Mewtwo had been experimenting a bit during their walk through the forest. He had started to expend his psychic senses, trying to see his new limits. He had been monitoring what had approached and what they had approached. The few pokemons present in the trees had been harmless, and the lotad in the pond was simply happy to have peaceful visitors. Peaceful, that very distinction had put him on edge, until Astra had found food he could consume and had then started to experiment with his side of the system.
The crafting system had been the most incredible thing Mewtwo had seen to this point in his short existence. How easily Astra could weave objects together to create new ones. He realizes he had gotten a small glimpse during their run, but he had been too tired to truly understand it at the time. And thanks to that, to all these untapped possibilities of seemingly unlimited combinations, he had sensed the newcomers far too late.
He still had felt them before they had made themselves known, but they were too close, and their thoughs screamed with fear, malice and doubt. There were four of them approaching, but only three come forward. The leading one opens with a fake smile.
"Why hello there." It exclaims with false mirth.
Three being resembling Astra step from the shade surrounding the small pond. They are all wearing cloth or leather garments and many of their features differ from one another: their heights, their build and many cosmetic features on their faces and bodies. All sport scars, some old, some clearly fresh. One has a strange pair of round glass pieces on his face, making his eyes appear bigger. This one is looking at Mewtwo with envy, awe and terror. The leading one is muscular, more than Astra, with a darker tone of skin. It tries to smile with fake kindness, but it appears mostly predatory to Mewtwo. The last of the three is keeping itself behind the first two, it has long fiery hair obscuring part of its face.
The fourth one, Mewtwo can only feel its presence move to their right. It seems to be circling. He keeps an inner eye on it as the contraption wearing one starts muttering to its leader.
"Shit dude, that's really a Mewtwo. We've got to-" It yelps as fiery hair jabs it from behind, silencing it.
A glare from the leader silence any further comments. "I'm Rick, crazy finding someone else here, 'specially after last night."
Mewtwo realize the implication the same moment Astra does. They were the secondary target of yesterday horde. "There were even those explosive assholes" "creepers" Contraption interjects, "Creeper assholes."
"You- you're humans!" Astra exclaims. Mewtwo realize Astra is radiating joy and hope, as well as a bit of apprehension. "I'm Astra. Pleasure to meet you. Last night was kind of rough yeah."
Wait, are we the first he meet? The unsaid question ring in all three of the humans' minds.
Mewtwo remains alert, but mentally blinks. Why is that surprising? That fact seems to rattle them more than it should.
"Hold on. Since when are you on the Ezian plane?" Contraption asks.
Mewtwo feels the data unload within Astra's mind and sees him stagger for a moment.
"Oof. That's a bombshell." He cannot help but exclaim, scratching his head to lessen the pain. "I arrived yesterday. why?"
Fuck! again, a similar though echoes simultaneously in all three of the humans minds. Fiery head looks up and nods to the leader, Rick.
"Oh, we-ell. Welcome hell, hand over you soul coins, you won't need them soon anyway." Rick tones turns from jovial to threatening in a heartbeat. He unsheathes a short metal blade, as do Contraption. Fiery hair unsheathe two shorter metal blades.
"My what now?" Astra is utterly confused, which is quite surprising. If one of those humans saying the name of the world they are upon was enough to unlock full knowledge and understanding, why did 'soul coin' unlock nothing?
"Grey coins you arrived with! Don't play dumb, we all start with a hundred! Quickly now!" Contraption and Fiery hair start to circle them both. Fiery hair holds her weapon with certainty, but Contraption is more hesitant.
Mewtwo can feel the fourth unseen human also preparing something. What exactly, he cannot say.
"Okay seriously, I have no idea what you are talking about." Astra barely finishes his sentence. Rick Materializes close to him with a crack and a gust of wind. Its blade immediately goes against Astra's throat.
Mewtwo, do you think we have any chances to either take them on or flee? Astra's thoughs become focused in a single question.
He was fast, I barely saw him move. Mewtwo answers. It is difficult to say. Mewtwo try to touch them softly, and feel his powers wash off the humans. He will need to fully commit himself to affect them. I will need to truly go all out.
Please let me be able to defuse this situation. Astra pleads to no one in his mind.
Be mindful that there is a fourth one hiding behind us.
From bad to worse.
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This situation is bad. So bad. I had been happy at first to meet humans, even if my broken memories had cautioned me against trusting them outright. And now I can see why. They are not friends, they are thieves looking for money. Well jokes on them, I have none. Or maybe I do?
"Okay if I had any how would I summon them?"
"How do you not know that? Everyone know that!" Rick explodes, pushing his sword harder against my throat. It surprisingly does not break my skin, but I can feel the pressure.
I lean further back, trying to lessen the pressure. If I could, I think I would sweat. I'm actually quite surprised at how calm I feel. And it's good because I have maybe a plan. I should have quite the angle to do a devastating attack against that man. I have legs of steel.
