscles, was 'yes.' The better answer, the one that would stroke Hirutani's god complex and make him higher than an entire bottle of ecstasy could, was 'yes sir.' But, Jounouchi figured, what made him so stupid wasn't that he never knew the right answers. It was that he often knew what the right answer was, but then deliberately chose the wrong one anyway.

"Fuck you," he said.

Jounouchi was momentarily blinded as Hirutani's fist crashed into his eye. The force of the blow knocked him back, his leg smacking into the corner of the coffee table as his cheekbone throbbed, and he barely had time to blink the spots from his eyes before Hirutani swung again. Jounouchi jumped back a few steps, both to dodge the strike and to move into the open area on the other side of the table. More room to move, more room to fight.

The problem, if it could be called that, was that they were more or less evenly matched. Hirutani was stronger, but Jounouchi was faster; Jounouchi was able to weave and duck around blows that Hirutani couldn't avoid, even as Hirutani was able to better withstand Jounouchi's fists every time Jounouchi socked him in the face. Ten minutes into their fight and Jounouchi's head was throbbing while Hirutani's mouth was freely bleeding and his right eye was swelling, but still Jounouchi ducked under another one of Hirutani's swings to move back toward the center of the room, his fists raised to block if he couldn't dodge, and that was when he noticed the thing sticking out of Hirutani's pocket.

He looked up in time to see Hirutani's fist rocketing toward his face—

Jounouchi caught Hirutani's fist and used Hirutani's own momentum against him, dragging him back toward the wall. Jounouchi was briefly pinned, but he wrenched himself free to twist around Hirutani again, his free hand palming Hirutani's knife out of his pocket on the way. Hirutani grabbed Jounouchi's arm, but Jounouchi twisted in his grip and slammed his foot against Hirutani's kneecap, and the pain—however brief—was enough to make Hirutani let go.

Jounouchi flipped the knife in his hand.

He'd never really fought with weapons before. They were cheap, as far as he was concerned. People who relied on weapons were people who couldn't kick enough ass with their fists. There were exceptions to the rule, of course; he was no stranger to using pool cues or chairs when he was faced with too many opponents that had too many size advantages on him back when he was a punk middle schooler who had a habit of picking just that kind of fight. But things like knives, things like guns . . . they weren't his style. He was too good at what he did to rely on things like that.

But this had to end. Hirutani turned to face him, a dangerous grin tilting his lips, and Jounouchi ran his tongue along his teeth, tasting blood. Not just this fight—this whole thing had to end, and if he could end it here, end it now—

Once again, Hirutani came at him. Jounouchi skirted to the side, and when Hirutani turned, Jounouchi slugged him with his opposite hand. It wasn't his dominant arm, but it worked; Hirutani stumbled back, and Jounouchi pressed his advantage, throwing his full weight against Hirutani to knock them both down to the floor, Hirutani pinned beneath him. Hirutani's head was against the wall.

Jounouchi raised the knife.

He could end it. He could. One stab was all it would take. One to the throat. He wouldn't get up from that. If he stabbed—if he killed Hirutani—that would be it, it'd be the end, he'd be dead and Jounouchi would never have to—no one would ever have to—

He swallowed, tightened his grip on the knife handle. His hand was shaking—adrenaline—and he raised it higher—

It occurred to him a second too late that Hirutani had been oddly still, watching him—and his hesitation, his late realization, cost him. Hirutani shoved him back, and a half second later kicked Jounouchi hard enough in the ribs to, he was pretty sure, at least splinter some of them. Jounouchi was thrown backward, and when his back hit the floor he lost his grip on the knife. It fell somewhere, but he had no time to see where as Hirutani threw himself on top of Jounouchi, straddling him, pinning him, pain searing across Jounouchi's ribs at the added weight, one of Hirutani's hands around his throat, the other holding his right arm down—

God, he couldn't breathe; Jounouchi grasped at Hirutani's hand with his left hand, trying to pry Hirutani's fingers off his throat, only for Hirutani to squeeze tighter. With the way he was straddled, he couldn't kick him off; his head spun and every time he tried to breathe, tried to cough or choke or gasp for more air, all he felt was pain, more pain and he couldn't—he couldn't—he couldn't breathe and needed Hirutani off, needed him to get off, get off, get off get off get—!

Jounouchi coughed and sputtered as Hirutani released some of the pressure—just enough to let Jounouchi breathe. Hirutani kept Jounouchi pinned beneath him, and as some of the dizziness faded, Jounouchi became aware of the fact that Hirutani was talking to him. Maybe he had been the entire time he had him pinned there.

". . . gave you the perfect opportunity, and you wasted it," Hirutani said. "You're soft, Jounouchi. Weak. You don't have it in you to kill. Not yet. It's in your best interest if you don't try, because unlike you, I won't hesitate."

Jounouchi glared at him. "I'm not—" His words were cut off as Hirutani tightened the pressure again, and he coughed when Hirutani loosened his grip.

"You are," he said. "Soft. Weak. Worthless as you are now for the things we're doing. For where we're headed. You want to talk about how Matsumoto's yakuza? Where do you think you'll be in a couple years, give or take? Provided you don't fuck everything up, of course."

Yakuza. The thought made bile rise in Jounouchi's throat, but then, that might've also been due to the guy strangling him. The last time Hirutani had him pinned like this—years ago, back in middle school—he'd held Jounouchi's arms, but it seemed that since then he'd learned—

"I'm done with petty gangs, Jounouchi. I'm better than that. You are, too—or you will be. Once I finally break you." Hirutani leaned closer, and Jounouchi ground his teeth together to bite back a gasp as pain flared in his cracked ribs. "I don't know what it's going to take to do it, but I'll find it. I'll break you, and then remake you. By the time I'm done . . ." He laughed softly. "The yakuza will be bowing to make way for us."

"Who says I want to be with the fucking yakuza?" Jounouchi spat, and Hirutani snorted.

"What makes you think you have a choice?" he asked. "In case you've forgotten—again—I decide your future. I decide where you go, what you do, how and when you do it. And I've decided you're to be my number two, no matter how many times you make me hurt you."

