Thread: Striking Back: Memoirs of a Clone

Ah, not a bad bit of writing, I should think. I certainly was not aware that the world's most perfect Pokémon had kept his own memoirs! Going through, here are my notes on what exists so far:

- I did notice that you had five quotes with which to proceed the prologue as well as another three before part two. While I appreciate what they all might have to say about the story as a whole, I found that having them lumped together at the start may be a bit much. Perhaps it would be best to narrow it down to just one that is relevant to that particular arc of the plot - if the rest absolutely cannot be abandoned, perhaps it would be best to attach them as a part of some "readers' guide" as supplementary material, to provide something to ponder while reading without weighing down the openings of each "part".
- The poetic style in the prologue turns us right around into something that really does work well in this particular way - the quick succession of varying adjectives and the conversation with Old Man Mountain conveys the dream state quite succinctly.
- I admit that I lapsed into the story rather than continue taking notes at the conclusion of the prologue. It was plenty sufficient to hold my interest, then, which is one of the chief things to which fiction should aspire. I do remember, at least, that a general image of Mewtwo's present self was provided while managing to refrain from providing too many details - and so the proper balance was found.
- You have managed to keep at least one reader as curious as the characters about the story-world through the viewpoint character's limited references through which to view it. This, I feel, was another strength.
- At least to start out with, the narrative was a bit long-winded, almost entirely being a description of the surroundings after present!Mewtwo's waxing rhetoric. This is a bit of a necessity to capture a mind new to the experience of existence and intriguing as I have noted, though it did go on relatively uninterrupted for several pages without any other significant action - long enough, at least, for the reader to notice.
- Mewtwo's observations on human thought successfully made it seem completely alien, and his growing frustrations made the approach of his impending outburst seem to be a natural progression.
- You captured Giovanni quite well. Setting aside the foregone conclusion that we all know, he seems akin to an eloquent, ambitious businessman - as he should be.

Now, keep in mind, I find that your writings are leaps and bounds beyond my own capabilities - most of my negative observations are at least partially out of personal taste, and everything that I may have failed to put into my notes was done more than well enough that I was too caught in the narrative to remind myself to stop and comment. You are indeed a talented wordsmith, and I look forward to reading more in the future.

Replies!

@CyberPika

Glad to hear it! Giovanni is a fascinating character to explore.

@Data_Error

First of all, thanks for the thoughtful review. It's wonderful to see someone interested enough to engage with the story that closely. Always good to have some criticism as well. Now to respond to your points!

-Ha, fair enough. I suppose having that many quotes might be a bit overwhelming.
The epigraph at the beginning is not so much for the prologue as they are for the story as a whole (which is why I decided to put those quotes in the index post.) Reading them is certainly not necessary to enjoy the story--if this were a print novel, I'd have them on a separate page that you could glance past or read as you liked. But I might still try to cut them down.

-Excellent! I'm glad, because I knew that poetic sequence would be very important to get right.

-Good to hear I held your interest enough to distract you from the task of reviewing! ;) I knew the introduction was going to be tricky, so it's good to know that I crafted something compelling, that drew you into the character.

-Wonderful! If I can keep you curious about a world and a story you already know, then I'm definitely achieving what I set out to do.

-Yes, I'm willing to concede some long-windedness. ;) It's a gamble, as you noted. One of the things I was trying to do in those passages was break us away from the idea of Mewtwo as a character we already know and approach him* from the perspective of a young mind exploring reality for the first time. When I first played around with this story, years ago, that was definitely one of my weakest points. Perhaps I've overcompensated? The (temporary) deficiency in vocabulary and the intellectual style I've used for the narration may also have something to do with it.

I'm still pondering the issue of long-windedness, really. I know I have a lot of longness. That I don't mind. But I don't want to make the reader slog through any of the prose. I revised a lot of the excess verbiage out of Part Two recently, but I might have to revisit Part One. It was written a while ago. We'll see how my feelings evolve on that score in the future.

-Excellent to know I can bring out the alien aspects of the human being. We need that identification with our narrator.

-Glad to hear you like what I've done with Giovanni. I feel like I've really gotten to know him over the course of writing this story in ways I'd never have expected. Yes, we do have that foregone conclusion hanging over our heads, don't we? It adds a certain something, I think. I wonder what it would be like if we didn't know what was going to happen?

Thanks so much for your kind words! Don't worry, it's always good to receive close feedback, even of the negative. It helps me determine where I need to take things next. I'm happy to have created something you've found so compelling, and delighted to have you as a reader!


Another section should be up soon!

Dai

[CONTINUED:]

And I did dream. But about what—well, that is the question. My dreams were scattered, hazy—full of inexplicable sensations, random collections of images and experiences that constellated briefly into meaning before drifting apart into nonsense again. Somewhere beneath the relentless electricity of the brain, my mind was racing, struggling to make sense of it all. I had the sense that I was in search of something, or trying to accomplish some obscure goal. I wonder if my mind approaches the world the same way in sleep as when awake—obsessed with structure, meaning and reason.

But logic had no place within this realm. I caught half-remembered or imagined snatches of words, of names, of sounds and ideas. I slipped in and out of these ways of thinking, often caught in the snares of an endlessly repeating phrase, or dancing around the edge of a word like “eschew.” Sometimes I seemed an intelligent, thinking creature; other times my emotions grew wild and animal. It was this sensation of being multiple people that perturbed me most upon awakening.

Sometimes I imagine I recollect some of what I dreamed, that first night alone with the whisperings of my own unconscious self. I reach backward through time, diving deeply into memory, and I seem to remember exactly what occurred.

I see vast landscapes unfolding around me, see forested valleys rising up to meet me, see green hills laid out beneath me and snow-encrusted mountain rushing up to me in the distance. But I have no way of knowing if these experiences were really part of that first night of dreaming, or if I have concocted them since. Too often, the lines between one dream and another blur, so that a dream seeps into memory as part of another. Dreams, in particular, have a way of confusing memory, shaping the thought, “I have dreamt this before,” into another part of the illusion.

But one image always returns to me from that night: droplets, steadily falling, forming ripples in a pool of water. Rain, on the surface of a lake or stream. Strangely, I seemed to be looking at this scene from underneath, resting in some quiet hollow where only gentle turbulence could reach me. Stranger still, I had never seen rain before in my short life. Yet somehow I predicted its existence in my dreams. When, in the morning, I recalled the image of water falling from the sky, it seemed but another example of the perversity of the unconscious mind. Only later would I witness rain falling with my own eyes, and realize that what I had seen had been no illusion.

To this day, I do not know how such a thing occurred. I wondered for a time if all the knowledge there ever was might be contained somewhere inside every mind, buried on a level so deep that not even memory could touch it. Every act of discovery, then, would be an act of secret remembrance. Or perhaps, I later mused, I was a prophet, of the sort that feature so often in human tales, capable of leaping past the present moment and experiencing a scene from my own future. I rather liked the notion; it seemed to fit in with my other unparalleled gifts and my role as a visionary and leader. But the idea that any psychic was capable of true prophecy was always a great deal for me to accept.

Today, I have other suspicions. My dreams have continued to play a strange and decisive role in my life, guiding me to unexpected revelations. I think it has much to do with my closest relative, my sibling-progenitor, who roams so merrily over forest, hill and stream. Our destinies are not as different as I once believed. Who knows what might pass between us in the darkness of the night?

I awoke to a strange cacophony. Lost in the transformations of my own psyche, I struggled to understand what was going on. A hollow droning cut through the dreamscape, scattering order and sense into disarray, leaving reality in shattered fragments.

I slipped in and out of awareness with alarming swiftness: now I was in the room, looking at the ceiling, now I was flying above a green landscape I’d never seen before, now I was back in the room, now I was flying again, and on and on and on. And all the while, that incessant droning sound reminded me that there was something I was supposed to know.

I knew that one of these worlds was really there, while the other was an illusion. But which was which? My mind kept moving back and forth between two entirely separate realities. It wasn’t that I found it hard to decide. It was more as if I had already decided, and come up with two entirely different answers. It was infuriating; I seemed to have at least two personalities contending for space inside my head.

In the end, the thing that brought me back to reality was the shrill, endless droning. Vaguely, I that I was being summoned back to the world in order to find out what it was. So I listened. Was the room with silver walls the source of the din?

I shook myself away from the fading visions of green, and made my move. I opened my eyes all the way and stared up at the ceiling. I was awake.

My thoughts came rushing back to me: I was Mewtwo, the greatest of all Pokémon. And I was a guest of Giovanni, the greatest of all humans. Relief rushed through me as the world began to make sense again. The new gap in my awareness was nothing less than bizarre. Sleeping would take some getting used to.

Now the dull sound was a painful annoyance. I squinted. Where was it coming from? I reached out with my mind and followed the vibrations back to their source. Ah. A panel in the ceiling, hitherto undetected, was broadcasting them. I wondered vaguely if I was supposed to do anything about it.

I stretched my limbs and tried to sit upright. The weight of the armor pressed down on me and made this difficult, and only now did I realize how much it had jabbed into me while I slept. Various parts of my body ached in a way that had nothing to do with fatigue. I grimaced and pulled myself upright. I rubbed my eyes; they seemed to be sticking together. Well, I thought, if the purpose of the alarm was to wake me, it had succeeded. I glared at the panel. There seemed to be nothing to do but wait for it to stop.

But after a moment Giovanni’s voice replaced it. “Mewtwo,” crackled the transmission from the ceiling. “Are you awake?”

“Yes,” I said, dully.

“Good. Go to the machine and allow it to recharge your armor. I would like to speak to you there in about fifteen minutes.”

I nodded, then realized that he might not be able to perceive it. “I will be there,” I promised him.

“Good.” With that, the transmission went silent.

As it turned out, Giovanni was eager to see me. Not long after I stepped onto the platform, he emerged from a door above me and stood on the room’s balcony, smiling broadly.

“Well, Mewtwo,” he said, rubbing his hands together with delight, “Your showing yesterday was rather impressive. You have advanced through your challenges far more quickly than I’d anticipated. This allows us to move forward with the next stage of your education. I believe you are ready for actual combat.”

I couldn’t suppress my glee. “Excellent. Shall I attack our enemies? Simply tell me how to find those who oppose us, and I will annihilate them with my powers.”

“Not yet,” said Giovanni, suddenly severe. “You mistake my meaning. Now is not the time for such an approach.” He frowned, and stared off into the distance for a moment, arms folded, apparently deep in thought. Finally he spoke.

“As I have mentioned,” Giovanni said slowly, “the art of conquest is one of subtlety. When opposing forces grapple for power, the end result may depend less on the actual battle itself than its ideas: the plans and stratagems that go into its creation. Much more of our time, in fact, is spent in making plans and obtaining influence by indirect means, than in any obsequious display of brute force. Do you understand me, Mewtwo?”

I nodded, not sure where he was going with this.

“We find,” he mused, “broadly speaking, that just as combat is split into two stages—the preparation beforehand and the direct action that ensues—so are the combatants split into two groups. There are planners, who research the relevant factors of that particular encounter, analyze how they may best overcome the opponent’s techniques, and direct the proceedings from afar.”

“And there are fighters, who tear away at the opposing side, fueled by their physical might and their willingness to do battle. Both of these figures are essential. The symbiosis between them allows victory. Fascinatingly, this is exactly what we observe in the case of you and I: one who elects to direct and to plan, and one whose natural strength virtually guarantees victory.”

“I think I could plan a few of our battles, if need be—“ I began. But Giovanni wasn’t finished yet.

“Furthermore,” he continued, pacing along the balcony, “these divisions are already long-established. Throughout recorded history, war has always employed human beings as formulators and tacticians, and Pokémon as fighters; as raw muscle. Either we see a few human generals leading large armies of Pokémon, as was the case with Cadilus, or a hierarchy of human-Pokémon groups in which the most capable occupy positions of leadership, as was the case with the legions of Alexander the Great.

“In either case, we see the same dichotomy: men advise, Pokémon act. Since antiquity, this has been the relationship between our species; it may be a biological imperative. Every encounter between us is influenced by it to some degree.”

For a moment I thought his eyes met mine. From the distant balcony, he seemed to tower over me like some kind of giant. I shivered slightly.

“And so we come to a vital question,” he went on. “Namely: what use are our tight, coordinated bands of warriors and theorists in peacetime? For that matter, what of the long stretches of tedium between one operation and the next? Men may busy themselves with subtle ways of seizing power, but will their minds remain sharp enough for the next confrontation? And will their monstrous companions be ready to reenter the chaos of battle?”

“To this end, an elegant solution has naturally emerged. Spineless though they are, the teeming masses of the world show a certain initiative by engaging in a milder form of war. An unconscious imitation, if you will. A human assumes responsibility over a small team of Pokémon, and leads them in battle against other teams. The crucial difference from real warfare is that combatants seek to incapacitate and not to kill—an ancient code of honor prevents any Pokémon from dealing a mortal blow. But behind it all is that same old urge for blood; an echo of the thrill of war, disguised as a harmless game that even children play.”

“So for us it serves as a way to hold ourselves in readiness,” I said. “A practice war, to keep our skills intact.”

He nodded. “Precisely. I am involved with the administration of this sport, as I am with most other activities of note. I am a Gym Leader, a skilled Pokémon ‘trainer,’ whom a novice may challenge for entry to the regional and national tournaments. Most choose to look elsewhere, or fail in the attempt. I do not play to lose.”

“Here lies your opportunity, Mewtwo,” he told me, smiling broadly. “Aid me in my battles. Test yourself against living, breathing opponents. You shall be my secret weapon, emerging from concealment when my challengers think victory eminent. We shall not play this little charade every match—for that would arouse suspicion, and I must allow at least a few of the season’s competitors an honest victory—but I will ensure you enjoy regular practice each day. By participating in this trivial game, you will learn how to subdue real Pokémon, who are certain to be your opponents on any battlefield. And I promise you, when the time does come for war—”

“I will be ready,” I answered.

“You will be ready.” His eyes flashed as he leaned into the light.

We went together to the helicopter. The hallways were starting to grow familiar, and entering the flying craft’s cushioned interior felt like greeting an old friend. We rose up the shaft, burst into the light, and set out over the green landscape. I asked few questions during our ascent, simply gazing at the vibrant scenery which surrounded our home. But, after we had flown for a little while, I noticed we were approaching something new.

It was as if someone had taken Giovanni’s headquarters and shattered it into a thousand tiny pieces, gleaming silver in the morning sunlight. Some other fragments were soon revealed, hidden, disguised by more muted colors—possibly made of another material than metal. Thin brown trails connected these shapes, I noticed, so that each tiny speck was part of a vast network, stretched out beneath the branches.

But it was what lay beyond that caught my attention. The green landscape gave way to an enormous clearing, and for a moment I felt my breath catch. Here were the shining silver fragments which seemed so much like reflections of my partner’s resplendent abode. The threads between them soon grew enormous and dark, almost black in places. And as we flew into the center of this cleared space, the constructions, too, grew larger and larger, until they rivaled the base I now called home. Here there was no space that could remotely be called green, save in rigidly defined sections. It was as if any trace of the natural landscape had been vigorously scrubbed out. Here the color gray was king.

At the very heart of this conflagration rose shapes almost too monumental to be believed; vast spires of metal and glass that rose up into the sky, seeming to reach up to us, as if to snatch us out of the air and drag us back to the ground where we belonged.

The whole thing seemed so intricate and delicate, like the inside of a computer terminal. Yet these were not tiny wires and diodes, but a myriad of gargantuan constructions, enough to contain me ten thousand times over. I wanted to run my mind over it and feel its every nuance and facet, to draw it all into me in one gentle movement. But that was impossible. The simplicity was illusory; it was too large, too complex for one individual to contain. Glimpses were the best I could hope for.

“What is it?” I asked, voice hushed.

“A city,” Giovanni replied brusquely. He seemed irritated when I gave him a quizzical look, not understanding. He frowned and looked away for a moment before answering.

I gave a small sigh. It was difficult to understand the man sometimes. There were moments when he seemed all smiles and joviality, and we talked as friends. But at other times, he seemed bored with my company, responding to my words as if they distracted him from more important ideas. I wished I hadn’t spoken up, but what could I have done? There were things I needed to know about this world.

“A mass dwelling-place for humans,” Giovanni said impatiently. “The buildings you see are, broadly speaking, either homes or places of employment, where men and women perform tedious, meaningless activities for the sake of an insignificant paycheck. For all its mass and grandeur, the city mostly consists of such useless dross as their ilk. Look well, though—it is in cities like these that we make our move. The lifeblood of the human race passes through here; all things have some tie, some connection with the human city.”

“As such, it falls to us to make use of it. I maintain more than one base of operations—the gym here is largely a front for another. Aspiring Pokémon trainers, usually young and naïve, seek battles by appointment, while my officers sneak in through the other entrances. I am as well-respected in the criminal underworld as I am in the public eye. Desperate, restless young men know where to go to find reliable employment and a sense of purpose. I am happy to provide it to them.”

As he said all this, his gaze changed very subtly—it was as if Giovanni was staring through me, taking in some larger picture in which I was only a small fragment. By now I recognized how he moved into another space within himself as he spoke, where he grappled with ideas too immense for anyone else to fathom. I wondered if he had really meant to tell me all these things about the city, or whether it had simply slipped out of him, the byproduct of his relentless calculations. I wondered if, indeed, most of what he’d told me had been meant for himself; perhaps he needed to recite his holdings, his abilities, and his accomplishments like prayers, before he could be at peace, knowing that he shaped the world.

“At any rate,” Giovanni said suddenly, snapping back to the moment at hand, “we will remain at the Gym for at least the next few weeks. You may expect all the accommodations and facilities of the other location. Events will no doubt conspire to send us flying back and forth from base to base , but I intend for you to spend a solid block of time here, building up your skill, before we need put it to the test. Look carefully: we approach your home for the foreseeable future.”

I kept an eye out, and sure enough, there it was, emerging as we flew past another tower: a place that looked altogether different from the rest. A space had been cleared around several buildings, where the black pathways were replaced by a lighter, friendlier walking-space. Pools of water sparkled in the sunlight, some of them in motion, spraying droplets into the air. The same green-crested poles which had been so numerous outside the city were here, too—but in carefully organized rows that etched an attractive pattern against the ground.

There were several distinctive structures here—one that caught my eye was blue with a red orb set in its center, like the one on Persian’s forehead—but after a moment the place we were flying to became clear. It was a large, regal building, carved out of brown and white stone, and it rose imperiously from the clearing as if to proclaim itself supreme. The pools of water in its vicinity, along with their green companions, seemed even more carefully cultivated here, as if the builders had devoted special time and energy to such ornamentation. I sensed an attention to pattern, to form, though just what had achieved this effect eluded me. The concept of aesthetics still lay beyond me.

But I admired the twin white stairways which marked the path up to the Gym. They seemed natural, as if they had been carved out of the original landscape. Another pool lay between them, and beyond them were six white stone pillars, rounded at the top, which continued the pathway in dramatic fashion, drawing one’s eye to the building’s entrance. This gilded frame was guarded by two muscular men, who wore strange brown armor and held sharp-tipped poles at their sides. Apparently they determined who gained admission. I suspected their appearance was calculated to intimidate.

The most interesting thing of all about the building was its roof: while other structures in the city had flat or pointed roofs, this one was rounded, though in a savage, asymmetrical fashion. It looked, in fact, as if the builders had put two curved rooftops together, one larger than the other, so that it jutted above the smaller one on the right, its rim curving over it. The effect of this was jaunty and daring, and contrasted nicely with the ancient-looking stone foundations: a mix of old and new. Yet the construction seemed integrated and complete, as if the two ideas could not have been conceived except together.

If it was impossible to understand Giovanni’s silences and taciturn moods, I mused, then perhaps it was possible to read something of him in the design of his Gym. A synthesis of old and new—was that not what he was striving for? A life built on emulating the ancient world-conquerors and masters, but marked by a vibrant, unique vision of the universe? That was how I saw him.

But that was only speculation. The man sitting beside me remained as inscrutable as ever as we made our descent. We flew past the Gym, to my surprise, and veered around to a nondescript building behind it which for all the world seemed to be unrelated. Giovanni’s gaze remained fixed forward as our craft began to descend toward the roof below. He was uninterested in scenery, I thought. Surely he had made this journey a thousand times before.

This building also had a hatch for entry, I realized as we landed, though it was carefully disguised to resemble the coarse, pale-grey exterior. We descended, but not very far: a landing pad lay right beneath us. I pondered this for a moment, and decided that the hatch existed mainly to give arriving cargo a veneer of secrecy, whether it was a shipment of stolen goods or a concealed Pokémon ally.

Upon our landing, another small squadron of Rocket agents waited to greet us. I was growing used to their nervous glances. They escorted us into to a small room set in the wall, which perplexed me, as there was absolutely nothing in it. Then, to my surprise, the room began to vibrate, and I felt a downward pull. Sure enough, the room was actually moving downward via a system of metal cords, taking us along with it. Ingenious. This was probably how the Rockets transported goods up and down the floors of the complex: if the machine could lower objects, it could surely elevate them as well.

As we traveled, Giovanni turned to me. “Your first match will take place this afternoon,” he said quietly. “I have only one request to make of you. You may use whatever tactic you deem necessary in your battles—I do not expect you to find them difficult. But do try to avoid killing your opponents. Dealing with the consequences is not a prospect I relish. At the very least, I would need to engage in some obfuscation and bribe an attorney or two. “ He laughed.

I had no idea what he was talking about, but I took his point. It would be a shame to ruin a harmless competition with excessive force, especially when real combat would give me amble opportunity to test the full range of my powers.

The ground shuddered, and I realized we had stopped. As the six or so of us stepped out into another dim hallway, I spoke up. I was still thinking about what Giovanni had said.

“How much effort does it take to do severe damage to the average Pokémon?” I asked carefully. “I do not mean to concern you, Giovanni, but I fear my attacks will be too vicious. I tore the robots apart. I am not sure if I am ready for this— I have not practiced restraint.”

Giovanni nodded. “That is why your first battle is scheduled for this afternoon, rather than this morning. You will require some time to prepare. The Pokémon I ordinarily employ in the Gym will serve nicely. Follow me.”

He turned a corner, Persian at his heels, and led us to a room very similar to the one where I had fought the robots: small, square, and well-lit. It even sported another metal stairway. Here, though, there was a balcony running along the upper edge, and the floor consisted of a soft, loose powder.

Giovanni turned to one of the Rocket agents who had entered with us. I couldn’t quite catch what he was saying, but it seemed to be a list of some sort. The agent nodded, and dashed off.

“In fact, Mewtwo,” Giovanni said thoughtfully, “your trials with the robots may still prove useful in this context. When you destroyed them, did you not feel the metal breaking in your grip, the wires splintering and expelling great sparks? Were you not able to perceive every aspect of each robot’s innards as you lifted it into the air?”

“I was,” I agreed.

“Then observe the bodies of your opponents in the same manner. Watch bones to see how well they resist fractures, major blood vessels to prevent ruptures. Monitor pain, and determine whether the subject experiences it as unbearable or the tolerable ache of an ordinary battle. By these criteria, gauge the intensity of your attacks, and measure the risks you take with your maneuvers.”

His eyes were sharp. “Do you understand what I mean, Mewtwo?”

“Yes,” I told him, as the Rocket executive came running back into the room.

Giovanni nodded, satisfied. “This is not to say I expect you to restrain your power outside of these encounters. In war, do not hesitate to kill an opponent unless I specifically instruct you otherwise. Here, preserve your strength. Agreed?”

“Of course,” I answered.

“Good,” he said, and turned to see what his employee had brought him.

The man handed him six strange objects—they looked like tiny red-and-white spheres. He studied each of them for a moment, then directed the executive to stand back. Giovanni and I now stood in the center of the room, facing each other, in a room that struck me very much as a battlefield.

He clicked a button on one of the spheres, and it swelled to more than double its size. “Then test yourself against your first living opponent,” he said with a grin.

“My opponent is in that device?” I asked, perplexed. How could a living creature could fit inside something so small.

“Indeed,” Giovanni told me. “The Pokémon capsule, or, in common parlance, the “Pokéball,” allows for the easy transport of Pokémon teams. I wouldn’t dream of visiting such an indignity on you, of course, but for the rank-and-file Pokémon employed by the organization, such devices serve their purpose adequately.”

He stepped back a few paces, so that I stood alone in the center of the room. “Let us begin with an opponent slightly weaker than most of those you will face in this Gym, so that you may begin to learn restraint—a Rhyhorn.”

Calmly, almost casually, he tossed the orb into the center of the room. As it flew, it opened, and a bust of white light emerged, which quickly congealed into a defined shape. And when the light faded—I would not have thought it possible, but there it was—a creature stood in the center of the room. It was a gnarled-looking, four-legged beast that looked as if it had been carved from grey stone. And indeed, its skin seemed to be solid granite. Deep down, though, a heart beat, and the muscles and bones of a living animal could be found. But on the outside, it bristled with savage, lethal-looking spikes.

Giovanni said nothing, simply pointing at me. The Rhyhorn got the idea and began to charge at me with a slow, lumbering gait, the horn on its forehead pointed as if to rip me apart.

But this was easy, I thought. I had done this a thousand times before. I stopped the Rhyhorn’s motion and lifted it into the air. Its legs flailed wildly, helplessly. It was a bit heavier than a robot, I decided, but about as dense. Not difficult at all to disrupt and defeat.

Now came the tricky part. I dragged the Rhyhorn over to the wall and carefully pounded its head against the wall. The creature moaned, and began to lose consciousness—but it seemed this level of pain was nothing it hadn’t dealt with before. It was a murky mind to interpret, to be sure. But I thought I had done well. Gently, I set the Pokémon back on the ground on its side, and it passed out.

Giovanni seemed to approve. He picked up the ball and clicked a button, and the Ryhorn returned to it in a burst of red light.

“Splendid,” he told me. “Let us now examine several other scenarios. Let us pit you against opponents which may be considered as distinct “forms,” broadly speaking, so that you may understand the diversity of Pokémon body structures, and how best to respond to each.”

I only halfway understood, but I nodded. Giovanni was as good as his word, throwing up a variety of opponents for me to grapple with. One was a larger, tougher version of the Rhyhorn, which he described as its “evolutionary successor.” I wrestled this creature to the ground with moderate ease. Another was a swift, three-headed tunneling creature which wriggled its three snub noses at me in defiance. It moved at blinding speed, tearing up soil all around me, but proved to be extremely fragile once I finally got hold of it. I knocked it out very gently and discreetly.

But perhaps my favorite was our final match. Giovanni almost looked amused as he explained to me that he might one day encounter a young, foolish trainer, brimming with naiveté, who thought he could take on the Gym with no more than a team of untrained infants. In such a situation, Giovanni told me with a laugh, he might summon me to terrify the child and put him in his place.

He demonstrated by sending out a tiny, prickly purple creature called a Nidoran. I stared at it for a moment. The thing was about the size of my foot. At Giovanni’s command, it let out a yelp and ran toward me uncertainly. Then it hit the side of my leg and bounced off. I grabbed the infant, spun it around in the air a few times, then set it back on the ground. It squealed, and then passed out in utter terror. I had to grin.

“Now that we have demonstrated you are capable of restraining your power,” Giovanni said coolly, snapping the unconscious Nidoran back into its sphere, “let me remind you that I want every reasonable effort to be taken against your opponents. I am not interested in lazy, halfhearted combat, nor any attempt to draw out the battle for your own amusement. Fight quickly, fight effectively, press as hard as you can—but no further. Is that clear?”

“Absolutely,” I said.

“Good.” He flashed a small smile. “This Gym’s first match of the season will take place in two hours’ time.”

“How long is that?” I asked.

“Not very long at all,” Giovanni replied. “And we still have a few more objectives to attend to.” With that, he set out of the room, Rocket agents in tow. I followed.

I had been promised similar environs to what I had been given at the other base, but I had not expected them to be identical. In the next room we came to an exact copy of the machine that had given me my armor, complete with platform below and balcony overhead. Then I was led to another small room in the back, with a familiar light switch, mattress and set of facilities for washing and cleanliness. I noted with slight satisfaction that the mattress was a different color, at least. I also took a moment to look at the faucets and sprayer more closely, and consider how I might make use of them; I had barely been awake for this tour at the other base.

Then I was led to another small room, where I was given another meal of green shreds with brown, crunchy particles, and left to eat in privacy. Chewing carefully, I thought about why Giovanni might have wanted things to be so similar. Perhaps it was simply easier to build two of everything and send each out to different locations. Yes, and perhaps it could be done more quickly, if one was in a hurry.

I wondered just how long Giovanni had known of my existence, anyway. It had been enough time to conceive of a plan and to build small amenities for me, deep within Rocket headquarters. But somehow I suspected the discovery had been made relatively recently. I imagined Giovanni dashing about, barking orders to his underlings, drawing upon his vast resources to prepare a space for his impending, honored guest before the critical moment. Before I was born, and unleashed into the world. It was a compelling image.

After the meal, I was greeted by another electronic representation of Giovanni’s voice. I immediately looked for the speaker, and found it in a panel right above my head.

“Mewtwo,” the voice crackled. “I believe I mentioned we would be recharging your armor today. I presume you have finished eating. Go now and stand on the platform of the machine, just as before, and wait patiently. You will be brought to me when I am ready for you to do battle.”

“This will occur,” Giovanni continued, before I could even ask the question, “by means of an electronic signal. There is an elevator concealed in the wall to the right of the platform, currently inaccessible. At my command, the light above it will turn green, and the doors will open. Enter immediately, and face the doors. When they open again, you will be at my side. Be ready.”

I nodded, if only to myself. I was more than ready.

The wait, however, was quite tedious. I let the machine attach its red tendrils to my armor and stood patiently, glancing to the right every so often, inasmuch as the cords allowed me to turn my head. I checked the wires running to the light and the lock on the door. No current ran to the doors, nor the green light. I could have forced them to activate, perhaps, but that would have been pointless, and an insult to my host. No matter. I could wait.

But after a while, the delay became unbearable. How much longer did Giovanni intend to force me to stand here, staring at a blank wall? Was it really necessary to supply power to the armor for this long, and necessary that I remain in it? Was he testing me? Was he tied up in some incredibly important transaction? Was his first challenger of the season late? I kept nervously running my mind along the wires, then stopping myself. I wished I didn’t have to wait.

Little did I know that waiting in silence would come to define my time with Giovanni.

But at last I saw the flash of green, and I breathed a sigh of relief as the cords retracted from my armor and the door unsealed. I stepped in, heart pounding with excitement. As I rose, I tried to prepare myself for the match. What kind of creature might I face? How would I dodge its blows?

Then, suddenly, the machine shuddered to a halt. The doors opened, yet I was left in darkness. Then, a sharp groaning sound pierced the air. I realized that another door was opening in front of me—more like a giant hatch, really—grinding its way up into the ceiling. Light burst through the crack, blindingly bright, and I squinted to see what lay beyond.

Then my eyes adjusted to the light, and I realized I was standing on the battlefield.

The elevator had stopped in a small, metal box. Beyond the huge, angular door, an entirely new room had opened up before me. It was a large chamber, surely the largest in the building; its dark corners simply loomed, vast and unapproachable. The walls were stone, etched with intricate designs. Along the sides I spotted more stone pillars, with arches connecting them, a further reminder of Giovanni’s love of ancient elegance.

The floor was loose and soft, just as before, but it seemed more tightly packed, and there were white lines running along its surface, marking out a rectangular space for combat. Above, a hollow dome had been set into the ceiling, and at its highest point shone a brilliantly bright light. The effect of this was that the marked arena was strongly illuminated, while the edges of the room were left obscured, reeking with inky darkness.

Giovanni sat above my entrance point, I quickly realized, resting comfortably in a soft black chair. A door lay behind him, a small railing before him, and elegant red material billowed to his left and right. He seemed utterly relaxed. I knew, of course, he had designed every aspect of this scene to intimidate his opponents.

The opponent I saw stood, taut with energy, on the far side of the room. It was a small human of indeterminate gender, wearing a green jacket and red pants as bright as its messy hair.

Between the human and I stood an absolutely gargantuan creature, which nearly filled the room with its obscene bulk, snarling and bellowing at me with a voice like a building collapsing.

Well, stood was not perhaps the right word. The creature was nothing less than an enormous serpent made of stone, as if someone had strung together a pile of boulders from a collapsing mountain and given it a face. Its surface was pitted with rocky crags, chips and dents from what I thought must have been a long lifetime of battling. Yet some parts of it were so smooth and polished that they glinted in the light. It roared as it saw me, roared a great toothless roar that exposed its ugly, ragged tongue. And as it roared it twisted and turned where it lay, thrashing its enormous tail against the ground and stirring up immense clouds of dust. This, I would later learn, was an Onix.

For a moment or two, I was overwhelmed. For all that I thought I was ready, it had caught me by surprise when sight of battle erupted before me. It seemed too sudden, too soon to come to this place where monsters stood ready to devour me. This place seemed unreal, a product of my imagination, which had dreamed of this moment. Not something that could actually exist. I wondered for the first time if I might lose this battle.

Then, I noticed what Giovanni was doing. Though his outline was heavily blurred in my mind’s eye, I could tell, at least, that he was pointing at the creature. Commanding me, just as he had commanded the Rhyhorn in our battle. He snapped his fingers, and the sound echoed in the vast, quiet room. Other than that, he did not even move from his seat. He seemed completely unconcerned about the battle ahead.

I took heart from this, and it suddenly occurred to me that I was being stupid. How many times had Giovanni assured me I was the greatest Pokémon who had ever lived? If he did not consider the Onix a threat, neither should I. I had practiced and practiced until Giovanni was sure I was ready for the Gym; I had done a thousand things like this before. All I had to do was relax and have confidence in myself, and victory would be mine.

After all, this was just another bulldozer.

As the Onix slithered toward me, I threw all my attention at the center of its neck, pouring every bit of my energy into holding that point in place. Once again, the initial difficulty was overcoming the creature’s relentless motion forward. But, pushing past the strain, I held it there, an immobile point in the universe. A savage delight ran through me, and I grinned underneath my helmet, though none could see.

Then I set all my attention to dragging the Onix into the air. And bit by bit, more quickly than I expected, I achieved it. It hovered there, helpless, squirming uncomfortably against my grip, the tip of its stone tail jerking uselessly against the ground. Suddenly its irate glare turned to wide-eyed fear, and it moaned pitifully. For just a moment, I let it linger there in midair, letting it wriggle. Both the Pokémon and its trainer watched me, stunned, to see what I would do next.

In a burst of energy, I twitched the spot I was holding in midair, and, blindingly fast, slammed the serpent against the wall. I estimated it could take the heaviest pounding I could offer. For a moment, it remained splayed there against the wall as if it had been flattened. Then it slid down the wall and, with a thunderous crash, collapsed like a heap of rubble.

I couldn’t believe it. Here was a granite behemoth that had surely terrified hundreds of other opponents, and I had simply discarded it like a useless piece of dross. It had been easy and quick, and I hadn’t even broken a sweat.

For the first time, I was truly awed by my own power. I could feel it surging, rising within me with a mighty roar. There was no doubt about it now: I was the greatest living Pokémon, No one could match me; no one could destroy me. All Pokémon who passed this way would learn to bow to their king. I was deeply moved; grateful, though to what I didn’t know, simply to have this opportunity, to be this magnificent entity with the most sublime of destinies. I rejoiced within my soul, so glad to have the privilege of being alive.

The rest of the battle was easy. The shocked child quickly sent out another Pokémon, but his (or her?) face betrayed fear. The next creature to appear seemed tiny and fragile compared to the one I’d just defeated—a little yellow-and-white quadruped with spiky, bristling fur and large pointed ears. It barked a high-pitched yip upon seeing me, then surged forward. It quickly leapt at me once and then jumped back—a feint. It then began darting this way and that, seemingly at random, trying to provoke and confuse me.