"Just think about your upgrade coins and they'll get summoned." The feeble glass wearing one answers. Uh? Are coins xp points?
I do just that, even closing my eyes to try and make a show of it. Nothing happens at first, then a single screen appears. displaying my current number of experience point, which is zero. I almost sniker a that. Okay it must be their sort of experience point. Is it used as money too?
"I don't have any." I plead. I only need to half-fake my desperation.
Can Mewtwo reattach my head on my body if it gets cut off? I mean he could but would it work? I stop that line of thoughs. Rick is almost ready to blow.
He removes his sword from my neck and instead grabs me, hauling me up. DO NOTHING!!! I mentally scream for Mewtwo.
"You will get your fucking coins out NOW" He roars in clear anger.
I am actually speechless. My mouth hangs half-opened at the fact my legs no longer touch the ground. Do I weight nothing? How much stronger are they? I can feel him slowly crushing my throat. I try to claw at his arm. My right hand does nothing, my left leave slight red lines, but only superficial. It does make Rick hiss and he punches me in retaliation. I wince as the metal plates covering my belly actually bend inward slightly. There is only one way out. Question is, can we actually get out?
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Mewtwo, get ready to push me into either of the other two. I have a plan.
What about fourth one?
You push me, you move up, then you harass. You mentioned a new path similar to the Terra Vis? See if you can make walls. Lots of walls.
And with that though, I strike. My legs flail around a bit for show, until my left goes sharply back, before going sharply forward. Right between Rick's legs. His eyes bulge and he immediately release me. He crumbles on the ground. I feel an invisible force grab me and I go sideways left, straight into glasses guy. Left arm first. The moment I impact him, I feel something crunch and he screams in pain. Turns out I am heavy. And Glasses guy is clearly weaker than Rick.
Rocks rise from the ground all around us and quickly create a small maze of stone pillars.. Damn Mewtwo learns fast. An arrow not too dissimilar to the ones from yesterday impact one of the pillars. It would have hit Mewtwo if he had not gone up.
I quickly scramble to my feet and spare a quick glance and glasses guy. Yup, broken nose and glasses. And bonus broken arm. I almost pity him, but they wanted this fight, not me.
The girl gets flung into a pillar while surrounded by a blue aura, but quickly bounces back up. She then start to jump from pillars to pillars at insane speed. "Incoming" I scream to Mewtwo.
On right! He sends back. I jump toward the closest pillar and another arrow barely misses me. This is going to be a problem.
"FUUUUUUUCK!!" Rick roars as he finally shakes off his manly pain. And barrels through the pillars straight for me. And his speed is beyond even the redhead.
I jump to the side and he misses impaling me, but only barely. And now I am on the ground. Rick turns around and jumps on me, pinning me down. He glares at me with a wicked smile. "That hurt you bastard." And he raises his sword above my head. "Hope you'll grow some when you return, so I can return the favor."
I see the aura of Mewtwo encase Rick, but the man does not budge. And then the sword fall. And a dark grey blur slams into Rick side.
The man goes flying and a small grey furred dog lands deftly before me. Its red on yellow eyes dart toward me, making sure I am fine, but quickly return on the man they just rammed into. Which seems transfixed by the apparition.
Another arrow flies through the air, but the little poochyena does a somersault and catches it in their teeth. They break it and fire a blast of black and purple energy toward its origins. There is a cry of pain.
"Mo', stop! It's one of Stradivii's bastard's runt!" Rick exclaims. And a pang of recollection strikes me. The name is familiar, nostalgic
"Shit!" the word echoes from the bushes, cutting my thoughs. A lanky man exits from the bushes and slowly moves toward Rick. He has one hand up and the other limp to his side. Traces of burns on it makes me realize that was the result of the poochyena attack. Strong.
Rick is holding his side and is wincing with every breaths. The poochyena's attack seems to have been surprisingly effective on him too.
"Zoey! We're moving out!" Rick exclaims.
The redhair, Zoey leaps down from one of the pillars and quickly get to the side of her team. Rick nods at her and wince at two new injuries marring her body. Mewtwo managed to do some damage too. It is somewhat reassuring.
"Don't think this is over metal boy. The runt won't always protect you." Rick snarls. He then turns to the last member of the team. "Get up Jack, we're moving out."
Jack, glasses boy, is still clutching his arm. With difficulties, and whimpering all the way, he rise up. With a final fierce glare, Rick turns around and marches off. The rest of his group follows, but a small snippet still reaches us before they move out of view.
"Rick, we need to tell the league about the Mewtwo." Zoey states.
"The league can suck a fucking dick. They'll know soon enough anyway." Rick snarls back.
And they are gone.
