If We Only Got His Airship As Well...

Fight (mini-fic)

BOOTING UP...

BOOTING UP...

ISF9 ROBOTICS SUB-DIVISION (424 AFE)

CMBTRN MK2 BCS REVISION 023

CPU: CALCUTEC HEXALITH CLUSTER CPU E0812

LOADER V2.1

EXEC VERSION 32.43

64 GDUNITS RAM SYSTEM

20 GDUNITS FREE

50 TDUNITS PRIMARY DATA STORAGE

38 TDUNITS FREE

EXTERNAL DATA STORAGE FOUND AND CONNECTED (ISF9 ROBOTICS DIVISION, B-BOX MK51)

LOAD ROM(1): GENERAL.OS

LOAD COMPLETE

INITIALIZING...

COMMENCING SELF-DIAGNOSTIC PROCEDURES...

MOTIVE SYSTEMS: WALKER, BIPEDAL / QUADRUPEDAL / HEXAPEDAL, DIGITIGRADE, OPERATIONAL

GYROS AND ACCELEROMETERS OPERATING NORMAL

MANIPULATORS: FOUR, FIVE-FINGERED, OPERATIONAL

SENSORY SYSTEMS: ADVANCED TARGETING SENSOR COMPLEX, ADVANCED RECON SENSOR COMPLEX, THREE GENERAL AWARENESS SENSOR COMPLEXES

POWER SOURCE: TWO INTEGRAL ULTRA-HIGH DENSITY RECHARGEABLE ARCANE ENERGY BATTERIES (ALL 100% CHARGED), ONE REMOVABLE ULTRA-HIGH DENSITY RECHARGEABLE ARCANE ENERGY BATTERY (100% CHARGED), MULTI-PURPOSE POWER CONVERTER

ADDITIONAL SYSTEMS: OPTICAL CLOAK - READY

WEAPONS: ASSAULT BEAM CANNON (POSSIBLE MODES - ASSAULT BEAM / ASSAULT PULSE), TWO CUTTER BLADES, TWO GRAPPLING HOOK LAUNCHERS (36 METERS, SMART HOOK)

VOCALIZER OPERATIONAL

OPERATION START.

Combatron found itself in a transport container. Considering unusual position and the fact, that startup sequence was initiated by the systems of container, which were very low on energy, some emergency situation happened, and now machine was to analyze it, find the way to humans and complete the mission in protecting them.

Because of how container was locked and lock itself was inoperable, combatron decided to take a way of force.

Machine deployed two cutter blades from the upper limbs, activated the blade enhancing system, enshrouding them in clouds of destructive arcane energy, then simply cut the container open, like a tin can, threw what remained of door away and jumped out, prepared to take on hostile targets.

Strangely enough, none were found nearby, and, apparently, the container itself was lying in some forest in the Kalos region. Combatron, after seven seconds of analysis, decided to move out to north, “hoping” to eventually find a human settlement. One activation of cloaking system later, and everything became silent.

Machine noticed the desolate land straight ahead. Since the arcane energy detectors were picking up some very strange readings, combatron resorted to quadrupedal movement in order to maximize speed. Right now, the only combat protocol in the robot’s mind was simple - “protect the civilians and eliminate hostile targets at all costs”.

Jan saw, how Yveltal prepared the Oblivion Wing, how the orb between wings and tail grew... and how, suddenly, bright blue beam from somewhere hit it and caused it to explode, cancelling the attack and throwing the Destruction Pokemon into uncontrollable tail-spin.

- Citizens, this is combatron robotic military unit speaking! - sounded from roughly the beam’s point of origin. When he and Aila turned their heads to it, they saw a six-limbed metallic construct dropping the invisiblity camouflage and swiftly turning cylindrical “head”, still slightly opened, like a backwards flower (authors note: like this), and glowing faint blue, from one side to another, searching for something.

- Citizens, I, as a most powerful military unit here, order you to evacuate at once to increase your chances of survival!

Jan wanted to object, but the thing somehow predicted it and continued:

- Failure to fulfill the given order will result in your death sentence with immediate execution!

- Let’s go, Aila, I don’t think we’ll make a difference in this battle, - motor-mouthed scared Jan, placing girl on the back of his Gogoat and setting a course for somewhere sufficiently far away from here. The metallic-looking six-limbed thing nodded in approvement and quickly jumped forward, saying something to barely-stabilized Yveltal.