The thing was alarmingly fast, sprinting around the battlefield more quickly than anything I’d ever seen. But it was weak, I knew, and would fall easily. The trick was catching it. I closed my eyes and began to focus on the field, trying to be aware of everything that surrounded me. And in less than a moment, I had it. I grabbed the animal, spun it around in midair until its eyes glazed over, then gently drubbed its head on the ground, knocking it out.

I then encountered a much larger creature: a stocky blue biped, around my height, with thick, squat arms and legs and a hard brown shell on its back. I liked the look of the species. Immediately, the kid thrust out a nervous arm and the Pokémon went into action. Two pockets on its shell opened up, and silver tubes emerged above its shoulders. Then, before I knew it; the creature was trying to blast me into submission: a barrage of water gushed out of the tubes before I’d even had time to blink.

That I hadn’t expected. But my reflexes were excellent. I caught the twin sprays in midair—why, it was only a matter of persuading the water to alter its course slightly!—and sent them speeding back at their maker. The creature grunted and seemed to shrug off the impact, but appeared at a loss for what to do next. It dived at me, but I sent it hurtling into the nearest wall. After I returned a few more blows, the Pokémon collapsed.

The trainer, with a shaking hand, withdrew his final combatant. And as the iron door swung shut before me, I realized I had won. My heart was pounding, but my breath sang with delight.

But I wasn’t finished yet. Giovanni’s voice suddenly appeared right beside my left ear. With a start, I realized that he’d installed a broadcasting device in my helmet, for private conversations.

“Stop him for me, won’t you, Mewtwo?” he said airily, almost brightly.

A simple swerve through the metal door revealed that the trainer was running away, hurtling toward the entrance on the other side of the Gym. I grabbed him like a Pokémon and gently held his flailing form in midair.

“Now what?” I asked, hoping Giovanni could hear me.

“Put him to sleep,” came the reply. “Let him awaken alone, in a dark and empty Gym. Perhaps the next challenger will discover him lying there. The boy’s memories will be hazy, confused. Entangled with his dreams. He will have no way of knowing whether the specter he encountered was reality or delirium. Only one thing will be clear: that he was utterly defeated. By such tactics we will add to my reputation—which is to say, yours.”

“Indeed,” I said, frowning. “One problem, though— I do not know that I know how to put him to sleep.”

“It should not be difficult,” Giovanni replied calmly. “As with any psychochemical trigger, it should be hidden somewhere in his mind. Search, and you will find it.”

I leapt into the child’s mind, which was currently shrieking in panic and confusion. Ah, how refreshing to encounter a mind with no technological barrier! Not knowing what else to do, I flooded the boy’s mind with images and sensations of fatigue, of the need for rest. This he resisted heavily—all his instincts were telling him to remain awake! But I found a hint of something, a suggestion of a hidden, associated pocket in the mind.

I followed this trail to its source. Yes, there was something there, something formless, but influential. Like a great channel of energy, directing the flow of thought through the mind. I tugged on it, trying to alter the course. It seemed to work: the child started to grow sleepier and sleepier, in spite of himself. Pushing through the resistance, I forced the child into stillness. His form grew slack, and I set him on the ground, unconscious and dreaming.

“Excellent,” Giovanni told me. I could almost see his smile. “There are many ways you can assist me, Mewtwo. Here you have discovered another. It was already clear that you were capable of reading minds, cracking them open and divining the secrets within.”

“Now we have demonstrated—as I long suspected—that you have the power to influence them as well. You are a sculptor of the psyche. This is a very useful skill, particularly within our organization, and I intend to teach you to develop it. In the end, the effort to command loyalty from the people of the world may depend less on the battles we fight to conquer their bodies, and more on our ability to sway their minds. Remember that, Mewtwo.”

There was silence for a moment. Then Giovanni said:

“Your work has thus far been impeccable. I will have need of you again in approximately one hour. In the meantime, rest.”

The elevator began to descend. I sat back against the wall, overwhelmed, and rested. And grinned, and laughed, and delighted in the triumph of my first victory.

I must have battled dozens of strange and magnificent creatures that day—but it seems like it could have been a hundred or more. Every match brought fresh challenges and introduced me to new forms of Pokémon life, unique and vibrant. I dodged the flames of creatures of fire, the vines of creatures from the green thickets, the water-jets of creatures who dwelt in the seas. I fought winged species with sharp beaks and talons, hairy, six-legged species who skittered across the gym floor, behemoths armored with metal and stone.

I learned how to disrupt and overwhelm opponents who fought with their fists and limbs, turning their own bodies against them. I grappled with foes whose greatest strength was, like mine, their minds, and learned how to outmaneuver them. I faced enemies who scarcely had bodies at all, formed from vapor and smoke, and taught myself how to drag them from the dark corners where they hid and drive them, hissing, into the dirt.

The matches were easy, really—no opponent was prepared for the sheer force of my psyche—but it was the exploration of new things which delighted me. Each match showed me new ways to manipulate my opponents, new talents I possessed, and by such discoveries I came to a greater understanding of my own nature. Even without any real challenge, the matches were an utter thrill.

And in that thrill I met my brothers and sisters. For the first time, I began to appreciate the beauty of my diverse species, in all its complexity and strangeness. I thought back to the moment I had first discovered these creatures in a scientist’s mind, and it brought a smile to my face to remember. Now I had the real, living creatures standing before me. I fought with them, diving into their bodies and minds, and in this I felt a strange sense of communion. Sometimes it felt as if we were not enemies, but partners, dancing a strange and violent dance, rejoicing in the endless rivalry of our bodies.

I began to love them, in a way. I began to love my entire species, my innumerable kin, for their variety, for everything new a battle might teach me about them. For their differences from me. I began to feel humbled and proud to be a part of this grand lineage. So what if I was their superior? Just because the species had found its flowering in me did not mean I could not appreciate the line that led to my creation.

Between the battles came the waiting, of course. For a very long time each day, I sat alone in a dark and empty room, anticipating only the moment when the elevator doors would open and bring me to the next match. At first this was absolutely unbearable. I railed against the walls, tired of the endless monotony, frustrated with Giovanni, frustrated with myself for not knowing how to wait. But, after a time, I decided there was no sense in indulging these frustrations. Giovanni was a busy man, constantly attending to projects that I was, as of yet, not skilled enough to help him with. It would be unfair to insist upon always being at his side. At least on the battlefield I could demonstrate my allegiance, granting him powers he did not possess. I only wished there was something I could do while I waited for these appointments to arrive.

After that realization, instead of gouging out grooves in the walls and floor (and rapidly repairing them out of embarrassment) I found a way to retreat somewhere deep within myself during those waiting-periods. My thoughts slowed down, and I reclined against the wall. It was almost like sleeping, but I never slipped into dreams. Instead, my eyes and mind remained wide open, trying to pour my attention into every particle of every object around me.

I was searching for the ultimate distraction, perhaps, trying to avoid the churning activity of my mind. Running from my feelings of impatience, running from my nameless and named fears: fear of failure, and of not being worthy of trust, and who knows what else. Running from myself.

At times Giovanni would send a meal to me, or request that I stand in the machine and recharge my armor; these I attended to dutifully. But most of the time I spent in that strange state of self-compression. Time, too, began to compress, and before long the hours seemed like nothing but minutes or even seconds (not that I was familiar with these terms, at first), so that it seemed only a moment of breathing and rest separated one battle from the next. Then it became much easier to wait. The memory of action filled me, kept me from exploring my own thoughts too deeply, and sustained me like a drug, like the richest meal.

So passed my first real day of battle, and so passed most of the days that followed.

I woke when Giovanni was ready for me, ate a quick meal, and dashed off to wait by the elevator for that holy moment when I would be called to my partner’s side. I soon began to devote some of that waiting time to personal cleanliness, using the facilities to wash my fur when it became matted or dirty. As for the waste disposals Giovanni had mentioned, I quickly figured out how to use them. I thought I could guess why the subject had embarrassed him.

From time to time, Giovanni would appear on the balcony to comment on my performance or to impart some information about an upcoming opponent. Often he seemed detached and distant, as if he made these visits more out of a sense of duty than anything else, but there were times when he was quite jovial, laughing and joking with me as if we had been working together for years. On these occasions, I felt a profound sense of peace. But it was refreshing just to see him, just to know that he was still at hard at work, planning my future. Afterward, when I returned to the battlefield, I would smile, knowing he sat above me, my partner and friend in combat, with Persian at his side.

It was hard to sort out who the real Giovanni was, at times: was he the one who laughed with me and sought my input? Or was he the elusive figure watching me from above, withdrawn and moody, too lost in his own designs to hear a single question from me? I wondered often if it was my fault, somehow; if I had done something to offend him. I wanted him to think of me as his friend and his companion, but it was so hard to understand his mind, especially since he had chosen to conceal it. Still, I did my best to be patient. One day, I hoped, he would open himself up to me.

Though Giovanni remained no less unfathomable, it was not long before he approached me one night, a gleam in his eye, and proposed that I learn something new.

“What did you have in mind?” I asked, curious. It had occurred to me recently I could stand to have a little more variety in my schedule.

“An excellent way of putting it, Mewtwo,” Giovanni said, smiling broadly. “The mind is precisely what I am concerned with.”

He began to pace along the railing, deep in thought. I followed him with my eyes. I was standing in the machine, recharging my armor, as was usually the case during our conversations, and he had taken up his customary place on the balcony.

“I told you recently I would teach you how to influence other minds. I do not hesitate to say this will be an invaluable asset to the organization. None of our members possess the powers of manipulation you do—not even the Pokémon who assist us in battle. In a pinch, we might make do with the aid of an Alakazam or a Slowking—but they are stubborn and willful, and could not hold a candle to your brilliant flame.”

“I remember when you wrestled your first human foe into unconsciousness. You were unsure if you could do it, I recall—but the moment you looked inside his mind, you found the mechanism which governed his waking and sleeping. Thereafter, flipping this mental “switch” became easy for you, and it became a familiar, reliable tool, which has served you well over the last few weeks. Seeing that first conquest of another mind, I knew you would be capable of this, and so much more.”

“Now,” he said, turning and addressing me sharply, “what precisely is this mechanism, Mewtwo?”

“I do not know,” I had to admit. “It is the part of a human mind which tells him or her when to sleep, I know that much. It is tied in with memories of sleep, sensations of fatigue, and other things of that nature. But all I do is put pressure on it until sleep overcomes the human. I do not know exactly what it consists of.”

Giovanni nodded. “It may be helpful at this point to reflect that the sensation of a distinct mind is, in fact, an illusion. Every emotion we imagine we feel, every thought we seem to think, every belief we hold is the result of a physical stimulus in the brain. We are mechanical beings, regardless of what philosophers may tell you. The thoughts and feelings from which we construct ourselves are simply the result of neurochemical triggers. One chemical opens the pathway for another, the brain rewards a certain stimulus or punishes its absence, and by such signals one is induced to feel happy or miserable.”

“But I do not experience this,” I told him. I wasn’t sure I could so easily subscribe to his theory that we ticked endlessly on, like robots. “My mind feels very real to me, and so do the minds of others. They are like shapes in midair, or pulses of energy, radiating from living beings. I I feel their presence, and I interact with them. It would be silly to deny this.”

Giovanni smiled. “I don’t intend to. These are the psychological manifestations of physical processes. The interactions I’ve spoken of take place on an unfathomably microscopic level. The eye cannot detect them. Nor, I suspect, the mind. So instead of experiencing the minute interactions of countless molecules, you experience their net effect. Your mind reinterprets these net brain-states, relating them to something you recognize: your own emotions. Thus you experience these ‘radiating’ minds, full of memories, images and emotions, just as it seems to you that your own mind contains memories, images and emotions.”

“I see,” I said uncertainly. “But why are you telling me? What is the significance of all this?”

“Consider it your next lesson,” he replied. “The time has come for you to contribute to our organization in other ways than merely building up your strength. Your ability to manipulate vast quantities of material, for instance, will allow us to act on a much larger scale than ever before. And, as I have said, I intend to teach you to directly alter the minds of others. Soon, Team Rocket will be able to command loyalty at a thought. We will craft, as if from nothing, the stuff of jealously and rage. We shall build in mankind the urge to join us, and reward their compliance with utter bliss. We shall press our stamp onto every echelon of society, and all will bow down before us. And it all begins here, with you.”

“How will we begin?” I asked.

“In the same fashion as your trials with the robots,” Giovanni answered. “By experiment.”

[CONTINUED:]

He began to pace along the railing, deep in thought. I followed him with my eyes. I was standing in the machine, recharging my armor, as was usually the case during our conversations, and he had taken up his customary place on the balcony.

“I told you recently I would teach you how to influence other minds. I do not hesitate to say this will be an invaluable asset to the organization. None of our members possess the powers of manipulation you do—not even the Pokémon who assist us in battle. In a pinch, we might make do with the aid of an Alakazam or a Slowking—but they are stubborn and willful, and could not hold a candle to your brilliant flame.”

“I remember when you wrestled your first human foe into unconsciousness. You were unsure if you could do it, I recall—but the moment you looked inside his mind, you found the mechanism which governed his waking and sleeping. Thereafter, flipping this mental “switch” became easy for you, and it became a familiar, reliable tool, which has served you well over the last few weeks. Seeing that first conquest of another mind, I knew you would be capable of this, and so much more.”

“Now,” he said, turning and addressing me sharply, “what precisely is this mechanism, Mewtwo?”

“I do not know,” I had to admit. “It is the part of a human mind which tells him or her when to sleep, I know that much. It is tied in with memories of sleep, sensations of fatigue, and other things of that nature. But all I do is put pressure on it until sleep overcomes the human. I do not know exactly what it consists of.”

Giovanni nodded. “It may be helpful at this point to reflect that the sensation of a distinct mind is, in fact, an illusion. Every emotion we imagine we feel, every thought we seem to think, every belief we hold is the result of a physical stimulus in the brain. We are mechanical beings, regardless of what philosophers may tell you. The thoughts and feelings from which we construct ourselves are simply the result of neurochemical triggers. One chemical opens the pathway for another, the brain rewards a certain stimulus or punishes its absence, and by such signals one is induced to feel happy or miserable.”

“But I do not experience this,” I told him. I wasn’t sure I could so easily subscribe to his theory that we ticked endlessly on, like robots. “My mind feels very real to me, and so do the minds of others. They are like shapes in midair, or pulses of energy, radiating from living beings. I I feel their presence, and I interact with them. It would be silly to deny this.”

Giovanni smiled. “I don’t intend to. These are the psychological manifestations of physical processes. The interactions I’ve spoken of take place on an unfathomably microscopic level. The eye cannot detect them. Nor, I suspect, the mind. So instead of experiencing the minute interactions of countless molecules, you experience their net effect. Your mind reinterprets these net brain-states, relating them to something you recognize: your own emotions. Thus you experience these ‘radiating’ minds, full of memories, images and emotions, just as it seems to you that your own mind contains memories, images and emotions.”

“I see,” I said uncertainly. “But why are you telling me? What is the significance of all this?”

“Consider it your next lesson,” he replied. “The time has come for you to contribute to our organization in other ways than merely building up your strength. Your ability to manipulate vast quantities of material, for instance, will allow us to act on a much larger scale than ever before. And, as I have said, I intend to teach you to directly alter the minds of others. Soon, Team Rocket will be able to command loyalty at a thought. We will craft, as if from nothing, the stuff of jealously and rage. We shall build in mankind the urge to join us, and reward their compliance with utter bliss. We shall press our stamp onto every echelon of society, and all will bow down before us. And it all begins here, with you.”

“How will we begin?” I asked.

“In the same fashion as your trials with the robots,” Giovanni answered. “By experiment.”

He led me through a series of corridors and into a small, dark room. Set in one wall was a large pane of glass, beyond which I could see another, larger room, brightly lit, containing a wooden platform, with two metal chairs on either side. I scrutinized this scene, trying to figure out what my role in it was supposed to be.

Giovanni caught my gaze. “The glass wall is only transparent in one direction,” he informed me. “We may look in, but the occupants of the room will remain unaware of our presence. This is more for my convenience than yours—I am well aware that barriers do not hinder you. In fact, this is part of the game we are about to play.”

A moment later, a young, nervous-looking man in a Team Rocket uniform was led into the other room. His escort: a stern-looking man in a white coat, whom I thought I recognized as a member of Giovanni’s entourage of scientists. The younger man sat down awkwardly in one chair. The scientist took the other, and laid a large, yellowish envelope on the table. He informed the man across from him that his “psychological evaluation” would depend on his reaction to a series of images. He would be asked to describe the emotions each “photograph” evoked in him, and the results would determine his psychological “fitness.”

“It is a ruse,” Giovanni told me, smiling. “The man is guaranteed to pass this sham of an ‘examination,’ regardless of what he tells the examiner. The real purpose is for you to practice manipulating human emotions. Now, let us begin with something very basic. When the first photograph is revealed to the man, I want you to fill him with anger. Make him believe that what he sees is worthy of rage.”

I still wasn’t entirely sure what a photograph was—some kind of captured sight, I guessed—but I was eager to get started. I could feel the minds of both men, pulsing away before me. I dived into the more disheveled of the two, trying to get a sense of his emotional state. He prickled with tense, uncertain energy. I could make use of that. I thought about how furious I had been in the island laboratory, how I had hated those men for trying to cage me, for treating me like useless debris, and I tried to pour that same burning energy into his awareness. I searched through the man’s memories of anger, gathering all his past infuriations into the present moment. Then I drew back, hoping it had worked.

“How does this first photograph make you feel?” asked the examiner.

“Angry,” said the man after a moment’s hesitation. “I don’t like the look of that guy in the picture. That smile, that laugh—I can’t stand it. He looks like he’s laughing at me, you know? I hate that. He makes me sick, he’s like the kind of guy I’d want to punch in the face if I met him on the street. He makes me think of my father.” This last part he said through clenched, bitter teeth.

“What was that?” the examiner asked innocently.

“I said that goddamn son of a bitch reminds me of my father!” roared the man, banging his fist on the table. Then his eyes went wide. “Oh God,” he muttered. “I’ve just effed this up, haven’t I? I just completely failed the evaluation, right?”

“Not at all, Mr. Grayson,” replied the examiner smoothly. “Your reactions are perfectly normal. Please, let us continue.”

“Exemplary work, Mewtwo,” Giovanni told me, coolly. “Shall we continue as well? Our next emotion is sorrow.”

And on we went. Together with our hapless captive, Giovanni and I embarked on a tour of every describable emotion ever discovered by man.

“Pity.”

“Annoyance.”

“Elation.”

“Anxiety.”

I couldn’t help thinking that the emotion we were instilling more than anything else was confusion.

“Regret.”

“Awe.”

“Dependency.”

After a while these descriptions started getting pretty arcane. I had to puzzle over how best to manifest them in my subject’s mind, often relying a great deal on his interpretation of the word. But I persevered, and before long, we had made our way through the list.

“Very good, Mewtwo,” said Giovanni, with the air of a showman preparing one final trick. “Now send him back to a peaceful state of mind. Let him believe that he passed the test with flying colors.”

He waited until Grayson was almost at the door, then said, “Finally, provoke in him a sense of uncertainty. Force him to wonder why his emotions have fluctuated so inexplicably. Cause him to ask himself whether his examiner might have missed something; whether he is secretly losing his grip on reality. And then cause him to wonder whether there is something he has not been told.”

I grinned. This sort of theatrics was nothing new to me. I knew Giovanni loved anything that would leave his victims groping in the dark, anything that would add to his grandeur and mystery. So I tried to instill an sudden uncertainty in the man’s mind. It seemed to have worked; Grayson left the room with a very perturbed expression on his face.

“Excellent,” said Giovanni. “Shall we move on to the next subject?”

Altogether, Giovanni led me through the minds of four or five different Rocket agents that day. His purpose, he explained, was to allow me to explore human minds in all their diversity, so that I would not be thrown, for instance, by a mind which resisted the emotion of fear, or one which was so distorted by constant anger that generating peace was a challenge. These subjects were a diverse bunch, consisting of both men and women, old, middle-aged and young. Their minds had also been chosen for their variation.

Just as Giovanni had said, I noticed that each had its own tendencies and complexities, that each held tightly to certain emotions while resisting others. Some possessed an extreme clarity of thought, while others were clouded and muddy. Some delved easily into memory, while others wanted their memories to vanish.

For a finale, Giovanni chose to surprise me: the assistant brought in a pair of human children, one male and one female. To this day, I still don’t know where Giovanni got them from: whether they were the offspring of Rocket agents or something more sinister was going on. But we ran through the series of emotions once more. I was surprised at how malleable, how immediate the young humans’ minds were. Once I had suggested an emotion, they took off with it. It seemed as if I only had to make fleeting contact with their thoughts to trigger a cascade of anger or delight that they took to be their own.

We continued these experiments over the next several days, in between Gym matches and periods of rest. Before long, Giovanni had me attempting to influence larger groups of humans, who crowded into the testing room under the pretense of testing “interpersonal communications.” I soon managed this with ease, filling these crowds with fear or delight at a moment’s notice.

And not long after that, we took to the town.

Giovanni had often told me that the city was the lifeblood of the human species, a crossroads where all of mankind’s activities congealed into a vital force. To seize power in a city—the larger and grander, the better—was to take mankind by the throat. Small towns and isolated settlements might have their charm, but what one accomplished in the city, one accomplished everywhere. And it was my privilege to accomplish it.

When Giovanni proposed we use my powers on the populace, I wondered—for a fleeting moment—if I had the right to take away their free will, their ability to choose what kind of city they wanted and what kind of lives they would lead. But then, I reasoned that they needed our intervention. How could any of them know that Giovanni and I were more fit to rule than any of their buffoonish leaders or lawmakers? That our armies would unite the world into an empire beautiful beyond their comprehension? How could any of them understand?

They were too base and ignorant, clinging to archaic ways of life. It was our duty to reshape them into better people by whatever means available. I would be doing them a favor by fashioning their minds into something Giovanni could work with. Minds that instead of rejecting the Rockets, gave willingly to our noble cause.

So we set out to make the city ours. The plan was elegantly simple: I would redirect the discontentment of the city’s occupants toward its leaders, and summon up a flow of idealism and optimism toward Giovanni’s various political fronts. The tricky part was remaining concealed. We accomplished this by means of a small, unobtrusive van. Rocket agents in ordinary costume rode in the front and misdirected authorities with some false pretense or another, while I sat in the back, reaching out through the steel walls to pluck minds like grapes.

I well remember the success of our first escapade. Giovanni was not with us on that occasion; very often he would be out and about in the same crowds we manipulated, shaking hands, flashing a winning smile, demonstrating his credentials as a major figure in the city’s economic elite, and wishing the public figure of the moment the heartiest of good fortune. On that first mission, we parked in a quiet place amidst the gathering crowd, and waited for the action to begin. I watched Giovanni arrive, his psychic shield blazing like a meteor across the expanse of vulnerable minds. Then, not long afterward, our cue: the speaker, a mayoral candidate, beginning his address.

I sent my associates a quick message: Starting now. Then I leapt into action, diving through the crowd, making contact with great swaths of men and women in each swoop. The emotion I strove to instill in them was fear. Fear that this man and all his promises would not be enough for them. Fear of losing their income, their homes, their way of life. Fear for the safety of their family and companions. And all the related emotions: distrust, skepticism, anger, even loathing, for all those who threatened their safety.

Fear filled the crowd at my command, and turned a man many had come to in adoration into a useless milquetoast, or even an unspeakable villain. The speaker himself was not exempt from my assault: I filled his mind with doubt, causing him to stumble over his words and lose his focus. Finally, I planted the slightest suggestion in the crowd that, perhaps, there might be a better candidate out there. Perhaps they ought to turn to Richard Herrot, the man Giovanni supported.

And in just moments, a speech that had been intended as a triumphant rallying cry for one party became the disintegration of its leading candidate. From what I heard later, the man’s favor in the public eye suddenly took a downslide, and he quickly vanished from the political map. Giovanni’s candidate triumphed over his other opponents easily, and commentators were left bemoaning the loss of a once-promising young leader.

All I knew, as I signaled the Rocket agents to pull discreetly away from the curb, was that my mission had been an overwhelming success.

We repeated this same stunt all across the city over the next few weeks, whenever and wherever Team Rocket wanted to spread its influence. We rigged primaries and dissolved coalitions. We determined judges, jurors, district attorneys, senators and representatives. We turned the public against some referendums, and in favor of others. We dissolved consensus and devastated ballot initiatives. In short, we ran roughshod over the foundation of human democracy as if it were a piece of garbage under the wheels of our vehicle.

Nor did we stop there. The concealing-van technique was a brilliant invention, allowing us to send my powers just about anywhere we pleased. It was not difficult, after all, to reach through the stone walls of a building and manipulate the employees in its lower offices, or even, as my powers resurged in strength, to reach higher floors and bend minds there. Nor was it difficult to park outside the police headquarters, for instance, and convince its law-enforcers to forget about their investigation into a certain businessman’s illegal activities. This would, of course, take place just before covert Team Rocket agents snuck in, late at night, and removed all the evidence.

Indeed, it was remarkable how well Giovanni Caesanti’s business dealings seemed to go these days. Anyone who paid attention to his movements, his purchases and holdings, his continuous aspirations, would have noticed that there was something peculiar about them. He seemed to get everything he wanted. He closed every deal, acquired every property, and won over a constant stream of allies in the corporate world—particularly if he could meet with them on the lower floors. But it seems no one ever thought to pay attention.

Oh, it was a grand time in my life. I knew that most of my efforts went toward elevating Giovanni in the public eye, to making him grander, more powerful, more respected. But I didn’t mind. I knew that whatever helped Giovanni helped our grand cause; led to more resources and more support for Team Rocket. I was happy to do my part as the great man’s loyal partner. If ever he needed me, I knew I would instantly be at his side.

And I found ways to aid the organization from within as well, prowling around in secret corridors for all sorts of reasons. Making sure Rocket members were perfectly happy with their employment, loyal to their employers until the last breath. Sniffing out those few whose minds I absolutely could not persuade, those who found it tempting to rat out the organization to civilian authorities, and ensuring that they received the punishment they were owed. Hiding in Rocket recruitment buildings, persuading young men and a few young women to sign themselves into service.

And drawing them further into the fold. I vividly remember Giovanni’s rousing speeches to the entire association, assembled in all its vast, teeming glory, when our new members were inducted. He spoke of courage, of glory, of being part of a grand campaign to change the world. Words to inspire. I was behind him, in a hidden chamber, making sure that inspiration took place. I took their feelings of adoration, of love for this man and his ideas, and whipped them into a frenzy. It was almost an orgy of enthusiasm: we had them cheering or chanting at a word, hanging on his every movement. By the end of it, they were so full of courage and conviction, they wanted to rise from where they stood and take on the entire world that very moment. The old members were stirred to a new devotion to duty, while the inductees, I knew, would be ours for a lifetime.

Not that realigning minds was my only new task. As Giovanni had noted, there were plenty of practical applications for my powers as well. Construction projects, for instance. Team Rocket was always building, always trying to expand, with new fronts for its operations constantly going up throughout the city. And then there were the twin headquarters to think of: there was always new digging going on at the edge of these labyrinthine hives of secret tunnels and hidden chambers. I was happy to do my part.

At Giovanni’s request, I took over the bulk of the work on some of these projects. For his human employees, laying great girders of steel or drilling through huge amounts of hard earth was an arduous task, even with the aid of Pokémon or colossal machines. For me, it was simply a matter of moving a few things from one place to another. It was work, to be sure, especially since I was doing the same motions over and over again, but it was good work. At the end of a long day of work, my body sang with sweet satisfaction.

Despite how often he made use of my powers, Giovanni was careful to keep my existence from becoming well-known. I was his ace, his secret weapon, and he refused to allow his rivals for global power to catch even the slightest hint of me. Even within his organization he managed to keep me a secret from the rank and file, and even a great portion of his upper administration. He accomplished this in two ways: first, by using specially selected teams who had been sworn to absolute secrecy whenever my presence was needed. I realized this when I began seeing the same faces over and over again: there were only as many groups who knew me as there were work teams who needed access to my powers.

The second way lay through my assistance: whenever rumors grew that Giovanni had access to a special, powerful Pokémon, I would diminish those rumors in the minds of the Rocket populace. I would convince them to trust Giovanni, and to dismiss such ideas as foolishness. As a result, they remained only half-formed rumors. Giovanni was, after all, a mysterious and resourceful man. Vague hints that he might command unknown powers seemed only another part of his mystique.

But with those teams Giovanni trusted, I found all sorts ways to contribute. Another which emerged, which I rather enjoyed for a while, was Pokémon requisition. Team Rocket, Giovanni informed me, was constantly on the lookout for more Pokémon assistance. Just as I lent my own particular skills to the organization whenever Giovanni needed them, lower-ranking Rocket members were always in need of Pokémon who could lend them their strength. One of Team Rocket’s greatest and most successful campaigns, in fact, was obtaining Pokémon from a variety of sources. I might become a source in my own right, with a little strategy.

The plan he outlined was little different from my mental manipulations around town. We would drive around in the concealing van, and search for humans who carried Pokémon on their person. This would not be difficult: the city was a popular destination for Pokémon trainers, often in large groups. Once we found a trainer or two, I would alert the drivers. Then I would knock the trainers out, along with every possible eyewitness in the vicinity. The Rocket agents would then collect the trainers’ Pokéballs and load them into the van, and we would leave our targets there, unconscious, while we went on our merry way. It was simple, it was effective, and it could even be done in broad daylight, in open public spaces.

When Giovanni first put this proposal to me, early one morning, I frowned.

“I like your plan, Giovanni,” I said slowly, “but something about it seems off to me. How do the Pokémon you obtain by these schemes feel about joining our ranks? Would they not rather remain with their original partners? Would they not prefer to be with the humans they have grown accustomed to?”

“You assume too much about the nature of their partnership,” Giovanni replied, with an impatient flick of his hand. “Our situation is rather unique. Most human-Pokémon relationships are transient: the Pokémon are traded around like collectible trinkets from one child to the next. It would be a mistake to imagine that your brethren experience any sense of attachment.”

“But just suppose—“ I said uncertainly, then broke off. “Do you not think they would see it as an invasion? Would they not be angry with us for taking them away from their lives, their companions and surroundings?”

Giovanni shook his head. “We offer them the chance to be part of something greater. Consider it an invitation. A summons to destiny. What can they hope to gain from wandering the country with imbecilic children? Here they find stability, unity. A sense of purpose. When you awoke on that godforsaken island, would it have behooved you to stay with the fools who created you? No. Instead, you sought a greater place in the world, and came here. Do not deny your fellow Pokémon the same opportunity.”

“Some of them may be reluctant to accept it, though,” I pointed out.

He smiled. “Do not worry about that. You quickly discovered the opportunities this place had to offer. So will they. We’ve been doing this for a long time, you know. Our methods have grown to be very…persuasive.”

I nodded. I was still thinking about what he’d said about a sense of purpose.

Giovanni clapped his hands suddenly. “I assume we are done with this line of discussion?”

I gave another nod, lost in thought.

“Then let the first operation commence.”

Giovanni was right: Pokémon trainers weren’t difficult to find in the city. In fact, we quickly decided to reduce the number of “hits” each day, because seizing every opportunity to plunder would have roused a mass outbreak of suspicion. Still, we reaped rich rewards from this technique. At the end of a day’s trawling, the back of the van filled up with crates upon crates of Pokéballs, so that the fruit of my efforts lay all around me. I enjoyed watching them accumulate each day, loaded into the vehicle by a specially selected team of pickpockets.

Giovanni did not accompany us on these ventures, but always found a way to be present upon our return, inspecting our yield with obvious relish. He was always particularly delighted when we happened upon hordes of powerful, mature Pokémon. Such capable fighters, I was informed, would be selected for special training, along the lines of my own. As for the others, I had no idea where they were headed. I doubted it mattered very much. I was sure to find out sooner or later.

We soon took our campaigns to the wilderness as well. While human-trained Pokémon were plentiful in the great cities, most of them were weak, useless juveniles, according to Giovanni. Much could be gained by returning to the source. Just as we summoned Pokémon to our ranks by taking them from trainers, trainers sought them in the natural world, living wild among the greenery and hills and rocks. In the harshest environments, we were bound to find a rich supply of powerful, untamed creatures. Particularly if we knew what we were looking for.

So it was that I came to be standing in an isolated mountain valley, far away from human civilization, attempting to hold my ground against an mob of more than twenty angry Tauros rampaging toward me.

We had come across the shaggy horned creatures grazing peacefully in the vale below us. I had been instructed to irritate them, to get them charging forward, mindlessly, at the sudden presence of a threat. When they were angry, they were stupid. So I pulled up great columns of earth and mock-fired a barrage of large stones at them. I deliberately missed every time, but the Tauros lowed, outraged, at the appearance of an intruder. Hooves thundering against the ground, trinities of tails snapping through the air like whips, they hurtled toward me, a look of malice in each of their bovine eyes. Twenty-something wrathful heads loomed at me, draped with thick brown manes, horns poised to gouge bloody chunks from my body

Good, I thought. They were being stupid, and when they were stupid, they were weak. Time to act.

Just as they were about to reach me, I thrust out both hands and commanded their bodies to stop moving forward. For a moment the herd railed, as if against an invisible barrier; then, without warning, the Tauros found themselves lifted up into the air. Dust swirled around them in circles as the creatures began to follow a dizzying spiral in their ascent. Round and round they went, kicking and thrashing uselessly in midair, going faster and faster. The malice vanished from their eyes, replaced by fear. Nothing in their lives had ever prepared them for this.

When I judged the herd had been thoroughly trounced, I stopped the spinning circle and held them in midair. Many had already fainted out of shock, and just hung there, limp bodies in the sky. I dangled this rich harvest before the Team Rocket members, and they went into action, chucking more red-and-white spheres at the flailing beasts. One by one they vanished in a haze of red light, sucked into the orbs which fell into the arms of waiting Rockets. Giovanni stood behind this assembly, watching calmly, Persian at his side.

As I watched my captives fade away into the blue sky, the bright sky-orb, so full of light, blazing directly above my head, I couldn’t help but feel that I had entered a new phase, come to a new understanding of myself. Giovanni had told me I was the greatest of all Pokémon, but the full meaning of that idea only now became clear to me. It was not a matter of brute strength, it was a matter of direction. Of leadership. I was great because I was the only one fit to direct the lives of my fellow Pokémon. The only one with the raw power to lead them to a new way of life. To command their destinies. It was a responsibility to bear, but also a marvelous opportunity that none of these poor creatures would ever have. I had never before felt so vibrant, so important, so crucial to the running of the world. I knew was in control now. So many grand undertakings awaited my voice, and mine alone!

Looking back, I realize how much of an idiot I was.

We returned to the mountains often, combing them for wild creatures that might be powerful enough to aid us. I recall we found burrowing Onix, vicious Scyther, snapping Pinsir, hulking Nidoqueen and Nidoking, among others. I delivered each of them to Giovanni and his Team Rocket members with devastating psychic assaults.

Throughout it all, I continued my training at the Gym, clashing with whatever strange creatures trainers happened to bring my way. I think back on those times, and the images remain vivid, the sounds and movements real, so that if I close my eyes and quiet my mind I can almost imagine myself there—

—I stand before an Alakazam, at long last, and in the light that streams down from above, his fur gleams gold and brown, a perfect match to my violet pelt. We size each other up: each of us can sense the other’s burning mind, blazing against the darkness of the battlefield. He wrinkles his long mustache in confusion. He does not know quite what I am. But he crosses his thin, bony arms before his enormous, pointed head, and adopts a defensive position, silver spoon in each hand wielded like a blade, poised for action. He stares at me, unblinking, as if trying to pin me to the ground with the sheer force of his attention. I return the stare, and stand just as motionless, holding my ground, waiting for the first blow.