Jounouchi scoffed a laugh. "I make you—"

"Yeah, you make me. What the hell else do you call this?" Hirutani shook his head in disgust. "You know the deal, Jounouchi. You know our agreement, and you continue to fight me. The sooner you give in, the easier this will be. You know that. I know that. If you weren't so damn stubborn, you'd admit it."

Jounouchi said nothing. He glowered at Hirutani for several long seconds, before Hirutani finally pulled back a little, his thumb stroking underneath Jounouchi's jaw.

"You'll learn," he said, and it almost sounded more like he was talking to himself. "One way or another, I will make you understand. And when you do, you'll be better for it." He met Jounouchi's eyes. "You'll see."

Hirutani pushed himself up, and once he finally—fucking finally—released his hold on Jounouchi's throat, Jounouchi pushed himself up, ready and raring to knock the shit out of him—

Only to have Hirutani stomp down on Jounouchi's ribs—his fucking ribs, god fuck!—and pin him back to the floor.

"You're done for tonight," he said coldly. "You're not ruthless enough. Not yet. You will be—I swear on my mother's rotting corpse I'll drag it out of you if I have to break every bone in your body first—but you're not yet. Give it up, Jounouchi. We're done here."

Jounouchi forced himself to smirk, and propped himself up on his elbows despite the boot on his chest. Fucking hell, if his ribs weren't broken before— "And then I'll get to cut your fucking throat out, right?"

Hirutani huffed a laugh, and turned away. Jounouchi watched as Hirutani picked up his knife, tossed it once in the air, and then caught it again before he slipped it into his pocket.

"You'll at least be able," he said. "But you won't."

Don't bet on that, Jounouchi thought savagely.

Hirutani made his way toward the door, unlocked it, and paused just before stepping out.

"By the way," he said, and he didn't turn to look back as he did, "if I find out that you were with any of your little Domino High friends during your random stint in the park tonight, then so help me, the next time you see them will be at their funerals." Jounouchi's heart felt frozen in his chest as Hirutani turned to throw a caustic smirk over his shoulder. "But don't worry. I'll buy you dinner first."

 From: Whispers in the Dark, ch. 3, “In the Details With the Devil”

Sample #2:

Nestled at the base of a mountain so far in the woods off the standard trail of Route 10 that it would take less of a map and more of a mercy from the Fates to find, Isolé Village carried the air of a town that was unaware that time was supposed to move forward at a decent kip. The lack of cellular reception that made Fulbert groan and grumble as he stuffed his pokégear back into his pocket aside, all of the buildings in the village (settlement might have been a better word for it, really—a little cluster of buildings contained within the small pocket created by the trees and mountain range at the back) looked to be at least thirty years out of style with the rest of the architecture in Kalos. Most of the buildings were fashioned out of wood (which was, Augustine thought, the primary reason why they had so much trouble with the houndour raid), and those that weren’t were constructed from stone. Choice in material aside, no house was greater than one story, and none of the businesses (of which there seemed to be only one of each variety: a general mart, a diner, a pharmacy . . .) looked big enough to contain more than one main room for business and perhaps one room in back for storage. There were no Pokémon Centers in sight.

But even with the rustic architecture and construction of the tiny village, it was clear that the reason why it looked as if it was falling apart had less to do with the fact that it was doubtful any new construction had taken place over the last several decades, and more to do with the fact that most of the buildings contained within it had been set on fire very recently. Scorch marks streaked the earth, leaving large dirt trails where it was evident grass used to grow, and soot was caked into the stone of the fountain in the center of town. Most of the buildings had holes that had been temporarily patched over with tarps or mismatched boards, and there were great black marks on the sides and front of nearly every building where it was clear a fire had been hastily put out. Half of the general store sign was missing so that it read GENER instead, and there was a sign on the door of the diner that read, CLOSED DUE TO HOUNDOUR PANTRY INVASION.

“Seems like we found the right place,” Fulbert said, though he looked disgruntled as he patted the pocket that contained his pokégear. “Even if we’re about thirty years too early.”

“It would be kind of ironic if a pack of houndour we were tracking just so happened to come raid the same village once every thirty years, wouldn’t it?” Augustine asked, and he grinned. “Particularly considering that I wouldn’t have been born yet.”

“Neither would I,” Fulbert said, indignant. “We’re the same age.”

“Are we?” Augustine asked, and his smile grew as Fulbert’s scowl deepened. “Oh, that’s right! I forgot again, my mistake. Well, what do you say we put that behind us and find the mayor of this humble town so we can get this show on the road?”

Fulbert looked as if he wanted to rise to Augustine’s teasing and press the point, but his distaste for being in such a remote area won out over his annoyance. “Fine. Sooner we get the info we need, the sooner we can find the houndour and get out of the sticks. I’m in.”

Augustine beamed. “That’s the spirit!”

Fulbert shook his head as he turned and started deeper into the village, attracting more than a few stares from the townspeople (who were, in contrast to the state of their hamlet, dressed in reasonably modern clothing if several years out of current fashions). But no matter how disgruntled his colleague was, Augustine couldn’t keep the grin off his own face.

Fulbert was not wrong when he pointed out that they were the same age, and if one wanted to be technical, Fulbert was actually several months younger. But aside from being built like an ursaring and sporting a beard that could make a hiker feel like a youngster, Fulbert had a habit of examining every situation with the same attitude a middle-aged man might take to newspapers bearing stories of rambunctious youth setting up underground rollerblading clubs in the local parks. No matter the situation, there was a serious and often grave angle to it that Fulbert was sure to spot and grouch about within the first five minutes of examining it. He was physically capable of smiling and laughing, of course, but his usual state of perpetual grump made it difficult for Augustine not to try and prod the fun out of him every now and again. That they had been roommates in university and had decided to partner up to aid in each other in their various areas of research after school only made it more irresistible.

