Destiny Colosseum ~ Training Rooms

[Dragonfree]

"You started being weird as soon as I said I was genetically engineered," Mia said, unblinking. "And then you get angrier every time I talk about how we were made. When you came to attack Dave you called him a science dog. And called his research science mumbo-jumbo."

 

[Negrek]

"Well, yeah, it is whatever fucking mumbo-jumbo," Nate said. "I ain't got a problem with science, I got a problem with people who think they got any right to go all Build-a-Bear on some kids because that'd make them stronger, or better, or more scientifically interesting or whatever the fuck. It's fucked up, and it leads to some real bad shit. So, yeah, I got a huge fucking problem with Dave science. I ain't got no beef with science when it's, like, staring at stars a lot of whatever the fuck. Those people can go off and do their weird nerd shit, I don't give a fuck."

 

[Dragonfree]

"I already told you they didn't want to make any kids," Mia said, annoyed. There was something weird about the way he talked about it, the vagueness about things that were still too specific to be hypotheticals. It leads to some real bad shit. "Did people make Pokémorphs in your world? What happened?"

 

[Negrek]

"Okay, fine. They didn't want to actually deal with kids, so instead they thought they'd make them and kill them before they were born. Not fucking better," Nate said. How the fuck was she not getting this? First time he'd heard of a science experiment gone wrong who wasn't pissed at their creator, honest to God. "God, I hope there ain't any pokémorphs floating around in my world." Aside from the one, but as far as anybody knew science wasn't responsible for them. "Haven't heard of any, at least. But we got plenty of fun genetic engineering shit, still. Like Mewtwo. Turns out that if you make somebody who's really good at killing, that's pretty much what they like to do all the time. Fucking thanks, science."

 

[Dragonfree]

"You were arguing that they thought they had the right to make kids that were better or more interesting. But you already knew they didn't. Why would you try to argue something that you know isn't true?" Normally Mia would have stopped trying. There was probably no point. She just wanted to make him understand why he was being stupid and stop being weird about Dave.

And... there was an engineered Mewtwo in his world who just killed people all the time? Hmm. "I'm good at killing but I don't do it all the time. Didn't anyone capture Mewtwo or put him in jail?"

 

[Negrek]

I'm good at killing, but I don't do it all the time. Holy shit. Not even trying to keep up the whole "medical research" sham now. And from the way she tossed it out there like it was a barely-interesting fact, she didn't even realize what she'd just said. What it meant. She really had no fucking clue, had probably been conditioned to accept whatever that fucking poochyena told her. And she truly didn't realize how fucked up her situation was.

Nate tried to keep his anger out of his voice, but the first couple words came out warped anyway. "You've seen Giovanni. He's a mewtwo. There's like twenty of us fucking souped-up interdimensional warriors or whatever the fuck, and we still ain't been able to take him out. Now imagine that in a world without no superheroes to save the day. There ain't nobody who can stop Mewtwo doing what he wants anymore. And all he wants is to be a huge murdering bastard. I don't get what you're saying about rights or not rights or what your pal did or didn't do, but I do know that when scientists or anybody start treating people like tools they want to design, bad shit happens."

 

[Dragonfree]

"We aren't designed as tools because they didn't mean for us to exist in the first place," Mia said. They'd gone around in a circle again. "We weren't made to do anything. They don't even want us to use our powers. There's no point talking to you if you're just going to keep saying the same wrong thing."

She frowned. Mewtwo was just too strong for anyone in his universe to stop him doing what he wanted? She was strong but she was not that strong. That was what Dave had been getting at about legendary Pokémon, she supposed. He really didn't like that. But Mia would like that, if it was her. Or somebody else sensible. Dave'd be a good legendary Pokémon, if they fixed his brain first, even if he wouldn't like it.

It didn't sound like this Mewtwo was all that sensible, though, if all he did was kill people. "Maybe if you engineered another even stronger Pokémon they could stop Mewtwo," she suggested. "But it would take a while. Does your world have any legendary Pokémon?"

 

[Negrek]

What, was it really that one word that was causing all these problems? "You told me you were supposed to be for medical research, didn't you? Or not you, like your cells or whatever. Maybe they didn't make you to use your powers or whatever the fuck"--yeah fucking right--"but they made you because they wanted to use you for something. Not because they wanted you. Because they wanted something useful to them. So it's supposedly like studying healing or whatever the fuck and not stabbing people. Still fucking sucks."

Not that there was any point trying to get through to her if that was her suggestion for dealing with Mewtwo. "I'll bet there's some dickhead out there trying to make an even stronger Mewtwo or whatever the fuck. Mewthree, something. But okay, what are we supposed to do when that on goes off the rails, too? We can't just keep making crazier and crazier clones. All that does is cause more problems in the end. And yeah, we got legendaries, but it ain't like here where they're just strolling around, like you can go up to them and ask a favor or whatever the fuck. Plus Mewtwo could kick most of their asses anyhow."

 

[Dragonfree]

Hmm. That made a bit more sense. She tilted her head. "It doesn't make any difference what my parents were thinking before I was born. Even if I cared about that, medical research is much more interesting than just wanting to have kids. And you could engineer the stronger Mewtwo so it gets cancer. That way, it will just die on its own, after it's beaten the first Mewtwo."

 

[Negrek]

Nate barked a short laugh. "Well, you do you, I guess. Medical research sounds shit boring to me." He shook his head. "Anyhow, might not matter to you personally, but I mean, like, in principle. You open the door to that kinda shit, again." He waved his hand. "Bad shit happens. Now, I dunno how cancer's supposed to take down some super-superclone, buy you're right, I guess, some kinda killswitch could maybe work, if you were super sure it'd actually work when and how you wanted it to, and the clone didn't figure out how to disable it." He looked away, no longer feeling quite so angry. "Pretty fucked up, though. The whole deal with Mewtwo is. Going anywhere near that shit is like poison."

