Yarvick "The Raticate" Xelsez
Team Aqua
Route 205, En-Route to Eternia City, Sinnoh.
Affected RPers: N/A

This was officially Yarvick's first time of going onto Route 205-or at least, onto Route 205 beyond the energy plant. He didn't expect it to be so...Rugged and confined. Two small cliffs made it a more cramped space than he anticipated, and as it turned out, going between the valleys just lead to a dead end, forcing him backwards and making him climb onto one of the cliffs. All the while, pesky newcomer trainers kept asking him for a battle, which he forcibly declined at every instance. He was not in a fantastic mood right now, and the older trainers would have respected that. The Newbies, however, were always eager for an a**-whooping that Yarvick simply was not in the mood for.

It didn't matter if it was coincidence at this point. His mother DIED (and had her body missing, so no burial to boot), his dad was still a total enigma and was being far too paranoid (if he could just FLY there without disobeying his dad's orders he'd have done so already), and this was assuming it was even his dad and NOT a giant trap for an ABH he simply didn't have. As for himself, he was feeling far more angry about it all than even he anticipated. He expected it to be painful, but it felt worse. He felt...Hollow, like a large chunk of him just vanished. He didn't even REALIZE how much of him was gone.

Bluh, his mother worried too much about him, specifically over his habit of compulsive larceny. It was an obviously legitimate concern, but she didn't understand why HE did it...It wasn't just a simple greed (though money helped), and though he had a sense of self-preservation, safety was not his primary concern. It was the simple, pure thrill of going in, taking something important, and getting out, all under the noses of some of the most powerful, wealthy individuals in the world. He was facing forces that by all rights he never could and injuring them in ways that could otherwise be impossible...It made him feel pretty powerful! It made him feel alive, more importantly, like that pumping blood in his veins and the breath in his lungs was actually being put to good use-if not WHOLESOME use. Plus, had she been more open with his father's identity from the start, it would put this whole crazy scheme to waste-he'd KNOW who his father was and wouldn't have curiosity get the better of him and drag him here.

And this was not counting the Clockwork Coalition, the murderers responsible. Their leader, Duke Velvetine, specifically. He looked so utterly calm when they passed...The only indication of something hideously wrong was a small stain of blood on the handle of the sword, and that was utterly it. It was like this was a routine performance, to go into households and murder random bystanders. It was tasteless, messy, and generally lacking in moral fiber-even from a pragmatic standpoint, abiding by some simple moral customs (in his case, only theft, no assassinations or murders) garnered more folk than people realized on the black market. And, of course, the crazy guy was probably out to gut his current employers. Literally everything pointed to them being the next logical targets of Team Aqua, barring their demise or some more important thing coming up.

He was going to get payback, most likely through Aqua's continued domination. If there was one thing he could do before their possible demise, it would be to direct them at the Clockwork Coalition through his knowledge and watch them burn to ashes. If there was one thing that was certain, there was no faction bada** enough to stop Aqua...At least, not completely.

"Hey, hey mister!" Yelled another 12-year old, obviously far too eager to get battling experience with his Pokemon. Yarvick knew the Trainer code of honor involved looking someone in the face as part of accepting the challenge. Hence, one of the best ways to refuse a challenge without talking is to simply avoid staring at it, like an angry wolf, and walk away.

Unfortunately, unlike an angry wolf, the trainer was looking for a fight this time. "Hey mister, I want to battle you!" yelled the snot-nosed brat. Yarvick didn't even bother looking his way.

"HEY MISTER! TURN AROUND! I WANT TO BATTLE YOU!" The obnoxious trainer yelled.

"Not interested!" Yarvick snarled. He seriously wasn't in the mood.

"But you have Pokemon!" The trainer said.

"That doesn't mean I'm obliged to fight every battle I come across, kid!" Yarvick yelled back, without turning his head towards the source. "I'm busy and I've got places to be!" He picked up his pace.

A Poke Ball was thrown overhead, and out came a Prinplup. "I challenge you to a Pokemon Battle, like it or not!" The kid said.