- You are facing Combatron-class assault robot. Death is inevitable, - said the machine, before it cloaked and started to charge the Assault Beam Cannon. Of course, the chargeup sequence itself partially compromised cloaking field and took more time in stealth mode, but right now, it did not matter to arcane robot - the only thing that mattered was the success of mission, and even in the current state, it was cloaked enough to disrupt hostile’s ability to aim effectively.

As much as machine would’ve liked, the Yveltal didn’t hover in one place - rather, it started to use general aerial attack patterns, similar to those, used by the most Flying-type Pokemon.

The first attack was saturation Razor Wind, directed at general location of the combatron. Though it, thanks to spread, barely scratched the paintwork on armor, it still made a disturbance to the cloaking field. Thankfully, combatron was able to cling to a rocky cliff and avoid being detected.

The next attack was another Oblivion Wing, targeted at escaping civilians. Because they were executing order to evacuate and combat protocols ordered so, machine was forced to prematurely fire the Assault Beam Cannon, exposing itself, in order to cancel the hostile’s attack and allow non-combatants to pull away safely.

The third was Dark Pulse, directed almost precisely at the combatron. Machine instantly disengaged the gripping system, allowing itself to fall off the cliff to avoid the powerful attack.

- No quarter! - replied robot, switching the Assault Beam Cannon to Assault Pulse mode and quickly sending two small beams of energy in hostile Pokemon. Yveltal shuddered, as streams of destructive arcane energy burned holes in his flesh, but continued the pursuit for elusive machine, furious in how it managed to allow the prey to escape and was trying to take the Destruction Pokemon down, barely noticing, that combatron was slowly luring it away from the human settlement.

The battle was raging on for the second hour already, with no immediate winner in sights. While the first part of the combatron’s plan - lure the hostile away from the civilians - was a total success, the robot still needed to defeat it for the sake of a world’s safety.

As usual, the Destruction Pokemon was commencing strafing runs with either Oblivion Wing or Hyper Beam one after another, sometimes adding Dark Pulse or Razor Wind for coverage, while the combatron was attacking it with Assault Pulses and, sometimes, trying to hit it with Assault Beam (not often, though, since it was draining batteries like no tomorrow).

Machine registered, how close Yveltal was passing to it this time, and took a chance.

Left lower hand raised, grappling hook launched. While recoil was pretty harsh, it was taken in account during aiming sequence.

Unfortunately, the hostile Pokemon made a sharp turn, evading the hook. Combatron instantly engaged the hoist, retracting the hook along with a rope back into the launcher, and swiftly jumped out of the way of another attack.

- The fight is already over, monster! - boldly announced machine, activating the Assault Beam Cannon and firing several small shots, trying to damage the wings and force the hostile Pokemon to land, where it would sever the spinal cord and slice the brain apart with the cutter blades.

It was a fifth hour of the fight, which continued to rage on even at night.

Both of the combatants were on their last reserves. Yveltal’s body was already overtaxed and overheated, while the combatron had exhausted two batteries, meant mostly for supplying weapons with energy, and was running on the third one only.

Combatron noticed, how the Yveltal, tired as he was, prepared to fire partially-charged Oblivion Wing at the machine. Unable to use the Assault Beam Cannon to cancel out the hostile attack, robot crossed the deployed cutter blades before itself and reconfigured their energy cover, extending it like some sort of a shield.

The impact of a Flying-type attack, capable of nearly-instantly draining life energy from other lifeforms, dissipated on the impromptu deflector, but it was at price - overloaded blade enhancing system malfunctioned, leaving the blades useless and damaging the servos of outer arms. However, it left Yveltal, who passed a little too low, open, and machine took that chance.

Combatron jumped with all power it’s servos were able to provide and fired both of the hooks, hitting the Yveltal this time and quickly pulling itself to him. Barely, but arcane robot still somehow managed to get a decent grip on the Legendary embodiment of death. The upper limbs, which, originally, housed deadly cutter blades, were out of commision, weapon energy supply was flat, but machine still had something left.

Barely clenching to the feathered skin, arcane robot has managed to move itself to the head of the Yveltal. Blue eyes of the Legendary Pokemon of Destruction, the Death Embodied, intersected with several lifeless sensors of the most advanced killer machine in the world, neither of them bearing any trace of empathy or sorrow.