 

[Dragonfree]

Mia nodded slowly. "So you don't like genetic engineering because in your world some people made Mewtwo and he kills a lot of people. But our parents weren't trying to engineer any people or Pokémon who could go out and kill anyone or be unhappy about how they were made. They all knew that would be very stupid. So really you should be mad at the people who forced them to keep us, not at them."

 

[Negrek]

Nate dragged his hand through his gills. "Not trying, maybe. Ain't like the poor fucks who did Mewtwo were expecting that to happen, neither. Look at it this way. Ain't nobody going out driving shitfaced is looking to crash into someone and kill them. And it don't go bad every time, but it's fucking dangerous and stupid anyhow. And yeah, maybe one time some other idiots showed up and, I don't know, distracted them while they were trying to drive, made things go wrong when they might not have otherwise. But that don't mean the person who took the car out when they were drunk as fuck wasn't being an asshole, especially when they could have just, you know, not." He smirked. "So, compromise? I'll be pissed at both of them. How's that work for you?"

 

[Dragonfree]

"That's not the same. When you drive drunk you're more likely to get into an accident. But they couldn't have kept us by accident, without the other people interfering. It's more like if you went out to drive normally, but then somebody else cuts your brakes so you can't stop when you were going to." She paused. "Only normal car accidents are a lot more likely, even if nobody cut your brakes. But people still drive cars."

Nate was more fun when he was less angry. She didn't know if he would agree no matter what she said; usually people didn't change their minds, because people were annoying. But he was really talking to her now. That was nice. "It's okay if you don't like Dave. But we're still getting him back."

 

[Negrek]

Nate snorted. Just had that much faith, didn't she? It had felt like they might be getting somewhere for a moment there, but... baby steps, or some shit. He didn't want to piss the familiar off so much she stopped talking to him at all. So he shoved down everything he wanted to say except for a statement that was at least technically true. "Yeah. We are." There were at least other people they needed to pull out of pokéhell, so they'd be doing it, one way or another.

Nate sighed and glanced down the hallway again. He could tell Rocky'd fucked off somewhere--probably felt Nate coming and decided he didn't want to chat. It was probably going to be more or less starting over, trying to track him down again. So, what the hell, he had some time. And he didn't want the scyther familiar to leave angry. "Anyway, enough about that, huh? You like fighting a lot, from what I've seen. I remember that battle you had against Rocky. Interested in any tips?"

 

[Dragonfree]

Mia could tell he still didn't want to get Dave back at all, and frowned at him. But then he changed the subject to fighting instead, and that was okay, if he probably wasn't going to change his mind anyway. "What tips?"

 

[Negrek]

"Well, like when you were fighting Rocky, you did a great job pressing your attacks. He didn't know what the fuck was going on." Nate smirked. "But somebody who really knew what they were doing, they'd be able to see you coming no problem. And then they could hit you. So I'd say work on mixing it up a bit. Don't rush straight in, go around the side or over the top. Make it so they can't even tell what direction you're gonna hit them from. Harder to defend from, and less chance of them getting an attack off on you while you're coming in for the strike. Get what I'm saying?"

 

[Dragonfree]

"Hmm." Mia thought about the fight, narrowing her eyes. She'd been winning before Rocky suddenly used Sheer Cold. She didn't need to do anything different.

But he was talking about other people who were smarter than Rocky, and it made sense. Trying to make it harder for them to know what she was going to do. Mia didn't like lies, but she did want to win fights. "Do you want to fight me?"

 

[Negrek]

"Ha! Well, I ain't the biggest fighter myself. More of a trainer type, you know. But I can show you what I mean." He took a step forward and gestured towards the training room behind Mia. "Interested, then?"

 

[Dragonfree]

Nate was a trainer. She supposed she remembered something like that, a bit, from when she wasn't herself yet. Dave had beaten him pretty easily when they'd fought, but he'd been smart with that Endeavor at the end. He was probably good as a trainer, when he didn't have to do the fighting himself.

Mia nodded and turned to the room. "That would be nice."

She suspected Dave wasn't going to like that she was training with Nate. But right now he was too dead to object.

 

[Negrek]

Maybe it was a mistake to try giving any battle tips to the definitely-a-supersoldier, has-apparently-killed-people (well, her model had) familiar. Even if she hadn't seemed especially murderous so far, what was it going to take? A command from the poochyena? Some kind of environmental trigger? It would have to be controlled somehow, they wouldn't have made somebody who was just gonna up and kill a guy at the drop of a hat.

Well, Mewtwo. Point.

It was hard to see anything of the clone bastard in the scyther familiar, though. Mewtwo was a constant stew of emotions, mostly anger, and, well, Nate had seen the familiar pissed and it was unnerving as fuck, but it wasn't nearly the same thing. Wasn't like she was going to get bored one day and decide to murder her way through the team for the heck of it or nothing. It wasn't like he knew her well or anything, but... definitely, she wouldn't.

Ah, fuck it. It wasn't like what little Nate could teach her would mean much in comparison to whatever battle conditioning or whatever the fuck she already would have had, or the poochyena's memories of it, or whatever. It had been a long time since he'd had the chance to have a proper training session. Way too long. Wasn't like Rocky ever listened to him or nothing, and just one wasn't going to hurt none.

"All right, great," Nate said, stepping into the training room. There were, as ever, a few substitutes piled in the corner. "All right, let's grab one of these guys. Why don't you show me how you'd go in for an aerial ace?"

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