Oh, dear lord. It was THIS kind of trainer. He only knew of one other guy, a guy called Vergil Brianson, some transfer from Unova back in 5th grade notable for having albinism. Unlike Yarvick's position as vertically challenged, Vergil's blood-red eyes and white hair were the talk of the town (though everyone who didn't like him made note of his abnormally large ears). Yarvick having a Porygon back in the day, and he having a Timburr, it was almost incessant whining on wanting to battle. He wasn't one of the people who derided him for his lack of height, though, so every-so-often he granted his wish, which usually resulted in Atlas taking a mighty beating due to Type Advantage and not having a clue on tactics, being only eleven at the time. Unfortunately, after 90% of the battles ended in a loss and the Timburr evolved, Yarvick just started avoiding him too, which lead to him tossing his Poke Ball overhead to force him into a challenge that he, at that point, still lost a majority of the time until he got to the finer points of using his single Pokemon. Yarvick also saw him basically beg anyone with a Pokemon to fight him. He was d**m well determined to become the very best he could be, which, while admirable, just got on Yarvick's nerves after a good long while.

"Kid, seriously?! You know this is really just wasting my time, and I don't have much of it!" Yarvick said.

The kid came around. Yarvick saw a few of Vergil's features in him, including his elephant-sized ears. It was probably Vergil's son, or nephew, or some other relative. He must have gotten married...Briefly contending with images of himself and Janine in a cathedral, kissing deeply after having just said the vows, he faced the brat. Like father like son...Though, he lacked Vergil's albinism, instead with blue eyes and a shaven brown head.

"You can't back down from a challenge, unless you're a chicken! And you're not a chicken!" The son of Vergil said.

"Kid, I've got to go meet my dad, I haven't met my dad, like, EVER. Seriously, passing." Yarvick said. He didn't have to lie at all, that was dead true. However, the Prinplup just got in his way.

"You either take us down or we'll just keep blocking your way!" The obnoxious kid said.

Oh dear Arceus he really was like his father.

"I am so going to crush you. Eos, finish him quickly." Yarvick said, with a noticable venom in his voice, throwing the Poke Ball to meet his opponent as the kid got behind and to the right of his Prinplup.

The creature that came OUT of the Poke Ball was DEFINITELY not Eos. In fact, it was a finned creature, blue with some orange spikes on the cheeks, hunched over...Oh dear Arceus no, he confused Eos and her Poke Ball with Oceanus.

Yarvick's face looked like he just saw his best friend eaten by Rayquaza, and was now next on its menu.

"F***! OCEANUS, NO!" Yarvick yelled. Even the kid immediately realized (from the unambiguous look of 'oh s**t' on Yarvick's face) that something had gone horribly, horribly wrong. He ducked immediately, and thanked Arceus he did so as fast as he did-Oceanus immediately shot at Yarvick with Aqua Jet, missing by inches, making the ground quake slightly where he landed from sheer force, only a few feet behind him. He got up quickly and reached for Oceanus'es Poke Ball, attempting to return it.

Oceanus eyed the Poke Ball, and, in an incredibly fast motion, destroyed it. He was now in CQC range, the last range Yarvick wanted to be at.

"Bubblebeam!" Shouted the kid. The Prinplup responded, sending a distracting jet of bubbles at Oceanus. It was harmless otherwise, but Yarvick used the brief blinding of the light as cover and got WELL out of range of Oceanus'es hands, attempting to pull out Rhea and stop this conflict.

Blinded by bubbles but hardly fazed by them, Oceanus did something natural and WAY too destructive-Earthquake. The ground suddenly rattled, sending rocks off the cliff-side, and Yarvick tried his best to get away. He was almost away from the falling rocks, when luck dictated that it would finally stop working in Yarvick's favor and send a Rock straight at his head.

BONK!

...

Yarvick awoke with a pounding, painful sensation focused on his head and several painful sensations on his chest. He managed to get up alright, and looked around. Route 205. His head was the only thing that was hit-he wasn't buried in rocks...Mercifully.

