Pokemon Fan Fiction / Pokemon Fan Fiction ❯ Wild Horses & Pokegirls - sidestories ❯ Third Impact ( Chapter 7 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Third Impact: WH&Pg Sidestory #7

DISCLAIMER: Something necessary apparently. This is just my take on Sukebe, sort of a parting shot as i leave the pokegirl universe for those others who hurried me through the WH&Pg story and whom i gave into entirely too often during the main story. The sidestories, on the other hand, have been more "whole cloth" of my own.

Professor Stroak came as soon as word had reached him and he could gain the assistance of one of Morisato's Megami for a teleport.

He had placed word at several sites he had deemed likely. Waste no time in contacting him if someone answering this description is seen.

"Becerra's", a tavern in the Orange Islands, was the sort of unlikely spot where odd things were bound to stagger through the door at any time. Even Ranma Saotome (both versions) had apparently made it into the establishment. The outsider about halfway between his Speech and his return to his homeplane. The native while participating in a Wreckball tournament locally. It was one of the sites that the Professor had deemed more than likely for *him* to appear.

The year, the date, the place, all were as he had calculated.

On entering the tavern, the Professor was careful to make his way to the bar first, Marianne at his side. Two tropical drinks that were more juice than anything with a kick were ordered. Clear heads were required for this endeavor. Once the drinks were served, he could observe the clientele without being *too* obvious.

Lots of pokegirls, of course. This was a place frequented by many "pets" and professionals. A few scattered humans of either gender. Finally someone who looked out of place.

A brooding young man in his late-20s from the look of him. His eyes though - they were far older. He stood out a little in this crowd, including his clothes which looked to have been in fashion perhaps two hundred years ago.

To the researcher's surprise, the young man got up and took the seat next to the Professor.

"Professor Stroak, I presume?" The young man briefly seemed sneering before a wave of depression visibly rolled over him.

"Yes. That booth over there?" The Professor looked around trying to see if there was some Psychic type nearby who would have read him.

The boy took one seat at the booth, so that both Marianne and her owner could sit across from him. "I propose the question game. You ask one question. I answer and respond with a question of my own. Fair enough?"

"Yes. Are you..." The Professor balked at asking the question after so many decades of trying to learn more about this fellow.

"Yes," the boy raised an eyebrow as he leaned back against his seat. "I am Jim. Also known as Sukebe. My turn. What do you know of this 'Mephaesta'?"

"Current terrorist pokegirl, rumored access to things which can turn a human of either gender into a pokegirl. Suspected to be based in the Orange Islands." Stroak thought briefly. "Oh, and Jim, you can call me 'Al'. My question. You never intended for Threshold, did you?"

"OK. Call me Jim. No, Threshold was supposed to end over two hundred years ago." Jim let out a deep breath. "As soon as my sanity began returning to me, I worked at minimizing some of the excesses. Even when events had driven me into madness, I had never intended that my legacy - my pokegirls, remain as slaves. Nor did I intend the human race to be constantly teetering on the edge of doom."

Al nodded. "The pokegirl genetic structure adapted. It became pervasive even in what were apparently human children. If the various traits reached a certain point, the child would be born female and eventually undergo Threshold. It is in that second puberty that those traits either move to dominance or stabilize."

Jim looked into his beer as if hoping to see some sign of deliverance. "Now my turn. You sponsored this Ranma Saotome. Tell me of him."

Professor Stroak spoke of the martial artist who had briefly intersected so many different lives, emphasizing the foibles and poor qualities of Ranma Saotome. There were enough people who would sing his praises that someone needed to remember that he was a real person, not a saint or a font of wisdom.

Jim nodded at several points. "That pretty much fits what I've heard. A figurehead of a movement that had been building for some time. Good. Your question?"

"Why?" Al held up his hand for a moment. "Why keep coming back? Your first message showed that you had your revenge and frankly it sounded as if you were still a bit nuts. Your second message seemed entirely different, you were overwhelmed by the horror that you saw around you."

Jim seemed to consider the Professor before him, weighing him briefly. "What do you think my purpose with the pokegirls was? Not simply revenge, eh? Even in the madness that afflicted me after McKenzie and her ilk destroyed the idealistic youth that I was and birthed the monster Sukebe, revenge by itself would have never satisfied me. Think. You likely have most of the pieces if half of what I've heard of you is true."

The Professor had the Blood Gift of Longevity. He'd been around a long time and hadn't slowed down much despite his age. He considered what he knew of Sukebe apart from the legends and myth that had all been gossip to start with anyway. A young man filled with idealism and a desire to benefit mankind, then becoming the monster he'd been portrayed as, finally this odd wanderer who showed up once every hundred years. "They're your children, aren't they? The pokegirls."