This venture was one such joint project of theirs. For the past three years Augustine and Fulbert had been tracking several different species of pokémon around the Kalos region. Fulbert’s area of research focused primarily on regional variations within different species—whether or not species that were born and raised in certain areas would have varying capabilities or markings compared with species born and raised in other areas, and other such hypotheses of that nature. Augustine, meanwhile, was intrigued by the concept of mega evolution (something which had very little evidence documented for it so far and which Fulbert had warned was not likely to result in a breakthrough big enough to sustain Augustine’s profession, but Augustine waved his concerns off), and was intent on following houndour given that its evolution, houndoom, was one of the pokémon that historical records said could mega evolve. Perhaps by studying houndour, Augustine could stumble across a clue that would help him progress his research. (And if not, well, it was fun to tag and track houndour, so it wasn’t as if he was really wasting his time anyway.)

But while the houndour had kept to their standard areas along Route 10 in the previous years, this year Augustine received an e-mail pleading for help from the mayor of Isolé Village, claiming that a pack of wild houndour had rampaged through and destroyed half the town. (How they managed an internet connection at all in such a remote location puzzled Augustine and Fulbert both, but Augustine was curious to find out.) Worried that it was their houndour pack, Augustine and Fulbert set out to investigate, and when their pack was missing from their normal dens, they opted to begin their search with the village and spread out from there to find out what had driven their pups off course.

It was likely going to be easier said than done, as Fulbert feared, but Augustine was looking forward to the adventure.

The mayor’s residence was, according to her e-mail, nearer to the back of the village, positioned just in front of the well. That was where they headed and where they found (who Augustine assumed to be) her, carrying a laundry basket containing a moving bundle of sheets as she made her way across the town square.

“Excuse me!” Augustine called, and when she looked up he waved and offered her a bright smile. “Would you happen to be Mayor Gosselin, by chance?”

“Yes, and you . . . oh!” the mayor’s face brightened as she took in Augustine’s and Fulbert’s lab coats, and she shifted the laundry basket so that it was tucked under her arm instead. The bundle of blankets inside of it continued to shift and move around. “Are you the professors? Professor Sycamore, and . . . ?”

“Fulbert. I’m a colleague of Professor Sycamore’s,” Fulbert said, shaking the mayor’s hand in turn.

The mayor beamed widely at the pair of them. “It’s a pleasure to meet you both. Thank you so much for coming out. I’m impressed you managed to find us so quickly!”

“So am I,” Fulbert muttered, “considering it’s so far out in the—”

“We’re both well-traveled, and we’re familiar with the area due to our research, so all it took was a little extra legwork and determination to find you all,” Augustine cut in. The mayor gave Fulbert a bemused look for a moment before she smiled gratefully at Augustine once again.

“Well as I said, we’re so grateful you could make it. Here, come with me; I’ll fix you both up a cup of . . . tea or coffee, whichever you prefer, and we can have ourselves a talk about the current situation. Whatever help you can provide we’d be most grateful for.”

“We’ll certainly do what we can,” Augustine said, and he motioned for Fulbert to follow the mayor first as she led the way back to her home. Fulbert rolled his eyes but followed Augustine’s gesture, and Augustine grinned.

The mayor’s home had, thankfully, seemed to be spared the worst of the damage caused by the houndour pack. There were only a few errant scorch marks marring the wood on the outside, and the inside seemed clean, open, and inviting. Potted plants hung in the corners of the living room, and while the coffee table was crafted from aged oak, the small, lacy table cloth fitted over it was charming, and there were coasters protecting the surface from any condensation caused by glasses. Augustine and Fulbert took seats on the sofa (Fulbert looking a bit uncomfortable, no doubt to the quaint furnishings), and the mayor set the laundry basket she had been carrying on one of the chairs nearest the door before she headed into the kitchen.

“What would you gentlemen like?” she called. “Tea? Coffee?”

“Whichever would be easiest for you,” Augustine said. “Would you like some help?”

“Oh no, you’re our guests! What sort of hostess would I be if I had you serve yourselves, hm? Besides, so long as you can help rid us of that houndour menace, you’ll be helping more than enough, trust me.”

“Don’t know ‘rid you of’ is the phrasing I’d use,” Fulbert said beneath his breath, tapping his fingers against his legs.

“So long as we discover what attracted them to the village in the first place, we can modify it and she—the village won’t know the difference,” Augustine replied, using the same undertone. “Though I agree, her word choice could be a little better.”

Fulbert grunted, but otherwise didn’t reply.

They were quiet for the next few minutes as the mayor prepared their drinks in the kitchen, Augustine surveying the room as Fulbert drummed his fingers against his thighs. Every now and then the laundry basket on the chair would wobble and shake, and Augustine felt his curiosity gnawing at him like a pikachu on a frayed wire. Just when he was about to get up and investigate it (manners be damned) the mayor entered the room with a tea tray and three cups, which she set on the table before them.

“Here we are! Three nice cups of tea,” she said. Augustine and Fulbert both sat up to take theirs as the mayor sat down in the only remaining empty seat. As she did so, the laundry basket shook again, wobbling ominously. Augustine watched it before he looked over at the mayor, who raised her eyebrows at him.

“What is—?”

Before he could finish his sentence something burst up through the bundle of sheets in the basket, startling Fulbert enough so that he splashed his tea on himself with a hissed profanity. As he grabbed a napkin off the tea tray to help himself, Augustine saw that the creature previously in the basket was a bunnelby, which bounded over to the coffee table, nose twitching.

“So you’ve finally decided to come out now that you know something’s been prepared, have you?” the mayor said, her tone caught somewhere between stern and amused. The bunnelby’s ears twitched, and he looked at her hopefully. She shook her head. “No, that tea is for our guests. You know where you can find your own food.”

The bunnelby pouted, but then bounded around the sofa to head to another part of the house.

“A laundry basket is an interesting choice of carrier for your pokémon,” Augustine said, smiling, and the mayor laughed as Fulbert wadded up the napkin he had used to clean the tea from himself and stuffed it in his pocket.

“Oh, he isn’t mine. He’s wild. We have bunnelby all over the village. They seem to like infesting our laundry most of all, but really they scamper every which way they can.” She shrugged. “We used to think of them as pests, but they’re far from our biggest and they behave better in comparison, so we don’t mind them much. We just set out food for them so they don’t get into ours.”

“Setting out food will just encourage them to stay,” Fulbert said, frowning. He glanced at Augustine. “And that might be what attracted the houndour.”