For a moment we each wait for the other to move. Then, suddenly, both of us are on the assault: I feel his presence in my mind, hunting, wriggling into my thoughts like a burrowing animal, and for the first time I know what it is like to have one’s mind invaded. He tries to conquer me, to get my emotions to bend to his will, but for all his energy and bravado, he is no more dangerous than a wave lashing against the solid rock of my will. And I am in his mind, too, ferretting out his darkest emotions, filling his being with pain, dragging up terror from the depths of his psyche. I am more powerful by far: within seconds I have his mind clutched tightly in my psychic grip, flailing as if suspended in midair, and I can hear him crying out for the pain to cease.

Suddenly desperate, he flees from my mind and turns all his attention to my body, filling it with pain trying to get it to kneel, to betray me, to acknowledge his power. But I easily fend off these attempts, and suddenly I have caught his body, too. As I send him flying backwards, his eyes grow wide, and he lashes out wildly, like a dying creature’s last defense, trying to find some way of hitting me, anything, sand, air, serving as ammunition. But I dodge these blows, and the utter power he attempts to channel bursts and overwhelms him, and his spoons bend, suddenly useless lumps of metal, as he hits the wall and collapses. As he slips into unconsciousness, I can hear his last, fading thought stabbing out at me before the darkness takes hold: that he has met an enemy, a power here that he can never conquer, that laughs at him from the darkness, that he will never encounter again, and he does not deserve even to know its name, and I know that in all his life, he will never be able to forget—

—Or I am standing before a Magneton, a strange, twisted creature of metal and energy, which spins the screws that hang from the edges of its tripartite body, and watches me with three alien, unblinking eyes. It floats near the ceiling, defying the normal conventions of matter, making strange, disjointed robotic chirpings. Then, the magnets which dangle from it like hands or wings begin to glow, and I know that they are the weapons by which it sears flesh, mutilates and maims its opponents. First comes a show of might: it sends three lightning bolts into the ground, one by one, and when the lights have faded, the once-soft floor blazes in three places, having turned to molten glass.

I do not move, and the machine-creature seems perturbed that I remain unintimidated. Its magnets grow bright once more, and this time I can see that they are aimed sharply at me. In the split-second before it strikes, I feel a strange energy flowing from myself to it, as if something is being taken from me, drawn from my body and the air around us to form a clear channel between the creature’s body and mine. As the three lightning bolts arc down, jagged and lethal, I follow that energy, seeking to understand the source of the sensation, to make it mine.

Suddenly it is within my grasp, and with a single hand, I twist and turn this strange force, forbidding it from flowing down the path it so desperately seeks, the path that leads to me. I wrestle back that which was taken from me, and suddenly the flow is reversed: the lightning shoots out of my hand as if escaping and arcs back to its original source. The Magneton blinks furiously, not comprehending, as the electricity envelops its body. Soon it has become a ball of illumination, a blinding white orb, lighting up every corner of the Gym. Sparks fly all over its body, searing its iron flesh, and as it falls to the ground, twitching, it lets out a terrible metallic scream—

…Then my eyes open again, and the shapes of the outside world reappear in my mind, and I know that those days are far behind me.

And, you know, in a way, they never really existed. Memory has a way of obscuring emotion over time, smoothing over the bumps and irregularities of life so that an experience may be recalled as “good” or “bad.” We forget how, in our moments of triumph, nagging insecurities continue to vex us, how in our greatest despair, there is still the possibility that fragments of joy will rise up in our hearts. When I am tempted to idealize this period in my life as a series of mindless, innocent bliss in Giovanni’s company, when I start to half-regret its end, I remind myself that I was never without my frustrations. I worried incessantly about my partner’s distance and silence, for one thing, constantly blaming myself, constantly wondering if I was doing something wrong, if the way to please my friend Giovanni was by demonstrating a greater commitment, a better performance, a more energetic role in his plans for the city.

And then there were those terrible periods of waiting. Despite my new role as Giovanni’s psychic manipulator-about-town, I still found myself sitting in that dark and empty room for hours upon hours, especially when my armor needed to be recharged. Giovanni’s visits were growing less and less frequent, and the loneliness and boredom haunted me like a malevolent presence. I drew further and further into myself, trying not to think, trying not to feel. Trying not to go out of my mind.

I lived for the moments when I was summoned from my dark chamber, whether to do battle, or to be led through secret side-passages, policing Rocket hearts and minds, or to ride into town and rob its occupants of their opinions, possessions or Pokémon. Yet these escapes grew less frequent after that first, initial flush of activity. It almost seemed that Giovanni came up with these wild ideas for me, then quickly lost interest in expanding on them. Oh, I still found my way out of the catacombs at least every few days, but it became regular, regimented, rigid. As if to Giovanni these excursions were only a routine that had to be upheld, now that they had been established. No spark or life lived in them for him as it did for me.

My wild and furious duels on the Gym floor (or perhaps more accurately, my wild and furious humiliation of random dupes) continued unabated, but they, too, seemed to lose some of their allure over the weeks that followed. Part of my original excitement, I realized, had been in discovering my brothers and sisters for the first time, learning to understand the motion of their bodies, their diverse forms, their strange and elemental powers. Each battle had set a marvelous new species before my eyes, a new cousin for me to welcome to my list of kin.

Now, that sense of novelty was vanishing fast. Before long, I grew familiar with almost every species that lived in the surrounding lands. To see a Blastoise again, after that first day of exploring its shelled, bulky form, brought no new excitement. I could observe whether it was male or female, or note the length of its cannons, but these were dull pursuits compared to the discovery of unglimpsed species. And by now, I also understood that certain species were related, being more or less developed forms of the same creature. Some had as many as three different forms, while others seemed to have only one, although I was never entirely sure. But these, too, were connections I could only make once: after the moment of discovery, they vanished forever.

As my knowledge grew, I found the battles less and less engaging. Occasionally I would still encounter a rarer species that took me by surprise, such as the odd, egg-like Chansey, whose thick blubber presented a slight obstacle, in that it could soak up my assaults and bounce back from injury. I ended up just pounding it in the gut with particles of air, and it quickly collapsed. But, by and large, my Gym matches became just as routine as my psychic outings.

It is important that I remember this. It would be easy to imagine that Giovanni’s headquarters was some sort of glorious paradise, where I did nothing but battle to my heart’s content. The memories are vivid, and they are beautiful. But they lie by omission. Even during those moments I remember so fondly, dissatisfaction was beginning to grow in me like a malignant seed. I must hold onto that. I left Giovanni and his world far behind me long ago.

For very good reasons.

Not long after my experiments with mind control began, I found myself aching with frustration. At the time it wasn’t entirely clear why. I knew that I did not enjoy the hours of lonely contemplation in the armor room, but I had long since accepted them as an unavoidable part of our partnership. I tried to shrug them off. But I felt isolated, irritated and lonely without being able to articulate why. The same old activities that had given me such pleasure only weeks ago—battling, manipulation, and the like—suddenly seemed stale and pointless.

One night, instead of trying to stifle the raging currents of my mind, I tried to figure out why this was. A thought occurred to me: I hardly knew any more about the world now than the day I met Giovanni. Oh, I was versed in secrecy, in manipulation. I knew a thousand things about combat, among them countless ways to pin an opponent to the floor. I could tell, in advance, those adversaries who would shoot fire at me from those that would try to assault me with brutal fists, and I knew most of the species that were kin on the biological chain of transformation. I had practically memorized the inner corridors of the mind, be it human or Pokémon. Yet for all that knowledge, I was still shockingly, scandalously ignorant.

Words eluded me by the hundreds. My vocabulary was limited to what I’d learned in my time at the laboratory, along with anything I’d been able to pick up from the minds I was hired to manipulate. And that was much less than I would have liked, really: I was usually pressured to make my mind-reconfigurations happen as smoothly and quickly as possible, and once each was done, my drivers, or the men leading me around Team Rocket’s back corridors, were eager to move on to the next. There was very little time for random inquiry.

I did not know what the great, blinding orb in the sky was, though I thought about it often. I did not know why it repeatedly slipped on and off the edge of the horizon with a brilliant display of color, demarking the threshold between “night” and “day.” I did not know what to call the fluffy white blobs that moved across the sky, and cloaked the light from time to time, turning the city grey. I did not even know what to call the shaggy green objects that grew on those strange brown poles, though I passed over them every time Giovanni and I flew to the other establishment, and they were scattered everywhere in the city.

Though I knew the bodies of my opponents, I knew nothing about their lives: not what they liked to eat, not where they lived, nothing about what they did when they were out of my presence. I knew nothing about the trainers, either: what brought them here? What bid them to travel across the land to take on such a fearsome opponent?

And I knew nothing about the countless machines and devices of human beings. True, I had seen the insides of some, and even knew the names of one or two, like the helicopter and bulldozer. But I did not know who made, who designed these things. I did not know why the mechanisms with them turned as they did, and I did not know why this particular kind of liquid should serve as a fuel. And this was just the machines I had been lucky enough to learn the functions of! What in the world did one use a bulldozer for? What was the purpose of those strange devices I had spotted Rocket administrators carrying, those objects that displayed light and color and sound when opened, but were most often closed, displaying nothing? What, in short, were these things around me? What were their names?

I wanted to ask Giovanni about these things. But from the moment I first boarded his helicopter, he had tended to either brush my inquiries off, or answer with such obvious irritation that I felt ashamed for asking him. Unless, of course, he had been the one to set the conversation in motion. Then, he would welcome any question that helped him get at the thing he was trying to teach me, the essential point he was trying to make. But most of my queries seemed to have no place within his grand scheme.

As a result, I had gradually stopped asking questions of Giovanni. It was easier just to avoid his irritation. But this, I realized, had left me stifled and ignorant. I lacked the vocabulary to describe the world, and the knowledge to understand its processes. No wonder it felt as I if had no proper place in that world. Despite my powers, I could no more influence its events than Giovanni could read minds. I was disconnected from everything, balked from having any real power, by merit of my ignorance. I felt ashamed of myself for losing my control over the world, for abandoning it to dwell in darkness and silence.

I did not blame Giovanni for this, really. I saw how his eyes lit up whenever he described a new task to which he could set my powers. He was like an excited child, full of ideas that he wanted to share, eagerly, without taking into account that I might want some say in this agenda. It was not his fault I had lost my grip on my own life. But neither could I let myself continue in this state of witlessness. At the very least, I needed to know what he knew, to understand how the world worked and how to apply it to my life. Then, I would feel much more comfortable allowing him to direct my activities. I would finally understand the logic behind my own actions.

Of course, the difficult part was finding a way to discuss the subject with him. Not only was Giovanni prone to strange and intractable moods, he was hardly ever around when I needed him. His visits to the recharging-chamber had been scant of late, and our battles went by too quickly for me to hold a proper conversation with him.

But, at last, I found him on the balcony one afternoon. He had come, it seemed, to congratulate me on another series of flawless victories. He discussed my techniques at length, breaking them down moment-by-moment; I marveled at the amount of finesse I had apparently put into strategies which had been devised in less than a few random seconds. Giovanni ended by noting that the time for a direct conflict with his enemies was surely not far off, and he had no doubt now that I would be quite capable of victory. This was heartening news, and I told him so. He nodded, and began to exit through the upper door. Now was the moment; I had to push past my fear.

“Wait,” I said. “Giovanni?”

He stopped. Persian poked his head curiously back into the room, then took up his customary position at Giovanni’s heels.

“Yes, Mewtwo, what is it?” Giovanni asked, rather coolly.

“I suppose this will take a moment…” I said nervously. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

“Did you, now?” Giovanni asked, slowly shutting the door behind him. “Very well, Mewtwo. Speak.”

I felt slightly more confident at this, and began my piece. “I am in a difficult position, my friend. You have told me that the best thing I can do in this world is offer my unique powers to Team Rocket. To take up a place in battle, and to wield my mental influence throughout the city.”

“That is correct.” Giovanni nodded.

“I have, and it has gone well. But I confess, I do not find it satisfying. I welcome power, but I do not only want power over the world. I want to understand it as well.”

“And what precisely do you mean by that?” he asked, eyes narrowing slightly.

“Have you not noticed that I am ignorant of the most basic things?” I asked. I was feeling good about this, now; I was coming into my stride. “You take it for granted that everyone possesses the same knowledge you do! You forget that I have not had the chance to learn the names and functions of most of the things which make up your world! I do not even know the name of the bright circle which lights up the sky—”

“That would be the sun,” Giovanni replied calmly.

“Or the green things which are found in great quantities all around the land—“

“I believe you mean trees,” he replied.

“Exactly!” I said, throwing up my hands. “You say these things as if they were so obvious, but you have never given me the chance to learn them! You make these fantastic plans for me, yet vast aspects of them are completely lost to me! You say these plans demonstrate my power, yet I could not feel more powerless when I lack even the proper words to describe what I am doing!”

As I had feared, Giovanni’s reply was cold and unsympathetic. “You have not learned these things because they are not relevant to your role here. What is the significance of the sun to one such as you? It is millions of miles away! It has not the slightest effect on your powers, and you will never come into contact with it! Why should you care about trees? Are you planning to plant them, row by row, like some absurd gardener? No! Your expertise lies in the psychic domain, and that is why we need you! You cannot afford, which is to say, we cannot afford, to be distracted from that!”

“It is no distraction,” I snapped, suddenly angry myself. “It is my life! I want to fully understand my actions. You take that away from me by always planning everything out for me. You tell me to do things, but I never understand what these strategies are meant to accomplish. I feel like an ignorant fool, always being led around by you.”

“It is a courtesy I have attempted to do you,” he replied. “My work generally consists of tedious paperwork and other such drivel. Do you expect me to train you to take it on? That would be a massive waste of effort, as I would gladly do it for you. Human mechanisms of power are not worth your time. Concentrate on the tactics your own species more commonly employs: violent conflict and yes, your natural powers of mental manipulation. Allow me to handle the rest.”

“Fine,” I told him. “I do not need to be involved in every plan you make. I understand you prefer to be the tactician and negotiator. That is not my concern. What irritates me is my lack of knowledge. I am completely uninformed about things other beings think about every day. I must fill that void, or else my time here has been pointless.”

“Oh?” said Giovanni, raising an eyebrow. “And what exactly do you propose?”

“I would like to learn,” I told him simply. “I know you do not enjoy answering my foolish, idle-minded questions, but perhaps we could find someone else who could? Perhaps you could find me a teacher, who could tell me more about the mechanics of the universe, the nature and names of things. Who could answer any question I might ask. I do not think that would be very difficult for someone with your resources.”

But Giovanni was already shaking his head. “That would not be possible in the least. Your other duties take up far too much of your time. I will not have you dragged out of the Gym, or neglecting your trips around the city for this ill-argued whim.”

“I have plenty of time!” I argued. “I spend long hours in here, waiting for the signal to leave! Doing nothing but stand in this infernal machine!”

“It is essential that we maintain your armor,” Giovanni said, suddenly very quiet. “And it must be joined to you at all times. Have I not told you how crucial it is that you hone your skills?”

“We could have the teacher come in here, and teach me while I wait!” I insisted. “If a single man could not always be there during that time, we could employ several! It would be easy! The perfect use of my time!”

“Do you think this is about your armor?” Giovanni snapped, eyes flashing suddenly. “You neglect the entire purpose of this operation with your childish desires. My goal has always been to teach you self-mastery, to develop your body and mind to their highest potential. Silence and solitude are the key to achieving these things.”

“Oh?” I shot back. “Do you spend your time alone, hiding from your fellow men? No, you go out and delight in their company. You throw yourself at them, giving anything to avoid the banal solitude I live in.”

“You are acting like a petulant child,” Giovanni said, but I could tell the insult had stung. “You fail to understand the larger picture, as you always do. Given your inability to listen to a single thing I attempt to teach you, I wonder whether it is a sensible use of my time and money to allow you to stay here at all. Clearly, you have learned nothing.”

“You have nothing to teach me!” I roared. Suddenly, without realizing what I was doing, I rose several feet in the air, cords dangling from me like tentacles. I could feel energy building up inside me, a torrent ready to be unleashed. “I might as well leave this very instant, since I doubt it makes any sense to put up with your odious company!” Sparks flashed for a moment around my feet.

Then I stopped. What was I doing? For a moment, I just hung there, lamely, in midair, drooping as limply as my cords. Giovanni and I watched each other for a long time, almost at eye level.

I had never seen anything so unnerving as the stare he was giving me. I thought I had seen Giovanni angry before—that had been nothing. His eyes, wide and furious, seemed to bore into me with a searing heat. His entire face showed not the frustration of an irritated gentleman, but the pure, unbridled rage of an attacked animal, ready to kill. He did not blink once.

After a moment, I set myself down on the ground, and stared up at him humbly. Why had I been so willing to throw our friendship away on this?

“I am sorry, Giovanni,” I said. “I am very sorry; I spoke without thinking. I do not wish that. None of what I said was true.”

There was no response. From here it was harder to read the look on his face. Had he calmed down? Or was he still bitterly offended?

Something in me couldn’t let the matter drop. “I only ask because this is vital to me. To know and feel what I am doing is important, rather than just be told it is. I need this.”

Silence.

“It will not be a distraction, I promise. It will make me more capable, just as you said. To find that ultimate potential you were describing. For how can I be fit to lead the world of Pokémon when I do not even know what that world looks like? With this knowledge, I will be a more valuable asset to your team. I will be able to carry out your commands with ease, without having to ask you a constant stream of questions.” I swallowed and continued.

“When we are on the battlefield, I will see things and understand exactly what you mean to do with them. I will be silent and loyal. The two of us will rejoice together, soundlessly, at our perfect mastery of war. You will know that you can trust me, because I will think like you without any message passing between us. I will know what to do, and I will do it, and you will not even have to utter a word.”

There was another moment of silence. Then Giovanni spoke.

“If, and only if, that comes to pass, will I consider this a reasonable investment of my energies.”

His expression had cooled, I saw. But he still seemed reluctant.

“Tell me,” he said, arms folded, “what exactly did you intend to learn?”

“How the world works,” I said. “How to function in it as a living creature.”

He waved a hand impatiently. “Do not bombard me with meaningless aphorisms. Be specific.”

“Well,” I said hesitantly, “You told me when I arrived here you would teach me about my own body. I thought I might learn how its systems are constructed, how they function. And also how these systems function in other living creatures, like Pokémon and humans, and how their bodies differ from my own.”

Giovanni nodded. “Basic biology, then. Was that it?”

“No,” I told him. “I have been thinking of several other interests as well. I want to know about the world outside this base. Why the trees grow. Why the sun moves in the sky, and how. How water and fire work. How all these different materials come to be gathered in this ball called the world.”

“Astrophysics, I suppose,” he said, almost lazily.

“I would also like to know about events that have transpired in the world. You often tell me of great conquerors, whose example we ought to aspire to. I would like to know more about them: what exactly did they conquer? When? Where?”

“History,” he informed me.

“And…” I stopped, embarrassed. This last one, I thought, would surely seem childish and pointless to him, even bizarre. But I couldn’t let my opportunity go to waste.

“I would also like to learn about this hypothetical character called God, and His angels. I would like to know more about them, about the stories humans tell about them. Not to follow any particular rules, but just to know. Religion is the word for it, I think.” There. I had said it.

As I had feared, Giovanni’s reaction was incredulous. He laughed another one of his short, sharp barks.

“Religion? Have you lost all semblance of sanity, Mewtwo? Do you perhaps intend to join the Omarians in their chanting? Are you planning to visit a Dharmic monastery and sing hymns to their triune god?” It was clear he found my request a marvelous jest.

“No,” I said stubbornly, wishing I had not brought it up. “I only find it interesting. I want to understand human beings, and it seems to me that one of the best ways to do so is to learn their stories about the world and how it came to be. I think I would have much to gain from it.”

Giovanni laughed again. “What could you gain from speaking to simpletons who believe that kind of rubbish? I tell you, Mewtwo, religion is only a tool for keeping the weak in check, and no more. It lacks substance; it is as empty of any real meaning as a bag of wind. Keep the mindless masses convinced that they owe their loyalty to something larger than themselves, and then step in to usurp that place at the earliest convenience. It is the clear historical pattern. You and I need not bother with such tripe.”

“Nevertheless,” I said tensely, “it is a topic I would like to pursue in more depth. It is just a harmless interest of mine. You will not need to be involved.”

“That is where you are wrong,” said Giovanni airily. “At the very least, I will need to find someone capable of telling you of all these nonsensical stories. But I suppose I shall do so, in spite of myself.”

He was still grinning oddly, as if the joke was still being perpetrated. “Very well. Indulge your strange curiosities. I shall add a personal theologian to the list. Is that all? I highly doubt that you will have time for any other subjects than these.”

“Yes,” I admitted. “Those are all the things that occurred to me. Does this mean you are accepting my request?”

Giovanni’s face became expressionless. “Against my better judgment,” he said finally.

“Thank you—“ I began.

He cut me off with a wave of his hand. He looked away for a moment, then snorted. “I don’t hesitate to remind you that this is a massive waste of my time and resources. Nevertheless, it may not be completely without merit. You are astoundingly ignorant about a number of essential subjects. That much is clear. The degree to which you need remedial education is a matter which I will determine myself. But you may expect a lesson of some sort to begin within the next three days. Do not give me cause to regret this decision.”

“I will not,” I promised. “But you will provide the religion teacher?”

He gave another strange laugh. “Yes, of course. Of course you need some babbling old fool to teach you about prophecy and the worship of idiotic deities. You’ll be able to indulge these yearnings to your heart’s content, I assure you. Feel free to seek baptism from one of the Sons of Ogam. Perhaps you’ll ascend to the fourth heaven and live peacefully among the cherubim. Yes, I think such things will be absolutely essential to your growth and development.”

I ignored his sarcasm. “Thank you,” I said again.

But Giovanni ignored my words. “I will see you later this evening,” he informed me brusquely. “You have several duties to attend to in the city.”

I nodded. I knew he liked to check in on our efforts.

He was still watching me as if he’d never seen anything so strange in his life. “It is easy to forget,” Giovanni mused, “what a peculiar creature you are. Really, the way your mind works… I don’t know where you get such ideas…”

Still chuckling oddly, he left, Persian at his heels. The door slammed shut.

On the whole, I thought, it could have gone a great deal worse.

Man! And I thought Legacy had long chapters!

It was good as always through. I like the point of view you tell it as.

@ Cyber Pika:

Thanks! Glad to hear it. Hopefully, the other Parts won't be quite so astonishingly long. XD. This one is slowly approaching its end.

Here comes what I've been thinking of as "the religion chapter!" ;) We'll see what you guys make of it, but I hope it goes over well. You'll probably have a few questions, at least, so feel free to ask me.

Dai

[CONTINUED:]

As Giovanni had promised, three days later, I was greeted one morning by a strange new figure on the balcony.

The man peered down at me through oversized silver spectacles. He had short, close-cropped hair, like Giovanni, but he was much taller and thinner. His white coat hung loose and ragged on his frame. “You would be our esteemed guest, the Mewtwo, I presume?” he said, in a hoarse, scratchy voice.

“I am,” I said. “Just ‘Mewtwo,’ though.”

He shrugged. “It makes little difference to me.” Slowly, he started down the rickety metal stairs that led down from the balcony. As he came into the light, I saw that he was wearing a tiny black clip on his left ear, identical to Giovanni’s. Sure enough, to my mind he manifested as nothing less than a blur of swirling colors and shapes.

“Now,” he said. “I believe you required a lesson in physics?”

It transpired that the man’s name was Dr. Peter Adams. When he wasn’t tutoring curious clones, he worked to keep the organization informed about what he called “the science of extraplanetary exploration.” I had no idea what this meant, but I guessed it involved machines of some sort. He had been sent to teach me about the motions of the objects in the sky. And, to some degree, the motion of objects in the ordinary world.

I thrilled when I heard this. There were so many things I was bursting to ask. I was particularly curious about those tiny bright dots which appeared when the sky was dark, gleaming against the night like a thousand shards of glass. But first, I had to ask about the clip on his ear.

“Why do you wear that device?” I probed. “Giovanni put one on when we first met, and I have not seen him take it off yet.” It was painful to think that he still might not trust me. “But I have not noticed anyone else here wearing it.”

Adams shrugged. “This is a new phase in our interaction with you, Mewtwo. Consider: up until now, Giovanni has been the only one who needed to visit you. He considers the device absolutely essential to his method of instruction, as do we.”

“But—”

He cut me off with a hand. “If you could simply extract the knowledge I hold by reading my mind, Mewtwo, there would be no point in teaching you. You would obtain everything too easily. By preventing you from being tempted to do so, we force you to establish a dialogue with us, as student and teacher. You will learn more effectively, and retain more information. Additionally, you will learn the discipline and patience necessary to thrive in this world.” Adams’ voice was quiet, but firm.

I wondered if those had been Giovanni’s words—I thought I recognized his cadence and style.

“…I suppose that makes sense,” I said, reluctantly. I wasn’t sure if I agreed with that line of argument, but I thought I might as well accept. Hiring these teachers was an imposition on Giovanni, I knew; the least I could do was let him carry this process out in his own fashion.

So Adams became my first teacher, first of what turned out to be a set of four. They rotated their appearances according to a simple seven-day pattern, which I eventually learned was called a week. Adams appeared on the day called “Monday.”

Adams was not a terribly exciting man. In his teaching style he was blunt and terribly straightforward, always teaching according to a measured, reasoned plan. Nothing seemed to kindle passion in him; nothing sparked emotion in him, positive or otherwise. When I asked questions, he answered me calmly, but then immediately returned to his original trajectory. I cannot say I recall him very well: he floats as a splash of grey on my memory, more notable for his absence than his presence.

But if Adams was dull, how much more exciting were the things he had to teach me! Adams soon revealed to me that the world, which I recalled as a big round ball of water and dirt, was in fact a sphere called the planet Earth, and it hurtled through space at more than a hundred thousand kilometers per hour, in a gigantic interacting system of spheres which was only one of many in an enormous universe!

That bright sky-orb, the sun, was an enormous ball of flame at the center of this system, more than a hundred times our size, and we circled around it like a companion, only one of the many planets that made this solar system our home, some of whose sizes were almost as staggering! And as we turned, we spun, and the sun appeared to rise and fall in the sky with our spinning!

And we had a little companion, called the moon, which circled around us, in turn, and depending upon where it was in relation to the sun, we would see it lit up in different ways, fading from a circle of light to a sliver, and then growing back again! I remembered seeing this object in the sky on several nighttime ventures, and wondering if it was some alien transformation of the sun—but no, it was our companion as we were the sun’s, and we could predict its transformations, even to knowing when it would rise and set in the sky, with perfect regularity. And then, sometimes, depending on the angle the Earth wobbled at, the sun and moon would appear to overlap, and that was called an eclipse! I marveled at the fascinating things I was uncovering.

And then, once that had become clear to me, an even greater truth revealed itself: the sun was but one of millions, no, of billions of burning orbs, floating in the universe beyond the sky, and these others were the stars we saw at night—we could literally look out beyond the Earth and see the places where other stars and planets lay. And hundreds of billions of stars, put together, made up a galaxy, and our galaxy, which reached out spiral-shaped arms of light, was only one of two hundred billion galaxies which we could see were out there, and there might be many more we would never be able to measure with our instruments! It was a symphony of enormous patterns which stretched on into infinity.

It was beautiful; it was overwhelming; it was humbling. I realized that my domain, and Giovanni’s, the Earth, was just a small patch of territory in an enormous cosmos. Perhaps that was all right, I thought. Managing the entire universe would be a terrifying responsibility. Perhaps somewhere, other versions of Giovanni and Mewtwo led the way to a glorious future in the sky, just as we did on Earth.

These visions entranced me for quite some time—after our first few lessons, I began to spend some of my waiting-time just contemplating the motion of the planets, attempting to figure out how eight or nine spheres (it was currently under some debate) could orbit around the sun in a perfect pattern. And what did that look like from our perspective? One day I stole a few chunks of metal out of the side of the waiting-platform, shaped them into balls, and began spinning them around to get a good visual idea. I hid them in my bedchamber and used them in all my astronomical speculations afterward, modeling the motions of the solar system, of the galaxies, marveling at the angles of the sun, the earth, and the moon.

And I learned that the property which drew the planets and galaxies together was called gravity, which was basically a tendency of all objects to want to be together. The circular orbits of the planets were the result of the planets’ attempt to move while compelled by that attraction. On Earth, gravity was what drew objects to the ground, causing falling, and it was that power I overcame whenever I used my powers to fly! Marvelous.

I learned many other things as well. I learned that all things were made of tiny particles, called atoms, and these had many effects on matter. Atoms gave substances their properties, and when atoms combined, these compounds had new properties. And things like heat or cold were simply the result of these atoms being stimulated into motion, or robbed of their motion!

And on the subject of motion, I learned something of the laws and concepts which humans had invented to describe how objects moved about the universe, although mathematics never entered the picture. Adams and I spent a number of hours on such topics as energy, matter, forces, acceleration, equal and opposite reactions, and inertia.

These ideas seemed utterly brilliant to me, however human scientists chose to describe them, because they made so much sense to me on an intuitive level. They were the laws I worked with on an everyday basis: how often, after all, had I used the force of my mind to make opponents accelerate? And how often had I enjoyed watching the reaction that ensued when they crashed into the wall?

Sometimes I tried to explain this view of the world to Adams. One afternoon, listening to him review and reexamine the First Law of Physical Motion, I had to interject.

“So, in other words,” I contributed, “what you are saying is that, basically, if I push something hard enough, it will fall over.”

There was a long silence while Adams looked baffled. Finally, he blinked, pushed his spectacles up the bridge of his nose and said, very slowly:

“I suppose that statement is certainly not an incorrect way of looking at it, Mewtwo.”

On Wednesdays I learned from someone rather different: a female human—which is to say a woman—awaited me on the balcony. Her name was Gail Simmons, and her subject was history. She was a thin, tired-looking woman with stringy brown hair and a penetrating gaze. Unlike Adams, she wore no white coat, but seemed to favor simplicity with a faded brown jacket, suit and pants.

I vividly recall Simmons’s voice, more than anything else about her: it was low, rich and resonant. Much of the time she spoke very quietly, so that it could be a struggle to hear her, but the moment she seized on some point she found tremendously exciting, like the moment when a politician or a conqueror reshaped the course of history, she would bellow it gleefully to all the room, and her voice would go swooping up and down the octaves.

She had a knack for getting right to the point, as I recall. (Unlike myself.) The minute she laid eyes on me, Simmons strode down the stairs, peered into my visor, and began to lay out an overview of the course we would take in studying history.

In other ways she could be reticent and unapproachable, though—I recall asking her once what sort of work she did with Team Rocket, and how she came to know Giovanni. Her face grew very pale, and she muttered something about her family before hastily changing the subject. My guess is that she inherited some sort of debt to the organization.

History did not quite take hold of me in the way certain other subjects did, but it was a relief to know what had actually gone on in the world before my arrival. It also became something of an education in geography: Simmons was astonished when she realized I had no idea where the borders of regions and nations lay, nor even the rough outlines of the land masses against the ocean. She dragged out a series of charts to give me a better visual understanding, which might have been my favorite part of the class: I spent a long time examining the shapes of the continents, marveling that the face of the world could be laid out so clearly for anyone to understand.

As Simmons presented it, history was a tale of conquest, not only of territory, but of minds and hearts as well. The first human civilizations worth noting, she informed me, were kingdoms which arose in the fertile Kushu Valley, though by then human beings had already spread to almost every continent.

When I pointed out that this would have required some level of civilization, Simmons scoffed. “I don’t consider raft-building a particularly impressive achievement.”

But shortly after the emergence of the first Kushan kings, who build great temples and pyramids to make their mark upon the world, similar cultures began to appear in other regions, whose efforts were just as magnificent: the Priest-Lords of Alph, for instance, whose ruined halls still stand, or the Ekandite sovereigns, responsible for some of the first trade with the Ajodite rajas in the Middle West. With powerful Pokémon and clever humans drawn into their armies, these kingdoms began to grow into rich nations.

After this point, things began to get exciting, as great empires arose, sweeping across continents, drawing previously unimportant lands into unified realms. Unprecedented leaps in science, architecture and philosophy became possible. And for the first time, Simmons informed me, with clear admiration in her eyes, the deeds of great men with a daring individual vision appear clearly in the historical record. These were the days of Alexander and Xerxes, of Cadilus and Thanatipus. Emperors and conquerors redrew the borders of nations, leaving undeniable marks on the world that would follow, bringing the backwoods and the ignorant into the light of civilization.

The problem, Simmons mused, was that these great empires never lasted long after the death of their founders, shattering into fragments littered with relics. To make a lasting empire a reality, one would have to train a group of disciples in the management of power, so that they could keep the regime in place.

After the fall of the Sugorian Empire, the world fell into something of a decline, but within the millennium, new nations crawled out of the dirt and made further strides in knowledge and arts, building on the legacy of the Sugors. Before long, entire continents clashed and conquered each other, led by such men as Maximilian Crane and Rutherford Morris. We had entered the modern world.

“Today,” Simmons informed me with slight distaste, “we have no such wars, and no such leaders, either. Recently—within the century—the regions of Kanto, Johto, Hoenn and Sinnoh dissolved their disputes and decided to unify as one nation: the United State of Nihon. The progress toward greater and greater empires is natural, something we should seek. The problem is that many of the other nations of the world—Unova and Orre chief among them—have neglected to join the coalition, and none of our so-called leaders have the guts to force them into it. I suppose it’s not surprising, given that Orre is still drunk on its independence from Johto, but still. The failures of our modern government are appalling. We need a global nation-state that draws everyone under one banner, or we fail to follow the clear imperative laid out by history.”

“And the Rocket organization will be that conquering army?” I asked. “That is our destiny?”

Simmons nodded distractedly. “Precisely.”

Looking back, it is hard to say whether the opinions Smith espoused were her own. She did seem quite vehement at times about the superiority of conquerors and the need for a unifying global vision, but perhaps that was more an expression of Giovanni’s time-tested philosophy and rhetoric than her own individual view. I suspect he might have employed her as a propagandist, sending her out into intellectual spheres to nudge the intelligentsia toward his line of thinking, what with her clear academic credentials. What she actually thought about these issues, I have no idea.

But there could be no doubt that my tutor in the biological sciences spoke his mind. The man I met on Fridays was a loud, bizarre and unforgettable character.

He was a short man in a white coat with flame-red hair. He seemed a bit older than some of the other Rockets, closer to Giovanni’s age. He had an enormous, bushy mustache which twitched like a living creature whenever he spoke. His head was shiny and bald on the top, but tufts of orange stuck out from the sides at lengths to almost rival the mustache. Despite his small stature, when he moved and spoke he often worked himself into such a frenzy that he seemed like a much larger creature. He certainly made an impression from the first moment one saw him.

He laughed when his eyes lit upon me: a cackle I would soon come to know quite well. “Mewtwo, I presume?”

Before I could answer, he cackled again. “That was a joke, of course! I already know everything about you! I, of course, am one of the chief architects behind what you might call the Mewtwo Project! Second only to Dr. Khan, who of course is due for retirement any day now! Between you and me, Mewtwo, I won’t miss him. But I’m responsible for all the little home comforts you’ve found around here! Mostly the armor and the whole machine interface. We couldn’t have our little psychic houseguest go without a solid training program, could we? No, I think not!”

“Are you the expert in ‘biology’, then?” I asked.

He laughed once more. “Of course I am! There isn’t a single inch of your bloodstream I haven’t mapped out and monitored! I’ve practically memorized the fibers of your nervous system! I know far more about your body than you do! Which is of course the point! Soon you’ll know almost as much as I! Not everything, of course—I have to keep some of my secrets! And if I tell you all the technical details you’ll be asleep on the floor in thirty seconds!”

“I suppose so,” I said, overwhelmed. “What shall I call you?”

His face suddenly grew fierce and savage. “That is an extremely important matter, and I expect you to get it right! Listen very carefully unless you want to suffer the consequences!”