"In a way," agreed Sukebe. "Yet that is only part of the answer. What do you know of evolution, Al?"

"Evolution is when a pokegirl reaches a certain experience level or..." Stroak let that trail off when he saw Jim frown.

"No. Not pokegirl evolution. The other sort."

Al sighed, trying to remember. Hardly anyone knew of such things anymore, part of that blanket of lostech. He remembered some of it. "Natural selection. The more successful an organism is in a given environment, the more chance to breed. Breeding passes on those traits which allowed the organism its success."

"Exactly. Do you know what it was like in the late 20th Century, Al?" Jim looked off in the distance. "I *was* mad at the time, but I knew well the problem affecting humankind. Look at the old records, what has survived, and see the madness that inflicted the rest of that world. There were no frontiers, not really. Man killed man, usually on the flimsiest provocation. There were fewer and fewer great minds, great innovators, because everyone was encouraged to think in narrow channels. Unnatural constraints were placed on human thought, pressures the organism couldn't bear built up, and things were getting worse. The upper 10% of any given population in terms of intelligence, success, skills - they weren't marrying. In the cases where they had children, the numbers were not great. Compared to the lowest 10% in those same terms - who often had very large families. The human race wasn't evolving any more, and technology was increasing the ability of these hordes to destroy each other daily."

"Nuclear weapons?"

Jim waved it off. "No. Not hardly. A High School Chemistry student could make explosives capable of killing hundreds in my homeland. Children barely able to walk were routinely able to shoot other children using readily available firearms. Countries were raised to hate other countries. There was racial hatred, gender hatred, religious hatred. Diseases were spread by people who didn't care if other people died so long as they could get a momentary thrill. Drugs were used with much the same lack of regard. 'If it feels good, do it' - and to hell with the consequences. No, in the end of the 20th Century, I may have been mad. But I was hardly alone."

"So what did this..." Al shut his mouth, eyes narrowing. "Human evolution?"

"Give the man a cigar," said Jim, smirk returning to his face. "In my madness, that was my goal. My pre-Sukebe days had seen me wanting to benefit all mankind by bringing forth technologies that would save the planet and end such plagues as mass starvation. As Sukebe, the goal became evolving humanity to a state where such things were viable."

"Homo Sapiens Enhancus," said Al, using the term that Researchers had recently coined.

Saluting Al with his drink, Jim's smirk turned wistful. "So every hundred years I return. The first time I cured my madness with some help from a Megami. The brief surfacing in 201 was largely uneventful, though I saw the beginnings of what I had sought earlier showing all around. All that remains is this."

Watching Jim push a small vial and computer card across the table, Al looked at both curiously without taking it.

Annoyance again flashed across Jim's face. "Take it. It's an Anti-Feral medication that should work on Kittens and most of their evolved states. It won't free them completely from the need to have sex and psychic contact with humans, they'll still need to reinforce their human side by such methods, but it won't be as bad. Though it is a side-effect that will make this valuable."

"How so?" Al continued looking at the fluid.

"Human births will be more common in Kittens who have used the drug. More to the point, you now have boys who have Blood Gifts due to their extra helping of genes. Girls with such things usually go through Threshold or are born pokegirls, right? This stabilizes things a bit more. With this, some of those human girls born of pokegirls will have Blood Gifts but won't go through Threshold."

With a trembling hand, the Professor picked up the vial. "And the card?"

"Details on how to synthesize the compound." Jim looked up at the clock. "The pokegirls are in many ways my children, but now most of the human race is related to me if you follow that logic. Like any parent, I want my children to thrive and surpass me. Not a race of human boys and pokegirls, nor pokeboys and pokegirls, but a new human race who can go on to bigger and better things. Release the medicine as your own resource. Who knows? Perhaps in one hundred years we'll meet again and you can tell me how well it worked or how terribly it failed."

Maryanne took the vial from the Professor as the mad scientist left. "Professor?"

Professor Stroak shook his head. "Our retirements are already planned, Maryanne. In a few more years our deaths will be faked and we'll go off where League scrutiny isn't so strong. In the meantime we can release this as if we had successfully broken through our own research into this matter. A few more years of playing mentor to young Ash and Gary and the others. And then..."

Maryanne might have been an Ingenue, but that didn't necessarily include clueless in the racial description. "'And then', Professor?"

"And then we'll see, won't we?"

==========

In 304 AS, Professor Stroak developed an Anti-Feral medication that works on Kittens and their evolved forms.
In 306 AS, the first human girl with an active Blood Gift was born of a Kitten using that medication. In 312 it was demonstrated that she was stable as a human and could not be turned into a pokegirl. Michiru Tengoku continues her life as a human and a musician in the Nerima area. -Source: New Science magazine, April 322 AS