“The houndour shouldn’t want the same food the bunnelby eat, though,” Augustine said. “Unless of course they were hunting the bunnelby . . . but I don’t see why they would go this far for prey. Route 10 didn’t seem to be suffering a lack of other pokémon.”

“They didn’t seem to be hunting the bunnelby, neither,” the mayor said, and both Augustine and Fulbert looked back to her, Augustine taking a sip of his tea (and doing his best not to grimace at the taste). “If they were, why would they attack our buildings? They ransacked the whole village, I’m sure you saw. Fires everywhere, they completely cleaned out the diner . . . it was a wonder we managed to chase them off. I’m still not sure we did. They didn’t seem intimidated by us, at any rate; one of them ripped Maurice’s broom from his hands and destroyed the thing.”

“Was it a wooden broom?” Fulbert asked.

The mayor gave him a quizzical look. “Yes, why?”

“Why would Maurice, whoever he is, try and chase off a houndour with a wooden broom?” Fulbert demanded, and the mayor opened her mouth as if to rebut, but didn’t manage to say anything before he said, “Houndour are fire-types. Even if one of them didn’t take it, they could have just set it on fire. Then he’d be holding a flaming broom and the houndour would still be there. What part of that seems like a good idea?”

“That aside,” Augustine said, as the mayor drew herself up in an offended huff, “can you think of anything specific the houndour did, or seemed to be doing? Did it look as if it was a coordinated hunt? Did you notice any odd behavior from them—any stumbling, dizzy or confused movements, unusual salivating—anything like that?”

“Not that I can remember, but I’m not the most familiar with houndour. We don’t usually see them ‘round here, and I’m not one of the ones that goes out for supply runs,” the mayor said. “They just seemed wild to me, but I know they hit up every building before they finally headed back to the mountains.”

“Back?” Augustine exchanged a glance with Fulbert, who gave him a puzzled frown in return.

“Well, that’s where they’re from, right?” the mayor asked. “From up in the mountains?”

“Not at this time of year, no, and definitely not when they came through here. They should have still been back on Route 10,” Fulbert said.

“But their usual dens were empty. It did seem as if they moved on, though there was no hint as to why . . .” Augustine set his teacup back on the tray. He wasn’t going to finish it. “They must have moved on early. The reason why is likely related to whatever it was that compelled them to come through here.”

“You’re sure you don’t know anything?” Fulbert asked the mayor, and Augustine discreetly kicked his ankle as an admonishment for his rude tone. Fulbert didn’t so much as twitch. “Anything at all?”

“Like I said, I’m just not familiar with houndour. None of us are. All I know is that when they were done they booked it back to the mountains,” the mayor said. “I can show you the path, if you’d like.”

Fulbert opened his mouth—to turn down her offer, if Augustine knew him, and Augustine did—but Augustine cut across him before he could reply. “That would be most helpful, thank you.”

The mayor smiled, and set her own teacup down on the tea tray. “Certainly, Professor. Come with me, and I’ll show you the way at once.”

She rose from her chair and headed toward the front door, and as Fulbert set his own (empty, amazingly) teacup down on the tea tray with the other two, he hissed, “It’s not like the mountains are hidden or hard to find. We can get there ourselves.”

“There’s no reason to turn down her offer, especially since she couldn’t give us much other information,” Augustine replied, his own voice barely above a whisper. “Be nice and let her help, it won’t hurt you.”

Fulbert made a sound deep in his throat that sounded an awful lot like harumph (which was, in Augustine’s dignified and educated opinion, a crotchety old man grunt if he had ever heard one) before he followed the mayor, and Augustine followed suit. The mayor smiled at them again as they joined her at the door, and without further prompting opened it so that she could lead them out (leaving it open for a second longer than necessary so that the bunnelby from before could dart through and bound across the grass).

“You really should watch out about letting wild pokémon roam your house,” Fulbert said. “Bunnelby might be cute, but that doesn’t mean they can’t bite or cause damages.”

“Oh, they’re fine,” the mayor said, waving her hand dismissively. Augustine grinned as Fulbert scowled. “Like I said, they’re hardly the worst nuisance we have to contend with, although . . .” She looked up at the sky, pondering something, and then smiled. “It’s the end of the month, so at least that’ll be off my family’s plate in short order. For a little while, anyway.”

“What will?” Augustine asked.

“Never you mind that, now. You’ve got enough to worry about with the houndour without having to handle our other problems, too,” she said. Augustine glanced at Fulbert, who gave him a look and shrug that plainly said ‘well, she’s right about that one’ in response.

The mayor led them to the base of the mountain, which—as Fulbert had pointed out—was more or less a straight shot through the village, not too far from the mayor’s own home. In fact, Augustine was perplexed to see that—the gap of wilderness between the mountains and village aside—the only thing that really seemed to be standing between the mountains and the village was no longer actually standing: the remnants of a small fence littered the earth, completely dismantled save for a few of the posts on either side.

“We put that up ages ago to try and deter wild pokémon from coming too close,” the mayor said, noticing Augustine and Fulbert’s stares. Fulbert gave her an appalled look. “It didn’t wrap all the way ‘round the village, of course, but our previous mayor—that is, the mayor before the mayor before me—thought that they might still get the picture . . . well. The houndour didn’t seem to, anyway.”

“Unbelievable,” Fulbert said. Augustine elbowed him in the ribs.

“Well, we’ll take it from here. We have a fairly good idea of where to start. Thank you so much for your help,” Augustine said.

“Glad to do whatever I can to make sure this whole thing gets resolved,” the mayor said. She paused, and then added in a worried tone, “Are you sure you’ll be all right up there, Professor? Should we send help if you’re not back by a certain time?”

“Ah, no. I might not quite be on the level of a hiker, but I’ve certainly done my fair share of traveling in my day,” Augustine said, and he clapped Fulbert on the shoulder. “Besides, I have my faithful colleague here with me, and despite his age he could survive in the mountains for weeks without tiring.”

“We’re the same age,” Fulbert said, and he jerked his shoulder out from under Augustine’s palm.

“So you really needn’t worry,” Augustine told the mayor, ignoring Fulbert. “We’ll be just fine.”

