This work is fiction. The work has no relationship with any person existing at any time anywhere whether real or imaginary or copywritten. Everything in this work is mea culpa.
This work is the property of Kerrik Wolf (saethwyr@ (SPAM) hotmail.com). Please remove (SPAM) to contact me.
You should not read this work if you are under the age of legal consent wherever you reside. This work may or may not contain any and/or all of the following: death, dismemberment, violent acts, implied sex, explicit sex, violent sex, rape, cannibalism, blasphemy (depending on your religion), BDSM, torture, mimes, and just about anything unwholesome that you could consider.
The pokegirl universe was first documented by Metroanime and to him all of us who reside or visit there owe a debt of thanks.
Feedback is encouraged. I enjoy hearing from people. Positive feedback will be appreciated, cherished and flaunted in front of people. Negative feedback will be appreciated, cherished and listened to, that I might continue to grow. Flames will give me a good laugh. Feedback may be delivered to: saethwyr@(SPAM) hotmail.com. Please remove (SPAM) to contact me.
Chapter 7
Jamie followed Ginevra down the street, staying the regulation three paces behind her. He was wearing a shapeless gray tunic and pants. An ornate bracelet gleamed on his left wrist. His hair had been shorn almost to his scalp and he looked directly at the daimon’s ankles as they walked.
For six months, he and his grandfather had been visiting worlds in their search for someplace acceptable to move the family to. It was kind of confusing, since Kerrik assured him that they would actually only be gone from what he was calling pokegirl prime for about an hour, and would still have the three months to prepare to leave along with everyone else.
So far, the results had been uniformly disappointing. Most of the worlds were almost identical to the one they’d left behind; which meant that the same problems would eventually arise there. They’d gone ahead and scouted them out, but the final determination was that they would be useless.
On a good dozen worlds, a war was raging between the various leagues and Sanctuary. Who was winning depended on which world they’d visited but, as Kerrik had pointed out, the civilian populations had been the losers in every case.
On several of the worlds, they’d found nothing but feral pokegirls. Humans had been either wiped out by the Red Plague or had been overcome by the feral population long before they arrived. Kerrik had marked them in his notes for use in raw materials and they had moved on.
On one world, the Red Plague had worked perfectly and wiped out most of the pokegirls. There, humanity thrived. Kerrik had merely muttered something about how even Chinese got something right once in a while, usually by accident. Madison had asked what that meant, which had elicited a long dissertation on magical diseases and how they functioned that had left Jamie’s head spinning. According to Kerrik, the accomplishment was about as unlikely as throwing a wrench into the engine of a car and fixing a broken computer in the house with the errant tool before it clattered to the floor of the garage.
Then he’d shrugged and said that this was yet another thing which proved that the multiverse was infinite and that in infinity one would eventually find anything.
One world had been horrific. There, only one pokegirl moved on land, hunting and killing the weaker members of its species and reproducing only to die. On this world, the arachnae had the ability to teleport and that ability had carried over to the widow, which could still access the memories of its pre-evolved state. That meant that most of them eventually came out inside cities and towns, utterly destroying them, consuming the populace and reproducing at an incredible rate until they covered all the land. Other pokegirls and humans were either extinct or were rapidly becoming so.
Before they’d determined what had happened, Jamie hadn’t known that the arachnae evolved to the widow. His grandfather had explained what was involved in causing the transformation, but Jamie had still made a firm resolution to be much more cautious around that particular species in the future.
Then there was this world.
Here the Red Plague had done what it normally did and decimated the humans. However, a group of powerful magic and psychic pokegirls had taken command of the pokegirl armies and swept the faltering humans aside. They’d won.
The pokegirls had set up city states which now dotted the globe and occasionally they warred amongst themselves for humans or other resources, but most of the time they worked together in anticipation of the day when Typhonna woke up.
However, their problems with going feral still existed, so they’d set up human ranches and put the surviving humans into them. Women were bred until they could no longer reproduce and then were killed. The males were portioned out amongst the pokegirls according to rank. To keep their breeding stock pure, pokegirls only reproduced through parthenogenesis and once one became a pokewoman, she was sterilized to prevent the inclusion of nonhuman DNA into the breeding population of humans.
The world was controlled by a High Council which held absolute authority. Each city state was ruled by a cabal of the most powerful and magically aware pokegirls in that region. Some of them were quite proficient mages in their own right, which was where problems had arisen.