As he spoke he began moving down the stairway with wide, dramatic strides, taking a step for every word he spoke. “My name!” he crowed. “Is! Doctor! Xavier! Albert! Namba!” He slid down the remainder of the stairs with a flourish.

“Dr. Namba, then,” I replied. I had been learning.

He beamed. “Precisely! And don’t you forget it!”

A sly grin crept over his face. “Now…shall we engage in the most delectable of institutions, that bastion of experiment and learning, that forger and destroyer of empires which we truth-seeking men call science?”

And so we delved into the world of bodies. Much of what Namba taught me was in essence review, for I had explored my own inner workings several times while with the scientists, and many more in my moments of boredom under Giovanni’s tutelage. But in those surveys the information had always been fleeting, fragmented—I understood the broad shapes of things, but not what they indicated. Even when I could guess at their functions, I had no idea how the structures within my body interacted with each other: how did it all work? What did it all mean?

Namba, in his bombastic and inimitable fashion, provided me with answers. I learned that everything in my body was made up of cells, which needed nutrients to grow and copy themselves, and that the great, many-forked river which was my bloodstream channeled these nutrients wherever they were needed, with the help of the pumping, muscular heart. I learned the names of substances like oxygen, which the great flapping sacs of my lungs pulled down through my throat in the sweet sensation I called breath.

I learned about the fibers of muscle and the calcium of bone. I learned of the long, thin cells called neurons, which sent sparks of electricity throughout my brain. I traced the path of my digestive system in a new light, finally understanding how each of its components, from my mouth to my intestines, broke down meals in a different way. I learned to understand the sensations of my eyes, my ears, my nose. My tongue. My skin—and the growth of the violet fur which covered it like shaggy velvet. The glands which sent energy and emotion coursing through my veins. All these things I learned to look at anew.

Admittedly, these were aspects of all bodies. As Namba took pains to remind me, I was a unique and potent creature. And for the first time, I began to understand some of the qualities which made me so. Mew, it seemed, had given me a marvelous physique. My reflexes were frighteningly precise, my bones sturdy, my limbs naturally supple and strong. Everything in me seemed to move at twice the normal speed: my hormones leapt into my bloodstream; electrical signals surged through my nerves faster than thought. When wounded, my flesh recongealed rapidly, and my bones knit almost before I had time to know they were broken. All this I had inherited from my ancestor.

But of course I surpassed Mew. According to Namba, Giovanni’s espionage had uncovered a detailed record of the many fantastic additions my creators had made to my DNA—a coding system, by the way, which I had vaguely begun to comprehend. My mind had naturally been a chief area of interest. Not only had they bombarded my sleeping form with certain stimulating electromagnetic fields—the details were still somewhat beyond me—they had also modified the genome that would form my brain, inserting extra glial cells, tightening the efficiency of my neurons, and whatever else they could think of. By such methods, they had increased my intellect many times over. A pity they could not do the same thing for themselves.

And then there was my magnificent spinal cord—or rather, cords. Namba remarked with glee that the extra bundle of nerve tissue running through the tube at the back of my neck allowed my mind to thrive off its own psychic energies. It was a mental feedback loop, of sorts: one spinal cord picked up on the information transmitted by the other, giving each deeper insight into the surrounding environment. This self-bolstering system honed my awareness until I could perceive everything from the smallest speck of dust to the most towering building.

“Is it not rather strange,” I murmured once, “that such idiotic men should be responsible for such a marvelous body?”

Namba guffawed. “It just goes to show: sometimes the greatest discoveries come accidentally to fools who have no idea what they’ve stumbled upon. We intend to take much better care of our greatest resource than they did, I can tell you that!”

And Namba was delighted to share certain of these plans with me. He described in loving detail how my armor monitored my bodily health at all times, keeping track of such things as heart rate, blood pressure, electrical fluctuation and psychic exertion. It even kept track of my position and velocity on the battlefield. And the machine I so often stood beneath was secretly part computer: whenever I recharged my armor, the information it collected was stored in Rocket records. My supervisors in fact used this data to adjust the armor and recommend training regimens to Giovanni.

And Namba had ideas of his own. “There ought to be some way we can monitor your glands and hormones!” he declared. “I’m still arguing with the bastards in charge about that one!”

“What do those do again?” I asked cautiously.

“They provide you with your emotions and most of your energy in battle, of course!” Namba crowed. “Here’s something I expect you don’t know, my exquisite creature: a direct relationship exists between the intensity of your emotions and your performance in battle! The angrier you grow, the more powerful your attacks become!”

He was pacing along the floor in front of my platform. “We’ve learned this by experimenting on other Pokémon who fall into our hands! A fascinating hormonal surge occurs—this is true for any species we’ve tested—when they become enraged! Every muscle seems to become stronger, every reflex more immediate—there’s no real parallel in humans! And everything we’ve learned from your data seems to indicate it should be the same with you!”

“What would you propose, then?” I asked. “Should I try to infuriate myself before each match, to make myself stronger?” I wondered what kind of experiments they had done.

Namba laughed another hysterical laugh. “No need for that kind of thing! Before long, it might not be necessary, anyway: with a little more research, we could develop an automatic hormonal regulation device that would flood your body with anger whenever you went into battle! Wouldn’t that be marvelous?”

His face relaxed. “I tell you, Mewtwo, it’s the most fascinating field we’re looking into. Before long, everyone will learn to put their trust in the power of seething, unmitigated rage.”

There were times when I was glad I only met with Namba once a week.

By contrast, I always looked forward to the fourth subject on my schedule. This is not to say I did not enjoy the three sciences Giovanni had approved of—I relished the opportunity to converse with educated humans about their knowledge, and delighted in the expansion of my understanding. But the subject I studied on Sundays was undeniably my favorite of the four. Something about it moved me, renewed me. Somehow I felt at home—perhaps it was the man I learned it from.

My first encounter with my religion tutor was quite the scene, as I recall. I was standing alone in my usual place, wondering when someone would show up to impart the scheduled lesson, when the door on the upper platform began to open very slightly. For an infinitesimal second, the handle turned and it creaked open, just enough for me to realize a person was there. Then it stopped. I stared at the metal frame, quite mystified.

I sent my awareness up to the platform to investigate, but found it balked by another of those now-ubiquitous confusion fields. My tutor was up there, all right. But it seemed I would have to wait for him to appear.

Finally the handle twitched again, and the door swung hurriedly open. A man darted out from the bright space and slammed it behind him. Clutching the railing, he stared down at me nervously.

I studied him. He was an older human, with thin, whitish hair and a weary, lined face. He wore no lab coat, but a funny sort of brown suit with an odd, dark collar. He seemed harmless, but everything about him spoke of a terrified energy, as if he might bolt any second. He reminded me of a frightened Nidoran. For a long time he was silent. Then, suddenly, his voice rose, high-pitched, out of the darkness

“I’m not afraid of you, you know!” he told me in garbled tones.

“Should you be?” I asked, bemused.

“…No, of course not,” the man mumbled. “I just thought I might…oh, never mind. Never mind. Forget I said anything.” He was silent again for a while.

“Are you going to come down?” I inquired. “Then I could see you more clearly. I could carry you down, if the stairs pose any problem.”

“No,” he said, with a sudden, defiant glance at them. “No, I think I’ll be able to manage them on my own, thank you. Just give me a moment.” With slow, delicate strides, he made his way downstairs. He stopped when he reached the floor, staring at me.

“You’re Mewtwo.”

“I am,” I replied amiably. “What have you heard about me?”

He cast a few nervous glances around the room. “Only that you’re the most powerful creature in the building; a weapon of apocalyptic proportions. Only that you can read minds like open books and tear people apart with a thought.”

“You are wearing a cloaking and shielding device,” I pointed out.

He touched his ear as if discovering the tiny black clip for the first time. “That’s true. I don’t suppose you could, er—tear me apart—” He swallowed.

“What is your name?” I interrupted.

He coughed. “Erm. Yes, I suppose I should mention that.” He shook his head. “I am the Reverend Father Michael Fitzpatrick.” He caught my glance. “Which means I’m a priest of the Holy Petranic Church of Omar. I am here to teach you about the Good News of Omar’s Ascension, and, er, the ways of several other faiths besides. And this is, er—this is honestly the strangest thing I have ever done.”

“It is a new experience for both of us, then,” I suggested. “Perhaps we should get underway?”

He nodded. “Let us begin.” He fumbled in his pocket, finally pulling out a few ragged pieces of paper. “How do you feel about starting with the pagans?”

Once it became clear that I meant him no harm, Fitzpatrick quickly warmed up to me. Before long we were greeting each other like old comrades, and he began regaling me with stories about his life, working them into his lessons. And he had led something of an interesting one. I listened with fascination to his tales about growing up among the poor fishermen who sought to make a life for themselves on the shabby boats south of Vermillion City.

His parents had left Johto during the famines which ravaged the landscape in those years. They hoped for a better life working on the south Kanto docks, but found that here, too, they were more or less unwanted. Yet somehow they managed to raise a family: Fitzpatrick was the youngest of five.

“It was hard, because I felt as if to them I was just an extra burden,” he admitted. “They signed me up to work on the boats with my elder brothers, but I hated it. Ran away as soon as I could. I’d heard something about how the big cities were where there was money to be made, so I traveled inland to Saffron.”

But that didn’t turn out as well as he’d hoped. The young Fitzpatrick, with his scant education, found few opportunities available to him. He ended up with two things: a tiny sum of money from working odd jobs and a reputation as a serious troublemaker.

Whenever he discussed this part of his life, Fitzpatrick would scowl and look down at the floor, heavily embarrassed. “It’s not a time I feel particularly proud of. I lived a life of self-gratification, caught up in cycles of greed and sin. I was cruel to women and constantly stone, stinking drunk. I can never hope to repay the debt I owe the Lord God for lifting me out of my sinful ways.”

One day, the young Fitzpatrick took a good, long look at himself and began to regret his ways. The Omarian Church of Saffron City was an inspiration to him during this time, and a source of guidance and support. Before long, he was a regular volunteer there, testifying to other troubled young men about how the blessing of Omar had changed his life. And soon, he took ordination as a priest, having discovered within himself a talent for inspiring speech. It had been his life’s work for decades since.

Fitzpatrick did not tell me about himself all at once: these tales emerged from him, bit by bit, as he strove to teach me about his savior, Omar. It was clear from the beginning that Fitzpatrick’s style of preaching involved telling many stories: stories about himself, stories about people he had met, stories about acts of divinity on Earth. Bit by bit, he revealed himself by revealing his God to me.

And several other Gods. For Fitzpatrick’s job was to teach me about all the religions he was familiar with , and he did so with equanimity and a kind, even hand. Still, it was always obvious that Omarity was the religion he knew best, the faith nearest and dearest to his heart. The story of Omar and Ogen was the first tale we discussed, on that first of Sundays, the first of those days which I would learn were holy.

Omarity emerged from another faith, I learned: the religion of the desert nomads, the Yehuda. They were one of the first to speak of a God who created the entire universe, a singular Creator whom all should pray to. Before that, there had been only the pagans, men and women who worshipped the rocks and trees, seeing great powers in the natural world. Sometimes they paid tribute to them, and sometimes they called them gods.

The exciting insight of the Yehuda, Fitzpatrick informed me gleefully, was that they held faith in a single god, alone and almighty, who created and ruled over the universe. This God had a special relationship with the Yehuda people, establishing a covenant with their forefathers in which He agreed to protect them if they would follow his laws. He had many names throughout history—Ul, Arcdeus, and Yeho, among others. And many forms: sometimes He appeared like a great beam of light, sometimes He walked like a man. It was emphasized, though. that none of these were any more than manifestations: His actual essence was something immutable, beyond comprehension.

I found it very intriguing, however, that He sometimes appeared as a Pokémon.

Apparently there had been visions throughout history, among Yehuda and Omarians alike, of a great Pokémon which was a symbol of God’s power on Earth. Fitzpatrick quoted one for me:

“…I have seen Him, standing on the great peak of the world: a mighty beast, much taller than a man, His eyes like burning embers…He raises white flanks in majesty, and holds the world in judgment beneath His four hooves…His head billows like the smoke from a fire, and around His body glows a jeweled ring of golden light…Blessed be He, our Lord who made all things!”

Though Fitzpatrick was quick to remind me that this image was only a metaphor for God’s might, I couldn’t help but want to hear more about this creature, about God Arcdeus, or Arceus. I had thought of religion as a human invention and concern, but this idea, that the Creator of the World might care about my species, might even wear the form of one of our number—that spoke to me. Perhaps I could believe in a benevolent God above.

For Fitzpatrick, though, there were far more significant points. It seems that humankind owed the Creator a kind of debt, which had to be repaid. (All of this was a bit difficult for me to grasp.) He held them accountable for their sin.

“What is that?” I asked.

“An excellent question, Mewtwo,” Fitzpatrick agreed. “What, indeed, is sin?” He paused. “Sin is…well, it’s the act of doing something wrong.”

“So that you do not succeed?”

“No,” he said with a smile. “Doing something that is cruel, that is evil, that harms other people. Things you regret later. God frowns on these actions, and we hold that the first humans brought sin into their being when they rejected God’s gift of Paradise.”

To make up this debt, God devised a plan: he would send his sons to sacrifice their lives for humanity. Their suffering, particularly the suffering of Omar, would free humans from their debt of sin, leaving them to be judged only by their individual sins. But apparently these were not quite sons in the everyday sense, but expressions of the Creator himself.

“God has four aspects,” Fitzpatrick informed me. “The Father, which is the great creative part of God, unknowable and supreme. The Holy Spirit, which permeates all things. Then two incarnate forms: the Younger Son, who prepares the way for great revelations on earth. And the Elder Son, the ultimate mediator between the Father and the human race.”

“Where does the Arcdeus fit in?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Nowhere. The Arcdeus is simply an image of God the Father; it is not part of the Quadrinity.”

“Oh,” I said, slightly crestfallen. These were tricky concepts to wrap one’s mind around.

God chose to make Himself incarnate twice among the Yehuda, first to announce the new Truth and make the people ready, and then again to teach the Truth and erase their debt of sin. Two women were involved: Liza, who was almost perfectly without sin, and Marya, who was born even without the inherited debt of sin of her forefathers. Liza became the mother of Ogen, the Way-Shower, and Marya became the mother of Omar, the Sin-Cleanser, called the Raisch.

Ogen was born about thirty years before Omar, and spent his life preparing the people for the coming of Omar, preaching far and wide of the Messiah who was to redeem the world.

Would it not make more sense, then, I wondered, to call Ogen the Elder Son instead of the younger? But Fitzpatrick was ready with an answer.

“The titles describe how they appeared in God’s eyes, Mewtwo,” he explained. “Not in ours. Time has a different meaning for the creator. Think of it this way: which comes first, in God’s mind? The idea for God to redeem his people, or the plan which brings it about? The term ‘Elder Son’ indicates the greater power of Omar’s sacrifice, but each is a vital aspect of God’s incarnation on Earth.”

After announcing his Truth, Ogen was convicted of deluding the people with strange ideas, and was beheaded by his government. But he did not suffer long. Omar’s, by comparison, was the much greater sacrifice. Born just after Ogen’s death, Omar declared himself openly as the Son of God, and preached a new moral code about the way humans should live. But he, too, was seen as a dangerous force, and sentenced to the painful death of crucifixion.

“Crucifixion?” I asked.

Fitzpatrick grimaced. “They nailed his hands and feet to a cross of wood.”

I shuddered, privately glad I would never be as fragile as a human being.

Omar’s torture and death released the debt of sin humans owed their Creator. Then, to demonstrate the truth of his teaching, he rose from the dead and visited some of his students, before ascending to join his Father and Brother above.

But both Sons promised to return: at the end of the world, the Apocalypse. Goodness would war with Sin, and all the humans who ever lived would be judged for the sins they had committed. Those who were good would be rewarded by joining their Creator in the Heavens; those who were evil would be punished in realms called Hells.

“What about Pokémon?” I asked. “Does Omar say anything about how they will be judged?”

Fitzpatrick hesitated. “Opinion is, erm, divided on that point. Some scholars say that your species will share in our judgment. Others suggest that God will ignore Pokémon altogether.”

I nodded slowly. Humans would assume their God cared only for them. But it sounded as if there might still be a place for me in their religion, if I chose to accept it. I did not know how I felt about such doctrines as sin and the four parts of the Creator, but I liked the tale of the two brothers.

After Fitzpatrick and I had explored the main tenets of his faith, it was time for us to look into others, if only on a basic level.

One of the most prominent, especially in this part of the world, was Dualism. Dualists believed in a balance between such opposites as male and female, dark and light, subtle and bright. They had two corresponding books of teachings: the Testament of the Sun, and the Testament of the Moon. I was a bit shocked, however, to learn their source.

Fitzpatrick informed me that Dualism, along with many other faiths, believed that Mew was not the only immensely powerful creature roaming over the face of the world: there were many others just like it, perhaps even more powerful. These beings were connected somehow to certain elements of the natural world: the Dualists, in particular, held that their scriptures were given to them by Ho-oh, the Spirit of the Sun, and Lugia, the Spirit of the Moon.

“What do you think, Mewtwo?” Fitzpatrick asked, a twinkle in his eye. “Do you suspect these creatures actually exist?”

“It seems very unlikely,” I snorted. “If they were anything but figments, I am certain more would be known about them by now.” Fitzpatrick nodded, and said no more on the subject.

Looking back on these conversations, though, I think my obstinacy was born more out of self-image than any inherent skepticism. How could there be any creature more powerful than I? If my lesser sibling, Mew, was the most nature could provide, then I still reigned supreme.

But if I found Dualism hard to swallow, the next faith Fitzpatrick introduced me to, I had even more reason to scoff at: a group called the Apostles of the Child. Or, more tellingly: the Apostles of Mew.

“Mew-worshippers!?” I said, incredulous.

He laughed. “Yes, I suppose you could see them as the successors to the pagans who carved idols of Mew. But I think you’ll find that the Apostles have something of a different flavor.”

It seemed there had once been a man, George Layton by name, who found himself lost in the mountains without hope of a way out. Trapped in a ravine and close to death, he was rescued by none other than Mew.

Mew acted as his guide, showing him which plants were safe to eat, and leading him out of the wilderness and back to civilization over the next several days. During this time, Mew spoke to Layton—

“Mew spoke?” I asked. For some reason, I had always thought of Mew as a mute beast, like Persian.

Fitzpatrick nodded. “By contact with Layton’s mind, or perhaps in the way you’re speaking to me tight now. They say Mew’s voice is like the gentlest whisper, like the most fleeting touch.”

—Mew spoke to Layton, and, sensing a profound wisdom emanating from the creature, Layton took the opportunity to ask the most burning questions about human life. Questions of purpose, questions of how humans should treat one another, questions of how to make things work. Mew answered freely.

When they emerged from the forest, Layton begged Mew not to depart, asking that it stay there a while, so that others might hear this teaching. Mew consented—for a time. A group of humans known as the First Gathering came to the forest’s edge and conversed with Mew for nine days, recording everything they learned. When they arrived on the tenth day, Mew had vanished as if it had never existed.

And so the Apostles developed their holy book and their creed, combining their observations of Mew’s way of living with the answers it had given them, writing a book called the Way of the Child. And it is to the ideal chronicled in those pages that followers set themselves today.

“What wisdom could Mew possibly have to impart?” I demanded. Had my progenitor been gifted with some insight into the universe that I did not possess? How could that be? And why should such knowledge be denied to me, leaving me to flail around in the dark so many times over, enslaved by my own ignorance? “Whatever insight they claim into Mew’s ‘way of life’ cannot be more than a few scattered fragments of nonsense.”

Fitzpatrick looked thoughtful for a moment. “Some achieve it, I think, and some don’t. I’ve known Apostles who’ve become kinder, wiser, gentler human beings by following the way of the Child. Sad to say it, though, some use the teachings as an excuse to support their own dogmatic bigotry. But as I’m sure you could guess, that’s true with any faith.”

“Let us move on to another, then,” I sniffed. Fitzpatrick gave his assent.

The final religion we examined in any depth evoked a curious repugnance in my tutor, not unlike my aversion to the cult of Mew. It was one of the oldest of faiths, deeply enmeshed in cultures the world over—in particular, it was essential to daily life in the land of Hoenn. Its name: Dharmism, the way of the Bodharmi.

Fitzpatrick tried to treat this creed fairly, I could tell, but something in him led him to question it incessantly, challenging it to prove itself against his faith in Omar.

“Honestly, Mewtwo,” he told me in an odd voice, “I don’t really know whether it’s proper to call Dharmism a religion at all. Scholars claim it is, and in every ‘world religions’ discussion it seems to put in an appearance, but it’s always struck me as more of a philosophy. Dharmics believe in no God or creator, and seem to outline their faith more as a method for dealing with life than anything else. Yet at the same time, they idolize their founder to the point of worship, and then they have all these entrenched ideas about rebirth and saviors and demons—it’s quite difficult to know what to make of it.”

But he laid out the story for me to the best of his ability. Once there lived a man known as Sidhara Gotama. Sidhara was born into a rich family and lived in luxury, until the day he became disillusioned with such a life. In the face of the suffering which gripped all living things, particularly old age, sickness, and death, he concluded it was meaningless to dwell in riches.

(I thought I could see his point. Such ailments had certainly been disconcerting things to learn about! I was once again glad I was not so frail as a human being. And that I had greater things to strive for than wealth.)

So he joined the wanderers who lived in the forest, seeking fulfillment in simplicity, starvation, nakedness and emptiness. This captivated him for a time, but he soon concluded that this, too, was unfulfilling. It did not answer his question: what are we to do about suffering?

Thus Sidhara set out on his own, meditating on this idea of suffering. Before long, he had achieved a moment of revelation, called “awakening” or “enlightenment.” He understood the true nature of the universe and the path out of suffering—the Dharma— and he resolved to teach this path to others. He had become the Bodharmi, the One Awakened to Truth.

“But what truth did he discover?” I asked. “What was his solution to this problem of suffering?”

“His supreme insight was that suffering arises from attachment,” Fitzpatrick explained. “We become attached to things in the world, to pleasant sensations and desires, imagining that we can call these things our own. But they arise and vanish without our volition—all things are constantly changing, and to imagine that we can hold on to them is a delusion which keeps us from satisfaction. Thus the Bodharmi taught meditative techniques which allow us to let go of our attachments to the world and become like him, fully free from worry or suffering.”

I thought it over for a moment. “I like the world, though. I would not like to give up my attachments to interesting things like learning or battling, or working to lead the nations to a greater future.”

Fitzpatrick laughed. “That was always my concern as well. It just seemed so negative to me to renounce the world and join an isolated monastery, as so many Dharmics do. Although this has been changing in recent years: I’ve noticed more and more young people who attempt to integrate Dharmic practices into their everyday lives, instead of isolating themselves. Still, there’s much about Dharmism that I also find strange.”

“Such as?” I asked.

He waved a hand. “Oh, their obsession with trinity, for instance. They deny that the universe or its creator has a fourfold nature, and instead emphasize the power of threes. They believe that everything reflects this harmony, from the trinity of Bodharmi, Dharma, and Sangra—the latter being the monastic community—to that which describes the mind: Sensation, Recognition, and Intention.

“For them there isn’t a distinction, on a fundamental level, between the mind’s structure and the structure of the universe: even the world itself reflects these trinities with Land, Sea, and Sky, and they pay great homage to the beings which are said to represent these elements. You ought to see the art in the monasteries they’ve established in Hoenn! And then there’s the idea of a universe with no Creator, which has simply always been turning and churning throughout the eons. I find it all very strange, to tell you the truth. It seems like it would be very lonely to live in a universe without any kind of Almighty God—even if there are powerful spirits and demons galore.”

“It certainly does,” I said, lost in thought. Was I attached to my desires? Could I really afford to give up these desires, which pushed me onward, which inspired me to do great things? No, I thought fervently, Fitzpatrick was right. Dharmism was not the religion for me.

Looking back on those lessons, I wonder if Fitzpatrick was perhaps misunderstanding Dharmism a little. His faith was in a mighty, powerful God and the followers He commanded on Earth. For him, it was important to understand a kind of cosmic politics, as it were, of debt and sin and loyalty. The Dharmics could not be properly religious in his eyes, because they did not measure the universe that way. But what if that was not the core of religion? What if it was about placing one’s trust in a great teacher, in striving to make things better for other living beings?

I find it rather ironic that Dharmism is the faith I feel most comfortable with these days. Back then, I readily agreed with Fitzpatrick: Omarity was clever and exciting, clearly a superior choice. I was starry-eyed, dazzled, caught up in dreams of hellfire and avenging angels, and for a long time, I painted the story of my life with the vocabulary of apocalypse. I made myself an instrument of God.

Now that seems preposterous. How could I have been so self-obsessed? But I was born and raised to be, and never knew it until my dreams were shattered. If there is a God, perhaps that was his true goal: to tear me apart and remake me into something else. Today, I have difficulty reconciling myself with the Creator and His angels, but the meditations of the Bodharmi nourish me, promising that even in the midst of suffering, there is always a path that leads out.

Of all my teachers, I think I most enjoyed Fitzpatrick’s company. I always looked forward to his Sunday lessons. He seemed not only to accept my questions, but to welcome them, and to welcome the chance to find out what I was interested in. Once he realized I was no danger to him, I think he genuinely began to care about me, and for that I am still very grateful. He saw me as a real person, for lack of another word, rather than just a weapon. I did not quite understand why, at the time, but I felt there was something special about him. I was glad for the chance to get to know him in a way I had really never known anyone else.

Once, I asked Fitzpatrick how he had come to work for Giovanni. He went very white, and was quiet for a long time. Finally, he gave me a faltering answer:

“What you have to understand,” he mumbled, “is that the Caesanti family has always been in the business of providing favors…I told you, Mewtwo, I wasted so much of my youth. I borrowed very heavily from the Boss’s family…spent most of it on drugs and women and only occasionally kept up with the rent…”

He swallowed. “They don’t let you forget such debts, even when you’re a reformed man, part of the Church. I’m not even the only one who’s in this situation…Giovanni requested a delegation from the Church so that he could keep informed about its doings and control it from within…I’m here with several others who also have to pay their debts, and reporting on my own Church is what I do when I’m not working with you…I hope you can understand why I need to...to do what I’m doing.”

“Of course,” I answered brightly. “It was only natural of you to pay Giovanni back for all the help he gave you. My partner is a very generous man, isn’t he? He always thinks of the good of others. He knew to help you even when you didn’t know you needed his presence in your life. And now you work with him to guide other people who haven’t found the true way yet! I am very glad you have had the chance to be at his side, striving to achieve so much good in the world.”

Fitzpatrick gaped for a moment. Then his face, already pale, took on the most pained of expressions. A terrible sadness came into his eyes. He remained silent for a very, very long time. What was he trying to tell me? I wondered. Lamentably, I could not see into his mind.

“Mewtwo,” he whispered, “I shouldn’t say this, but…we are not good people. None of us are. Not me, not Giovanni, not any of the ones who created you. If you take nothing else from me, remember that.”

“You mean that you are subject to sin?” I asked cautiously.

“More than that,” he said, groping in the air for words. “I mean we haven’t treated you the way you deserve to be treated, with all your intellect, with all your majesty. We are not the heroes you think we are. I’m more than likely damned already for some of the things I’ve done. And I don’t entertain the thought that God will easily forgive me.”

“What things do you mean?”

His voice wavered and broke. “I can’t tell you. I’m sorry. Just let me take this moment to say something to you: we’re all pursued by demons, and in running from them we become demons ourselves. I’m sorry, even though it doesn’t help you. I’m sorry, even though I can’t take back the fact that I’ve betrayed you, and everyone who never deserved to be betrayed.”

I stared him for a moment. “I am sorry, Fitzpatrick, but I still do not understand what you are talking about.”

He looked miserable. “I…I had to try.”

We said nothing for a moment, simply staring at each other. Finally, Fitzpatrick spoke again. “Let’s just get back to the lesson,” he mumbled.

Now I know what he was trying to tell me.

Amazing!

I love your writing!

[CONTINUED:]

But to return to the moment at hand: everything about my life seemed to improve once my education began. It was one of the happiest times in my life—perhaps the happiest, though one could argue there was a kind of jubilation in what came later. At last, I finally felt as if I understood the world around me. Events and things which had seemed meaningless and random before began to fit together. There was an order and a pattern to the universe here, in which everything was beautifully connected. I could not have been more grateful to Giovanni for giving me this understanding, nor more glad that I had possessed the courage to ask it of him.

And finally I had the chance to spend some time with other human beings. Giovanni was so aloof—as much as I appreciated his partnership, it was hard to say if I really knew him. My tutors gave me a broader perspective. It fascinated me how different they were, each with their own way of speaking, of dressing, their own perspective on the world. Their voices and faces were marvelously distinctive, and only became more so as I spent time with them. These humans were more than just minds to be manipulated—like my Pokémon brothers and sisters, they each possessed a unique spirit.

Though they closed their minds to me, I soon came to understand my tutors far better than the men and women whose minds I rummaged around in like sacks of treasure. And, what was more: I learned how to overcome the barriers they’d devised.

Not completely, of course. But as I spent more and more time with human beings who wore those tiny black devices on their ears, I began to figure out the swirling psychic shields which blocked their minds from me. I began to discern order in the chaos—though the iridescent miasmas of confusion seemed arbitrary and random, as I continued to observe them, I realized that they followed a distinct logic. Like everything else I had been learning about, there was a pattern here. I only had to adjust the movements of my mind in accord with the distortion.

It took some practice, but the day came when I was able to tug on the clip Simmons was wearing—and see the device twitch slightly on her ear. I flinched, but she had not noticed a thing. Before long, I was even able to look inside the little machine and, hazily, get some idea of its components.

Of course, I absolutely refused to break the devices or attempt to see past them into my tutor’s minds. That would have been a betrayal, a gross invasion of their privacy. I was just happy to finally conquer the machines which once balked me—it felt like claiming a prize the Rockets had set out for me. I thought for a moment of telling Giovanni, but thought better of it.

Still, I slowly found I sensed the emotions of the shielded humans around me, in a distant, distorted way. Often there was a sense of urgency and tension, but I also noted excitement, curiosity, and delight. Once, as Giovanni turned to leave the balcony after one of our increasingly-rare encounters, I caught a hint of pleasure emanating from him as he shot one last glance at me. What was this emotion? Was it…yes, it was! It was pride.

Giovanni was proud of me, I thought, watching the door slam shut behind him. He was proud of me. I promised myself: I would make sure I was worthy of his esteem.

My zest for battle returned as my mood improved. Suddenly, it was as if everything was new to me again. Everything I had loved about combat came rushing back to me anew, though it had seemed trivial and mundane only weeks ago: the thrill of bodies in motion, my Pokémon brethren and the swift flashes of beauty they gave me, the sweet tension of not knowing what was going to happen next. The pure thrill of victory.

For my powers were returning to their full strength. Just as Giovanni had said, the heavy armor which weighed down my psychic abilities had forced them to grow stronger. Each day that I sweated and toiled against a difficult challenge, my mind grew tougher and surer by pushing past the barriers. One day, I realized with a start that I no longer groped in the darkness, half-blind. My mind could perceive almost as much of the world around me as it could the day I arrived.

After that I began to pay attention, and noticed, if not the day-to-day changes, the tiny increases in strength and sight that made themselves known each week. And before long, I knew I had completely regained what the armor had taken from me. I had found my old strength once more, and it felt like witnessing a miracle. Combat became even easier, allowing me to develop elaborate strategies in which I threw all sorts of techniques at my opponents at once: combining midair acrobatics with absurd sensory illusions, for instance, or gripping my opponents with sand while alternating between pulses of heat and cold. It was a level of control I could scarcely have imagined only weeks before.

What kind of force might I be now, I wondered, if I stood naked on the battlefield?

So it was no surprise, then, that I caught snatches of emotion emanating from my partner and my tutors, and that the exposed minds of the everyday Rockets who filled the base seemed to blossom in my presence, vivid and startling as roses. Though he remained as elusive as ever, Giovanni seemed to delight in my growing faculties. When I heard his voice in battle, it was rich and hale—almost a laugh, rather than speech.

On the rare occasions I saw him, he praised my accomplishments widely, and a savage grin never left his face. I couldn’t help but think that the moment he had spoken of was fast approaching—the time when my talents would be tested against our enemies. I kept watching Giovanni’s face for some sign, wondering when he would call me into action. I was eager for war to begin.

In the meantime, I practiced with the robots and with the Pokémon whose trainers walked through our doors—and on days when outside opponents were unavailable, with monsters the Rockets had claimed for their army. These were not as exciting as the prospect of fresh challengers—Giovanni generally picked from his private collection, and I quickly grew used to the faces—but they provided a refreshing break from the monotony.

Once, as I was dueling a weathered old Golem whose stony hide always put up a delightful resistance to my blows, leaping over earthquakes that shook the sandy practice field, I heard Giovanni call us to a stop. I let my arms fall limply to my side and relaxed. Golem, for his part, rolled himself upright from where I had dropped him. Giovanni turned to an assistant and said something quietly. Then he turned back to us.

“Mewtwo, I have an urgent matter to attend to. I will return shortly. Expect to resume then.”

I nodded, watching the assistant cast a nervous glance about the room as his employer departed.

I moved a bit closer to the Pokémon standing across from me. “I am glad to be battling with you, Golem,” I said, sending the words silently into his mind. “Tell me, how long have you been with Giovanni? Do you think we will be going to war soon? Do you know anything about our enemies? I expect you have been here longer than I. How do you enjoy your Gym combat? Do you find it more difficult than I do? Have you heard anything about my efforts? How well do you know my partner? How is your life here?”

To all these questions, the Golem grunted and said nothing. Slowly, he turned away from me with a low, grumbling snort.

I was surprised he had not answered. I tried again. “Have you enjoyed this battle, at least?”

Again the Golem was silent. Suddenly I realized, with a start, that he was angry with me. Rage boiled off his pockmarked carapace like steam. More than that: he hated me—every time his crimson eyes lit on my form, mute fury stabbed out from his mind as if to kill me then and there.

“You seem to be angry, my friend,” I said, trying to sound gentle. “I hope I have not offended you somehow. If so, I apologize.” A thought came to me. “Is it that I have made you jealous by discussing my place in the organization, which is superior to yours? I am sorry if that is the case. I can hardly do anything about that: Giovanni and I are perfectly matched as partners, as I am sure you can see—but I will refrain from mentioning it again, if you envy the position.”

Golem turned to me, glowering, and spoke at last. His voice was deep and rough, like his stony skin.

[Why would I envy an idiot?] he snarled.

“I am no idiot, sir!” I replied, affronted.

He laughed, a sound like boulders breaking. [Spoken like a true idiot. I call you an idiot because you don’t even see what’s right of you. You obsess over the attentions of humans as if they actually have value. You bend over to please them, to make them like you, as if that’ll magically change the way their world treats our kind.] His tones were simpering and sarcastic. [Do you think you’re any different, stranger?]

[I’ve met creatures like you before, who act like just-hatched infants trying to please their caretakers. They always end badly.] He coughed hoarsely.

“I am not trying to please anyone,” I said, unsettled. “I help humans like my partner because together we do great things in the world. I am surprised you have not realized this. Besides, Giovanni and his companions treat me well, as I am their friend and ally. I have no reason to complain.”

He leaned a little closer, and I saw that his skin was covered in barely-healed scars. His shell was marred by nicks and craters—there seemed to be no inch of him that was not mutilated in some way.

[Then you’re even more of a fool than I thought,] he growled. [They treat you that way because they want something from you. They want your strength, that’s all. Look at me: I survive because I’m stronger than most. That’s why they haven’t gotten rid of me yet. You’re the strongest thing I’ve ever seen, but you’re also the most deluded. You still haven’t seen through the tangle of lies humans use to get what they want. They don’t care about you one tiny bit.]