Combatron, despite Destruction Pokemon desperately trying to shake it off, had finally alinged itself with the part of beast’s skull, where the brain was located, and steadied the joints.

Energy source switched, power rerouted. The head-mounted Assault Beam Cannon started opening like a backwards flower once again, howling chargeup sound getting higher with each millisecond passing and cannon itself glowing blue brighter and brighter.

Combatron registered, how fast the energy from the main power supply was draining, but machine couldn’t care less about it - if the beam makes contact, it’ll be worth it, even if it’ll mean total cessation of the combatron’s operation.

Yveltal understood, how the thin-limbed metallic thing, despite all of the damage, started preparing the most powerful beam attack, directed right at his head, and he couldn’t do anything about it. For the first time in untold millenia, the Destruction Pokemon was not angry, not annoyed, not furious, but outright terrified. And then everything broke loose.

Monstrously powerful beam erupted from the energy cannon. Even the skin of the Legendary, capable of shrugging off any but strongest attacks, could not stand in the path of focused destructive arcane energy of such a magnitude.

The bright blue beam easily atomized the skin and tore through the skull, completely destroying the brain, and then continued along the neck and spine, which were “lucky” to happen to be in the way of beam after the Yveltal’s attempts to throw the combatron off. In less than four seconds, a decent parts of head, back and tail of the Destruction’s embodiment ceased to exist.

The wretched corpse of the Yveltal, along with powerless husk of combatron, fell into the lake, dead machine still clinging on what remained of Destruction Pokemon.

When two dead deathbringers impacted the water’s surface, combatron’s powerless servos easily gave up, as it was thrown away from the Yveltal’s body, which skipped across the surface a single time, like a stone.

After both of them sunk to a considerable depth, Destruction Pokemon’s true ability has finally kicked in, starting to absorb life energy of everything around (which was not that much) and trying to fold what remained of the body into the Cocoon form. It’ve succeeded... mostly, because sheer scale of damage, done to the body, and insufficient amount of absorbed life force prevented normal full-scale resurrection sequence from taking place. It has required a fresh start, start from the very zero, start from anew.

On the bottom of the lake, inside what would normally be an Yveltal, folded into a Cocoon form, old life, which was to be eternal, has perished for good and entirely new one was born. It was smaller and weaker by magnitude of several orders, but, at least, it was.

Weird dream is still weird

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

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

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

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

Continuation (Lawrence III and Yveltal).

Lawrence III is a scientific genius and the single best artist in the Pokemon world. He travels all around the planet in his giant airship - Flying Palace of Arts - and seeks inspiration everywhere and in everything, creating unique and priceless artworks in process. During the Orange Islands Incident, he tried and succeeded in awakening Lugia to get the inspiration he was seeking throughout his entire life. After the incident was over, he has donated his entire art collection, except for the Ancient Mew card, to the Shamouti people and flew away in his somewhat damaged Flying Palace of Arts. His last heard words were “How it all began, and how it will begin... again.”

“I’m afraid I’m not a trainer, young lady, I’m merely... an artist. I’ve began my artline with the Ancient Mew card, and now, I’ve created all this. Legendary Pokemon have always been my passion, and soon, my artwork of life itself will be Legendary.”

Unlike her normal world’s counterpart, backwards world Yveltal does not look that fierce and predatorish. While her body retains the normal Yveltal look, her eyes are not full of anger and a desire for prey. Instead, they are almost always filled with sadness and sorrow, because she never forgets those she was unable to save. Hovewer, she loves playing with both human and Pokemon children, because, as she says, “It’s one of those things that gives a meaning to my life”, and during these sessions, she may temporarily get herself out of her depressed state and become happy.

“Why do I, the Destruction Pokemon, look like this? Because I understand the value of life, unlike the Life Pokemon, Xerneas. What a cruel irony - the Life Pokemon loves to create a new means to kill and the Destruction Pokemon is the one who saves lives from the twisted creations of Xerneas. Being functionally immortal and having nearly infinite memory, I can never forget those I was unable to save and had to put out of theirs misery. Even more painful to me is that I was not able to save Zygarde from the one of the most evil Xerneas’s creations - the mind-altering virus. Sometimes I think, that there is nothing I can do about this irredeemable immortal psycho Xerneas, and it makes me want to curl up in the Cocoon form and never leave this state. However, when I look at the happy smiles of the humans and Pokemon, when I see them fulfilling theirs dreams, when I play with theirs children - these thoughts go away and I feel that I’m needed. As long as there is hope in anyone, there’s a reason for me to live and fight Xerneas.”