A handful of the police in any city were powerful enough to pierce the magical illusions that Kerrik used to hide what he looked like, and since there were no humans with pokegirl traits in the population, he’d immediately been recognized as being unusual and pursued for capture. After the first battle, he’d been forced to stay hidden for the whole three months they’d been investigating this place.
It had become apparent within a week that this world could never be the family’s home, but when Kerrik had cast the portal spell to leave, the planetary High Council had detected it and promptly attacked. Since the whole idea was to keep a very low profile, they’d run. Now he was working on a way to keep from being detected while they escaped and the cabal worked to find him and make him theirs.
That left Jamie and his harem to continue the investigations. Ginevra acted as his owner and Madison was their backup in case the wheels came off.
Jamie was shaken from his reverie when Ginevra abruptly turned into a shop. He glanced around quickly as he followed her. His eyes narrowed when he saw that up ahead there was a checkpoint where the police were checking identity papers for humans.
Considering the scarcity of men, there was a thriving black market in stolen humans and that was one the authorities were understandably eager to quell. Jamie’s bracelet showed he was owned by Ginevra, but it was always safer to avoid checkpoints whenever possible.
The daimon wandered around the store for a few minutes and finally purchased an ivory figurine that had been salvaged from the ruins of a human city. She headed outside and turned down the street, heading away from the checkpoint with Jamie following close behind.
Ginevra slowed, allowing Jamie to close up behind her. He noted absently that her curly golden hair was almost to her shoulders and was starting to form ringlets. “There is another checkpoint up ahead,” she muttered, “that wasn’t there when we passed earlier. They are blanketing the area with them. This must be a sweep for criminals and not a casual ownership check.”
“We don’t have a choice; we’ll have to brave it. Let Madison know she’s on standby.” Jamie was reluctant to use his twee lest he be detected as having the ability to have mental conversations with others, something humans almost never had. Kerrik had given both Ginevra and Madison twees when they started the explorations.
Ginevra led him into the line that had formed for the second checkpoint. Both she and Jamie worked to look bored as the line crept forward. Up ahead, three pokegirls scanned humans and pokegirls alike while a heavily armed reaction team chatted amongst themselves.
As they moved into the inspection area, the set of Ginevra’s shoulders changed slightly. A voice whispered through his mind. Ginevra reports that the inspectors have pictures of you and her.
Jamie gritted his teeth. Madison, inform grandfather that we’re about to be discovered. Gin, blunt the pursuit before we run.
The hound leading the inspection team looked up and her eyes widened. Ginevra held out an electronic ID. “My papers.” The hound’s eyes flicked automatically to the device and the daimon turned her offer into a lunge which ended when she ripped the hapless pokegirl’s throat out in a gout of blood.
Between the shock of the attack and her sudden activation of her fear aura, pokegirls exploded away from them in a screaming mass as Ginevra grabbed Jamie by the arm. Overwhelmed by the fear, he struggled to run from her as she dropped a fireball on their spot and teleported away with her tamer.
“They are weak and unused to fighting,” the daimon sneered. She held Jamie close until the fear passed and he stopped shivering.
He took a deep breath. “Are we free?”
“A high ranking psychic will be tracking us soon. Madison is ready, but we don’t want to lead them straight to her.”
He grimaced and pulled at his pants. “You made me pee myself.”
A tiny smile appeared as she glowed briefly. Now she was slightly taller and more muscular, with tiny gold horns peeking out from the curls on her forehead. The gold sparkles in her amber skin had become wires of gold that twined across and through her flesh. “Good. Remember that someday I will be the master and you should fear me.” The demoness surveyed the area. “They will come soon and we will kill them.”
“You will. I don’t have any weapons and I’ll just try not to get squashed.” He stripped off his pants and pulled the belt out to tie around his tunic. It fell past the middle of his thighs and almost to his knees. “I’m not going to die covered in piss.”
“Blood, more likely.” She hissed. “Madison says they’re coming.” Energy blades sprouted from both of her hands. “She’s in position and has us under long range surveillance.”
Jamie, get down.
Jamie threw himself flat as three pokegirls teleported onto different locations of the roof where they waited. Ginevra slashed the alaka-wham with both blades while the neo iczel shot towards her. The ka-d-bra’s antenna uncurled as she prepared an attack that Jamie could only watch helplessly. He blinked when a figure appeared behind the pokegirl. The nin-ken dog that Madison had summoned cut off the ka-d-bra’s head with a single slash of a shimmering red blade.