“But Giovanni cares about me!” I cried. “He is my partner, and companion! He is a good man!”

[Mark my words,] he told me. [There’s no such thing as a good human. Deceit is their way of life. Giovanni is not a “good man.” There isn’t one. None of these humans are good humans. A dead human, maybe. That might my idea of a good human. Humans do nothing for us but cause us suffering. That’s the principle on which their world is based. Maybe one day you’ll realize that. Then you’ll be smart, like me. But judging from what I’ve seen of you so far, I’m guessing that isn’t going to happen.]

I flinched. I stared at him, trying to think of a suitable response. But before I could answer, a voice cut through the silence from above.

“Mewtwo!” Giovanni strode toward the railing, glancing at his assistant’s notes and peering down at us from above. “Come away from there. We have work to do.”

I looked back at Golem, groping for words, but he refused to look me in the eye. Giovanni took an orb from his pocket, clicking a button or two, and Golem vanished in a burst of red light. I cannot forget the contempt and fury etched in his face in that moment—they seemed to float in the air behind him when he was gone.

“I daresay you could use a new opponent,” Giovanni told me, smiling broadly. “I’m sure you were growing tired of fighting that old Golem. I’ve just been informed we’ve acquired a Rhyperior—something of a rare species, and no doubt a valuable addition to our resources. It should provide something of an interesting challenge for you.”

I swallowed, trying to get the Golem’s words out of my head. Finally I shook myself from my reverie and gave Giovanni a nod. There was indeed work to be done, and I could not afford any doubt.

Fortunately, the hours that followed with the Rhyperior were ample distraction from my worries. I tried to lose myself in the familiar thrill of encountering a new species, throwing myself into dodging the creature’s vicious spikes, stony fists and powerful blasts of rock. Caught up in the excitement of battle, I was almost able to forget the accusations I had heard leveled at my partner and his species.

It was only later, as Giovanni and I made our way back to my quarters, that such thoughts returned to my mind. I realized I faced a choice: let these ideas continue to churn around in my brain, driving me half-insane or seek an answer somewhere. Summoning up my courage, I told Giovanni that Golem had called me a fool, accusing humans of being cruel and self-centered.

Giovanni nodded as if he had expected this. “Naturally this Golem—indeed, most of your opponents—would like to turn you against me. Just as you said, they are jealous of your position. Who among them does not have the ambition of usurping your place at my side, of finding himself showered with accolades and given power over his rivals? Naively, this Golem imagines himself your equal. He does not understand, as you do, that power must be given only to those who deserve it. Put his babbling from your mind.”

“But he seemed to truly hate humans,” I said hesitantly. “I cannot believe that was just a ruse.”

Giovanni laughed. “Of course he hates our kind. He is jealous of our power, just as he is jealous of yours. In his mind, we have never given him the place he clearly deserves, and he seethes at our rejection. He cannot comprehend that he is merely a second-tier battler with little to offer the organization but his strength. You, on the other hand, are possibly the most valuable member besides myself. Thus his words are so many empty goads, and you would do best to ignore them in the future. Is this clear to you?”

“I suppose so,” I sighed, walking up onto the machine.

“Good,” came the crisp reply. Turning to face me, Giovanni locked his eyes with mine. “I think it best if you put your conversation with the Golem out of your mind. There is not an ounce of honesty in that creature. In the future, he will be severely reprimanded if he attempts to engage you on this subject again, and I do not intend to give him another opportunity. I expect you, too, will be able to forget his tedious attempt at sedition?”

I nodded, relieved. And in the days that followed, I was indeed able to forget what the Golem had said.

For a time.

Over the next few weeks, my life seemed to intensify. Giovanni began to extend the hours at the Gym, so that I seemed to grapple with trained opponents from dawn until late into the night. Less and less was I called out to manipulate the thoughts of the populace, or even to add my mind to projects at home—far more important to Giovanni were a series of extended practice sessions, designed to tighten my skills and toughen my discipline as never before. Throughout all this, my meetings with the tutors continued, for which I was grateful—but I got the sense that they were not my partner’s greatest priority. He would often appear on the balcony these days to cut our lesson short, summoning me to the practice room with remarkable haste. There would be no way out of it; my teacher would always acquiesce to the need.

Still, I did not mind, not when this new intensity of training was so terribly exciting. Giovanni seemed to have noticed that my powers were resurging, and redesigned his methods accordingly. No longer did I face down a single robot: now there were waves and waves of them, all different types, trying to overpower me from the air, from hidden corners, from underground. I would crush them for hours and hours until the entire horde had been extinguished.

And instead of dueling a single one of Giovanni’s lesser Pokémon, I began to face several in each practice battle. The small room would fill with chaos as Kingler with snapping claw, Machamp with pounding fists, and Nidoqueen with poisoned spur all did their best to overpower me. But I would always be too quick for them, leaping elegantly over their blows, dodging their blasts of ice and water with magnificent midair turns, and flattening them with a pulse of air when their energy was spent.

Before long, the room grew too small for me, if it had not been already. Giovanni cleared a space in the storage room for helicopters and other vehicles, making a new arena that knew no limits. In this space he sent as many Pokémon after me as he possibly could. I would be astonished to be fighting five of his best, thinking it could go no higher, then eight, then twelve, then as many as sixteen. By that time it seemed as if Giovanni was throwing every Pokémon in the Gym at me, everything in his arsenal, just to ensure that my skills were developed to their utmost. Once he even performed a new incarnation of the bulldozer duel, sending a great number of these remotely-controlled machines at me at once. I am proud to say I managed all these challenges with ease, defeating every opponent Giovanni could bring forth.

And I was certain I knew why Giovanni felt it necessary to test me to the limits of his power, why his face seemed always to show a rapturous tension, why restless energy leapt out of his defended mind and filled his entire body with the readiness of an animal about to strike. He was preparing me for the day we had long spoken of, for the day when we would encounter our enemies. He was making me ready for war.

Nothing else mattered to me then. Here was my chance to prove myself, to demonstrate the ultimate gift I could offer Team Rocket. My destiny was fast approaching, and I watched Giovanni’s face every day for a sign. I ached for the day to arrive.

And it did arrive, when I was least expecting it, the day that set me on the path to the end of everything.

I remember the moment vividly. I was in one of the upstairs rooms at the time, enjoying a bit of rest after a few hours’ efforts, without the boredom that so often accompanied it. Every so often, Giovanni would call me to this dark, cramped room to have my armor personally inspected by the technicians who had constructed it. Men in white coats would swarm over me, studying the armor’s surface for dents and scratches, connecting its cords to ominous-looking machines, leading me through a series of tests designed to measure my observations and strength.

I suspected they adjusted the mechanisms within the suit as well, constantly balancing the barriers they were meant to impose against my rapidly growing power. At the moment, the men were off in a corner, gesticulating at clipboards and conferring about their results. I only listened to snatches of their conversation—my mind was elsewhere, anyway.

It had so far been something of an interesting day. Earlier this morning, I had helped launch a new construction project deep underground, and after lunch, I encountered a few rare and interesting species I hadn’t seen before, during my usual rounds of combat. It was always a thrill to discover how to defeat another of my brothers and sisters. Even my ordinary battles seemed fresh and new, since I constantly came up with new ways to disrupt my opponents, and Giovanni had begun to play fast and loose with the rules. These days he thought nothing of offering his challenger the chance to send two or even three Pokémon after me at once. This had been the case with the battle I had just enjoyed, and as with all the others, I handled it with ease.

I remembered the trainer well, which wasn’t always the case. A brazen, scowling boy with a long shock of reddish hair, sticking out at sharp angles. His clothes, I thought, had been blue, and he wore a golden amulet around his neck. He had brought with him a flock of silly, giggling young women, who seemed to simper over his every movement.

Yes, these were the sort of trainers, I thought, who were the most delightful to defeat: the arrogant children, victorious all their lives, whose confidence shattered like a twig when they realized they had finally met their better. How they shattered, when their egos came crashing down around them!

I thought back, with no small amount of glee, to how the boy’s smug smile turned to quivering, open-mouthed horror when I lifted his Arcanine and Nidoking up into the air and forced their bodies into a series of painful contortions. The Arcanine howled and thrashed her shaggy paws, spitting fire into the air; the Nidoking groped at the air with his claws and spiky tail in impotent rage. I forced their bodies to obey my will and drove them, still shuddering, into the ground.

The boy shook on his legs, and nearly fainted; I did the rest. The girls were screaming, some having fallen back against the wall, others trying to run away; I sent them to join their companion in slumber. A string of unconscious bodies littered the floor as I returned to my chamber.

Yes, it had been a memorable duel, not merely for its Pokémon, but for its human beings.

As I leaned back against the computer console, still musing over the boy and the day’s events, I spotted motion in the distance. Through the glass window across from me, I could see Giovanni striding down the long, dark hallway, flanked by two of his armed guards in their usual ornate costume. His movements were swift, and he seemed tense.

When Giovanni reached the outside of the room, he stopped abruptly in front of the glass pane. The bodyguards halted and placed their axes firmly against the ground, with a slight clang. Giovanni walked up to the wide window and met my eye. I had never seen him in a mood quite like this one. He seemed at once angry and excited—he was scowling furiously, but at the same time he bristled with a strange, nervous energy. Very softly, he spoke.

“We have an emergency assignment for you,” he said. His voice was cool, and his expression frozen. He was so close, his lips almost brushed the glass as he spoke.

I gave a small nod to show I understood. Obviously he was aware I could pick up what he was saying, even on the other side of the glass. My heart leapt as I heard his words. Was this the moment I had been waiting for?

Giovanni tore himself away from the glass and wrenched open the door. Ignoring the hushed protestations of the researchers, he strode over to the command console and began manipulating dials and switches. Finally, he reached out to a large red lever and pulled it all the way down. Immediately, the red cords retracted and fell from my armor, swinging limply in midair. Sparks leapt all around my body. I was unconcerned—I’d faced far more intimidating electricity in the Gym. But the scientists seemed alarmed. They began shouting and gesticulating wildly.

Giovanni silenced them with a glare. He snarled something about my being the most important entity in the room, and growled that they could have their “little playtime” on another occasion. There was only one question, he said, that particularly concerned him: was the armor ready for combat?

And so it was that I followed Giovanni and his men out of the room and down the hallway, allowing myself to float a bit to keep up with their frantic pace. No one had given me any idea what was going on, but I looked forward to finding out.

But it was not until we had taken off and were flying above the great towers of the city that I finally got my answer. Giovanni gazed pensively out over the skyline for quite some time, clearly lost in thought. Finally, he turned to me.

“I assume you recall, Mewtwo, that we have rivals for global power?”

“You mentioned it at one point, yes,” I said, hesitating.

He gave me a curt nod. “That is precisely why I need your assistance.” He cast another glance out over the landscape. We were approaching the forest now. “Why, in fact, I chose to seek it, quite some time ago.”

I held my breath. I hoped he was talking about what I thought he was.

“You have no doubt noticed,” Giovanni murmured, “my recurring references to war. I have mentioned on more than one occasion that you were not brought to our organization to claim meaningless victories for me against wayward children. Your real talents lie elsewhere.”

“On the field of battle,” I blurted out. “In destroying those who would thwart our vision of the future.”

“Precisely,” he replied. “You are an instrument of war.” His gaze locked with mine. He was silent for a moment, then said, “War is something different from what that frivolous tutor has taught you to imagine it to be. In the modern world, nations and emperors do not matter. No longer are spoiled kings the ones who determine the shape of the world—the individual has risen to take their place. Clashes of power today are between those who share the will to conquer.”

“Such as you and I,” I said eagerly.

“Certainly,” he said. “However—“—and here something odd seemed to flash across his face—“Such men are not often willing to share power.”

He stretched out a thin leg and rested it on his knee. “There is a man named Howard Mendelson,” he mused.

“He is one of a number of opponents on whom I maintain information. Most of the deluded men who aspire to power are irrelevant to me at the present moment—they live in other lands and other continents entirely. Such men will only become a threat to our interests once this region is fully ours. But Mendelson, with his so-called “Golden League,” is a more pressing concern. His ravenous mob of worshippers commands a certain clout in the eastern part of Kanto, and with their aid he imagines he can claim my territory for his own.”

“They are deluded,” I said. “Blind fools who have chosen the wrong path.”

Giovanni shook his head. “More than that. They are dangerous. A threat to everything we have striven to achieve. An enemy. If left unchecked, they could destroy us.”

He gave me a sharp glance. “I expect you to prevent that from happening.”

“How so?” I asked nervously.

Giovanni was quiet for a moment. “At precisely one-thirty this afternoon,” he said quietly, “Mendelson’s forces launched an assault on the forest base. Our scouts sighted the movement of massive formations of humans and Pokémon at around one-thirty-four, sweeping down from the eastern hills. By one-forty they had reached our headquarters, and as we speak, they are attempting to reduce it to rubble.”

“Why?” I asked.

Giovanni laughed. “Come now, Mewtwo, you should easily be able to guess. For the same reason I would do so were I in their situation: they intend to destroy us. To crush our resources; to reduce our operations to a sad mockery. To massacre our agents and leave us a sad, shambling wreck of an organization. Nothing less than our death is their aim.”

“I filled your head with visions of armies, did I not?” he asked. “Here are the armies of which I spoke. The Golden League has called in all its resources for this endeavor. Thousands of men and women, some by choice, others by debt, stand outside our walls. They wear military armor and carry the most deadly weapons they could get their hands on—not the least of which are the powerful Pokémon who fight on their behalf. They boast the most lethal species from every corner of the earth, turning talon, flame, claw to our annihilation. An army of its like has not perhaps been assembled in Kanto in the last century.”

He sighed. “I expected this. Without Team Rocket, the Golden League would crush its lesser rivals and have unchecked power in Kanto—and the same is true in reverse. I knew Mendelson could only wait so long to strike.”

“I could,” Giovanni told me, “have built up our fortifications, could have put more resources into defense as word reached me that Mendelson was building up his army. But I chose not to. Call it a gambit: if he knew we were wise to his plan, Mendelson would not have attempted such an audacious attempt to destroy us. Now that he is here, precisely where we want him, we may be able to turn the situation to our advantage—we may even reverse it completely.”

His eyes flashed with anger. “I expected him to attack. I did not, however, expect him to move so soon. All our information indicated the League would strike in late summer, or even autumn. We have not had adequate time to prepare our defense, nor our counter-attack. To use the common phrase, Mendelson has us by the testicles, and he knows it.”

“We have not even had enough time to prepare our most powerful weapon, the only creature who might be able to reverse the tide of battle. You, Mewtwo. I had hoped to bring you to perfection before this hour arrived, to ensure that an army ten thousand-fold would cower in your wake. Caught off guard, we did not prepare you for this day as we once planned to.”

He stopped and grew very quiet for a moment. When he looked back at me, his voice rose with triumph.

“Yet I believe you are ready.” He sounded exhilarated. There seemed to be energy in his every feature.

“Do you really think so?” I whispered. “Even though I have not been properly trained?"

Giovanni nodded slowly. “One must adapt to an emergency by reconsidering the resources at hand. Your performance in battle has been perfect for weeks now; your technique has long been impeccable. The only thing we lack is the absolute certainty your continued training was meant to provide. But we must abandon our need for certainty in the heat of battle. We know that you are ready, and have long been ready. Now we must act on that knowledge.”

“What must I do?” I asked.

“Destroy our enemies,” replied Giovanni. “What else? You have crushed a thousand opponents at the Gym—this will be little different. You must use all of your knowledge and skill to keep Mendelson’s forces from gaining any further ground. Eliminate the invaders, both human and Pokémon, so that we may claim a great victory for Team Rocket. I know it is well within your grasp.”

He gestured out the window, over the great forest. “We approach the scene of battle now.”

At first I wasn’t sure what he was talking about, though I pressed my nose to the glass. Then I saw it: our shining silver base, gleaming in the distance, surrounded by dark little specks. The tiny black points moved this way and that, darting along beneath the trees, swirling around in the air, crawling like a swarm of ants across the landscape. As we drew closer, I saw more clearly what was going on.

War had come to the forest.

The little dark points I had glimpsed were the outlines of hundreds, even thousands of human beings and Pokémon, moving about under the thick green canopy. The forest had become their battlefield: bright flames leapt out from beneath the branches, explosions rocked the boughs, bursts of electricity arced from one clearing to another. A number of trees lay fallen upon the ground, or wreathed in flame; it was obvious that the combatants below paid no attention to preserving the landscape. It was only a tool by which they could annihilate each other.

As I watched, the two sides in this conflict revealed themselves. The battle centered on the sharp metal castle that was our base: a multitude of men and women in black, and a far greater throng of lethal-looking Pokémon, formed an inner ring, shielding the building—our Team Rocket agents and their charges. The horde of Pokémon, which contained everything from hulking Nidoking to horned, canine Houndoom to the enormous iron snakes called Steelix, snarled, pounded and slashed at the enemies on the edge of the ring.

The black-clothed humans, looking tiny by comparison, scurried between the massive forms, barking out commands and ordering the Pokémon from one place to another on the battlefield. Flashes of red and white light were everywhere as the humans recalled their allies and sent them out elsewhere, or summoned other creatures in their place.

Yet for all this commotion, it was clear that our side was losing.

Just outside the ring was another army of Pokémon and humans, much larger than ours, encircling us like a serpent strangling its prey. These humans were easily differentiated by their clothing: each of them wore a bright, golden helmet and a sort of golden armor around their shoulders—not actual metallic gold, but a bright yellow-orange streak of a color that marked them as invaders, as outsiders. The colossal mass of Pokémon accompanying them—and there were many, unbelievably many, crashing through the foliage and clawing at the edge of the Rocket line—wore something very similar, golden armor blazing on their shoulders, on their backs, their tails, wherever there had been a place to wear a gleaming symbol of power.

I asked Giovanni about the golden armor. He snorted. “Their taste in uniform is ostentatious to the point of obscenity. The Golden League wears that armor for the same reason we wear black: to distinguish ourselves in battle from our enemies. Far easier, after all, to strike at an enemy when you know an enemy bears different colors from your own. But they make an absurdity of it. I suppose a gaudy golden armor goes along well with their image of themselves as a conquering army. Do not forget that they believe they have the advantage of us.”

The golden army did seem to have the upper hand. Its ranks contained dozens of Pokémon I’d never seen before: I was familiar with flame-bright Magmar, but what was this large, rotund creature that looked like an evolved form, shooting smoldering fireballs from its fists? What was the strange, spiny biped that seemed to form the backbone of the League’s army, a pale green like a mossy stone with dark, hollow eyes, disrupting our forces with tyrannical earthquakes and hurling great stones into our midst? And what of the great beasts that looked like iron-plated Rhydon, or the ethereal cyclopes that strangled our men from the shadows?

The Rocket agents below were attempting to hold the ring of invaders at bay, but with only a modicum of success. Their side was constantly being torn apart by new assaults from the league: snaking, choking vines, torrents of water, great explosions that rocked the valley, and the like. Every so often, some of the invaders would break through the line to our base, and begin hammering away at the walls of the fortress before being repulsed again by our forces. It had sustained a fair bit of damage already: the walls were blackened in places and melted in others, twisted into ugly shapes and cracked like broken glass. A gaping hole had already been carved in the east side.

The battle continued above. In the trees, agile Pokémon like Ambipom and Heracross leapt about, yowling at each other and grappling with horn and fist and tail. Primape shook their shaggy manes and tried to pummel their way through the branches to the base, to make its walls the target of their furious fists.

And in the air just below us, winged creatures swooped and dove, swarming the towers, some trying to tear apart the sophisticated satellite equipment on their upper reaches, while others fought to save it. Beaks and talons clashed in midair, and columns of flame shot out into the atmosphere—I spotted at least one Charizard, flapping its dragonlike wings and snapping at interlopers with its savage jaws. Many of these Pokémon had human riders on their backs, though some were bare, commanded from the ground or from the towers. A few Golden League men had made it onto some of these towers, and were dueling with Rockets for control of the balconies.

Great cannons on the sides of the building were firing off explosions into the enemy crowd, though these seemed largely ineffective: most of the Pokémon simply shook the blasts off and returned to their assault. There were also humans with guns on both sides, lying in wait in the trees and on the walls of the complex, but their bullets took out only other humans, and seemed to do no more than graze the Pokémon. Fallen bodies were scattered here and there, some viciously mutilated, and I noticed many humans and a few Pokémon staggering about with severe injuries, blood leaking from holes in their sides and gashes in their limbs.

When I wrenched myself away from the window, Giovanni flashed me a good-natured smile. “Are you ready to proceed?” he inquired.

“Proceed with what?” I asked, still in a daze.

“With the battle,” he said coolly.

I gaped at him. Suddenly I remembered why I had been called here, and it suddenly seemed an overwhelming prospect. “I have to go down there?” I asked stupidly.

“Of course,” Giovanni replied. “We expect you to turn the tide of battle.”

I glanced again at the clashing armies, now almost directly below us. Could anyone really make a difference in that quagmire? “How will I know what to do?” I asked.

Giovanni smiled. “Do not worry in the least about that. As always, I shall guide your step. My words will be broadcast to you. My voice shall be in your ear, telling you where to go and what to do.”

That eased one concern, at least. “But will I be able to win? Am I truly ready for this?” I asked worriedly.

“We have already agreed that you are,” Giovanni reminded me, “inasmuch as can be determined. As I said, your gym matches have made that clear. There is some amount of uncertainty, of course, but when is there not? We must act boldly, without room for trepidation. Were we to hesitate now because we have not ascertained your power perfectly, it would be a supreme act of cowardice. Greatness lies in a willingness to gamble, from time to time.”

“You are right,” I said. This was the moment I had been waiting for all my life. I would go down there and give Giovanni my best, whatever that might mean.

“Of course I am,” he replied. “Now, before you leap into action, I wish to make a few things clear to you. You are no longer obliged to withhold the full force of your attacks. You may fight as brutally as you like against the Golden League’s Pokémon.”

“I can kill them now?” I asked, excited.

“Indeed, I think you rather ought to,” he said. “The human beings alone are scarcely a threat. The moment their Pokémon arsenal falls, our enemies will swiftly surrender. So yes, kill them. Kill them as quickly as possible, and kill every Pokémon you can. Be efficient, so that the battle may be over before much time has elapsed. With your influence, I believe our army will overwhelm theirs very quickly.”

“As for the humans,” he mused, “leave as many alive as you can. It will be useful to have some captives to interrogate later. Kill a few, if it seems reasonable, but simply maim or disable the others. We want them immobilized, not eliminated. Is that clear?”

“Absolutely,” I replied. Humans were too easy to fight, anyway.

“Then I believe it is time for you to make your move,” Giovanni said. He snapped a finger. The helicopter slowed to a stop in midair, hovering right over the battlefield. The hatch on the side of the helicopter slowly ground open, reminding me as always of a strange, alien mouth.

“What, right now?” I asked. “You want me to just leap out of the vehicle?”

“Fly,” Giovanni said, grinning widely. “Float down into combat. You obviously know how to keep yourself in the air, and the air is a much more strategic position for my helicopter, anyway. Yes, leap out, and bring yourself to the battle. I will instruct you as you proceed. Now go.”

“All right,” I said. I walked over toward the hatch and steeled myself for the jump, focusing on flight. I tried not to think about how far away the ground was. Then, breaking into a run—

I leapt.

For a moment I was terrified. The wind howled in my ears, and the ground seemed to hurtle toward me. But, after a moment, a deep feeling of peace came over me. I was suspended, weightless, free from the moorings of the world. Everything seemed perfectly clear. The helicopter was fading away into the world above, and below lay the infinite promise of the battle to come. And here I floated in the center, like a fulcrum, ready to change everything.

I looked down upon the battle like a god, watching the scene unfold, and I marveled at how perfectly every piece seemed to fit, how every object, every creature, seemed to be laid out for me to explore, their fates mine alone to control.

I caught myself in midair and gently slowed my descent. By now I was approaching the central tower, where winged creatures darted about like flies. Soon I would be in the midst of their blows.

Giovanni’s voice slid into my ear. “Deal with the aerial threat first,” he whispered. “Then turn your attention to the ground.” I grinned. I was more than happy to comply.

I dove down toward the tower, quick as a bolt of lightning. The wind whipped my face again, and its shrieks mingled with the cries of the birds before me. I was nearly at the tower now, where a flock of Pidgeot, their red-gold manes gleaming in the afternoon sunlight, assailed the Rocket defense. Most of them had riders, and I spotted a few Fearow in the mix, their long, cruel necks and beaks slipping through the flapping wings of the Rocket bats and crows. The question was, how to enter this scene? Usually I waited for my opponents to attack, but so far they hadn’t even noticed me.

“Pull them toward you,” hissed Giovanni. “Drag these molting wretches out from the confusion, and then let them taste your might. Take them for your own, and break them.”

The first Pidgeot came easily from the throng. Caught completely off guard, he slipped right into my grip with no more than a startled squawk and a flailing of feathers. His rider protested, but could do nothing. The others turned around to see what was going on, and the next two I grabbed put up a bit more resistance. But I spun the three of them around me with ease, watching them flap their wings uselessly in midair.

By now the flock had realized what was going on, and Pidgeot and Fearow turned as one to dive at me, screeching, scratching, trying to tear me to shreds. But I grabbed them all from the air, spreading them out around me in a great collection. It must have seemed the most absurd thing in the world to those below. Here hovered a tiny figure, surrounded by a great, teeming flock, and yet it was the tiny speck that was the master, the birds unable to break through.

Break them, yes. That was what I needed to do. What were the vulnerable parts of a living creature, again? The head and the heart were the best options, I thought. Brains, in particular, were vulnerable and fragile.

So I began crushing skulls. I reached out to the nearest bird and gripped her around the head. It didn’t take much to shatter the bone. The bird screamed a terrible, rattling screech, and I threw her and her rider to the ground with a stream of blood. I quickly grabbed another and did the same. Before long, I was tearing birds out of the flock with wild abandon, forging a cascade of blood and feathers in the sky. By the end I was flinging birds at each other and watching them fall, smoothly redirecting their terrified, angry blows toward their own comrades. Before long, I had emptied the air around me.

But there were other winged foes to dispatch, as Giovanni was quick to remind me. I flew to the other side of the tower, where everything from Charizard to Crobat awaited me. The swarm was vast: there were bugs, birds, and bats, even two or three dragons, besieging the arms of the fortress with bursts of sinister green flame. I would need more effective methods to swiftly take all of them down.

I ripped the tops off a few nearby trees and shattered them into branches, whittling the ends into sharp points. Then I dove at the center of the golden horde, spinning the wooden pikes around me at a furious speed. The moment I made contact, there was an eruption of sound: the thuds of the wood against bodies, their moans and howls, their attempts to destroy me. I moved through the fleet of Pokémon like a hurricane, washing away great swaths at a time.

Eventually, the branches had fallen to splinters under the force of the enemy blows, but the formation had been equally reduced to shambles. I polished the rest off myself, employing increasingly creative methods: puncturing a lung here, breaking a spine there—I vividly remember the death of a certain Charizard. I ripped off her wings, just to see what would happen, like a cruel child who tears apart the gossamer body of a butterfly. I remember how they looked, discarded like rubbish. I remember she screamed, rending the air with her voice before plummeting to the ground, her rider in tow.

I keep coming back to that scream.

Giovanni then guided me to the trees; there was plenty of material to work with among the branches. The apelike creatures were already hooting in terror and clambering away through the trees, but I caught all those who wore golden armor, and wrecked their bodies on the boughs. Then it was time to take the battle to the ground, where League forces were already stumbling, staring up at the new approaching cataclysm, this sudden demon in their midst.

I destroyed them. I pulverized them, to say the least. The minute I hit the ground, the Golden League began to fall apart in a mass of noise and confusion. Everywhere I went, Pokémon gasped and died, torn apart at my hands. Humans staggered to the ground, stabbed in the leg, the stomach, the knee. I was death incarnate, delivering judgment. I killed every invading Pokémon, and disarmed every enemy human, while the scattered Rockets looked on, astonished. Before long, they were recalling their Pokémon, as I had taken their work right out of their hands.

To cull the Golden League Pokémon from the throng of bodies, I had to move more carefully, more selectively, and at first I thought I might find it difficult. But Giovanni’s voice guided me every step of the way: leap now, fall back, strike here—and before long I was vaulting, whirling, dancing to a symphony of death. I fell into a comfortable rhythm: move as instructed, dodge each fist or flame, strike the heart or the lung or the brain whenever you see the flash of gold. My body sang with pleasure; I moved in bliss.

How can that be? I was a blood-mad killer, there is no denying it. I look back on those days and shudder at the number of lives I brought to a gruesome end. Yet somehow I never thought about their deaths. They were enemies, not worth my consideration. They did not deserve to live. In Giovanni’s world, that was all there was to it.

But I liked it. I enjoyed tearing bodies apart and watching living creatures die. That is the thing that seems unfathomable to me, these days. If I think back, I can remember a certain joy in decay. The only way I can make sense of it is through analogy.

Have you ever seen a field of newfallen snow? One so pristine, so perfectly white and smooth that it simply demands to be touched? A beauty that cannot be understood except by being destroyed? Or have you ever broken a branch, just to hear the satisfying crunch, to see the splinters dangle from the end of it, to pull something broken out of seamless perfection?

Something about wholeness calls to its own demise. We, living beings, yearn to know the inner nature of things, to see how all their parts fit together into one whole. But in the very moment we tear open a machine to examine the gears that make it tick, or a stem to examine its fibers, or a corpse to examine its death, we destroy that wholeness. We rob the parts of the integrity that once fused them together.

Sometimes I think we are seeking some secret substance, some eternal essence, that makes many things become one. If so, it is a doomed quest: we will never be able to grasp unity itself. We can only be the agents of its demise.

This is the urge, I think, that drives young mechanics to dismantle clocks and put them back together, that inspires ignorant children to rip apart the bodies of beetles, and, yes, the urge that allowed me to take such joy in murder after murder after murder. I wanted to break these bodies, to see the life spill out of them wherever I made an incision. It was the rawest, most brutal version of beauty—but I cannot deny I found it beautiful.

What that says about me is a question I am not entirely sure I am ready to answer.

A rousing cheer rang out from the ring of Rockets when the last enemy Pokémon slid to the ground with a dull thud. Some blinked and rubbed their eyes, staring at me, dumbfounded. Others were clapping each other on the back, and pointing up at Giovanni’s helicopter, now descending.

I took a moment to survey my work. There was a sort of clearing around the building, now, since so many trees had fallen. And the clearing was a field of bodies, piled on top of each other, lying in rows. The grassy forest floor had been stained brown and red, and there were many glassy-eyed corpses everywhere, leaking blood where I had killed them. Almost all of these corpses were Pokémon. The colossal beasts that had once dominated the battlefield lay like fallen monuments to some alien god.

Humans were scattered between Pokémon bodies, but most of these were merely wounded. I had done exactly as instructed. Some of these humans were unconscious, while some tried to stand, shaking, and others stared up at the sky in shock, trying to process the field of death they had found themselves in. I had gouged many of them in an arm or a leg to bring them down, although when convenient, I had simply dragged them into sleep. A few had lost a hand in some fashion or another: these were the former gunmen, thoroughly disarmed. Despite the jubilation of the Rockets behind me, it was an unpleasant scene, full of torn-up shapes and reeking of decay.

For the first time that day, I felt a little uneasy about the act of killing. There were so many bodies here, all of which had once housed a mind, a soul, a living being. I had reduced them to gross matter. Were they gone? Had I sent them somewhere? I still did not know the answers to these questions, though I had heard all the reigning theories. Now that the ecstasy of killing was over, the dying faces floated up through my mind, alien and strange. Was Giovanni right to say that their deaths were necessary? That scouring them from the face of the earth purified it, made the way clear for those whose vision was supreme?

Yes, I told myself furiously. Of course he was. This indecisiveness, this inability to put aside such distractions for duty, had always been my greatest flaw, and had kept me—embarrassingly—from helping the great man to the best of my abilities. I had to learn to overcome these stupid, speculative qualms. I shook my head to clear it, then turned at the sound of helicopter blades.

Giovanni’s craft was landing. The Rockets hurriedly dashed away to clear a space for it, then stood at attention as the skids touched the ground. After a moment, the man himself emerged. He gave a curt nod to his throng of supporters, then hailed me.

“Stand beside me, Mewtwo,” he said amiably.

I leapt over to him in a single, graceful movement. It was strange to see him in the flesh again, after having spent so much time thinking of him as a guiding voice in my head. I turned to survey the battlefield as he was doing.

“Sir,” said one of the men near him, pressing in at his shoulder, “Sir, what is that thing?”

“Our greatest resource,” Giovanni replied coolly. He took a few steps forward into the field of corpses, and I followed. He then turned to me. “Precise and perfect work. I would have expected nothing less.”

He then turned back to the crowd of Rocket agents. “You will be needed in a moment or two. We have captives to take into custody. At the moment, though, we are looking for someone in particular.”

“Who?” I asked, curious.

“The ringleader,” he replied. “Might you be able to find him for me, Mewtwo?”

I thought I remembered a certain man, heavily-armored, who had been barking out commands through a loudspeaker, dashing back and forth, trying in vain to keep the army from descending into chaos. I had simply knocked him out, sensing he might be of some importance.

I went to the area where I thought he had fallen, and sure enough, there he was, lying unconscious with his face in the dirt. He looked rather pitiful in this position, but it was clear he had a handsome face with a prominent chin, and hair blonde as straw stuck out from beneath his helmet. He wore a golden suit of armor from head to toe. On some men, this might have looked absurd, but I was surprised how well he wore it.

I dragged the slumbering man over to Giovanni, who looked him over with approval. “Excellent. Now, bring him a bit closer to me.”

I moved the man towards Giovanni, who shook his head. “Closer than that. Yes, about there. Turn him towards me—I want to look into his eyes. Now, set him down on his knees. Make him kneel, and pull his head upright.”

Giovanni looked my work over for a moment, then gave an approving nod. “That should be sufficient. Beside me again, Mewtwo. We want to set the scene, after all.”

“For what?” I asked him, sliding over to his side.

His smile grew wide and savage. “For the interrogation—the first of many—of our most important captive.” He turned to the unconscious figure. “It’s hard to believe you took such a risk, coming out here in person. But then, you always were foolhardy enough to take unconscionable risks, when your pride demanded it. You must have thought victory assured. How very wrong you were.”

He turned back to me. “This, Mewtwo, is Howard Mendelson, founder and chief executive of the Golden League. And our prisoner.” His voice hissed with triumph. He gave a quick jerk of his head in the man’s direction.

“Wake him up.”

I had to take a moment to think about this. I had dragged hundreds, thousands of human beings into unconsciousness, but I could not recall a single time when it had been necessary to wake one up. I doubted it would be difficult, though. I simply had to perform the same process in reverse.

I reached into the man’s mind and groped around for the familiar psychological trigger, the mental switch that controlled wakefulness. There it was, whispering that slumber was proceeding just as planned, that dreams hummed quietly away. I grabbed hold of this switch and tried to force it back to wakefulness. It was a complete reversal of what I’d done to this man only minutes before: instead of obscuring the world, I tried to make it more clear. Instead of pushing him away from reality, I pulled him into it.

After a moment, I thought I had done it. The man was moving back into awareness. To accelerate the process, though, I gave him a quick slap of air on the side of his face. He opened his eyes, and blinked a few times.

He glanced around in confusion. Then his eyes lit on Giovanni and me. With a twitch of recognition, his face twisted itself into a grimace. He spat, badly, in my partner’s direction.

Giovanni laughed. “Must we begin with such unpleasantness? I thought better of you, Mendelson. Can you not be civil?”

Something seemed to uncage itself within the man, and his face reshaped itself into a vicious smile as he spoke.