The mayor smiled, although her smile seemed a bit uncertain in the face of Fulbert’s sour scowl. “Well, all right then,” she said. “But you make sure to come on back down if you need anything at all, you hear?”

“Yes ma’am. Thank you for your kindness.” Augustine bowed courteously (Fulbert inclined his head in a little jerk), and after returning it, the mayor turned to head back toward the village. When she was out of earshot, Augustine turned to Fulbert and said, “You could at least try to be a little polite.”

“Me? I’m just being honest. You want to see rude, you didn’t even finish your damn tea,” Fulbert shot back.

The aftertaste of the tea still lingered in Augustine’s mouth, and he couldn’t help but grimace a little. “It wasn’t very good tea,” he said.

“Hah, see, and you call me rude.”

“It’s not as if I told her that her tea was bad! That would have been rude. I simply didn’t finish it because we have work to do. You’re the one constantly trying to refuse her hospitality and making fun of their—what used to be their fence.”

“Look at it.” Fulbert gestured to the ruins of the fence. Upon giving it a more serious look, Augustine could see that even when it was standing it would still fall short of the village borders by a few feet on either side. “What pokémon was that supposed to deter? Caterpie? There aren’t even caterpie out here.”

“At least they tried. It was a solid idea,” Augustine said. When Fulbert gave him a flat look, he grinned. “No, it really was. That wood looks like it was pretty sturdy when it was still standing. It was definitely solid.”

Fulbert gave him a look of deep disgust, and turned toward the mountain trail. “I’m leaving you for dead in these mountains. Goodbye, Augustine.”

Augustine laughed, and jogged after to catch up. “You would never. But if we are getting started, how do you want to handle this, hm? I’m sure we can take care of this within the day—two at most—but as fun as this adventure is bound to be I think we should have some sort of plan before we get started.”

“Augustine Sycamore wants to use a plan. Wonders will never cease,” Fulbert said. This time it was Augustine’s turn to roll his eyes. Fulbert paused in the middle of the dirt path, and squinted against the sun at the mountain range that stretched before them. “We can cover more ground if we split up, and I think I see a fork ahead. You take the left, I take the right?”

“Sounds like as good a plan as any. And here, I had a feeling that we would lose cell reception out here, and so . . .” Augustine dug into his travel bag, pushing past his notebooks, travel mug, and other equipment to produce two large walkie-talkies. He held one up in each hand, beaming as he said, “Ta-da!”

Fulbert gave him a nonplussed stare. “What are those?”

“They’re walkie-talkies. You know, devices that can allow us to communicate over long distances.” Augustine poked Fulbert in the shoulder with the antennae of one of the walkie-talkies. “For such an old man, you really are clueless when it comes to the technology of your generation. I know you really want to fit in with the youth and use all their tech instead, but—”

Fulbert swiped the walkie-talkie from Augustine’s hand, and in the same beat punched Augustine’s shoulder with his other fist. Compared to how hard Augustine knew Fulbert could hit (with the broken hinges of their dorm room door after they locked themselves out one winter serving as proof) Augustine knew that Fulbert hadn’t hit him that hard, but he still rubbed the spot nonetheless.

“I know what a walkie-talkie is,” Fulbert snapped, and he held it up and shook it a little as he said, “But what I want to know is what century this one is from. Did you get this up from the sunken part of the S.S. Cactus?”

“They’re not that old,” Augustine said, and he couldn’t help but sound a bit defensive as he examined his own. “I found them in my parents’ attic the last time I visited. I think they’re charming.”

Fulbert snorted. “Charming. It’ll be real charming when we’re stuck up there and they don’t work.”

“I tested them before I took them from my parents’ house. They work just fine,” Augustine said, and he smacked the antennae of his own walkie-talkie against Fulbert’s shoulder. Fulbert gave him a skeptical look that Augustine didn’t think dignified addressing. “Let’s just get started, shall we? We can radio one another through the walkie-talkies if we find anything, and we’ll meet back here in two hours to discuss regardless of whether we find anything or not so that we can change our strategy if necessary. Agreed?”

“That’s the most logical plan I’ve ever heard you produce in your life, so yes,” Fulbert said.

Part of Augustine wanted to tap Fulbert on the head with his walkie-talkie this time, but he settled for smirking instead. “I disagree. Don’t you remember the pulley system I created so that we could bring food we had delivered to us up to our dorm via the window so that we didn’t have to go down into the cold to get it during the winter months?”

Fulbert shook his head, and started up the mountain path again, veering to the right as they had discussed. “I repeat, this is the most logical plan I’ve ever heard you produce in your life,” he said.

“You made great use of that pulley system! You used it just as many times as I did!” Augustine said, and he raised his voice as he took to the left path, walking backwards so that he could call after Fulbert’s back.

“That doesn’t mean it wasn’t ridiculous!” Fulbert shouted back, without turning.

From: Genesis

Sample #3

Like TF, the corridors of BF consisted of polished, gleaming chrome. And if the corridors of TF had felt empty (even if most of the rooms Alan had passed while walking the halls had not been), then the corridors of BF seemed intent on making him aware that he was completely and utterly alone. That thought was ridiculous, he knew; Lizardon’s pokéball was in the right pocket of his lab coat, and so long as Lizardon was with him then he would never, not ever be alone. But the corridors of BF felt weighted with an oppressive, yet somehow omniscient, silence, as if despite the lack of another soul or any security cameras that he could spot, his every move was being observed by some mute presence he couldn’t see. Alan hastened his pace through the corridors, and was careful to move on the balls of his feet in an effort to muffle his footsteps.

While the corridors of BF matched the corridors of TF, the rooms were another story—or at least, the room containing the chimeras was another story despite how the maps hadn’t seen fit to mark any sort of distinction between them. The moment he stepped over the threshold into the chimera holding room the motion sensor lights flickered to life, revealing a room that was three times the size of any of the rooms above. The floor and walls in this room were comprised of concrete, not unlike the stockrooms of most retailers, and while there were long, metal tables in the center that held various instruments, charts, and other equipment, the main point of interest in the room rested in the cells that lined the walls.