@blackjackgabbiani, how do you like this? For some reason, I can’t imagine Artist!Jiri without toga and some unfinished artwork on the background.

APPARENTLY IN ANOTHER WORLD HUNTER J GIVES OUT RARE POKEMON

If you look closer at the moments when the last shell from those, which were  launched on island, hit’s the rock, you can see, that it DID some damage (rock shards flying), and sheer kinetic power of impact can be observed when shells hit the Moltres (he is pushed backwards pretty hard). And yeah, I’d like to learn more about Flying Palace too. From what I’ve seen in the movie, she has 5 levels plus exhibition hall and control tower (it can be seen during the scene where Moltres and Zapdos are wreaking havoc on her), her GUI language is English and she has 3 main anti-gravity modules (”Mayday! Mayday! Prepare for crush landing on Lightning island!” scene. If you look closer, you can see the word “CAUTION” on the left side of hologram GUI and three power scales on the right side, which are going criticaly low).

Why don’t any bad guys in pokemon carry guns. This one guy is okay with glassing the entire earth but he won’t shoot a child.

Keel Lorenz (pic related) got nothing on the Benusis la Arwall (aka Neo Icon Epiphanes).

Cyrus and Cyrus

Every time I read about Cyrus from Pokemon, I think of Cyrus Temple from SRIII. Some time ago I thought about some sort of Pokemon/SR crossover, where entire “Daedalus” with Cyrus Temple onboard suddenly finds itself in the Pokemon world. “Daedalus” here has all the armor vehicles (including Temple’s unique version of “Crusader” tank, his unique version of F-69 VTOL fighter and his hoverbike ”Specter”). Because everyone on the carrier is the member of the Special Tactical Anti-Gang unit, I think, that they’ll wage war on Team Rocket and other teams pretty soon, but will they integrate into local International Police or will they remain on their own? Also, STAG have pretty advanced technology on their own, like “Viper” laser rifle, S3X “Hammer” laser spreadshot weapon (energy shotgun), “Sonic Boom” hand-held acoustic cannon (that can easily gib human in the short range and toss vehicles around, if fully charged), “Crusader” tank with plasma cannon, co-axial repeating laser and beam laser in place of a machine gun, N-Forcer MRAP vehicle with repeating laser, F-69 VTOL fighter jets with microwave laser beam cannon and homing energy blast weapon, “Condor” VTOL transport jets with repeating laser and, of course, “Daedalus” with lots of high-caliber autocannons and rocket launchers to both attack enemy and defend herself. Additionally, STAG utilises conventional projectile weapons (McManus sniper rifle, Annihilator RPG, Satchel Charges, Minigun and Kobra pistol) and Riot Shields. I can even imagine a several moments with them:

Jenny releases an Arcanine and blasts the door to the landing pad open, while screaming:

- Stop right there, Cyrus! You're arrested for tampering with Legendaries and endangering the world!

She's then greeted with the sight of several STAG troopers aiming their Vipers and Hammers at her and her Arcanine from the hovering Condor, while completely different Cyrus gets into his F-69 and replies:

- I think you've found the wrong Cyrus, dear lady, because my name is Cyrus Temple, and I'm the commander of the STAG.

Cockpit closes, F-69 takes off and flies away along with the Condor, leaving Jenny and her Arcanine going "What the hell"?

During the next weeks, a lot of people in the world discuss this strange event adt start making theories, what in the Reverse World is the STAG, when suddenly giant airborne aircraft carrier with the STAG logo flies over a Veilstone City and deploys F-69's along with Condors, they immideately fly to the Galactic Veilstone Building and drop a lot of STAG troopers, which then breaks in the building and make a short run of Team Galactic. After the end of the mission, elite STAG trooperd drags a badly beaten up Cyrus and his survived henchmen, when Temple flies of the carrier on his Specter VTOL jetbike and greets shocked police officers, who were thinking, what to do with that giant airship and how to deal with the jets. Temple then says:

- And that is why we are called Special Tactical Anti-Gang unit. Sorry, ladys, you've really dissapointed me, but you might still be not that hopeless and we may teach you, how to uphold police's name and how to make gangsters tremble from the very name of yours. I think, it'll better for the "Daedalus" to stay here for several days.