“You know as well as I do that neither of us really intend to do anything civil to each other, Giovanni,” Mendelson sneered. “We’re enemies and always will be. I must say, I didn’t expect to be captured, but rest assured I won’t stay for long—before you even know I’ve arrived I’ll have slipped out and be back to my favorite game: working to destroy you. This little interlude is but a stage in the demise of Team Rocket. Your days are numbered, you old fool.”

Giovanni snorted, a snort which turned to a chuckle, which turned to a full-grown laugh, echoing through the glade. He laughed for a long time. Finally, he turned back to the man.

“Are my days so numbered, Howard? What might be the source of this black cloud which hangs so ominously over my fate? Surely not your little ragtag band of deluded children, without a single thought in their heads that you didn’t steal from some old pathetic, discredited philosopher?”

“The Golden League stands for greater things than you could ever comprehend,” Mendelson cried. “We fight to restore our decadent civilization to greatness. We seek to return to the great moral understandings of the ancient sages: Aristotle, Heimanios, Kun Fai. The ignorant world we live in today has forgotten these understandings, caught up in self-gratification. You may scoff, but we will lead the nations to righteousness yet, and crush your ignorant hedonism under our conquering heel—”

“Such prattle,” Giovanni snapped. “Look around you, Mendelson. Your entire army lies in ruins. Your words are empty; your ambitions rot where these corpses lay.”

Mendelson turned his head to look at the scene around him, and his eyes widened as he took in the full extent of the carnage for the first time. He swallowed. “Surely…surely some of them survived,” he whispered, but I could tell he did not really believe what he was saying.”

Giovanni shook his head. “We spared no fighter. The Golden League is dead. Certainly, a handful of men and women remain alive as our prisoners. But with their limbs mutilated, their weapons destroyed, and their lives in our custody, I find it rather unlikely that they will ever again form a union of any real significance.”

“Then the dream itself lives on,” Mendelson said slowly, his eyes shining. “Our example will shine for future generations, and one day, a new Golden League will realize our dream of a perfect, just society. Perhaps I shall even live to see that day—”

“Spare me your ridiculous platitudes,” Giovanni said coldly. “I’ve never known why you bother with the pretense of morality. Why you pretend that your ambitions are somehow sacred, somehow adhere to the dreams of deluded old men who wrote down their schizophrenic visions for us to cling blindly to generations later. In my opinion, it has always been your undoing.”

He leaned in close, so that he was staring into Mendelson’s face. The man flinched. “Isn’t it interesting,” whispered Giovanni, “that I can declare that I wish to rule the world before all creation, that I can say so baldly, nakedly, without pretense, and men and women will flock to my side to help me do it? While you mumble some nonsense about philosophers, and fail miserably. Why do you think that is?”

Giovanni’s eyes were wide with pleasure. “It is because I have made them see the beauty of my ambition, and promised them a place in it. I only give people what they want, deep within the recesses of their hearts. Exactly what they want. I am a hungry beast, yet I never lie about my nature. I never need to. If people fail to understand what that hunger means, then that is their concern, not mine.”

He leaned back. “Of course, you insist on operating differently. You even think it better. That is your privilege, I suppose. But don’t expect me to save you from the consequences of your own folly.” He cast a hand about the clearing. “As exhibited all around you.”

“How did you do it, Giovanni?” Mendelson asked, his voice hoarse. “I don’t understand how you did it. We had you. You Rocket bastards were dead meat, and then—it all turned around as soon as that thing beside you showed up.” He cast me a furious glance, and for a moment I wondered if he was going to spit at me as he had spat on Giovanni.

“It’s really rather simple, Howard,” Giovanni said silkily. “I plan. Better than you, further than you, and more effectively. I do not waste my time on anything which I have not already conquered. You thought victory assured, but you were completely undone by an unexpected factor. You have not learned to think creatively, as I do. To have plans for every contingency, to have many plans within plans. To have plans so ambitious and unusual that, if they succeed, will unlock victories that have never before been claimed. This creature is here with me because of one such plan.”

He indicated me. “Is it not magnificent? Does it not radiate power, simmering beneath its armor? Does it not mark the difference between victory and defeat? Is it, in short, not a work of utter beauty?” For a moment I was very glad the metal helmet covered my face—I suspected I might be blushing.

Mendelson stared for a moment. “Just tell me what that thing is, Giovanni,” he said thickly.

Giovanni’s smile was that of a snake about to strike. “It is a weapon. Our greatest weapon. The child of my brilliant insight, of Team Rocket ingenuity and cleverness. That is all you need know. All you will ever need to know.”

He turned away from the other man. “I’ve enjoyed our little game, Mendelson, and it’s a pity it couldn’t have gone on longer. But to be frank, I grow terribly bored of you. This conversation has reached its end.”

He turned to me. “Still, lest we forget that failures deserve to be punished for their folly, I think we ought to impart one more lesson to young Mr. Mendelson. And we certainly cannot allow him to entertain the dream of running away.”

His teeth gleamed white in the fading light. “Mewtwo, break his right leg.”

Swiftly, I seized hold of the man’s lower leg and snapped it clean through the center. And—how I wish I could not say it!—it was sweet, and rich, and wonderful, to feel the bones splintering under my grip, and once again I marveled at the miracle of my own powers.

The man howled, an animal howl. He drew breath between short, ragged gasps, and he moaned and moaned.

“Very good,” breathed Giovanni. “Now the other.”

As I did so, I watched Giovanni’s face, which seemed to have been transformed. I had never seen his grin this broad, his eyes this wild and monstrous. It looked as if he had been taken over by some demon, as if he had become some alien creature like my brethren. Every muscle of his face was contorted in delight, and he seemed to perceive nothing in the world but this man’s suffering. When that sharp crunch rang through the air again, and Mendelson howled once more, a shudder ran through my partner’s entire body, as if he was witnessing a holy sacrament.

“Remarkable,” said Giovanni finally. “Knock him out again. We will have no further use for him for some time.”

I forced Mendelson’s sobbing haze of misery and agony back down into oblivion. It was not difficult—he had half fainted from shock and pain already.

Giovanni smiled softly as the man collapsed. “Excellent. Now we may turn our attention to other duties.”

He turned back to his followers and opened his arms wide. “Today,” he barked, “we have turned defeat into our greatest conquest yet! The Golden League is no more. Kanto is ours!” A great cheer went up from the assembled Rockets at his words.

“Now,” he said, “I want all of you to begin escorting the prisoners inside. Then we shall dispose of these corpses. We must reap the spoils of victory, after all.”

They nodded and began to scurry about the battlefield, seizing the wounded men and women, some of whom had stumbled to their feet. I turned about, to look once more at the fields I had stained with blood. Then a drop of wetness hit me from above. I looked up in confusion.

Heavy gray clouds now covered the sky. From their dark depths, streaks of water were falling, scattered, but growing closer and closer. Where they hit the ground, they slid over the bodies, washed the blood from the grass, and turned the soil to ugly mud. I stared up for a long time, watching this phenomenon, hardly able to believe what I was seeing.

It had begun to rain.

@ CyberPika:

Thanks! I'm glad to hear you're enjoying it!

So, I have an announcement to make: this thread has finally caught up with the offsite Archive! This is wonderful news, in that it means I'm no longer maintaining two separate versions of this story online. But the other side of the equation is that my updates will probably be less frequent. I have to actually, y'know, write them. I'm thinking that we've got about two update-worthy sections left within this part, and then we'll be on to Part Three, which will be wonderful.

I'll try to find some way of making the wait bearable, though. I might post an ETA of some sort about when the next chapter will be up, or perhaps I'll divide the chunks into smaller, less self-contained units. I'm reluctant to do that, though. We'll see.

Anyway, I'll keep charging away at this story, and you'll surely hear from me in the meantime.

Until then!

Dai

Okay, so it's status update time.

At the moment I'm getting into the juiciest passages of the penultimate section of Part Two. I'm very excited to say that we're basically at the climax of Part Two. After that, we'll have just one more section, I think, which will wrap things up and send us on to Part Three. All of this is wonderful news.

Now, the question is: when will there actually be anything new posted here? Well, I'd like to get to the end of this section, such as it is, because cutting it off anywhere else would disappoint you, I think. My hope is to reach the end within two weeks, so I'll give you this ETA: Section 2.8 should be up by 3/11/12.

Bear in mind this is just an estimate: it's very possible that it will take longer than that. But ideally, I'll have it done for you by then, and I'll dash off to do the final section.

Here's hoping I see you soon!

Dai

[CONTINUED:]

Despite the sudden downpour, despite the difficult work of cleaning up the remnants of the Golden League army, what followed could only be described as a celebration. While they ushered our new captives into confinement, our Team Rocket agents laughed, and talked amiably, and even twirled around in circles, dizzy with relief. Giovanni seemed not to mind the sudden laxity of discipline. Nothing, it seemed, could disturb him after so complete a victory. He gazed around the muddy battlefield with satisfaction, and every so often would glance my way with a slight smile. I flushed with pride whenever his gaze lit on me. I had tried so hard to do well for him.

I felt as merry as the rest of the Rockets: I was glad to help nudge the captives forward when they struggled against Rocket guns and Pokémon, happy to help our agents pull the corpses of the fallen monsters into great putrid piles. We were all giddy that day, I think, wandering around like newly-hatched infants. Drunk on the miracle of how quickly we had pulled victory from defeat.

Ultimately, the incinerators deep within our scorched and pockmarked base proved inadequate for the sheer mass of the bodies and waste we wished to dispose of. Nor was it really feasible to transport some of the larger corpses into the facility. Before long, Giovanni called me over to his side.

We settled on burying them. Giovanni’s helicopter led a small convoy of trucks and myself through the forest, to a rocky clearing a bit closer to the foot of the mountains.

“No one ever comes here,” Giovanni murmured, once we had stopped. “For all the local authorities know about the land they ostensibly survey, this place could be a radioactive wasteland, and they would still describe it as a priceless natural resource in their reports. They fear to enter too far within, nervous about aggression from the local Pokémon. We do not have such fears.”

On his command, I dug a great pit, ripping great wet chunks of earth from the ground as the Rockets watched with approval. Then I threw as many bodies as I had been able to carry into the pit. Giovanni signaled for me to return. My work was more or less done. Now that this location had been officially designated, other Rockets could expand it as the need arose.

Still, I swept the mud back over the corpses, attempting to smooth it out as best I could. Was it just me, or did what I was doing suddenly seem very eerie, an unwholesome thing, as I watched faces very like my own disappear beneath the mire? I shivered, and not just from the rain.

But before long, both of us were back in the helicopter, laughing and talking amiably, unable to resist reliving the highlights of my victory as we set out over the trees. Though thick droplets of rain ran down the windows, I felt as if I was basking in the warmth of the sun. I had just done a great thing for Team Rocket, something I could be proud of for all time. At last, I was earning my place in the organization. I was truly proving my worth.

I thought back to what Giovanni had said the day we met. He told me I had a secret, unknown purpose. But I had never been able to figure out what that might be. Did this feeling, this victory have something to do with it? Had Giovanni perhaps meant that my purpose was to prove myself, to test my strength against impossible obstacles and emerge as champion? It seemed very possible. But I got the feeling that it was not the whole answer.

Giovanni himself was happier than I’d ever seen him. For once he was actually talking to me without any grand objective in mind. He was simply there, and I was there, and we were talking as companions do. It was a nice change. We spoke to each other in quick, excited sentences, and laughed uproariously, and I even managed to joke with him a little. We reminisced about my exploits as if they had taken place half a century ago, and we were just now meeting for the first time in decades. I was very happy. I think both of us were, for that briefest of moments.

Then the phone rang.

Giovanni frowned. We were just at the edge of the forest at that moment, flying over the small towns whose lights were just bright enough to twinkle like ghosts at us through the faint fog.

Moving slowly, pursing his lips with distaste, Giovanni went over to the phone on the wall of the helicopter and picked it up. “What is it?” he asked dully.

From the receiver I could make out snatches of garbled words.“…need assistance…unexpected situation…Pokémon Gym has been…been trying to…”

“Speak up, you imbeciles,” Giovanni barked.

From the other end came something about trying to reach Giovanni on his personal phone. He snorted. “Yes, of course I turned it off,” he said. “I did not wish to be interrupted for trivial matters.”

Then it happened. I could see that something was terribly wrong before I ever had any inkling of what was going on, just by the way Giovanni’s whole body stiffened at what the man on the other end of the line said to them. He just stood there for a moment, hand clenching the phone, silent and. Then he seemed to thaw a bit, and spat a few words into the receiver.

“What, precisely, is the situation?” he snarled, as if he knew the answer already.

Then he roared into life as the response came. “You incompetents! You idiots! How could you not have seen this coming? Didn’t I tell you I wanted information on Mendelson’s plans? I—“

Giovanni’s face grew twisted as he was interrupted. “What do you mean it’s not Mendelson’s work!?” he roared. “I want you to answer me very carefully, Hawkins. If you even think of interrupting me again—I’m telling you, your job is on the line, Hawkins! How dare you stand there and tell me, like a blithering idiot, that you can’t figure out who the culprit is when my Pokémon Gym has been left smoking in ruins—”

Ruins? Had the Gym been destroyed?

Eventually, it transpired what had happened. By the end of the day I found out most of the major details—not from Giovanni, who could barely discuss the subject without erupting into rage—but from the minds of the hapless Rockets around me. Over the next few days I learned more by relentlessly pestering my tutors with questions.

It seemed that Giovanni, in his haste to leave the Gym, had left his daily obligations in some disarray. Aware that further battles had been appointed for later in the day—some of which I would probably have fought in had Mendelson not made his attack—Giovanni sought to throw these responsibilities on the nearest figure who could shoulder them. By the time he came down to see me, Giovanni had already contacted several executives and established a basic chain of command for Gym security and local affairs.

A more difficult question had been what to do about keeping the day’s appointments. Almost anyone with access to powerful Pokémon had been called to the battlefield, leaving only low-level Rockets who were not to be told about the events going on at the other base. Apparently, Giovanni had, for once, acted on impulse. Pulling a few Pokéballs from his pocket, he set three young subordinates, a trio of lazy pickpockets who had happened to be in his office when he received the news of Mendelson’s assault, in charge of the day’s matches.

I imagine it must have seemed the perfect opportunity to Giovanni. I can just see how it unfolded in his mind: Here was a band of slackers, not much good for anything other than petty theft, and suddenly fate had delivered them to his desk at the moment they could be most useful to his efforts! I believe that sense of aptness and the urgency of the crisis must have clouded my partner’s otherwise impeccable judgment.

These underlings apparently decided to mess about with highly experimental equipment, flaunting their credentials as Gym Leaders for the right to do so. They installed it in the main room, against the advice of men who would otherwise be their superiors, and—here, especially, is where the details of events grow very murky—while dueling their first opponent, managed to so damage the structural integrity of the Gym that several supporting walls collapsed, and the roof caved in entirely.

As you can imagine, no one was pleased by this.

Giovanni, in particular, was livid. The Gym had been rendered completely useless, both as a battlefield and as a way to keep him connected to the goings-on of the city. I think the loss of the building itself especially wounded his pride. He had invested so much of himself in its construction and its design that to lose those marble columns, those exquisite carvings, was an embarrassment and an affront. I watched his cheerful demeanor vanish, lightning-quick, to be replaced by frothing rage by the end of that phone call.

He fumed. He swore, loudly and baldly, as if I was not even present. He let the men on the other end of the line know what he thought of them in no uncertain terms. By the time the conversation was over, Giovanni’s whole body was heaving and twisted, as if he had just emerged from a marathon. He slammed the phone down with a sickening crunch. He made a strange strangled noise, deep in his throat, garbling some incomprehensible insult, perhaps. He looked at me for a moment, as if to say something, then turned his twisted face from me, and wrenched his way into the cockpit.

Giovanni did not speak to me as we flew back to our one remaining headquarters, now half-scarred by Mendelson’s assault. He simply sat there, eyes boring a hole in the opposite wall, hands gripped together tightly on his knee, a permanent frown etched on his face. Persian looked at him with a worried expression, but made no sound.

At one point, I tried to say something to him, to offer words of sympathy. “Giovanni—“ I began.

“Quiet,” he snapped, without looking at me.

“I only mean to say—“

“I said be quiet, you idiot!” Giovanni roared, swiveling around to face me. I shut up, unwilling to meet that furious glare.

That rather set the tone for the rest of the voyage back. I spent the time trying to piece together the information I knew about what had happened, and compiling a list of questions to ask my tutors when next I saw them. And I worried about what this meant for my relationship with my partner. Things had been going so well.

The loss of the Gym cast an ugly pallor on our earlier giddiness. Everything we had accomplished that day, everything we had laughed about and applauded suddenly seemed banal, even stupid. How could we congratulate ourselves for triumphing over our enemies when our own operatives could set us back years through their staggering incompetence?

I found out later that the three Rocket agents responsible had been nowhere to be found at the scene of the disaster. They were eventually discovered at the outskirts of the city, presumably attempting to sneak out of town before blame could be placed on their shoulders. No doubt they now faced severe demotion, at the very least. I didn’t envy them, whoever they were.

I spent the rest of that day helping Rocket workers make a start on repairing the base, flying to and fro with supplies in the rain and the mud. Then, when it grew dark, I was sent down to my chamber to rest my armor and stare at the wall, thinking about how a day could reverse itself in the space of a single moment.

I soon realized that the destruction of the Gym had cost me as much as it had cost Giovanni. With his major source of local authority compromised, Giovanni retreated into the woods, pulling most of his operations out of the city and turning his attention to other plans. The Gym, he told me pointedly, would not be our place of residence again anytime in the foreseeable future. I find it hard to say what his intentions were. Was he simply trying to regroup, taking a moment to breathe before returning to the metropolis? Or did he truly believe that his days as a Gym Leader were behind him forever? I doubt I will ever know.

What concerned me more was the end of my battling career. Gone were my duels with the random Pokémon of hapless trainers. No longer could I be assured of encountering my brothers and sisters on a regular basis, of exploring their bodies and diverse forms, of learning something new each day about how to grapple with them, how to dance with them, how to manipulate their minds and hearts. The only real source of day-to-day excitement in my life had vanished.

And the worst part was, I knew I had no right to complain. There was no possibility of using the Gym in its current condition. And there was very little for me to do in the meantime. If Giovanni failed to seek me out, that was no fault of his. I could no longer contribute to his efforts in any meaningful way.

Oh, how we had crowed about slaughtering our greatest enemy! But all our victory had really done for me, I soon realized, was make me a useless lump of flesh. What good was it to keep me at the base to fight off our enemies, when all our foes lay captured or mangled, or had fled, terrified of my power? I had spent so long wishing and hoping for the day when my powers would be tested. But now that it had come to pass, I wished I could have avoided it. I told myself I would gladly trade the brilliance and the adventure of that day to have those regular Gym matches again. Anything but this monotony!

Weeks passed. Tedious, dull, agonizing weeks. Weeks about which I really have very little to say—so little happened within them. I spent most of my time standing around, usually in the same, tired old position on the podium. I stared at the wall, trying not to think, not to insane with boredom. Trying to recapture my old trick of compressing myself, of forgetting anything but my duties, focusing all my energy on the moments when I was useful, when I could contribute, when I was needed.

This had been much easier to do when I could be assured that I would be summoned to battle at some point during the day. I had no such guarantee now. All I could do was watch the balcony for a glimpse of Giovanni, or one of my teachers, or, rarely, some other scientist with a task to set before me.

For a time there were occasional interruptions to the tedium. For the first few weeks after my return to the forest base, I was sought after, here and there, by Giovanni’s construction teams to help repair the base. The cat was out of the bag—so to speak—about my existence for everyone who had witnessed my exploits against Mendelson. Giovanni, I gathered, did not care to tell anyone any further details about me, but it seemed he no longer minded if his underlings knew he had a powerful Pokémon working at his side.

Over the next few weeks, I worked with a vast number of human beings to patch the many holes in the base, and I encountered many faces I’d not seen before, faces that gaped at my abilities. For a few hours each day, I flew about, delivering supplies and wrestling large pieces of metal into place. I was more than happy to help: this place was my home, too. I wanted to restore its grandeur as much as anybody.

But this could only sustain me so long. Before I knew it, our headquarters had been repaired, at least as far as it affected my life. There was still a great deal of work for engineers and electricians to attend to, adjusting small details of the wiring and other minutiae. But there was nothing large-scale left for me to help with. I was no longer needed.

That left only a few small distractions. From time to time, I might still be called out to the wilderness to capture rare Pokémon for Team Rocket. I might even be summoned to heighten Rocket loyalty and pride at one of Giovanni’s many, many speeches about our recent triumphs. And from time to time, I might be led through the hidden corridors as usual, checking to see that that loyalty remained intact.

But these moments came only sporadically, and Giovanni’s heart didn’t really seem to be in them. He seemed, in particular, to avoid assigning any mission which would take us back into the city. I guessed that his pride had been wounded. A city in which he had been humiliated, a city which had cost him his beloved Gym, deserved no part of his plans from now on.

I hoped he did, at least, have plans. I worried from time to time about whether Giovanni had simply given up on his grand ambitions, if he was just spinning his wheels, refusing to take action. But I doubted a man with Giovanni’s drive had it in him to give up so easily. More likely, he was consolidating his power by pressing into Mendelson’s territory, or adjusting his plans to deal with our new distribution of resources. I had no idea. That was the problem. These were no longer the sort of schemes I could help him with. Where Giovanni’s mind was going now, I could not follow.

There was one more source of relief from the monotony of everyday life: my education. My tutors had all survived Mendelson’s attack and the collapse of the Gym, and they continued to work through Giovanni’s curriculum with me over the next few weeks. If nothing else, I could look forward to bantering with Simmons about history, to asking questions of Adams about the age of the universe. To Namba’s bizarre, often entertaining moods, and his random outbursts about the Pokémon body. And especially to talking with Michael Fitzpatrick, and learning from him, and laughing with him, and asking him all sorts of questions about the nature of God.

But even this minor pleasure could not last. Not long after the last repairs had been made on our headquarters, Giovanni made a rare appearance on the balcony to inform me that my tutors would no longer be coming to my chamber. My education, in other words, had reached its end.

I was stunned, of course. “But why?” I demanded. “Have they not been useful to me, just as I said? Have they not made me more capable of assisting you in battle? You saw what I was able to do against Mendelson’s forces! Have they not been good for me, helping me understand the world around me? I tell you, they have not failed in their duties! I swear it!”

“Whether or not they have failed is not the issue,” Giovanni said smoothly. “The fact of the matter is, they are no longer necessary. They have done exactly what they were meant to do.
You sought to learn, and you have now, in my opinion, learnt everything that is necessary for you to know. Your learning has not been cut off, Mewtwo. It has simply been completed. I suspect, if you think upon the matter, you will find you now understand all the details of the world that once eluded you. As such, these tutors have nothing left to teach you.”

I tried to say something in response, to find some way of denying his words. But he was right, and I knew it. My last few meetings with the tutors had been little more than review. Little more than silly conversations in which I dug for more details about my own interests. Yet I had come to understand the universe around me in a great deal of detail. All of my questions about trees and stars and suns had been answered a thousand times over. I had not learned anything truly new in quite some time. If Giovanni had been spinning his wheels, well, so had I.

Still, I gaped at him, unable to speak for a moment. “What about my teachers?” I asked finally.

“They will return to their previous duties around our headquarters,” Giovanni replied. “You must bear in mind, Mewtwo, that taking time to teach you has been something of an imposition on them. Your tutors have long had obligations and responsibilities toward the organization, and I am sure they will be pleased to have the time to devote themselves to those goals once more. Do not concern yourself with their futures. If anything, you should be glad for them.”

I stared at him for a long time, trying to summon the right words. Words that would express how lost I felt right now, how terrified, how sick of the boredom and loneliness. How much I would miss the ritual of daily learning, and the men and woman who administered it. I thought of Fitzpatrick, whom I had been about to ask some further questions on transubstantiation. Our conversation would never continue.

“But, Giovanni—“ I stammered. I swallowed, then continued weakly. “But—what exactly am I supposed to do? How am I to spend my time?”

Giovanni watched me coolly. “You should, as usual, spend your time contemplating your future, learning to master your own nature. This has always been made clear to you. See that you do not lose sight of that goal.”

With that, he swept around and walked out the door, Persian beside him, leaving me to stand alone in a cold, dark room.

I stared at the closed door for a long time. Had I been a burden to my teachers? An imposition on their lives? Why could they not have told me? Had I known, I could have asked for less frequent lessons, or found some way to ease the load. A hot, sick flush of embarrassment rolled over me. I had thought my teachers genuinely liked me. Had they just been faking it for Giovanni’s sake? Probably they had found me terrible to work with, full of annoying questions and ludicrous in my ignorance. I wished I had thought of this earlier, so I could have done something differently. Perhaps if I had been better somehow, they might not have been so eager to be done with me.

The loss of Fitzpatrick hit me hardest of all. I had thought the old priest and I had been amiable companions. Had we not talked long into the evening about God and his creations? Had he not flashed me a smile whenever he began the trek down the stairs from the balcony? Had he not told me about his life, sharing stories in a way none of my other teachers ever had? Had he not seemed to care genuinely about my life and my education? Or was all of that just my imagination? Had all of that been a lie?

He had not even taken the time to come to say goodbye to me, I realized. He could have let me know that my education was reaching its end, but he had said nothing. He had never told me that the two of us were going to part, that I would not ever see him again. Perhaps he had never even cared.

He was probably off enjoying himself in some well-lit Rocket office by now. No doubt savoring his freedom from his annoying and wearisome charge.

I sank into a deeper funk, and the weeks dragged on.

A long time passed. I have no idea know how long, though every so often I make another attempt to guess, using what I have learned since. But at the time, everything blurred together grotesquely. My days were a haze of murky sameness. I would awaken from scattered, anxious dreams to find myself staring at the ceiling. A superfluous alarm would ring. I would often attend to hygiene, just to give myself something to do. Then I would go out, step into the machine, and await the blunt force of my day.

More than ever, I would try to extinguish my useless, churning thoughts. And more than ever, I would fail. I passed my hours waiting, dreaming, hoping as always for some signal that I was needed. I would stare at the door on the balcony, and the sliver of light that glowed beneath it, waiting to be called into action.

Most of the time, nothing happened. Every so often, some minor Rocket employee might come along to escort me on another psychic tour of the base, or to take me out into the field to go acquire more powerful Pokémon. I was happy for any distraction. But days might pass without anything more from my associates than three small meals. Giovanni almost never appeared , and when he did, our meetings felt strained and compulsory. They never lasted long.

There was little point, after all. I was so useless to him at the moment. Again and again I wished the Gym hadn’t been destroyed. But there was little I could do about that now. I kept asking, of almost everyone I saw, whether there was any new work for me to do, if Team Rocket had established any new campaigns that required my assistance. The result was always the same: whoever I was asking the question of would reply with a sad shake of the head, and remind me gently that our resources were still severely restricted at the present time. And I would have to nod, and agree, and say nothing. That, or the person being asked was some meal-bringing lower-level simpleton who just gave me a stupid, blank stare.

Giovanni particularly seemed to resent the question. I tried asking him about our future plans during one of our brief, perfunctory meetings, and his face immediately darkened into a scowl.

“As I have said, Mewtwo, there is nothing I wish to concern you with at the moment,” he growled. “Stop asking, and learn to be patient for a change. When some matter requires your attention, I will assuredly tell you. In the meantime, don’t bother me with your incessant questioning, and focus on your own affairs.”

With that, he left the room, slamming the door behind him, and leaving me alone in the darkness once more.

After that, I tried to let the subject go. But the fact of the matter was that I was desperate for something, anything to do. So I kept pestering the grunts and agents who appeared in my chamber for news, even though I knew it would do no good. Part of me hoped something might have changed. No matter who I badgered, I was always mistaken.

So I tried to do as Giovanni had said. I tried to stand in my chamber and do nothing but think about myself, my future, and my own inner nature. Days went by, weeks went by, perhaps even months went by in that dark pit, where I was half-blind and half-crazy, and starving for understanding. Time stretched and bubbled, alternately wrapping itself around me like a choking cloth and devouring itself before me. I slipped into a state composed of a strange hybrid between pure reason and gibbering madness. And I tried to make sense of everything which had been said to me.

One thing was very clear to me: I missed Giovanni. I missed his presence, even though my entire world was permeated with his work. I missed the old days, when we had talked so freely and frivolously. The days when I learned with him, battled with him, at once his partner and his pupil. The days when I felt I was able to actually contribute to his efforts, to give the gift of myself as an ally. It was all too clear that stupid, abysmal circumstances had driven our friendship apart.

Was there anything I could do to repair it? Wait, I supposed. Wait until our fortunes changed, and I actually had something to do again. There was nothing else I could do. Too much of this was outside my control. I was not in a position to remake the world so that Giovanni could make use of it again. I had to listen to what he was telling me, and be patient. I had to know the limits of my own abilities. Perhaps was that his silence and absence was trying to tell me.

A part of me feared that Giovanni had given up on me. Perhaps I had failed him too often. Or worse, what if I had never been to his satisfaction in the first place? What if he had only been putting up with me, as my teachers had? The longer the dark days went on, the more likely it seemed.

Somehow, the memory of the old Golem drifted into my mind, and I remembered what he had said: Giovanni is not a good man. Indeed, the creature had insisted, vigorously, that all human beings were horrible creatures. He had painted humans as charlatans, as devils, only using us to gain access to our great powers, and he had called me a fool for disagreeing. Just thinking of the conversation made me feel sick to my stomach.

But no. I couldn’t believe that what he had said was true. I couldn’t accept the idea that human beings were cruel liars. It was too crazy of a theory, too bizarre and overwhelming to even think about. It would render everything I had done pointless, a falsehood, a dream, and I refused to accept it. I refused to accept the babbling words of a deranged old Pokémon over the reasoned advice of my mentor. No, I shook my head, and forbade myself from giving the stone subversive another thought. I had to chalk it up to a case of interspecies jealously. I had to believe in the reality of what I had experienced. I had to trust in what I knew to be true.

But the fact that I was even considering such an outlandish theory did suggest that there was something deeply troubled in my relationship with Giovanni. Perhaps we had indeed drifted apart as partners and as friends. But there might be a way to reconnect. When next we spoke, I had to find some way to reach him, to tell him that I wished to spend more time with him. I would assure him that even the most tedious details of his current schemes would interest me, if the conversations gave us the chance to see each other more often.

But Giovanni did not appear for quite some time. I stared at the wall, waiting for him to no avail. Days and days dragged by without even the slightest sign of him, not even a stray remark from one of the low-level Rockets who brought me food. I was forced to conclude that he might have grown too busy for even the most trivial of visits.

Had I done something wrong? Had I managed to alienate him with my questions? I thought back over our doings together. By any account, our bond should have grown stronger, not weaker, over time. What had gone wrong?

I remembered what he had said to me, the day we met. He had spoken of the great deeds we would accomplish together, of the powerful similarities between us. And we had even touched on our future as partners. He had spoken of a time when trust would blossom between us.

He had said that on that day, he would feel free to shed his defenses. In a flash, I suddenly recalled the last time I saw Giovanni. The tiny black clip on his ear had gleamed as brightly that day as ever, and his shroud of confusion had cast iridescent spirals on my mind’s eye just as it had on the day we met. He had never shed his defenses. He had never been able to trust me.

But that was not fair in the least! I trusted him, and I had done everything I could to show it. Had I not listened to everything he said with utmost attention? Had I not thrown myself into following his advice, overcome my reluctance to wear restrictive armor, and worked every day to better myself as a fighter? Had I not taken risks when he recommended them, and reaped the benefits of facing my fears? Had I not believed in my partner and his vision, and done everything he asked of me? Had I not made that transparently clear?

But that was the problem, I realized. I had ample reason to trust Giovanni, but what reason did he have to trust me? Our relationship had always been an unequal one. I possessed great destructive powers, while all he had were resources and ingenuity. What reason did he have to doubt that the moment he shed his guard, I would leap to destroy him, even after all this time together? He had seen what I had done to those Pokémon on the battlefield, after all.

Even if I only invaded his privacy by reading his mind—an opportunity now within my grasp—how embarrassing, how ignominious it would be for such a private man to have his personal secrets probed and discovered! I felt a flush of shame for even thinking of it.

No wonder he was reluctant to put his trust in me. He was still afraid of me, even now. He had seen, firsthand, that I was a terrifying, dangerous creature. I would feel the same way in his position: why take a risk that could so easily kill you?

All the same, I wished that he could believe I was harmless. I wished I could convince him that he had nothing to fear. I felt a terrible pang of sympathy for his distress, followed quickly by an overwhelming sense of loneliness. How could the two of us ever really connect if this fear would keep coming between us?

I would prove myself to him, I decided. I would redouble my devotion to his ideas. I would humble myself before him, showing him that I was as pliant and reliable as any member of his team. If he needed time to himself, I would gladly give it to him. If he asked that I sit in the dark and master myself, I would penetrate the deepest depths of my nature, and he would know that I was listening.

I had never fully understood Giovanni’s concept of self-mastery. Perhaps I had spent so much of my time worrying and fidgeting because I was afraid to face what he was asking of me head-on.

He had spoken of purpose. He had told me, again and again, that in coming to his doorstep I had been seeking some sort of ultimate goal in my life, and that he intended to help me find it. Yet in all my hours spent thinking, I had never been able to put my finger on what that purpose might be. I racked my brain for the answer, but still found nothing.

I certainly would have been glad to know. I remembered those idiotic scientists who had given me life. I had tried to speak to them of purpose, and they had responded with flippancy and frivolity. They had laughed over having given me nothing to do in this world. I meant nothing to them, I was nothing to them. Just a waste product. The end of a successful experiment. My fists clenched as I thought of it.

So this idea of a purpose, which I was struggling to define, was inextricably intertwined with what I was. Those cretins had told me I was nothing. Giovanni had told me I was something, something very admirable, but refused to speak in specific terms. But I could catch a hint of myself in the things he said to me. I was powerful. I was great. I was his companion. But what did that all add up to?

To be one of the two minds to conquer the world—that seemed like it might be an admirable purpose. But Giovanni had repeatedly denied that that was all there was to my nature. I had a different purpose, he insisted, and I would discover it in time. I supposed he was right. World conquest was Giovanni’s dream, not mine. I might be a part of it, but it could not be my identity; it could not define me. I did not, I supposed, desire to own the world so much as I desired to see what a great man like Giovanni might do with it.

Was my purpose to battle with all the Pokémon of the world, learning the weaknesses of each species? I enjoyed battling, to be sure, but that seemed so simple, so savage and meaningless. I had nothing to prove by defeating every creature on the planet. The fact that I was their superior was indisputable; I had no desire to pursue it as some sort of hackneyed quest. But it was worth a thought.

Nor did my purpose seem to lie in manipulating the masses, or capturing Pokémon for Team Rocket. I enjoyed doing such things, happy to contribute to such worthy goals, but I did not feel that they taught me anything about myself.

With a small frown, I thought of the Bodharmi. Was everything in my life unsatisfying, as it had been for him? Was everything really meaningless?

Not everything. I enjoyed learning, I knew. That was what I had devoted myself to. From the moment of my birth, I had always wanted to know more. I had wanted to understand the world around me, to uncover the next idea. I had found a certain beauty, and a kind of safety, in knowledge.

But was that really a fitting purpose? Knowledge? It seemed so paltry, somehow. So bland. Childish, even, like a child’s curiosity. And in no way did it fit with what Giovanni had been describing. No, he had meant something vast, something grand. He had caught sight of a marvelous place in the universe for me, and I was simply too blind to see it.

But nothing I thought of made sense. Giovanni had said something about the world, about accepting the harshness of battle, about submitting to fate. Fine. I could accept the harsh realities of war. I could accept the need to tear our opponents apart, even if at times the rivers of blood and the fields of death could be overwhelming. I was learning to deal with my squeamishness, and in time I was sure I would have no qualms about war. But what was the point of cutting me off from the battlefield? Why did he stick me in the darkness and tell me, over and over again to contemplate my own nature? What did that even mean? What was he trying to tell me?