“Cells,” Alan thought, was putting it gently. “Cells” was the word that the Aether Foundation had used in its documents describing the containment facilities for the chimeras, but the structures that lined the walls from the doors to the very back of the room were better described as cages. Each individual cage reached floor-to-ceiling, and while the width of the cages wasn’t as impressive, it at least didn’t look as if most of the chimeras were being crushed by the size of their prisons. Each cage had solid metal walls on either side, but the doors that faced the center of the room were barred. It was for this reason that Alan was able to get a glance at each chimera as he passed by its cage, at least as much as the light in the room would allow. Bright though it was, most of the chimeras had pulled away from it the second the lights flickered on, and now cowered at the very backs of their cages as he passed by their doors. They weren’t entirely silent—he heard claws scraping against metal flooring in some of the cages, could hear labored breathing coming from others, heard feathers rustling in some and the sound of tails accidentally thumping against bars in another—but not a one of them so much as sniffed in his direction as he passed. Maybe he was biased, but he thought the silence sounded an awful lot like fear.

He made it to the middle of the room before he crouched down in front of one of the cages to try and get a better look at the chimera contained within. He had chosen the cage at random, but the second he laid eyes on the creature inside it, he felt he had made the right choice. He couldn’t pin a name to this particular chimera (though thinking back over ‘cc.xsml’ again, he thought Type: Ignis was as good a guess as any given the red and orange markings), but that didn’t matter very much to him. What did matter was that the chimera was, like the others, huddled in a trembling ball of fur and scales at the very back of its cage. But as terrified as it looked, it also looked pained. The eyes that gazed at him from the shadows were glazed over, pitiful looking with the way its ears were pressed back against its skull and its snout rested on large, scaled forepaws. The light couldn’t reach the chimera very well, but Alan could still tell that it was having difficulty breathing. Setting aside the way each breath stuttered through its body like an engine struggling to start, he could hear a whistling wheeze through its nose every time it inhaled. Alan moved a little closer to the door, and when he did a weak whine escaped the chimera’s throat. Alan felt his heart splinter.

“Hey,” he whispered, and he poked his fingers through the bar of the cage. The chimera didn’t move. “It’s all right, I won’t hurt you. I’m here to help, I promise.”

The chimera lifted its head, and after staring at him morosely for a second, slowly started to drag its body toward the door of its cell.

“That’s it,” Alan said, and he gave the chimera an encouraging smile. Its snout (so much like a growlithe’s, even if its eyes were all houndour—he’d recognize eyes like that anywhere) wiggled as it sniffed him out. “You can do it. Just a little farther, all right?”

“And just who the hell are you?”

The second the new voice—loud and sharp as it was—cut through the silence in the room, the chimera leaped back to its original position with such speed and force that the entire cage rattled. It wasn’t the only one; so many chimeras jumped at once that the room was suddenly full of the sounds of bodies clashing against metal and startled, pained yelps. Alan himself jumped to his feet and whipped around to face the door, his fingers snapping into fists as he eyed the person who had spoken.

The man who had entered was at a point in his life that Alan felt was best described as either “mid-life crisis” or “pretentious to the point of embarrassment.” Though he was dressed in all white as most Aether Foundation employees were, the man’s excuse for a lab coat had a collar so large that it flared up to reach the back of his head on one side, and drooped so ridiculously on the other that the end of it touched his ribs. His glasses were not much better. Though the shape of them suggested they were supposed to imitate laboratory safety goggles, that was just it: they held the appearance of safety goggles, but none of the practicality. Lurid green and huge though they were, they weren’t nearly secure enough on his face to actually shield his eyes from harmful liquid or debris. About the only thing they succeeded in doing was drawing attention away from the man’s obviously receding hairline.

But as ostentatious and overall awful as the man’s appearance was given his position within the Aether Foundation, that wasn’t as important as his identity. Going based on the employee list Alan had looked at before, the man glaring at him from the doorway was none other than the branch chief of the Aether Foundation—a man named Faba. Alan didn’t know the specifics of every one of Faba’s responsibilities, but he was smart enough to know that it was unlikely he would be able to bluff the branch chief into thinking he was a newly hired employee. At the very least, he wouldn’t if he tried to be too specific about it.

“No one in particular,” he said, and he slipped his hands into the pockets of his lab coat as he turned away, palming Lizardon’s pokéball. The room was large, but with the tables in the center he didn’t think Lizardon would be able to battle comfortably. Still, better safe than sorry. “Just a researcher, passing through.”

“Is that so,” Faba said. He strode into the room, the door swinging shut behind him, and Alan locked his jaw as the chimeras tried to squeeze themselves against the backs of their cages as Faba passed. “That’s funny, because this isn’t exactly a place most people can pass through. This tends to be more of a place you get to deliberately. A place you go through on purpose.”

“Really,” Alan said. He made a show of looking at the other cages, and kept his tone as light and casual as he could. “Imagine that.”

“Yeah. Imagine it.” Faba’s tone was tart, and not at all amused. That was fine by Alan; he wasn’t feeling very amused himself. He looked back over as Faba walked along one of the center tables in the room, and noted that Faba had not once looked away from him. “Imagine my surprise when I went to access my user account to get some work done and found someone else was already logged into it. Imagine my surprise when I finally got in and saw how many documents had been open recently—documents that, prior to tonight, hadn’t been touched in months. Imagine my surprise when I saw the warp panel activate not ten minutes after that.”

Alan pretended to consider it for a moment before he said, “I imagine that must have been pretty shocking.”

“It was.” Faba smiled, and maybe it was the fault of the glasses, but it didn’t look like his smile reached his eyes. “But as shocking as all that was, I think I’ve got a pretty good grasp on the situation now, Sonny Jim. And seeing as how I do, I can tell you one thing you’re not, along with two things you are, and one you’re about to be.”

Given how very obviously busted he was, Alan thought Faba probably did have a good enough grasp on the situation—at least a good enough one to make it likely that the Aether Foundation enforcers had already been alerted to his presence, and were likely waiting outside the doors to arrest him as they spoke. There was a very good chance he was going to have to fight his way out of this situation, and he was incredibly thankful now that he had the foresight to copy the Project Alkahest folder onto his PokéNav Plus when he did. If nothing else, it would make it easier for him to plead his case when the Aether Foundation no doubt turned him over to the police. All the same, Faba wasn’t arresting him immediately, and Alan had to admit that he was a little curious about where Faba was going with his taunts. So rather than release Lizardon immediately, he said, “Oh? And what would all of those things be?”