- What is the "Daedalus"? - asks one of the Jennys.

- Ain't she's a beauty? - replies Temple and gestures to the hovering carrier, leaving everyone shocked.

Scene ends. Article for the Dex:

"Team STAG.

While they simply call themselves STAG (from "Special Tactical Anti-Gang unit"), most of people in the world considers them as another criminal team, which is completely wrong. While not officially linked with the International Police, STAG acts like law-enforcment organisation and even supported by governments, but it's methods are very different to those of the International Police. While International Police mostly relies on individual approach and it’s kind reputation, STAG prefers to act by force and to implant awe in the criminals minds. The most shocking part in the STAG's methods is that than they prefer to use firearms (although they do use Pokemon, but on a small scale), and they aren't limited to the stun guns! STAG troopers prefer to use energy-based weaponry, such as high-power electrical stun gun, "Viper" laser rifle, S3X "Hammer" energy shotgun and "Sonic Boom" hand-held acoustic cannon, and the last three of them are more than capable to kill. Same can be said about their vehicles - all of them have very potent weaponry, which was designed to ensure maximal available destruction. Their base is the giant airborne aircraft carrier under the name "Daedalus", which also serves as their most powerful combat asset - this airship can easily wreak havok on the entire city! There are some rumors that STAG is, actually, from another world, but no STAG member had ever commented that."

@blackjackgabbiani, what do you think about this madness?

Did he have “Terror”-like version of the Flying Palace (pretty close to the original version), more agressive outfit, and the dream to finally finish his collection, no matter what the cost, so he went more dark and became sort of like Jirarudan/Zero/Hunter J’s hybrid? It just would suit theory about him being inspired by Jules Verne’s Robur (who went from half-serious nickname ”The Conqueror” (of the skies) to more serious pseudonym “Master of the World” in the second book, so, Jiri may’ve took pseudonym “Schwager” here) so well.

I had a dream that Jiri was in a new movie but the dub didn’t know who he was and renamed him Schwager. Like “swag”.

IIRC, only female Salandites can evolve.

How do I evolve Salandit? Is there a trick to it? High Life is level 41 and nothing has happened. How about Charjabug?

I think original Hikokyuu is far closer to the “Terror” from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_of_the_World_(novel), which was built by Robur the Conqueror after the “Albatross” and was capable of land travel, submerging, sailing and flight. It was described as small submarine-like ship with wheels on the underside and retractable ornithopter wings, and, although no jet engines were present on the outside, some Parsons turbines were mentioned. Here’s several pictures from DA for you:

“Terror”

Robur the Conqueror along with “Albatross” and “Terror” on the background

“Albatross” again

All of them are pretty close to the Verne’s descriptions, so they’ll give you general picture of these two machines. And yeah, final Hikokyuu may’ve been inspired by the “Albatross”, but original version looks pretty similar to the “Terror”. By the way, I’ve found this early production picture already, but thanks nonetheless.

Here’s that picture of the original Hikoukyuu and Melody’s instrument. Articuno has about…twice its mass in tailfeathers…

@mgrgfan check it out.

Considering the fact, that Lusamine is pretty much Ragyo Kiryuin’s Alola form, I’m very afraid, that this may’ve been something similar to the “purification”, and I wish I’m mistaken. Either way, whatever has happened with Lillie, was similar to the Ragyo’s “purification” in terms of plot impact.

Pokemon SM08

So… Apparently Lillie is still the same rich kid we know, and something traumatic happened during her time living with Lusamine that led to her being afraid of touching Pokemon, probably the Type: Full experiments or Ultra Beasts attacking. Gladion is still missing, probably trying to help Type: Null, and Lusamine is working in her other mansion, aka researching Ultra Beasts.

Which makes me wonder if the Sun and Moon anime is actually a pre-Lillie finding Nebby story, where she’s gets over her fears of Pokemon by the start of the games. It would also explain why the others aren’t Trial Captains yet. They haven’t gotten the announcement/approval/appointment. 

(Ash has very few derp faces this episode. Which is good.)