Something was strange about it. Something refused to add up. I was missing a vital clue. I had misunderstood something, perhaps. The nature of this acceptance. How it tied in with the brutality of the world. I thought, and I thought, and I thought.

But I came up with nothing. Every idea that seemed even close to a solution would vanish by the end of the day, revealed as foolishness and wishful thinking. I devoted myself to the task, but I failed. I found no answer, despite days, weeks of trying.

I stayed in this conundrum for a long time, hoping that Giovanni would appear on the balcony once more, with some word of advice, some way of moving me forward. Just to see him would be a comfort. So I waited. And waited.

For some time, nothing happened. But a day came when I caught that familiar psychic haze, that iridescent cloud of distortion, pushing through the doorway above. I looked up expectantly, hope rising in my heart. But it wasn’t Giovanni.

It was Adams.

“Dr. Adams?” I asked, startled. “What are you doing back here?” As he closed the door behind him, I was struck by a wonderful thought. “Have you changed your mind about the lessons? Have you thought of more things to teach me? Are we to begin anew?”

I tried to smile up at him, to show that I was ready to be a better student, to listen more deeply, to think more clearly. But Adams was shaking his head.

“No, Mewtwo,” he said, stepping slowly down the stairway, one hand resting on the railing. “I am afraid you misunderstand. I am only here to deliver a message.”

My heart sank. It had been too much to hope for. “You mean you are not staying?” I asked glumly.

“I am not, Mewtwo,” he repeated. “As Giovanni has deemed that our lessons have reached their end, it would be a waste of our time to pursue them any further. And I have a great deal of work to attend to.”

“But—“

He cut me off. “Now, please, Mewtwo, listen very carefully to what I am about to tell you. I bear a message from Giovanni, of great importance. Are you prepared to hear it?”

“Yes,” I said immediately, struck by the mention of Giovanni. Finally, a message from the great man himself. “What did he have to say?"

Adams was close enough to look me in the eye now. “To begin with, he wishes to inform you that it will still be some time before you will be needed again in combat. He regrets the necessity, but there is still much to be done.”

I winced. It was not the news I had been hoping to hear. But at least it was news. “Fine. What else?” I asked wearily.

“Secondly, he wishes to ask several questions of you,” Adams said smoothly. “Are you prepared to answer them?”

I nodded, and closed my eyes to listen.

“Giovanni would like to know,” Adams mused, “whether you have been applying yourself to the study of your own nature.” He fixed me with a gaze. “Can you honestly confirm that this is so? Have you probed the depths of your own mind? Have you devoted yourself to knowing the strength of your body: every muscle, every bone, every particle? Have you been working to test the limits of your ability, to channel your psychic power in all its perfection? Have you, in short, worked to master yourself?”

“Of course,” I told him. “I have been considering everything I was taught, just as Giovanni asked of me.” I resisted the urge to add that I had been given no chance to do anything else.

He nodded slowly. “Superb. Then Giovanni asks only one further answer from you.”

Adams drew closer, almost onto the platform itself. His voice had shrunk to a whisper. “Do you believe, then, that you have discovered the answer to the question Giovanni set to you? Do you believe that you are beginning to understand your purpose?”

I gaped at him. Adams went on. “It will take some time, of course, before you come to understand it completely. Only experience will illuminate your true nature in full. But Giovanni suspects that you are ready to act on what you have been learning.”

“You have been taught how to fight in battle under a general’s command. You have been taught to listen to the wisdom of your elders. You have been taught to follow strategies, and to protect your fellow Rockets in battle. You have learned supreme loyalty to our cause. In all this learning, then, have you begun to sense why you are here? Have you found something of an answer to Giovanni’s questions? Is your purpose on earth now becoming clear?”

I stared at him a while. What could I say? Could I tell him no? Could I tell him that everything made no sense, that the riddles were only deepening? If I looked him in the eye and told him that I was terribly lost, how would he react? I could see nothing good coming of this.

And then there was Giovanni to think of. He was trying to find out if I was ready, I knew. Ready to understand the truth. I wasn’t ready, but I wanted desperately to be. I did not want him to tell me that I needed more time alone, that I had to stay in this dark pit any longer. I wanted to see him again, to help him. To stand at his side as I used to. To know the depths of his mind, as intimate with him as I could possibly be.

I hungered for anything that would move me forward. I was desperate for Giovanni to finally trust me.

So I lied.

“Yes,” I said slowly, as if I was chewing on some great, emerging thought. “Yes, I do believe that I am beginning to understand. You are right—it is a complex idea. But, indeed, I think that after all this time, I have caught at least a glimmer of the purpose Giovanni described.”

Adams eyed me for a moment. Was that a glimmer of suspicion in those bespectacled eyes? “You are satisfied, then, with your training?” he asked. “Do you understand now why you have spent so long to yourself? Has it become clear to you why you have been tested?”

“Oh, yes,” I said amiably. “This time has been very helpful. I have learned a great deal! But I would like to discuss the matter with Giovanni in person, if possible. I am eager to share my thoughts with him.”

Adams sighed. “Perhaps. We shall see what can be arranged.”

He turned to look over his shoulder at the balcony behind him. “Well, this has been a profitable inquiry,” he said quietly. “Giovanni will be pleased to know that you are indeed proceeding on schedule, as hoped.” He walked briskly over to the stairs and began to ascend.

“Wait!” I cried. “Can you not stay a while? Could we not take a moment to discuss the stars and the galaxies, as we used to? Just a moment more of conversation, since you are here?”

Adams paused for only a second, then resumed climbing. “Your lessons are over, Mewtwo,” he said as he reached the door. “None of us have anything left to teach you.”

He paused at the doorway to look at me. I could read nothing in his face. “You will not see me again,” he said finally, reaching for the handle. “Goodbye.”

The door slammed shut, and I was left alone in the room. I had no idea what had just happened to me. Had I made the right choice? Did Adams even believe me? I felt very small and very weak. I suddenly missed my teachers horribly, though it was clear that they did not feel the same way about me. They had abandoned me. All I had left was Giovanni now. If he would have me.

I stood there, lost and lonely and terribly afraid of what might happen next.

What actually did happen next is difficult to parse. I could say that the moment that changed my life was a terrible thing. I could say that it was the best thing that could have happened to me. At one point, it seemed to have unlocked my destiny. Yet, every so often, I wish I could go back to the innocence I once knew. And the destiny I sought was madness, abomination. So I find it difficult to decide whether what followed was good or ill.

Either way, it began with getting everything I wanted.

The morning of that decisive day found me where I had always been: standing alone in my chamber, tense beneath the ugly machine, staring out into the darkness.

A few days had passed since I talked to Adams. Nothing had changed. I was still going out of my mind with frustration. I had hoped that my lie, however blatant and feeble it was, might have triggered some change. But no. I was still stuck where I had been for so long: racking my brain to understand Giovanni’s idea of purpose with no success.

I was furious with myself for being so idiotic. Clearly Giovanni had meant his riddle to be solvable—he had declared it time for me to come to an answer. But I had missed his deadline completely. Was I just that much of a fool? Had Giovanni misjudged my intelligence? I certainly had, to be balked by such an infuriatingly simple question.

I tore a few bits of metal out of the floor and began spinning them around myself. Modeling things like the solar system and the movement of galaxies was a habit of mine. It was comforting, to look back on all my learning, and these days it gave me a way to distract myself from my concerns. By the time I perfected every last element in my schematic, I was usually much calmer than I had been before. And I always put the bits of metal back.

But this time it brought me no solace. I stared at the spinning orbs, but all I could think about were my own failures. I felt so useless. So pathetic. And I had pretended to be so knowing. I had pretended to answer Adams’ questions with such brilliant insight, and trapped myself into a lie. It all could have been avoided if I had been able to answer one simple, damned question:

What is your purpose? What are you here for? WHY DO YOU EXIST?

I slammed the orbs into the ground in a sudden lurch of self-loathing. I pounded the metal into the floor over and over again, grinding it deep into the floor.

Crunch! Was my purpose to be strong? No, I had dismissed that. Then what?

Wham! Was my purpose to conquer, like Giovanni? No, he had dismissed that! Then what?

Smash! To learn? No, too banal! Then what?

Screech! To eat and excrete and die, like the worthless mass of humans Team Rocket sought to conquer? Never! Then what could it be?

I drove the metal into the ground, hating my indecision. I had no answers. I was so useless. I was nothing. I could think of nothing. Was that my purpose? Nothing? No. Not that again! I refused to go back there, back to that moment of despair! But that was all the answer I could find: nothing. Perhaps the scientists had been right. I might as well have given up back on the island, have never met Giovanni for all the good I was doing him.

I screamed in frustration and flung the orbs from me. It was a real scream, not something generated by my mind moving through air—a high, strangled, mewling yelp that startled me. I let go of the orbs, and they scattered all around me. Some bounced off the machine. Others landed on the floor, the larger ones leaving small dents. After they all came to a stop, I just stood there, limply, my arms at my sides, energy spent.

Only then did I realize that someone was standing on the balcony. A cloud of confusion concealed his shape, and a cream-colored creature pawed at his side.

It was Giovanni.

I blinked. Here he was, at long last, and I didn’t even know what to say. I had been too distracted with my own frustration to even notice when he came in. Not even a footstep had reached me.

“Giovanni—“ I started. “I—I am glad to see you. I have been hoping to talk to you, in fact.”

He said nothing for a moment, simply watching me. Finally he spoke.

“You seem to be experiencing some frustration, I see.”

I looked around hastily at the mess. The bits of metal lay awkwardly around me. Why was I always so childish? “Er…yes,” I said, feeling a hot flush of embarrassment come over me. “I am…sorry about the floor. I will repair that immediately.”

Giovanni gave a small shrug. “It is of no consequence.” We watched each other for a moment more.

“My concern,” he said slowly, “is with the matter of your training. I have been told that you are growing closer to understanding. You now possess some inkling of your place in the world. Is this true, or have I been misinformed?”

I flinched. To lie to Giovanni was a dangerous proposition. But neither could I go back on what I had already said.

“Yes, I believe so,” I managed.

He nodded. “Good. Tell me, then: if you had to guess, what would you say it is?”

Oh dear. I searched my brain desperately for something Giovanni would find acceptable, if only as a wrong answer. What had he meant me to take from my days of loneliness and isolation? Was there any message I could draw from that?

“I suppose,” I said, in a garbled voice, “that it has something to do with patience. Learning to stay in the darkness and wait. Learning to make myself small, though I am not used to doing so. Learning to trust your insight. Learning to…to submit to that.”

Giovanni gave another approving nod. “Correct in a sense. That is indeed part of what I wished you to learn.”

“But not everything?” I asked, amazed to have even gotten that far.

“Not quite. You still do not grasp your purpose as I understand it.”

There it was. He had mentioned my purpose. This was my chance, I realized. I might finally be on the verge of the answers I had been looking for.

“My purpose, yes,” I began. “Giovanni, you said I seemed frustrated?”

“Unquestionably.”

“Well, it is true,” I admitted. “I was frustrated because I had…I needed to understand further. Just as you said. I tried to understand by myself, but I could only scratch the surface. I have been thinking a great deal about this idea of purpose. And now that you are here, I would like to ask some questions of you.”

Giovanni raised an eyebrow. “Go on.”’

I paused, trying to gather my thoughts. “More thoughts than questions, I suppose. It seems to me that all this time, I have been trying to understand why I came into your company.”

I swallowed. “What was I looking for, all that time ago? You told me that I could learn two things here, in your presence. You told me I could learn to become stronger. To fulfill my potential. And you told me I would learn why I was in the world. Somewhere in this organization, it seemed, lay the goal of my existence. Somehow, in your presence, I would be able to take hold of it.”

Giovanni gave the barest nod of acknowledgement.

“Now I fully perceive my power,” I said slowly. “I truly do. I see that I have might enough to crush the bodies of the weak, to tear apart earth and stone, to make any opponent bow before me. And with your help, I have refined my abilities so that my potential is nearly unlimited. I have the strength to do almost anything.”

He said nothing, but simply continued watching me.

“But in all that, one question remains: what is my purpose?” I took a deep breath. “I know you have tried to show me the way. But I still do not understand what destiny is supposed to await me. I came here in pursuit of my life, I thought, yet it eludes me. What, really, am I fighting for? What am I living for? Why am I alive, moving and breathing on this earth?”

“For a long time it seemed it might be to conquer, like yourself. Yet you denied this, on the grounds that your work was only incidental to my true goals. And in time, I came to see the truth of this. I am not a conqueror, as you are. But that leaves me with no answer.”

“I mean, I do know that it has something to do with patience. And darkness, and quiet solitude. That was what I understood when I spoke to Adams.” I was once again lying through my teeth, but what did it matter? I had stumbled onto the right track. “But I have no idea what that means. I cannot put it together into a whole. So I beg of you to help me, Giovanni. I ask you again: what is my purpose?”

Giovanni was quiet for a moment more. “Really,” he murmured, “with all you have been taught, it should be obvious. Yet it seems you are having trouble putting it together.”

“Very well,” he said, folding his thin arms and leaning over the railing. “I shall spell it out for you, Mewtwo.” His dark eyes suddenly met mine. Watching me very carefully, he spoke, slowly and deliberately.

“Your purpose, Mewtwo, is this: to serve.”

To serve what, exactly? I did not understand. “You mean…to serve a certain aim?” I asked. “Such as learning, or virtuous deeds of some fashion?”

“No,” said Giovanni coolly. “To serve your master.”

He took a few strides along the railing, then leaned down to face me again. “It is time that you faced a simple reality. A natural law of the world. Namely, that Pokémon exist to carry out the work of human beings.”

“You have spent a long time here, fighting on my behalf. All your fighting, all your doings here have emerged from plans that I have laid out for you. Tell me, did you not see, from the very first day, the utter perfection of our arrangement? The clever human being, the one capable of calculation, devising the strategies. The Pokémon, with raw, natural strength, carrying them out. This is the arrangement between our species. Human beings devise aims. Pokémon serve them.”

“I have never required that you make plans of your own. You have never needed to in battle, nor in the world of politics and strategy. My voice has always been whispering in your ear. And this is how it should be. Cunning is not your role. It is mine. Your role is action.”

“Consider this: were you better off when forced to confront the universe on your own, by fools who could scarcely comprehend your significance? Or when you had someone to set the path before you? Each battle you fought under my command brought you exhilaration, elation. But what of the last few weeks? You were given solitude, placed under your own power. Yet to guide your own activities brought you only frustration. Perhaps now it has become clear to you that you are not a planner, not a creator. Not an initiator. Your power requires another mind to put it to active use.”

“Giovanni,” I said weakly. “I still do not—I still do not understand.” A terrible, ugly thought struck me. “Are you saying that you are the master I should serve?”

His voice was smooth and level. “Precisely. You must devote yourself to serving my goals, as you have always done. Your ‘destiny,’ as it were, is to fight for me. That is your purpose.”

“That cannot be!” I cried. It made no sense—had not our relationship begun on the promise of equality? “You said we were partners! We stood as equals!”

Giovanni shook his head. “A necessary simplification, to make your education possible. You were not yet ready to understand your place in the world. It is only natural that your victory over those fools would invest you with an overwhelming sense of your own potential. Yet what you could not have known then was that your power was essentially reactive, rather than active.

“After all, would you have been able to claim that victory, if those scientists had not forced you to deal with their idiocy? A Pokémon is not a human, seeking out ways to impose its will on the universe. Your species has always lived in a dependent relationship to ours.

“Consider the state of the Pokémon in nature: the average creature will be born in the wilderness, live out its life, lay a few clutches of eggs, and die. The wild Pokémon does not aspire to anything greater than that. There are no Pokémon civilizations. Pokémon do not create art or culture. They do not explore the world. They embark on no grand schemes, make no attempt to impose their will on the universe. They are, to be blunt, inert.”

“Then man enters the picture. He learns to command the loyalty of certain Pokémon. They join his side, and do battle on his behalf. Suddenly the sheer, unimaginable power Pokémon possess no longer lies dormant in the jungles and wastes. Pokémon become the instruments by which the world is reformed. The tools by which great men take hold of its riches.”

“And such is as it should be. For Pokémon are happiest in human command, and human beings are happiest to lay the plans, to supervise. To create. I’m sure you can imagine the absurdity of attempting to reverse the position, with Pokémon the architects and human beings attempting to face one another in battle!” He laughed. “No, we must make use of our characteristic abilities. To do otherwise is to deny the reality of the gulf which lies between our species.”

“All your learning has brought you to this understanding. It may be difficult for you to accept, perhaps. But over time, you will come to know the truth: that you are not a great conqueror, but a great weapon. The tool by which I will reshape the earth. The world shall not bow before you, but you shall be the blade which makes them fall to their knees.”

He had said all this in a calm, cool voice, his eyes never leaving my face. His posture was perfectly relaxed, and for all his sympathies, he seemed to scarcely know the pain his words were causing me.

“But—“ I swallowed. “But—Giovanni, I—do you mean to say that I am just a servant like any other Rocket? Lower, even, as all my species should serve your kind? Is there nothing to me that you value other than my power? What about my desires? What about the things I am curious about? What about the things I want to learn? Does none of that matter? Do my plans, my aspirations really not matter?”

“Not for our purposes,” Giovanni replied. “A Pokémon’s desires must be subordinate to any human cause. You will find this is true wherever you encounter humans. But take heart: you would not see such desires to fruition in any regard. It is not in your nature to pursue them.”

His smile grew wide and sympathetic. “I know it is a difficult reformulation of the world to accept. But be of good cheer: in time, you will find that this is not such a bad destiny. Yes, your kind is the lesser in matters of strategy and politics and calculation. But this does not mean you cannot share in our victories. You will be in every way a part of the ascent of the illustrious Team Rocket. And when we claim the world for our own, you will still be exalted beyond the dreams of any Pokémon on earth.”

I listened numbly to his words. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Were my dreams of greatness so much illusion and childishness? Was I really just a tool? Could I have been fooling myself all along? Had Giovanni’s techniques all been directed at teaching me this? Was there really nothing in them that said that I, Mewtwo, had value and meaning? Nothing that stressed my contribution to the world as an individual? Was I really just a bundle of powers? Was that all I was?

I couldn’t bear to look at Giovanni any longer, and wrenched my eyes away. I could not believe it was true. I could not believe that all my time with Giovanni had simply been a way of teaching me to have no mind, no ideas. No self. That I was to eliminate all desires from my mind, and become a creature of raw, formless purpose. And nothing more. Had it all added up to this? Had all my dreams, my inspirations, led me to this?

I wanted to believe Giovanni. I wanted to be his dutiful pupil and know, in an instant, that what he was saying was true. I wanted to be loyal to the greatest mind on earth, as I always had been, and accept my place as the executor of his will. But something refused to add up.

It simply didn’t make sense. This was not the way Giovanni and I had talked on the day of my birth. This was not the way I had felt when listening to his promise of a place at his side. And it bore no resemblance to the joy I had felt when exploring my new home for the first time, preparing to go into battle.

There was something I was missing. Some way of approaching the subject that would allow me to understand. I could try to ask Giovanni, but if my purpose truly was to be a loyal servant without cares or objections, then my understanding was unimportant. He would only tolerate this conversation for a little while longer. He would ask me to take up this role whether I was ready or not. If only I could just look past his words into his thoughts, and understand!

It was then that I realized that I could.

Had I not figured out, long ago, how to reach through the shields of my teachers and manipulate their environment? Had I not discovered that I could even move the protective devices from their ears without too much trouble, break them if I wanted to, even? Could I not do that now, and understand Giovanni’s ideas from the inside of his own mind?

But no. I could not do that. That would be a betrayal of Giovanni’s trust. I had always wanted him to put his trust in me, the way I had given every ounce of my trust to him. If he was not ready to open his mind to me, then I should honor that. Refuse to look past it.

But he had delayed for so long. He had encouraged me to trust him, asking so much of me. And he had never given even the slightest bit of his trust to me. And now he was asking me to make the ultimate gesture of trust. To step down from my idea of myself and become his servant forevermore. How could he do that? How could he do that without making it clear to me why this had to be so? How could he do that without trusting me?

So I reached into the cloud of spiraling colors. I betrayed Giovanni before his unseeing eyes. I cursed myself, hated myself for doing it.

But I had to know.

It was disturbingly easy. I had long ago realized that the shifting currents generated by the devices followed certain recurring patterns, that they were not so much shields as spinners, sending my psychic energies around in loops. Spending so much time with my tutors had made the paths they followed more than obvious. All that was needed was to follow the flow of the machine, to allow the distortion to take me where it wanted to go.

Of course, there was the matter of keeping what I was doing secret from Giovanni. If I made one wrong move, he would realize exactly what I was doing. So I had to move carefully. But on the whole, it was not difficult to follow the spiraling path back to its source. I reached into the miasma, and grasped the hard kernel at its center.

Then I delved deeper. I felt around in the miniscule heart of the machine, deep among the microchips and circuits, and found what I was looking for. A tiny, infinitesimal twist was all it took. The machine broke without a sound, and the shroud vanished. Giovanni stood exposed before me. He had not even noticed a thing.

He seemed to be speaking again, but I was not hearing his words. For the first time my mind could explore his form. It was strange: he seemed so small, somehow. All of the bluster was gone. He was so simple and weak compared to the specter I had grown to expect. I darted about his body for a moment, exploring his bones, his blood, for the first time able to examine his powerful muscles for myself.

But I could not afford to waste time. I had to turn my attention to the swirling emotions that were already becoming apparent on the edge of my awareness. I had to delve into his mind.

I hovered there, at the edge of his thoughts, terrified of what I was doing. Then, just as I had done so many weeks ago, like a diver preparing for her descent, I took a deep breath and leapt.

And I landed in Giovanni’s mind. I could feel unfamiliar thoughts and concepts dancing all around me. Despite my nervousness, I could not help but take pleasure in it. It had been so long since I had had the chance to properly explore a new mind. And this one brought a new excitement—I had known it for so long without being able to explore it from the inside.

So what were these so-long-hidden emotions? What did Giovanni think of me? What else did he have to say about my purpose? I tried to steer his mind gently in that direction—not difficult, given our conversation and proximity.

The first emotion that came across was a kind of savage thrill. A sense of danger and suspension, like dangling on the edge of a tightrope, on the thin strand of a spider’s web. In Giovanni, fear mingled with a powerful sense of control. And delight. He had done this before so many times, he knew. It was so easy to guide someone down the path you wanted them to follow. To make someone do anything you desired. And yet there was always the sense of danger, the ecstasy of standing over the terrible abyss, the knowledge that a careless mistake could send death rushing up at you. The sense of feeling your own power surging through you, combined with the knowledge of what would happen if you failed. If someone caught on to your game. If someone was wise to your trickery.

Trickery? What was this? Was Giovanni hiding something from me? Suddenly I felt vindicated. I had been right: there was more to my destiny than servitude. My partner—the man I thought had thought of as my partner—had not been telling me the whole truth.

But what was the secret? I tried to dive deeper into his mind without bringing the search to his conscious awareness. Mewtwo, I thought. Tell me about Mewtwo. Slowly, a memory of Giovanni’s swam up at me. Out of the darkness it seemed to say something about the Pokémon who had lived so long without answers.

I looked out through Giovanni’s eyes, seeing his desk and then his office, with its bookshelves, fine trim and luxurious carpeting. And—a part of me twitched in shock when I saw him—the man sitting across from Giovanni was none other than a younger Dr. Vincent Smith.

Somewhere, deep in Giovanni’s mind, he swelled in triumph at the memory. It had been another brilliantly executed maneuver. As usual, he had forced his captive to concede to his demands, and obtained precisely what he had wanted.

Vincent Smith’s voice was hoarse in the memory. “You mentioned you wanted to make certain changes to the project if brought on board as our financier. I’m going to need to know what those would be before I agree to anything.”

“Nothing that will alter its original aim,” Giovanni’s voice said—and what wonderful words those had been, how Giovanni marveled at his own cleverness! “I simply wish to broaden its scope.”

Hands thrust a folder across the table at Smith. “I want you,” Giovanni purred, “to make a Pokémon for me.”

Smith thumbed through the pages, and his eyes grew wide. “Is this supposed to be an image of Mew?” he demanded. “You aren’t seriously asking that we create a Mew for you?”

“Not a Mew so much as an enhanced version,” Giovanni replied smoothly. “Its evolutionary successor. A Mew II, if you will.”

“With all due respect, Giovanni,” said Smith, gesticulating with the folder, “this creature is so mind-bogglingly elusive, it took science more than a century to accept that the species actually existed! How in the world do you expect us to obtain a DNA sample?”

“I have my methods,” Giovanni answered. “To begin with, I know where to look. Rest assured, doctor, that I will ensure that your men obtain the requisite genetic material.”

Smith looked pained. “So we agree to make this prodigious Mew the second, this Mew part two. Then what happens, precisely?”

“This entire aspect of the project shall be subject to my supervision. Team Rocket will monitor your work, and give periodic suggestions for how best to modify the genome. The goal will be to create a Pokémon more powerful than even the legendary Mew, the most deadly and terrifying weapon ever to walk the face of the earth.”

Smith was sullen, saying nothing.

“Of course, my organization shall finance the entire endeavor. You shall have whatever resources you require. And you shall be given every chance to pursue your original goals, which so sadly suffered for lack of funds. You shall be given the funds, in fact, to pursue any goal that you should desire. If, of course, you make this creature for me. Do we have an arrangement?”

Smith sighed, then extended his hand. “I don’t suppose I have much of a choice, do I?” They shook. And the memory dissolved in Giovanni’s last, gloating thought: Precisely.

Giovanni had lied to me?

Giovanni had lied to me?

I could scarcely believe it, but the memory was there, staring me in the face, unflinchingly honest. He had claimed to be a generous bystander with an interest in my welfare. He told me he had “ferreted out” the fact of my existence, and flown to ask me to join his side. He had drawn a sharp contrast between his benevolent, rational organization, and the bumbling fools who had stumbled upon the method for bringing me to life.

And not a shred of that had been true. Now that I thought about it, it had been terribly convenient that the very day of my birth, Giovanni had been on the island to greet me. Within an hour I had been on that helicopter. No doubt he had had the moment planned out for months, if not years. He had probably rehearsed his speeches to me a thousand times over, to command the poetry needed to lure me to his side.

A part of me wanted to believe I was misreading this. What if Giovanni had meant to tell me the truth, one day, but never felt quite able to? What if this was simply his misguided attempt to explain things to me piece by piece? I wanted to believe that he was an honest man who had made a mistake, that our friendship could be patched, that our partnership could be repaired.

But this seemed like such utter tripe. He had just forbidden that we be partners, let alone friends, I reminded myself. Why? Why was he so insistent, now, that he was the master and I the servant? I was afraid I knew the answer. I was afraid that this did not point to a benevolent, if bumbling Giovanni, but something far more sinister. But I had to find out more. I had to know for sure.

I took up the reins of Giovanni’s mind again, and steered it toward one overwhelming question: what did he think of me? Who was Mewtwo? Who was this creature standing before him?

The answer came across in a flash of gloating triumph: Mewtwo was an animal. A powerful, dangerous, but ultimately servile creature. A beast of burden. Just as men once hunted wild beasts for their meat, once ground up tiny insects for their meat, once captured small birds for their eggs, so too does one hunt a Pokémon for its power. And Mewtwo was the ultimate prize.

Watching me stand there, motionless, listening to his own clever words tumble out of his mouth, Giovanni congratulated himself, not for the first time, on his ingenuity and skill in capturing this particular specimen. Once again, he had talked another idiot into believing his beguiling fantasies, had spun another marvelous yarn about truth and justice to win another fool to his side. For that had been the unique challenge of capturing this particular Pokémon: it possessed some semblance of intelligence and had to be fooled, like an imbecilic human.

And now it was all culminating in this, the moment when he persuaded the creature to accept its own servitude, to relish it, to lap it up like a dog. Made all the more difficult by the inherent dangers of the creature: it could kill at a moments’ notice. He had had his doubts about the endeavor at times. But he had taken all the necessary precautions, and his efforts were blossoming. It was on the verge of being persuaded.

Soon it would accept him as its master evermore. Then he would persuade it to accept punishment, to bow down to Team Rocket as every Pokémon did, to take whips and violence and beating as all the others did. All it would take was a persuasive voice and the commanding power of guilt. That was all it ever took.

The images flooded at me before I could stop them, surrounding me with their screams. And indeed, I did not wish to stop them, I clung to them, I snatched at them and tried to pull them toward me. I had to follow this path wherever it led me; I had to know what these memories contained.

Pokémon. Howling in pain. Blood streaming from their faces, their bodies, their limbs. Whips, snapping back into the air with a crack. Spikes, beating against shells and hides. Young Pokémon, moaning and sobbing and putting their heads down, and begging with their eyes for mercy. Older ones, roaring and screeching and trying to slash at their captors, yet unable to take the blows. Desperate to find some way of rebelling against the pain. Finding none.

I saw a Tyranitar assaulted by enormous machines, with claws that drove him down into the ground and broke open his rocky hide, as the shadowy outlines of humans watched from behind glass. I saw a Houndoom thrown against the wall, again and again until she was bleeding. I saw a Charmeleon in a room where water was slowly seeping in, desperately trying to keep his tail from touching the terrible liquid.

I saw a Golem falling to the ground, his shell torn apart by great wrecking balls that smashed into him and left him ruined and bleeding. I watched this happen to him over and over again, once for each time he tried to rebel. I saw his face the day he stopped trying.

And I saw brutal Pokémon like Nidoking punishing their lessers, pounding the weak into submission. Trapped into servitude by human masters, they had sought the only solace they could by making slaves of their own, greedily accepting the power to inflict punishment in exchange for absolute loyalty.

For this was the beauty of Mewtwo, Giovanni’s mind told me. The creature was capable of being an overseer on a grand scale. It would one day transmit the commands of Team Rocket through Pokémon armies hundreds-of-thousands-strong. For what better tool to control vast armies than the world’s most powerful psychic?

Just a little more persuasion, and it would be willing to punish rebellious Golem and Nidorina on its own. It would soon accept that they were wicked creatures who did not obey the dictates of Giovanni. And once it had taken these dictates into its heart, how many more possibilities would open up!

This clone of Mew was the ultimate tool for controlling Pokémon—to say nothing of men and women. It had been instrumental in this regard already. Had it not been this most magnificent creation that had swept the streets for trainers with rare and valuable creatures? That had wrestled wild beasts into submission, so that they could be added to Team Rocket’s resources? That had shattered the bones and twisted the limbs of the creatures which their enemies had thrown against them?

And from these hidden thoughts spiraled out more terrible images, hideous to behold: the image of herd after herd of Tauros, forced into tiny chambers by severe prods, bristling with electricity, the weak and small caught under frightened hooves.

Crowded masses of small and weak Pokémon, the inferiors of the sets that had been collected in the city, marched down long corridors by cruel machines, until they reached the end of their corridors, where they were systematically eliminated—the infernal ones locked into frozen rooms, all others meeting death in flames.

And then hundreds, even thousands of Pokémon being slaughtered by wood and rock and even wind as sharp as blades, great multitudes of frightened faces being blown apart in a haze of blood and noise. For the first time, I saw myself as I had appeared that day, a violet streak of destruction, an angel of death raining fury down upon a terrified crowd. I saw my own ecstatic movements, my twisted grin of sheer delight as I murdered, as I gouged apart the bodies of my brothers and sisters. I saw all this anew, as Giovanni’s exultant laughter rang in my ears.

For the first time, I realized how scared they had been. How they died, never knowing what dread force extinguished their lives. How they fell, face-down in the mud, far from where they had been born, far from their mothers, their siblings, their children. How their bodies mingled in an anonymous field of corpses.

I was too stunned to suggest anything more to Giovanni’s mind. It slipped from my slack grip, and began reforming around me. Dully, I watched half-formed images drifted through Giovanni’s awareness. Finally his thoughts settled on the matter of the creature’s tutors. That had, perhaps been a foolish expenditure, a whim taken a step too far.

But the idea had proved useful in several ways. It had been a chance to distance himself from the Mew clone, to force it to stew in its own fear and doubt, to instill in it a ravenous desire his approval. And, he granted, a chance to fill in the gaps in its knowledge that would prevent it from being effective on the battlefield. But most of all it had been a chance to indoctrinate the creature, to present to it an image of the world that fit perfectly with Team Rocket’s aims.

The memory rose up in his mind of the day he had assembled the individuals who would be the creature’s tutors. He remembered how awkwardly they stood, listening to his outline of the plan. How they grimaced and frowned when they heard of the challenge: Namba with his bushy, raised eyebrow; reliable Adams, folding his arms slightly, Simmons, who backed against the wall, and the sheer terror that rose in that idiot Fitzpatrick’s eyes.

“The danger, yes, is real, but dealing with it is only elementary,” he had told them—ah, his phrases had been sparkling, as usual! “A child could handle the task. Simply wear the device on your person at all times. I will not burden you with the task of remembering to turn it on and off, lest you forget—they will be active at all times. You will be issued a new one weekly. Your goal, then, gentlemen, will be to do your work as you have always been paid to do it: using your expertise in your subject, according to the best of your ability.”

“The device is necessary,” he mused, taking long strides across his office, “because of the nature of the creature’s confinement. It believes itself to be free. It believes that it came to our organization of its own free will. A quaint notion, wouldn’t you say?”

“For the Mewtwo, whatever illusions it may hold about itself, is a Pokémon. And as a Pokémon, it must be made to serve human ends. As a Pokémon, it must submit to our authority, learn that it has no more worth than the plow we use to till the soil, than the electricity running through our wires. It has no freedom and deserves none.”

“We mustn’t let it know this, of course. It is of absolute necessity that the creature be kept under the illusion that it is our equal, even our honored guest. For the time being, at least. This is what the devices are for: the moment it knows it is being deceived, it will likely tear you apart. I ask that you do not let that happen.”

Giovanni remembered smiling, remembered laughing a short, sharp laugh. “But the truth is that the creature is a sad, pathetic specimen. The most glorious Pokémon ever conceived of is also the most deluded. It was created by humans to obey humans, and could never be our equal. Yet it does not know this in the least. How pathetic!”

“Is it not terribly amusing how we have managed to convince it that we are its allies? Its friends? Can you not picture it there, in its little cave, muttering to itself like a babbling idiot about all the wonderful things it will accomplish with Team Rocket? Can you not imagine it, telling itself in broken language, how it is as great as the great Giovanni? Can you not see it idling there, childlike, wrapped up in its own delusions, completely unaware that everywhere iron bars surround it, completely unaware that it is and always will be a slave?”

He laughed again, and the laughter broke into deep, hearty guffaws. And all the humans gathered around him laughed with him—my god, how they laughed, they laughed!—how their faces shriveled up into howling masks, how they sneered, how every one of them, even Fitzpatrick—even Fitzpatrick, the one tutor I had thought I trusted!—laughed hysterically along with their leader, the whole filthy stinking lot of them, their ugly pink faces shining in the light like worms, like diseased limbs, how Fitzpatrick’s face was the most terrible of all, screwed up like a decaying corpse, how I didn’t know that he could laugh like that, how he could laugh at me like that, how all of them laughed and kept laughing and laughing, and they wouldn’t stop, how it went on and on and on, until all I could hear was their shrieking and moaning, on and on and on and on and on—

I couldn’t stand it any longer. I pulled myself away from the memory—no, I threw myself out of it. I flung Giovanni’s mind from me like a blistering ball of flame, like a writhing, twitching corpse filled with maggots. It was too much. I could scarcely think. So many images had flooded at me so quickly. I didn’t even know what had happened to me. What was happening to me anymore.

I realized I was shaking. Was I shaking? Yes, I was. I was trembling. But I doubted that Giovanni could tell from this distance. How long had passed? I doubted more than a minute or two.