Faba snorted. “Well, for one, you’re not ‘just a researcher, passing through.’” Faba affected a mocking voice that he clearly thought was supposed to be an imitation of Alan’s, yet Alan thought sounded much more like a vocal caricature of a teenager. “You’re a snot-nosed smart-ass, but you’re sure as hell not a researcher of any kind. I don’t care what costume shop you pulled that lab coat from.”

“Excuse me,” Alan said indignantly, “but I’ve been employed as—”

“And as for what you are—well, that’s one of the things. A snot-nosed smart-ass who somehow found his way in here, but sure as hell isn’t going to find his way out, which leads me to the second thing you are: sorry. And as for what you’re about to be?” Faba smacked his hand against the bottom of the table, and a series of metal clicks rang through the room as the barred doors in front of the chimera cages swung slowly open. Alan spun around to watch each door open, though none of the chimeras within moved an inch. “Well, given the time of day, I’d say you qualify as a very light breakfast.”

“You’re joking.” Alan turned back to glare at Faba, whose leer didn’t fade even as he pulled something from the pocket of his flashy coat and put it to his lips. “These chimeras aren’t in a fit state to do anything, much less attack me. They’re either sick or injured, and they’re definitely scared. Whatever you’ve done to them, they—”

A sudden cacophony erupted from the cages. On instinct Alan clapped his hands over his ears to try and muffle the noise, even as he looked around in time to see most of the chimeras scramble from their cages, hackles raised and tails lashing, feathers and fur puffed in clear agitation. Their eyes were bright, wild; several staggered as they exited their prisons and most were breathing heavily, but all of them had their hungry eyes pinned on him.

Alan whipped back around to face Faba as he demanded, “What did you do to them?”

“I just told them it was dinnertime. Breakfast. Whichever.” Faba laughed, and returned the item—the whistle, Alan realized now—to his pocket. “As far as they’re concerned, you’re just a meal passing through, Sonny Jim. And by the way, I recommend you start doing that. Passing through, I mean. Moving. Running. Or you’re about to be a whole lot sorrier than I at first gave you credit for.”

Alan looked back to the chimeras—and, specifically, to the one he had been reaching out to before. It stumbled toward him, breathing hard, saliva dripping from its mouth. He reached out his hand toward it, palm up, slowly, gently—

The chimera lunged, fire lacing around its fangs, and it was only by virtue of the reflexes he had drilled into himself during his years in Lysandre’s service that he managed to yank his arm out of the way just before the chimera’s fangs connected. But that one attack was the trigger; as a mob the rest of the chimeras pounced toward him, snarling and crying out in various degrees of aggression and distress; and Alan, knowing that there was no room for Lizardon to fight all of them and no chance for him to calm them down without fulfilling Faba’s sadistic prophecy, spun on the ball of his foot and bolted for the door.

The right way back to the warp panel was to hang a left out of the chimera room, take another left upon reaching the end of the hall, take a right at the end of that hall and then enter the second door down on the left. Alan knew this—he could visualize the map in his mind’s eye, still, and even if he had been unable he remembered enough to retrace his steps. But none of that mattered as he threw himself through the doors and—in a moment of blindness where his only thought pertained to putting as much distance between him and the voracious chimeras pursuing him as possible—made a sharp right and sprinted down the hall. It was a stupid, stupid decision, and one he regretted the second he made it and realized what he had done—but then, it hardly counted as a decision, hardly counted as a thought as he ducked beneath a Flamethrower that avoided singeing his hair off, but succeeded in blasting against the wall at the opposite end of the corridor and making the chrome paneling glow bright red as it partially melted. He skidded to avoid crashing into both the wall and the newly heated piece of paneling and made another hard right down the next hallway, the chimeras scrambling over themselves and each other as they hastened to follow, barking and snarling and yowling in agitation, hunger, and rage.

But he wasn’t dead yet. He could still make it back to the warp. Not the way he had originally come, no—there was no way to make it past the chimera pack, and not enough room for Lizardon to comfortably fight against them (and not enough time, either, for him to stop running and form a strategy for the too-narrow corridors that would let both him and Lizardon escape a battle like that unscathed). He could still visualize the map, even as he took a left at random to avoiding leading the chimeras around in a semi-circle that would likely end in a dead end (literally) for him. If his position on his mental map was accurate (and gods, he needed it to be accurate), then the T-shaped intersection they were coming up on led to a storage room on the left, and the arena on the right. There was another set of doors on the other side of the arena that would loop back around to the wing of BF that housed the warp panel. If he could just make it through the arena—

Rather than turn, Alan dodged to the right and spun the second his foot made contact so that he could bolt for the set of double-doors at the end of the hall that led to the arena. The half-second longer he spent running straight at the wall rewarded him; the chimeras, not anticipating his dodge out of the way, crashed into the walls and tripped over one another as they attempted to untangle from the pile-up they’d landed themselves in. The distance between them widened, and Alan ran hell-for-leather at the doors, the motion sensor light above them flashing green as he came within range and causing the metal doors to slide open—

Alan threw himself across the threshold, and the moment he crossed it the door slammed shut behind him. The chimeras who had succeeded in separating themselves from the pack quickly enough to charge after him were a few seconds too slow; they crashed bodily into the door, their howls of pain, confusion, and fury audible even over the sound of flesh and bone meeting steel. Nothing short of relief flooded Alan at the sound, but even as he took a second to catch his breath and thank whoever had designed the facility that the motion sensor apparently had a delay (or that the door locked after recognizing an entrant), he still felt a pang of sympathy for the creatures on the other side.

He had no intention of being their breakfast, but that didn’t mean they deserved to suffer.