The neo twisted in midair and a barrage of magic bolts struck the summoned creature, which flared and vanished under the assault. Madison had learned to use barely enough life energy to allow one of her summoned cards to make just one attack. Duelist pokegirls had never manifested on this world and the locals tended to panic and hit her card summons with massive overkill just as soon as they showed up. It meant she could make many more such attacks before becoming too tired to continue fighting.
The neo iczel refocused on Ginevra just as the luster dragon dropped out of the sun and smashed the combat pokegirl into the rooftop. Its head dropped and the neo screamed when teeth snapped closed on her.
The roof groaned and shifted beneath the dragon and timbers snapped with explosive sounds as the neo struggled to get free. Ginevra drove her energy blades through the dragon’s jaw and deep into the neo’s skull and spine, killing her instantly.
The dragon stretched out and Ginevra cast an illusion of her and Jamie on its back before it spread its wings and took off, dropping below the level of the buildings and winging off to the west to provide a distraction before it was destroyed.
Jamie growled a curse as he grabbed his pokegirl’s hand. “Nobody had any weapons, damn it. I’m still unarmed.”
This is Virtue. Meet up with Madison and await instructions to return to base. It is time to leave this world. It was the AI that worked for Kerrik. It went by several names, which changed frequently to no pattern that Jamie could discern, but usually was named either Virtue or Vice. According to all three twees, it severely sucked in the social skills department and had an ungodly level of processing power available. Kerrik refused to discuss what it was or where he’d gotten it and all anyone knew was that it was not resident inside his body.
Ginevra’s green eyes flashed in the light. “Await instructions to return? We are not children and can fight too.”
Jamie shrugged. “You know the rules. We hear and obey. Go.”
***
Kerrik’s ears were flat and his teeth were bared in a vicious grin as he monitored the fight. “All right, you whores, we are leaving and if you want to play then come and join the fun.” He summoned a golf ball sized sphere of softly glowing red energy that rose to hover over his head as he strode out of the empty building they’d turned into their base and into the alley that ran alongside.
He began casting the portal spell. With a flash and a crackle of mystical energy, the sixteen alaka-wham, archmages and neo iczel who ruled this world appeared around him. We have you now, human. Surrender and we will let you live. Resist and your death will seem to last for years. Eyes flicked up to the sphere as he released the spell.
This is Vice. Return to the base, but do not come out at the end of the alley. Come out at the mouth instead.
Madison grinned and wrapped her arms around her tamer. “Let’s go, sir.” Ginevra grabbed his hand and the view jumped as she teleported to the mouth of the alley where their base had been established.
Jamie gasped and Ginevra’s mouth dropped. The other end of the long alley was gone, scooped out in a perfect sphere a hundred meters across. The edges of buildings and the rock on the edge of the sphere glowed with a sullen red light and heat pounded at them even though they were almost twenty meters from the edge of whatever had happened. Steam wreathed the bottom of the sphere where cut pipes sprayed water onto the superheated ground and sharp cracks were heard as concrete shattered from the stress. All three of them coughed at the stench of ozone.
Jamie jumped when Kerrik strode from behind the dumpster and shoved it to the side in a scream of metal. The portal gleamed a soft blue. “Go. I’ll be right behind you.”
“I thought the cabal would be all over you again,” Jamie coughed as he watched Ginevra hurry through first.
Kerrik smirked. “They are, if only in the form of free carbon.” His ears rotated. “The sudden departure of their leadership seems to have shaken everyone’s nerve. Good. Go.”
Jamie followed his pokegirls through the portal and sucked deep lungfuls of suddenly pure air as his grandfather stepped through behind him and closed the gate.
***
Madison speared another fish and tossed it to Ginevra, who drained its life energy and tossed it on the pile for dinner. Jamie and Kerrik cleaned and stuffed them with spices before spitting them over the flames. Finally, Jamie sat back and motioned Madison to stop. “We’ve got enough that, when they’re dried, we’ll have food for a couple of weeks. I only wish there was something else to eat besides fish.”
“We saw some sad looking kattle on that one island.” Madison squatted down next to him. “But there wasn’t any meat on them.”
Ginevra snorted. “They weren’t worth killing.” She looked out over the water. “Nothing here is worth killing.”
“There’s not much here to kill,” Jamie pointed out mildly. He looked at his grandfather, who was accessing his pokedex. “Any theories?”