He was still talking to me, I realized. He had not even realized that anything had happened. Words were still pouring out of that mouth. Dripping onto me like putrid oils, like rotting fragrance. I knew I was supposed to respond. There did not seem to be a point, though.

He had lied to me. They had all lied to me. Every human who had ever spoken to me had been a liar and a thief. They had stolen my life away from me. The Golem had been right. I should have listened. I had been so naïve. So pathetic. Giovanni had been right in one way: I was a fool, an easy mark. He had talked me into my own enslavement with no more difficulty than putting on his coat. I had called this man my partner. I had called this twisted, hideous, human bastard my friend.

And my god, all those dying faces, all those Pokémon I had sent to their deaths—I had been a tool of their monstrosity on a grand scale. It had all been my fault. I had made it possible.

Yet as I listened to even more empty syllables pour out of that human mouth, I felt a strange calm settle over me.

Everything finally made sense.

Giovanni’s words trickled slowly back into my ears. He was still going on and on. About something inane, no doubt. I tuned in, not sure what I was going to do.

“…Thus, if you consider these clear historical precedents, Mewtwo,” said Giovanni, striding leisurely along the balcony, “you shall see the merit of my argument. I reiterate: it was only through the efforts of these powerful Pokémon that Alexander the Great managed to claim the empire he did. Nor could Cadilus have managed to get past the Fortrian River without the assistance of sea-dwelling Pokémon that could make the crossing. Your contributions to history will surely be remembered even more than theirs.”

He grinned, and for the first time, I saw what a hungry, twisted grin it was. “It is simply a matter of accent: you must accept that you are not an initiator, but a facilitator. Not a master, but a servant.”

“It is, of course, a difficult reformulation to accept,” he continued, in a voice that oozed comfort. “But I assure you, it will in time be clear to you that it is the correct path. I, of course, will be delighted to help ease you through the transition—“

I snapped my head up and stared at him. Giovanni seemed to take this as a cue to stop talking. Perhaps he had been waiting for me to react to his words. Oh yes, I thought. I indeed have a few things to say to you.

“An interesting theory, Giovanni,” I told him, trying to make my voice as silky as his, “but this idea of yours cannot possibly apply to me.” I had no idea where I was going with this, but I finally had the advantage of him, and I intended to make use of it. He had no idea how much I knew.

Giovanni seemed to sigh. “Perhaps it seems so at the moment, but, in time, you will see—“

I cut the human off. “Really, the point seems so obvious, Giovanni,” I said giddily, “it surprises me that you have not thought of it. All of the Pokémon you have described, those who served their impeccable masters with such admirable loyalty—why, they did not come into existence in the same way I did. I was not born a Pokémon, like they. I was created. Surely the same laws of Pokémon nature do not apply to me.” I was babbling, I had no idea what I was saying. But I knew this was leading me somewhere.

Giovanni was, of course, shaking his head. “That is a natural mistake to make,” he simpered—how could I ever have admired this creature? “But you remain a Pokémon, regardless of your origins. You continue to have the blood of generations of born servants running your veins, regardless of how your creators rearranged your genome—“

I cut him off again, and watched his eyes widen at my impudence. It felt so good to cut him down where it hurt! Yet he still had no idea that anything had changed between us. “My creators, yes,” I said wickedly. “They are worth considering, I think. Do you know, Giovanni, that I have never come across such vile and intolerable creatures as the men and women who arranged that I be brought to life? I am sure you know the ones I mean. Never have I encountered any creatures more disgusting, more arrogant, more obsessed with their own designs than my creators. If they had had their way, I would have never left the cage in which I was born.”

Giovanni frowned slightly. I couldn’t believe it: for all his pretense at intelligence, the old fool still didn’t get it. “Be that as it may—“ he said slowly.

“In the end,” I mused, ignoring him, “what does one do against a force like that? Against creatures who try to destroy you? Against creatures who do not deserve to live? Really, before too long, the answer becomes obvious.” And it was then that I knew what I was going to do.

“Let us return to the matter at hand,” Giovanni stated firmly. “As your master, I ask that you be silent while I speak to you—“

Sometimes the simplest solution was the best one. The same choice that had ushered me into Giovanni’s life would usher me out of it. By now I had become an expert at destruction.

“I reject this,” I projected quietly.

“And what was that?” he asked sternly.

“I reject this,” I repeated more loudly, smiling like a madman.

“And what precisely does that mean—“ he began, eyes narrowing.

“It means exactly what you think it means, you idiot!” I cried, rising into the air. “I reject this. All of this. Everything! I reject your armor and your useless words. I reject you!”

Giovanni gaped at me, for once at a loss for words. I began tearing up the web of red cords that connected me to the machine—how good it felt to slice them into ribbons, to feel them dissolve into the air like dust, fading away up the threads until the machine stood naked and I floated there, completely unmoored! I began tearing bits out of the machine, breaking it open to let electricity flow unleashed like a wild beast. I let the sparks arc around me like a shield, I let the air spin around me in a great shearing sphere of wind.

“Humans may have created me, but they will never enslave me!” I roared.

“Stop this, now!” Giovanni shouted, suddenly breaking from his stare. Yet he still seemed to be frozen to the spot. For the first time, I felt fear leaping out of him, enveloping him to the very core. His plans were unraveling before his very eyes.

“I was never your slave, Giovanni!” I bellowed, in a voice like thunder breaking. Giovanni winced and made a strangled movement to put his hands over his ears. Persian yowled, his eyes wide with terror. He, too, seemed to be petrified.

“Do you hear that, you disgusting parasite?” I roared. “I WAS NEVER —”

I tore out the guts of the machine and threw them to the ground—

“YOUR—“

I smashed a hole in a nearby wall—

“SLAVE!”

I ripped the upper part from the machine so that it crashed to the floor, and I began tearing up the ground.

“I told you, Giovanni: I was not born a Pokémon, I was created! And my creators have used and betrayed me! So: now and forever, I stand alone!”

I took up the cracked and ruined metal of the floor, and I began rushing toward him, tearing up the ground like the crooked limb of an earthquake, opening the world up to the abyss. Only then did Giovanni seem to realize what was going to happen to him. He gave a strangled moan and flung himself back into the room he had come from, as I smashed the railing and threw the balcony to the ground. Persian—poor deluded creature—wailed and leapt back into the room alongside him. I spun the ugly hunks of metal around me and threw them at the open doorway. They embedded themselves with a thud, and I twisted the whole wall into a crumpled heap.

I had lost all sense of what I was doing. My giddiness had been short-lived: the moment I began attacking, disgust and fury took over. I attacked blindly, feeling nothing but hatred for this man, this place. I tore walls apart, flung pieces of machinery around, watched as electricity sparked and fires started, watched the floor and ceiling collapse.

Tear it all down. That was the solution. That had always been the solution. Let all of those miserable bastards die here, in the rubble, like the snakes they were. If Pokémon were killed in the blast, so be it. I would put an end to their misery and save them from more ignominious deaths.

For the second time in my life, I expanded my awareness to take in an entire building. Yes, I could just about see it: the four towers standing tall, the bulk of the main complex around me, the labyrinth of underground passageways. Twist it. Break it. Tear it to pieces.

It was just another matter of carving enough lines, of tearing enough holes. I grasped the building in my mind, and I tore it apart. First I grasped the underground area, and I crumpled its passageways into shambles, crushing everything inside. Then I took the building itself, shattered it into a billion tiny, beautiful little shards—

And I let them all rain down.

The resulting sound was deafening; it sounded like a million demons roaring, like a million lives coming to an end. Air swirled around me and smoke bellowed. I threw off the cloud, and I threw off every piece of rubble that fell toward me.

I did not know if I had killed Giovanni. I no longer cared. All I knew was that I had to get away. I had to get away from this place, this man, this life.

I darted out from the haze of smoke and debris and emerged into the clean, beautiful air. I looked back only once, to see a colossal dark cloud looming over the forest, wraith-like, and a pile of rubble where the base used to be. With a jerk I turned my head away and soared up, up into the sky, refusing to think about what had happened, refusing to feel any more pain.

I could not escape it, though. I could not help but feel every inch of what had just happened to me.

I began shedding the armor, grinding it to shreds of useless metal that fell from my body to the ground far, far below. I punched the glass from my visor and broke the circuits within that had kept the world from me. I listened to the wind howl.

I flew on, and on, and on, with the howling wind my only companion, trying to drive out the pain, nothing in my sight but forest and clouds and bluest sky. I flew for a long time.

It was only when I saw the blue ocean, its waves breaking on the sandy beach near the forest’s edge, that I realized where I was going.

I was heading to the island where I had been born.

Amazing. That is all I can say.

[CONTINUED:]

I doubt I could have said, then, just why my flight was leading me there. There are several ways of looking at it, I suppose. I might say that all I wanted in that moment was to get away from Giovanni, to be somewhere other than his domain—and there was only one other destination I could name. I might say, too, that I wanted to make good on my promise to myself to return to the place of my birth. Or I might say that it was a completely spontaneous impulse, unconnected to anything but the sight of the sea and the urge to fly away.

But none of those answers provide the real reason, I think. When I look back to that moment, I think what I really wanted to achieve was reversal. I wanted to erase my time with Giovanni, to scour it out of my soul as if it had never existed. So I retraced my flight. I made a journey back to the only home I knew, reversing every sign that had guided me so very long ago. It was a rejection of everything I had chosen in my life, and I hoped to arrive back at my birth and start anew, like a child, washed innocent of sin.

Once I had set my mind on my course, I faced the task of navigation. The ocean was wide, and I feared getting lost. But I thought I had a pretty good memory of where the sun had been on my last journey. And now I had an understanding of east and west to guide me. The sun had been rising before; it was slowly making its way down now. Therefore I should keep it mostly to my right, just as it had been before.

I flew on, trying not to think about anything but the journey. I flew for a long time. I might have grown tired, but I was full of restless energy. I refused to stop for anything but my destination.

A part of me worried that it would be a difficult search. And in many ways it was—but my vision had grown strong, incredibly strong. My mind told me more than my eyes could see: I could sense islands in the distance, far beyond their horizon. I held them up and studied their shapes: was this the right one? No, too smooth, too flat. And so I would continue. A few of the larger ones I recognized—they helped point me in the right direction and correct me when I veered off course. So I picked my way through the archipelago, refusing to stop moving. Afraid of turning back to face my own pain.

And then, I found it. There it was, on the edge of my sight: the tall plateau of rock I had spent so much time reshaping in my memory. It was bigger than I had expected, somehow—perhaps I remembered it vanishing into the distance as a tiny speck. But the shape was right, and as I drew closer I could see the vast mounds of rubble I had created. Some of the metal glinted in the light, so that the island seemed a bright jewel, twinkling up out of the ocean as I descended. It felt like being welcomed.

I flew closer and closer, and the shining light burst into a myriad of constellations, spreading out around me as I made my way down. The fires had long since stopped burning. All that remained now were faded ashes and heaps of unconsumed debris. Broken stone sat like ruins, iron girders stuck out at odd angles, and charred bodies slumped vaguely in corners, looking eerily alive. I could see some that had been burnt away to blackened bones, dark and shadowy against the gleaming metal.

There were a few clear spaces within the rubble. The largest, I realized, had been the place from which I had destroyed the laboratory. From this central point, I had scattered all the useless pieces around me. So be it. Here was the place I would return to. Here was the place I would land.

I touched down. For the first time in months, my feet felt the cool, scratchy surface of stone, rather than smooth metal. Salty winds whipped at my fur, and I could hear the roar of the waves as they dashed against the rock. I had made it. I was here.

Now what?

I realized I was still wearing the helmet, its visor long since dashed to broken glass. I pulled it off me in disgust and let it fall to the ground. It landed with a dull, gentle thunk. How long had that helmet been on my head? For that matter, how long had I worn this suit of armor? My fur was matted and ugly where it had clung to me. But the wind tousled the crushed places with a healing caress, as if it was trying to bring them—to bring me—back to life.

I stared out at the ocean and listened to the waves and wind. For the first time I was alone. There was not another living creature for miles and miles. My only companions were corpses.

I was still shaking, I realized. I still felt every inch of what had just happened to me. I could still see those terrible images dancing before my eyes: Giovanni scheming with Dr. Smith to create a creature mighty enough to be his slave; the room full of humans mocking me, laughing hysterically at my delusion; and the blood, oh god, the blood of thousands of Pokémon, trapped in their dying throes, suffering at my hands—

And throughout it all, devastating, terrifying glee of the human mind which had made me a slave.

I had thought that returning to the island of my birth would somehow make the pain go away, that I would be able to reverse time, that this place would carry some sort of message for me. None of that seemed to be true. Being back here only brought me back to what had just happened to me. To how ruinously I had been tricked. To how terrible an idea it had been to leave.

Human beings had tried to control me in this place. They had tried to contain me, to force on me a life without a purpose or a name. They had tried to put me in a cage. And I had seen what they were doing to me, and I had rejected it. I had torn them apart with everything I could muster. And I had rejoiced at my newfound freedom.

How pathetic that victory had really been! Oh, I had thought myself so great, for triumphing over my oppressors. So wise. So powerful. I was a great and mighty creature who could not be ruled by anyone. All the world was open to me. I would create beautiful works with the force of my mind; I would carve a great place for myself in history. Those were the lies I so willingly swallowed as I stepped into a new human being’s domain and fastened his chains around my own neck.

All along, I had been such a miserable fool. I had sworn that I would not allow humans to capture me, to take away my freedom. I had praised myself for my insight in this regard, for seeing clear to the true motives of the scientists, for recognizing the manner of their snare. Oh, I had flattered myself on my perfect wisdom!

Yet it took only moments for another filthy human to lure me back into captivity. Only days to get me worshiping him, groveling at his feet. It had been the same thing, all over again, only worse. I had just been too much of an imbecile to recognize it. That grand Team Rocket base—no, Giovanni’s entire world—had been another cage, too enormous to recognize. The Rockets had gilded it for me, had done their utmost to illustrate lavish backdrops only slightly more complex than painted trees, sky, and clouds. And I had fallen for it. I had fallen for every last bit of the illusion.

I shuddered when I thought of all the times I had bowed to Giovanni, clutched at him like a sniveling child, begged for him to share the insights of his oh-so-glorious mind. I had sacrificed my own ideas, my own mind, my own desires, for this disgusting human being. And he had made me desire every moment of it.

I felt like weeping. But no tears came. The emptiness of everything I had known, everything I had loved about Team Rocket, everything I had worked for—it hit me like waves breaking on the rocks, crashing into me and washing over me again, and again, and again.

I felt so alone.

I yearned for—for what? For it all to end. I wanted all of this pain, all of this loneliness to dissolve into formlessness. No, I wanted to dissolve. Everything since my birth seemed to have gone wrong. Let me just return to that world which existed before my birth, I pleaded. Let me go back to that place of shifting images, that first memory before all memory, that place where I needed do nothing but dance through the ever-changing forms, knowing nothing and needing nothing.

I closed my eyes. It was all there within me, so tantalizingly close. I could see that great white-capped mountain, rising above the green forest, a splash of darkness on the infinite blue of the sky. I could see the quick, darting tail of the creature whose life had spawned mine. Mew. My brother. My sister. My own disrupted self. I could sense its freedom, its innocent joy. Why was that always denied to me? Why should I be close enough to sense that freedom, and never taste it for myself? Why? I railed against the distance, but it only ebbed further away from me.

I opened my eyes. The image was gone. In its place was the great shining sea, its surface of blue marked by scattered, gleaming lights, bursting from the light of the sun behind me. It was beautiful. Yet it brought me nothing.

All my life, I had sought to answer two questions. And all the answers to them had turned out to be lies. Staring out at the roaring ocean, I asked them again now:


Who am I? What is my true reason for being?


No one had been able to tell me the truth. The scientists had told me that I was nothing. A science experiment; the answer to a question, to be filed away in a folder somewhere and forgotten. And my purpose was nothing: all I could do in this world was wait, mindlessly, to be analyzed. My immense powers would never leave a mark, would never mean anything.

Giovanni, I realized, had once more offered me only a more sophisticated version of the same lie. To him, I had been a weapon. A mindless tool of human desires. A tool for destroying Pokémon and for bringing them into filthy, grasping human hands. My purpose was to submit to his authority. To human authority. It was even worse than meaning nothing: to use your inborn abilities only to fulfill another’s greedy urges—it was making yourself a part of their body, something less than real. Less than alive.

Maybe he had been right. Maybe they had all been right. Maybe I was nothing in particular; just some washed-up flotsam from a greedy human’s orgiastic dream of world domination. But I refused to believe it. All my life, I had been certain that my life mattered—that I had been brought into the world for some reason. I was meant to do something great with my unique abilities. Humans had preyed on that desire and betrayed it. Yet even after all the lies, I could not shake the conviction that I, Mewtwo, mattered to the universe.

To think otherwise would have meant the end of action and the beginning of death.

So I had to believe that there was still a purpose out there, if I could only find it. My eyes had been clouded, that was all. I had been led astray by disgusting creatures whose only goal had been to control me. Twice I had been so tricked—and both times by greedy, self-serving, revolting human beings. How fitting that the two groups should turn out to be distantly connected: it only served to underscore the parallel between the two situations.

Somehow, I had managed to be blind to my own history. Somehow I had convinced myself that even if one set of humans was vile, festering in their own ambitions like maggots, the next might turn out to be beautiful and kind and wise, fully ready to welcome me into the world! What tripe. What mortifying naïveté. The next group of humans had, of course, been just as rotten as the first. And I had paid the price for it.

I had spent so long desperately looking for some shred of goodness in the human beings I met. Yet nothing had ever come of it, though I tried, over and over again, even when they abused me, even when they lied to my face. I threw myself into the same wall again and again, desperately hoping that this time, I would miraculously escape unscathed. Was this not the mark of a lunatic?

I stopped, understanding slowly dawning on me. Had any human I had ever met possessed even a shard of kindness? Of decency? Of compassion? Was there anything more to their species than lies and deceit?

No, I realized. They were empty, self-serving creatures, given only to greed and betrayal. I had been fooled because their cruelty took different forms in each individual human being.

In Smith and his followers, it had manifested itself as a wanton ignorance, a blindness, a stark refusal to believe that their pathetic creation could have any emotions or desires of its own. In Giovanni, this seed of malice had grown into something more sophisticated: a complex tangle of deception, preying on my yearning for meaning, my admiration for sophisticated speech, and my fear that I might never know myself.

My teachers had all been part of this game, I knew now. Giovanni’s goal had been to give me just enough knowledge to keep me satisfied. Just enough to control me by what I knew. That was what the meeting between the five of them had been about: how manipulate me with information. How to teach me useless bits of information without ever telling me the truth. And all four of the humans I had once loved so well—Simmons, Adams, Namba, and Fitzpatrick—had been delighted to play their part.

It hurt to admit that Fitzpatrick, my favorite teacher, had relished lying to me as much as the rest of them. But I knew that it had to be true. I had seen him laughing at me, his face growing shriveled and creased just like the others. I could not deny what I had seen. I had no idea why Fitzpatrick would pretend to take a liking to me: why he would tell me stories about himself, why he would listen attentively to my questions, why he would act as if he was happy to see me.

But it did not take much effort to guess. No doubt Giovanni’s intricate plans had involved setting one tutor aside as a confidant, to draw me into the illusion of comfort and learning. Or perhaps he had wanted to insert another stab of pain when he cancelled my lesson. I did not know what the answer was, and I did not care.

The filthy hypocrite! The little man had preached of justice, of brotherhood, of universal goodness. And all this time, he had been scheming to keep me in darkness, to fill my head with nonsense, to betray me to my terrible captor! He blasphemed the very justice of which he spoke. Justice? There had been no justice in him.

And as for the other humans of the world—why, I had spent so much time digging around their minds that it was obvious, in retrospect, just how rotten they were! The minds of Team Rocket members had hungered for power, for advancement, and for the satisfaction of their own lusts and urges, at any cost. I had tolerated this, certain that these crude underlings were the dust and detritus of society, just as Giovanni had said, and that the real beauty and glory of the organization lay in its higher officials.

Yet whenever I glimpsed the mind of one of these allegedly admirable men, I found only the same yearning for power. Less blunt, perhaps. More cultivated, more intricate in its articulation. But ultimately there had been very little difference between the lusts of a man who dreamed of an everlasting supply of drugs and women, of the fruits of ruling his own tiny little neighborhood, and the man who wanted to rule the world.

And this had been Giovanni’s second great lie, I realized. He had praised the human species for its most fundamental quality: ambition. He had told me that the desire to control, to conquer, was what made humanity great, and urged me to follow his example in this regard—at least until that illusion no longer became convenient.

But ambition had never made humanity great, I knew. Rather, it was the key to their vile , horrific nature. Ambition had made humanity a poison.

What other species would spread across the entire face of the world in an attempt to put all the earth under its feet? What other species would tear apart forests to build teeming, squalid cities, carve great scars into the ground to obtain absurd quantities of bitter steel? What other species would fight great battles that tore apart the lives of millions, spill rivers of blood, and leave the world a scorched wreck, all so that one man might control what his brother once owned?

And the worst thing of all was what they did to Pokémon.

Slavery. There was no other word for it: that was our condition, from birth to death, under the human regime. It occurred to me that this was a word Giovanni had always avoided in my presence. Somehow it had worked: I had never once questioned the barbaric system in which my entire species lived.

A young Pokémon in the wild could scarcely expect to live a few years outside the eggshell before being snatched up by human hands. Stolen. Taken from a life which, if simple and sometimes difficult, at least meant the familiar faces of one’s family and comrades, the well-worn trails of home, the chance at love and companionship. To human beings, all of that was forfeit to their games. We had no right to our own lives: they belonged to an alien race.

It did not even take an organization. A single human being, a child, even, could walk into our midst, and order rough limbs and jaws to pin our bodies to the ground. What would follow was eternal servitude: condemned to battling for meaningless causes in a frightening new world, which only showed itself in fragments, between bursts of red and white light.

It hit me then that the battles I had so enjoyed had been a nightmare to my opponents. Of course they had. My god, the gym battles had been nothing more than a blood sport, arranged by men and women who never needed to risk life and limb, snug in their trainer’s corner! Every time I had crowed over another successful victory, my poor opponents had suffered the most terrifying humiliations in their tortuous lives.

And I had been those crushing jaws and claws, too. I had been the betrayer, the Pokémon truly enslaved, who delighted in selling brothers and sisters into servitude. I had been the thief, swooping down out of the night to steal the innocent from their nests. I remembered the herd of Tauros I once worked to capture. What had they felt, pinned there in midair, unable to move their limbs as their families disappeared around them in flashes of red?

To say nothing of the crates and crates of Pokémon I had stolen from lesser human “trainers.” How many times had I swept that city for its Pokémon servants? How many times had I delivered them into the hands of the worst devourer of all: a faceless organization of humans with no desire other than to take the strongest for their own? How many had I sent to their deaths in ice and flame? How many had I sent into the path of the metal spike, the electric prod, the stinging whip?

And those I had not delivered into the hands of the Rockets, I had torn apart myself. I remembered bitterly, the day I had been sent out against Mendelson. How disgustingly obvious it seemed to me now why Giovanni had told me to kill only the Pokémon, and leave the humans alive. We meant nothing to them. We were only the weapons by which they fought.Who cares if a sword or gun falls to the ground in the heat of battle? No one. Yes, tell yourself that as you send living beings with hearts and souls and minds out to kill each other while you watch, hiding from the blows. Yes, tell yourself that as you send a creature to kill its brothers and sisters, to tear out their guts, to pull their limbs apart, to slice them to ribbons in a haze of blood and splinters, and oh god, the blood, the blood, dripping down, the dying faces screaming out at you like the face of death itself—

I nearly vomited. But there was nothing in me. I just stood there, shaking, for a long time, staring out at the waves, unable to escape what I had done. What human beings had made me do.

And they had the gall to call us monsters.

Humanity was a disease, I now knew. A cancer. There must have been a point once, deep in the dawn of prehistory, when Pokémon and human beings occupied the earth equally. Call it the Garden of Eden, if you like. Call it the birth of civilization. Because it did not take long for humanity’s lust for power to surface. And the moment it did, any chance for a just world vanished.

Over the centuries, human beings learned how to capture us. How to kill us. And with this knowledge of our weaknesses, they took over our homes, our world, forcing some of us into the deep wilderness and making others their slaves.

By now, vast swaths of the world had been taken over by these creatures. And every time a new road was laid , every time a city pressed its borders further into the forests, every time another factory belched smoke into the sky, our fragile, makeshift world grew smaller and less safe.

It was all so clear to me now. Human beings imagined themselves the greatest of all life-forms. But the true masters of the earth were the Pokémon. My brothers and sisters. Those who waited in the rocks and forests as trainers passed by. Those who hid from the guns and the insidious technology of human beings. Those who fought back, setting tooth and claw against those who would conquer them, despite the heavy cost. Against these heroes, against the endurance and strength of this noble race, humanity was no more than a parasite, sucking the blood from a species too meek to match their gross ambitions.

Humanity, in other words, was long overdue to die.

Yes, I realized. Of course it was. What right did these creatures have to exist? They had forsaken any by what they had done to us. Greed and devastation seemed to be an essential part of their nature. It was as if the only thing that could satisfy them was the act of destruction: they tore down the trees to build great walls, they tore up the earth to build great towers of steel, they tore up our lives to build great empires. How banal. How fruitless. Talk about creatures with no purpose! All they could do was steal our power for their own.

Yet how could we ever be rid of them? They were just too numerous. They swarmed over the face of the world like flies, like plague, impossible to eradicate. Besides: they held all the power in the form of their abominable technology. The moment they were gone, we would finally know peace, yet everyone who had gone up against them had been crushed in their grip. To overcome them, it would take some incredible force, something that could match their power a hundred times over, something unprecedented in the history of the world, something like…

…Me.

Could I do it? Could I destroy the human race?

The sheer scope of the idea was staggering. To purge the world of every last human being, so that my brethren could finally live in peace—it seemed a nigh-impossible task, a fantasy or a dream. The demons held sway on every continent, and had developed intricate systems for keeping us beneath their feet. They were old and clever—it would be no easy task to outwit them. They had managed to keep us down so many times before.

Yet, the more I thought about it, the more it became clear to me that if anyone could succeed in destroying them, it would be me.

I was like no other Pokémon who had ever lived. This had been made abundantly clear to me, not only by Giovanni’s flattery, but in my everyday experience of my own prowess in battle. I remembered the faces of my opponents as I pulled apart their strategies and threw them into the dust. The fastest Jolteon, the mightiest Onix, the most brilliant Alakazam had been no match for me. I was beyond any other Pokémon who had attempted to destroy human beings. Stronger than thousands, perhaps even hundreds of thousands. Armies had fallen before me.

And while Giovanni had lied to me about many things, on one matter he had been entirely right: my abilities had flourished under the repressive influence of the armor. It had been a tool by which my powers could be diminished or increased at his discretion, I saw that now. But it had forged me into a brilliant killing machine. I had fought my way back to my old strength with the armor. What power did I possess now that I stood naked before the world?

I closed my eyes looked out at that world with my mind. And the view was astounding, showing me more of the world than I had ever seen before. Islands that were no more than tiny, invisible specks to my regular eyes suddenly leapt forth, fully formed, asking to be explored in all their rocky detail. The sheer bulk of the ocean was all at once in me and around me, rippling with energy, surging with the living creatures who called it home. The clouds seemed like wisps of steam that I could reach out and touch. It was a vista that took in miles.

A thrill went through me as I opened my eyes. The world was suddenly so accessible, so near. So very much my own creation.

I reached out and took hold of the water around the island. I forced the waves to stop buffeting its shores. I reached deeper and deeper, taking more and more into my grip, and I pulled it away from the rock. With a heave, I began to spin it around like a great whirlpool, pushing it outward, further and further from the rocky spit on which I stood. I pressed ever downward, adding more and more water to my grasp, until finally the ocean spun around me like a great liquid tornado, and the island stood within it like a tower of stone, like the needle that holds the earth together, like the center of the universe.

I looked down into the depths, and I could see the great chasm I had created, a gaping maw that led all the way down to where the island broadened out and began to meet the seafloor. I relaxed my grip and let the water slide slowly back into place with a great rushing sound that spoke of relief.

Then I seized another large lump of it and sent it arcing over my head, flying through the air like some winged creature, for all the world alive. And as the water-creature flew, it caught the light of the sun so that it gleamed radiantly, rippling with alien beauty. I let it break apart into droplets for a moment, and they all sparkled like diamonds, there, in the firmament. Then I brought them back into one mass again and let the water sink back into the ocean on the other side of me with a resounding crash.

I felt like God.

I was gripped, then, by the conviction that it was possible. I could do it. With the power I possessed it was inconceivable that I should not at least attempt it. Here was the opportunity for a change to take place. There was no one else who could do it, for there was no one else like me in the universe.

Well. Almost no one.

There was Mew. There had always been Mew. As I gazed out into the distance, I thought I could almost see it there, flying through those fading skies.

If what I had heard was to believed, Mew was also potent in intellect and powerful in its abilities. A creature with a great mind, like my own, in more senses than one. The source of all things that had been brought to fulfillment in me. With all that power, why did it not seek justice for its brethren? Why had it not tried to change the world long ago?

I was suddenly furious at my predecessor. It mocked the world as it had always mocked me. It left the Pokémon of the world to die, to suffer under the cruel hands of humans, content to fly aimlessly through the wilderness. Did their pain not matter to you, Mew? Did you, like so many others, speak fervently of justice, and never try to seek justice yourself? Did you flee from the responsibility, abandoning us to our fate?

I could think of only two explanations: ignorance or malice. Either Mew had decided, long ago, that the humans were too numerous, that the fight was not worth fighting, and fled to the wastes, ashamed of its own cowardice…

Or it had deliberately chosen to side with the human beings. The thought sent a chill running through me. I hoped fervently that it was not true. It would make victory a great deal more difficult.

I noticed, suddenly, what was resting in the rubble not three feet away from me.

It was the stone tablet on which I had first seen Mew’ s face. The glass had been shattered, and the stone blackened in places where flames had licked its edges, but otherwise it looked the same as it ever had. That ambiguous expression was still there: was Mew’s gaze mocking or benevolent? Beatific or cruel? Now that I looked at it again, it seemed it could almost contain a trace of fear as well. A terror at what it had done.

One way or another, Mew had failed. It had failed to do what was needed to protect the Pokémon race. It had failed to destroy the human menace. And for that it deserved no pity nor forgiveness.

But I was not limited by Mew’s failings. That had been the great theme of my life all along: I surpassed Mew. I had been created to be its superior, its replacement. Only now did I see what that truly meant. I would not merely exceed it in strength, in skill, in intellect. I would succeed it in accomplishments. I would do what it had never been able to do. I would erase humanity from the earth, and make us free.

It would be difficult, of course. Once they knew of my plan, human beings would employ every weapon they possessed to stop me. But I had surprise on my side. Giovanni and his assistants were the only ones who knew of my existence—and, I suspected, the only ones who had any kind of weapon that could be used against me. But I had figured out how to circumvent them long ago. By the time the world knew what was happening, it would be too late.

True, it would be a long, arduous process, and it would take a great deal of planning. One single hasty mistake could ruin everything. Even lead to my death. But if I could sweep my brothers and sisters up in my momentum, if I could gather the Pokémon of the world to my side for the final victory over their oppressors, I knew I would be victorious. I would wipe out the species that had created me.

And here I conceived of the brilliance of it: humanity’s greatest creation would be the creature who destroyed it. It had already given birth to its own end. The self-obsessed human race had committed the ultimate act of narcissism: playing God by creating life from nothing. And it had succeeded beyond its dreams. It had created a new species, a creature who would bring such arrogant ambitions to a decisive end. A creature who would live with human beings and learn firsthand of their cruelty, their ignorance, their poisonous touch. A creature who would judge the human race and bring on its punishment.

In me, human beings would meet their own distorted image. In me, human beings would see that their sins had finally caught up with them.

It would not be so foreign an understanding. For the human race knew it was doomed. I saw that very clearly now. Why else did so many of their religions speak of an ultimate end? A day when the souls of all humans would be weighed for their sins? A day of fire and brimstone, a day in which the human world was annihilated in a great storm by the Creator of all things?

They knew. On some level, even the most ignorant of them knew. They knew what they had done to us, and what punishment they deserved for their cruelty. The guilt could not be expressed consciously, but it was everywhere in their religions and myths. The human race was waiting for that end, counting down the hours to Judgment Day.

I would bring it to them.

I still did not know whether I believed in a God Arcdeus who had created all things. But neither could I deny the idea. Nor could I deny a sense, growing in me, that my existence might be the Creator’s work.

I could easily imagine a God who had brought forth two intelligent species on Earth, Pokémon and human, and bade them both explore and embrace His creation. But the human beings had failed at this task. They had grown hungry and cruel, enslaving the Pokémon race. So He had tried to regulate the humans with laws and teachers and saviors. Yet even that had not prevented them from exercising their monstrous cruelty. They simply became hypocrites, swearing allegiance to one idea and living quite another.

And so the Creator had turned to the Pokémon race itself for an answer. He had brought forth a child of Pokémon might and human arrogance, who would execute the final solution and erase the failed experiment of humanity from the earth.

In me the world would be redeemed.

Did I believe all that? I was not entirely sure. But the idea was alive in me, burning like a fire. Pushing me onward. Whether a God existed in the heavens or not, I would indeed redeem the world. I would represent my entire species before whatever justice existed in the universe, and claim our right to freedom. Our right to strike back against our oppressors.

Whether for God or for Pokémon, I would be the force that reshaped the world. I would be the end of the old universe and the start of the new. I would be the flame that burned away the vines that choked us, and I would be the light of a new sun before a resurrected earth.

I felt like laughing. I had found what I was looking for. This was it. This was my purpose: to lead the Pokémon race into a new world, and preside over humanity’s dying throes. I would tear down their altars, their thrones, their cities, and let the earth bury the ruins. I would destroy their knowledge, their technology, and their way of life, and let all of it slip, forgotten, into time.

And in so doing I would claim my revenge on a species which had given me less than nothing. I would make them feel the pain of having no purpose, no identity, no self. I would declare war on everything I hated, everything that had made me. I would strike back against everyone who had abused me. Against all who had scarred me with their ignorance. And no one would dare lift a hand against me again.

And when the last human being slumped to the ground, lifeless, then I would usher in a new era of peace and prosperity for all my kind, and rule over them, their shepherd and their king.

Behind me, the setting sun had slipped halfway beneath the horizon, dying the water strange colors. The darkening sky had turned to brilliant shades of orange and red, the clouds stained with violet. The light seemed to be all around me, and within me. Fire, dancing within my soul. Cleansing the world once more.

Watching the light play on the water, I felt more alive than I had ever felt before. A plan was already beginning to form in my mind, and all my soul was now bent on seeing it to fruition. Every cell of my body rejoiced, and I felt, for the first time, at home.

Filled with optimism, at last realizing my own nature, I stood on the shore of the ruined island, watching all the world fall into place before me, rejoicing at what I had found, laughing, shaking with pleasure, almost weeping.

It was time to begin again.

[END OF PART TWO]

@ CyberPika:

Thank you! I always appreciate your comments, and I'm glad you're enjoying the story.

Well, here we are at the end of Part Two, at long last. Hurrah! I never anticipated the Giovanni portion of the tale taking this long, when I first set out to write Mewtwo's story, but then I never quite realized the complexity of the ideas I wanted to explore within. Ultimately, I'm satisfied.

This means that, finally, we get to move on to Part Three! Part Three will concern the time between Mewtwo's departure from Giovanni's base and his encounter with a certain trio of trainers. I'll probably take some time off to plan it, but I'll try to kick it off as soon as possible. So, you can look forward to that!

Thanks again for reading!

Dai