Now that the chimeras were no longer three steps from devouring him, Alan took a minute to survey the room he found himself in. When he had first noticed the arena marked on the map, he had assumed that it would be a battle arena built to League regulations: concrete or steel rectangular walls, and a floor that was either hard-packed dirt or concrete as well to give the pokémon that battled on it good traction and even footing. The floor would be unmarred save for the regulatory boundary lines that marked where each trainer was supposed to stand as much as they marked the center of the field where the pokémon would duke it out. It was true that the Alola region didn’t function under the League system, but the moment Alan saw that they had an arena within the BF section of their facility, that was the first assumption that sprang to his mind and he hadn’t thought to dash it.

But rather than a battleground that would stand up against League regulations, the arena Alan found himself in was massive, pure white from floor to ceiling, and rounded. The walls curved and combined with a domed ceiling (or what little Alan could see of it, anyway, given how the very top of it was shrouded in shadow) to give the room a spherical appearance. Windows lined the walls on the left side at the base of the domed ceiling; the windows were too high up for him to get a good look through the glass, but from what he could see they looked like the windows to a spectator room of sorts, not unlike the one Lysandre had watched him from at Fleur-De-Lis Laboratories during the mega evolution gauntlet. His throat suddenly dry, Alan tore his eyes away from the window, and looked to the opposite side of the room instead. There was, as the map had shown, a set of doors on the other side of the arena; but what the map hadn’t bothered to mark was the cavernous opening just to the right of the other set of doors, inside of which Alan could hear guttural breathing, and—before he could so much as take a step across the room himself—slow footfalls so heavy that each one made the room quake.

Alan stood, frozen, for just a second. The footsteps—for that was what he knew they were, somehow, even if he didn’t know how he knew, and even if he didn’t want to know that despite how he did—were slow and rhythmic; his pulse timed itself to them, each thud in his chest painfully in-sync with each pounding beat against the floor, but as his heart pounded in his ears, Alan could hear it beating the same word into his brain again and again: Run. Run. Run!

His nerves were on fire as he pushed himself forward, starting across the room at first a brisk walk, and then an outright jog. Even if it wasn’t set up the same as a League stadium, length-wise it was still about the same size, and so even though he forced himself into a sprint to match the hastening footsteps of whatever behemoth was emerging from the opening by the exit, he only made it halfway across the room before the creature finally stepped out from the maw of its cave and reared not one, but three gargantuan heads in the blindingly bright lights of the room.

The beast—no, chimera, it was another chimera, he was sure of it—was at least as tall as Primal Groudon, if not taller. Like most of the other chimeras Alan had seen, this one was quadruped; its massive forelegs resembled a pyroar, whereas its hind legs were closer to that of a houndoom. Each of the chimera’s three heads was an odd cross between (if he had to guess) an aerodactyl and a tyrantrum, and it had a tail that looked nearly as long as the chimera was tall, and about as robust as Prism Tower. The chimera was covered, from its back all the way down its tail, in what looked like metal plating; but as it crossed the room to stand between Alan and the doors on the other side, Alan saw the steel shift and catch the light. Rather than a solid plate, it looked more like a coat of quills.

As it emerged from its den, the chimera plodded over to stand between Alan and the exit. With how languidly the chimera moved, it might have been coincidence. For just a moment, Alan could believe that perhaps the chimera wasn’t blocking his exit deliberately. Perhaps, if he asked nicely, the chimera might even let him pass without a fight.

But once it stood before the exit, its tail slowly swishing across the floor to thump against the wall hard enough to make the room rattle despite how casually the chimera had flicked it, all three heads turned to him. Three sets of eyes, all six of which were an odd mishmash between reptilian and avian, focused squarely on him. And as Alan stared up at the beast that only had eyes for him, one of the heads began to raise its hackles over yellow, pointed teeth.

On instinct, Alan walked backward until his back hit the doors that he had entered through. The chimera pack on the other side had either left or gone entirely silent; not a peep could be heard from them through the steel. Unfortunately, the door didn’t open, either. Either the motion sensor had broken when the chimeras had body slammed the door, or the door was perma-locked from his side. Either way, with his original door locked and refusing to budge, the only exit was the one the three-headed chimera was guarding. That meant that his only options were to either get past the chimera or die.

Alan took a deep breath, and glared straight back into one of the chimera’s faces as he reached in the pocket of his lab coat for Lizardon’s pokéball.

The idea of sending Lizardon against the chimera was not one that thrilled him, but he had no intention of dying without a fight.

Lizardon appeared, as he always did, from a shower of light within the pokéball. He wasn’t small by any stretch; he grew bigger by the day, at least to Alan’s eyes, even if Manon insisted that she couldn’t tell a difference and that he was “as big as ever.” But although Lizardon was far from tiny, he looked it standing before the chimera, which easily towered over him and sniffed two or three times in his direction once he materialized on the field. Lizardon stared right back up at the camera, holding its gaze for a long moment, before he twisted around to look back at Alan. Alan didn’t need Lizardon to utter a sound to understand the ‘are you saying what I think you’re saying’ look he was receiving. He nodded, and Lizardon flattened his horns against the back of his head.

“I know,” Alan said, “but we only need to distract it long enough to get to the door on the other side. If we can get it to move, we can get out of here, but we’re going to have to fight to do that. Will you fight wi—”

Lizardon snorted, sharp and annoyed, cutting off Alan’s question before he could ask it. Despite the situation, Alan smiled as he stowed Lizardon’s pokéball back in the pocket of his lab coat, and clutched the Key Stone around his neck in a tight fist.

“Right. Thank you. Get ready, then.” Lizardon turned back to face the chimera, but Alan kept his eyes on Lizardon as he otherwise focused on the pendant in his palm. “Key Stone, respond to my heart. Surpass evolution—mega evolve!”

Lizardon roared as radiant light emanated from their matching necklaces, and his scales turned from vivid orange to inky black, his eyes shifting from bright blue to dark red. Brilliant blue flames burst from his mouth, matching the flame that now topped his tail, and without waiting for a cue from Alan he gave his wings several strong beats to push himself into the air, trailing smoke behind him as he arched up toward the chimera’s left-most head. All three heads were focused on Lizardon now, their eyes following his every movement through the air, and Alan flexed the fingers of his left hand.

“Lizardon! Dragon Claw!”

From: To Devour the Sun, ch. 5, “The Point of No Return”