"Prinnn..." Said a sad voice to his left. Yarvick turned, and saw two things: An unconscious Oceanus, KO'd by a considerably large boulder to the head, and a dead obnoxious trainer, his skull shattered like porcelein by a pile of smaller boulders that covered most of his body. The Prinplup looked longingly at the dead kid, tear streaks down its eyes.

Yeah, he wasn't recovering from that even if the brat had MEND.

Oh dear Arceus. Nobody was around. They'd think he was directly responsible for this, whether Oceanus was clearly out of control or not! D**mit, not another one of these instances! He stomped the ground angrily at the d**m stupidity of it all. If only he sent Eos out as planned, or managed to send out Rhea before Oceanus used Earthquake, then he wouldn't be in this bind! He recalled there was technology to discover the last known owner of a Pokemon even if it appeared wild, so even if the case seemed to be another murder by an overly-territorial wild Pokemon, they'd know in time that it was him.

The Prinplup looked to Yarvick-a response to his angry stomp. Yarvick expected some level of anger or whatnot, but it seemed that he couldn't even bring itself to do that, merely staring at his chest with a sad look on its face. Then Yarvick looked down and noticed the pinpricks of blood where the stinging pain was-the Prinpulp probably got a bit angry and used Peck. Repetitively. But it seemed this was some time after this...An hour, even.

In any case, he was alive...And the sooner away from this catastrophe, before someone else discovers it, the better. Also, the sooner he could apply some bandages to the wounds, the better as well. He no longer wanted to give any association with Oceanus-he had attempted to kill Yarvick for the last time, and Yarvick had extended the olive branch quite openly for some time. Truly his loyalties to Commander Brillo were undying and unyielding, to the point where even with the love of his life on the line he would still murder the accidental murderer of his trainer.

This was NOT looking good for Yarvick. It was a matter of time before it was discovered he was responsible for the crazy destruction at Goldenrod (at least partially), a clear act of terrorism that would land him on execution row without doubt...Even if it was Johto and not Sinnoh that got blown up.

Then again, who'd take the risk of having anyone with the loyalty of Deoxys left alive?

He was so focused in his thoughts and worries that he did not at all notice the Prinplup walking behind him...

...

Doctor Propizio Wasser Te Haurangi, aka Dr. Prop.
Team Aqua
AMS Deathwing, Mirage Island, Hoenn
Affected RPers: @Neo Emolga AND @Lord Celebi

"Shut up, sit down, and relax," Noah said, trying to give off calming and reassuring vibes despite his clear irritation. "It was some kind of shared dream, and Diabora was there. They're not dead if that's what you're thinking."

That did not do anything to internally calm Massadar down-anyone could tell by the looks in his eyes, his absolutely terrified, panicked-to-hell looks, but he nevertheless took a seat, shaky. Propizio recalled Diabora only through some recent testing; he was apparently the voice in the ABH, an unrelenting troll that would find the rowdier corners of the internet to be to his liking. If this was any indication, he clearly had more power than just teasing people...

"I think it's some kind of trap, I doubt it's going to take Raidon long to figure it out," he added.

And, with that, just as it looked like Yantil was about to faint from sheer worry, Raidon came to, debuting, leaving an unconscious Celebi. Not long afterwards did Doctor Tiantus, with an abnormally agitated remark about his head hurting. Dr. Prop decided not to bother with why it was so, the situation looked...Tense. Reg Lando and Finch Reynolds came to shortly thereafter. Dr. Prop's attention was almost wholly focused on the unconscious Celebi-so much potential.

He refocused on Raidon once the Dread Lord spoke: "Captain Ashfield, priority number one right now is stopping Diabora. This incident has proven him too powerful to exist. He questions my stranglehold on Hoenn and eventually all of Maridia. As such, we will use whatever means necessary to wipe his scum from the face of this planet. Is this clear?"

Hoo boy...This had to be pretty serious. Whatever Diabora was, it was now blatantly clear that it was a massive pain in Aqua's side and Raidon intended to eliminate it, which also meant it had physical presence.

"You bet your a** it is," Noah said, nodding his head. "I have a feeling that a**hat meant to keep us trapped in there much longer, but we're nobody's b**ch."