And I flop down on the ground. I... We... Fuck. My breath starts to speed up. Fuck. I'm panicking. Now? Why now? Wait, aftermath! FUCK! I try to get it under control, I only inhale and exhale faster. I start to shiver, then my entire body starts to shake. They were about to kill me. There had been no hesitation on Rick's eyes. He had been about to kill me. They had not even been afraid of Mewtwo!
I slowly hug myself. I feel cold. I- A three-fingered hand fall on my right shoulder. I try to jump back at the touch, but the hand holds me down. I look to my right and come eyes to eyes with Mewtwo.
Mewtwo, the pokemon without a heart according to the pokedex, is looking at me with a pained expression. Part of it is his own pain, but also there is also worry for me.
You have water streaming from eyes. I blink. You alright? They gone, they beyond my senses. Far. We safe.
His broken mental speech alleviates my worries somewhat. "Thanks." I answer, and I wipe my tears. "I'm... alright. A bit shocked to be frank with you." I sigh. "I though I had finally found others, but... Well you saw what happened."
Mewtwo nods. I look him up and down and wince when I notice a few shallow cuts along his legs and tail. "You also got hurt." I wince in worry.
Not too bad, not bleed or hurt anymore.
I chuckle at his headstrong statement. "Are they really gone?"
Yes. They beyond my senses, I can sense far now. And I no sense them, I no see them either.
"Good." I answer and take out a couple of oran berries. I had collected them before going, we still have about seven in reserve.
Mewtwo nods and eat one, offering the other to our little third companion. They nod in thanks and accept the offering. We spend a few more minutes in silence. I glance at the pond, miraculously untouched, and can see the little lotad is still there, but he is trying to be a lilypad really hard.
It is Mewtwo that breaks the silence. You like them?
"The lotad?" I question, confused.
Lotad? The answer is also one of confusion. No. This one is accompanied by laughter from Mewtwo. Rick-being and others. You are like them?
"Ooh!" I laugh too. "In a way. They are what humans are supposed to look like. We had the muscular dude, Rick. The one you threw me into must have been more focused on knowledge because he was really weak, but he seemed to know more than the others. The woman, Zoey was clearly athletic, beyond her actual performance. And the last man, Mo'? Was it Mo'?"
That is what it was called? There were three males and one female in group correct?
"Yup, three guys and one girl. Well, Mo' was also more on the athletic side of humans. They were quite the selection of humans." I chuckle. "And then you have me. I... appear human. But I do not think I am. I have a human mind, I think, I can't even be sure."
What do you mean? Hey, you're getting better at communication Mewtwo. I learn fast. He answers my though with pride.
"Heh, Well you remember when I introduced myself? I called myself Astra, because that is what the system called me. But when Rick described that poochyena as Stradivii's bastard's runt, The name stirred something within me." I sigh and look straight into Mewtwo's eyes. "I believe I am a machine loaded with three sets of memories. My current self, Astra." I tick one finger up. "The encyclopedic knowledge of everything in this world, but only when I am confronted by something that unlocks it." I tick another finger. "And the remnant of my past, broken for some reason." I tick a third finger. "Part of my body appears as flesh, but I do not know how much of it actually is. So to summarize, I look like a human, but might not be one."
We return to resting. The fight cost me less than I though. I only went from below 50% to about 40%. Not too bad. If the rest of the day is calmer, I should be able to manage and keep looking for food. Especially if our small savior stays with us.
Speaking of. "Hum... Thank you for saving us. I would have dies without your intervention." The little poochyena look at me and nods. They then bark and growl in an attempt at communication.
I try. I really try, but most of what must have been said goes straight over my head. They clearly made the dog equivalent of a shoulder shrug, but then explained something that I did not understand. At all.
She says it was task to guard abductees that appear where you did. But to also let them experience world much as possible. Then if signs that quarry is pack leader Hound's master, then guide to pack leader. Thank you for the translation Mewtwo. I had almost forgotten you are a pokemon for a second here.
I listen to Mewtwo and when the name Hound is mentioned, my broken memories send a wave of relief and happiness. Tears start to stream from my eyes once more and I simply let it happen. My reaction makes the poochyena nod in approval. She, I caught that Mewtwo, then growls some more and the transcript arrives soon after.
You recognize pack leader name, you come. We go to pack leader. Should we? Mewtwo adds, he is slightly suspicious of the turn of events, and without my broken memories, I would have been too.
"Yes, I think we might be able to find more answers to our questions if we follow her. Maybe they can help us gather more supplies on the way too. Food is still a problem." But let's remain cautious. There are other humans here, and whether that Stradivii is my past or not, they still trained this one's leader. We do not know what their intentions were. Nor what they are now. I add mentally. Though communication had been a shot in the dark at first, but I am certain it will come as quite the useful trick later on.
"All right, little one. Lead the way." I say to the poochyena.
She huffs at the 'little' mention, but beckons us toward the south-east. I nod to Mewtwo and we follow her.