"I dunno about you, but while we were in there, I had a feeling we weren't alone," Noah said, after a brief silence. "I made contact with the guy that Diabora referred to as Qinglong, and Diabora mentioned I was the seed of Qinglong the same way he said you were the seed of Zhu-Quiao, whoever the hell that is. Now, at first I thought it could have been just part of the dream, but then again, that wouldn't make sense. Qinglong actually helped me bail out of that dream trap, which would be total paradox if Qinglong was only limited to Diabora's dream itself. There's no damn way Diabora would have put in an exit guide in his own dream trap. That means somewhere out there, I owe somebody named Qinglong a beer."

Qinglong and Zhu-Quiao. Well, he hadn't heard of those names before. Definitely didn't seem to be anything to take lightly...

...

A few minutes later, and Propizio was now altering the DNA sequences within the very structure of the mutagens as planned, in an attempt to perfect the mutagens. He figured that, regardless of what some people might think-ranging from "It's Overkill," to "Thinking of eight Pokemon is hard enough," to "I still don't want to try Chimera Forms yet," all of which were valid, but in Propizio's opinion, if something wasn't brought to its full potential, it was a waste-and there were many who thought like that. Potential is not a thing to waste, and if there was anything that had potential, it was Chimeras.

Thinking about it: Now humanity had a way to go freakishly far beyond JUST bursting, and had just SO many applications! Sometimes the powers of multiple Pokemon even interacted in ways that made them incredibly dangerous-IE, Ampibom and Ninetales combos for an extra nine hands of cursed potent, and why not throw in Machamp for even better control and a LOT more power? The combinations were amazing-and having more room to combine Pokemon could undoubtably lead to some truly amazing things. Granted, it was pretty hard to think of effective Chimera forms past eight donors, but there were a lot of ways this could go.

Whether or not the extra potential for extra donor genes was appreciated, a Pokemon's actual Abilities, ranging from the mundane to the extraordinary, had quite an impressive power to them, especially in pairs, and Dr. Prop could not see that going to waste. He could think of brutal combinations, or things that cover weaknesses. Rain Dish and Dry Skin to effectively give a MEND-like effect in rain; Simple and Contrary, which would take the well-known Serperior strategy of spamming Leaf Storm and crank it up to eleven in a hurry. Even having one ability could be incredible; A Chimera that would struggle against such moves as Earth Power would find Levitate a blessing (to say nothing of the fact that Levitate makes one FLY.)

All based on some simple tweaks to genetics. Well, theoretically. In order to PROVE that, well, he'd need more testing. He'd always need more testing, he'd need it to prove anything, even though he was fairly confident he was correct just based off of his theory. Testing was how any scientist could back up their theories, and a good test could prove even the most outlandish ideas, and for Dr. Prop, testing was the FUN part of his job, at least as soon as it got to the life-sized models.

That was the fun of being a scientist-for being alternatively recognized as absolutely insane and an unparalleled genius, sometimes both at the same time, or sometimes one after the other.

Of course, the actual process of modifying the mutagen, though still quite better than just endlessly writing down equations, was still tedious. He had to make note of EVERY change he made, no matter how minor. It was for the simple reason that, quite frankly, if it could not be reproduced in a laboratory setting under the same environment-scientific common sense here!-it was effectively a spoiled theory, and he would NOT fall victim to that. So, with every alteration to the base mutagen he made, he wrote down WHAT the alteration was, with what tool did he make it, and if he dared to backspace because he made a mistake (a reoccurring event due to his klutzy tendencies), he wrote THAT down too.

Science was only boring when it first started, or int he opening stages. The fun came when it was time to actually use the crazy tricks he had planned out. Dr. Prop already had ideas on how to woo people over to the idea: Make a Chimera with the capacity to use Flash Fire, stuff it with no less than ELEVEN other Pokemon who were all unanimously weak to fire, and have someone shoot flames at him and watch as he sits through it unharmed. He could already see the looks on their faces when a Chimera that by all rights should instantly die to fire instead thrived without even blinking. It made him smile through work that, when not frustrating, was simply tedious.

Being a scientist was a job where you EARNED your fun.