“Of course I have a theory.” Kerrik switched his pokedex to holographic mode and an image of the earth appeared, hovering in midair. It was a deep blue, with light cloud cover visible in patches across its width. “Although chemical and genetic testing on the fish has proven that this is an earth, as you can see, there aren’t any continents or large islands. All that we’ve found are a few strings of tiny ones, like the one we’re on now.” He flashed a smile. “Yes, you already know this, but it never hurts to be complete. When we arrived, I launched a satellite and it has finally finished mapping the planet. Then I set it to looking for anything that might be of interest and it found this.”
Jamie leaned forward interestedly. This was new. The display zoomed and as the distance closed he began to make out a wake and what looked like a speedboat moving at a good clip through the water in front of it. The view closed rapidly and the speedboat resolved into a grayish colored square head moving rhythmically from side to side as it swam. Beneath the water he could make out a black shape that he presumed was the creature’s body. It undulated as it moved through the sea. “I’ve never seen that pokegirl before. What is she?”
“Typhonna.”
Jamie stared at it. “That would explain why I couldn’t identify her. What’s she doing up?”
“My theory is that she never went to sleep and this is the result. For three hundred years she’s been swimming and destroying whatever she comes across. The islands that are left are too small to support life.”
Jamie shook his head. “You think she destroyed the world?”
“That is what she does.” Kerrik sighed. “I’m beginning to think I miscalculated on how long this is going to take. If it’s going to take years to find the family a home, I should return you to Caomh Sith first.” He picked up some gravel and began tossing it into the water, his ears flicking as he thought.
Jamie grimaced. “What we need is to find a place before Typhonna destroys it.”
Kerrik stopped in mid toss and twisted to stare at his grandson. “That’s it.”
“Excuse me?”
“We would be best off finding a place that Typhonna hasn’t destroyed. There would be a lot more land available and, therefore, more places to disappear.”
“But Typhonna has been a constant in all the worlds we visited. That’s a pretty tall order.”
Kerrik nodded. “You’re completely right, but only if we play by the rules.”
“There are rules?” Madison gave both of them a curious look.
Kerrik shrugged. “In a way, there are. I’m trying to avoid having to redo the socio-political landscape of wherever we’re moving to in order to make us a home. It’s a lot of work and makes enemies by the ton. It usually makes a lot of corpses too, often on all of the involved sides; and those can be troublesome to deal with.” He went back to tossing pebbles into the water. “However, there may be another way and it won’t involve any of your mothers or aunts yelling at us.” He waved his arm in an arc. “This place is perfect and we’ll do it here.”
“I do not understand.” Ginevra folded her arms. “I do not like not understanding and you make me not understand too often.”
Madison burst out laughing and ducked behind her tamer as the demoness wheeled suddenly to face her.
Kerrik carefully didn’t smile. “How about I explain, then?” He tossed the rest of the pebbles into the water and carefully wiped the grit from his palms. “Since I explained the perils of time travel to your parents, if I use it, I’m going to have to be very careful to justify what happens if I do so. However, this is perfect, since when we go back in time and change things, we’ll be saving this world from Typhonna and utter destruction. Right now it’s dead and I can use that to justify what I’m going to do.”
Ginevra knelt and looked into Kerrik’s eyes. “You do not look crazy. How can you save the world from Typhonna? She is death.”
Kerrik’s face stilled and Ginevra scuttled backwards away from him as he spoke. “I have seen death and Typhonna is not it. She may be an agent of destruction, but she is not death itself.”
“You can put her to sleep?” Madison looked curiously at him.
His face came back to life as he smiled. “I’m sure I can figure something out.”
***
Jamie looked around the camp one last time before turning to his grandfather. “We’re ready to go. I’ve watched dad’s journals and he never really explains how he managed to travel through time, but I know it involves a magic pokegirl like Ginevra.” The demoness preened as he spoke.
“I know how he does it and it involves a delta level bond and a trained mind. I don’t have a delta bond with any pokegirls and you don’t have the trained mind or a delta bond.” Kerrik slipped his pack onto his shoulders. “In any case, everyone involved has to be able to use magic and have complete trust, along with something else that I’m not going to explain. While you and Ginevra have that trust, I think I’ll do the driving today. Besides, Shikarou’s method is imprecise and we’ve got a specific target to hit.”
“I do not trust him completely.” Ginevra gave Kerrik an angry look.
“Of course you say that you don’t.” The demoness’ emerald green eyes flared.
Jamie interrupted. “When is that?”
“I want to hit 2008. That will let us determine the extent of the Red Plague’s effects on humanity.”
“I’m not familiar with the old ways of telling time. What is 2008 in AS?”
Kerrik frowned and looked thoughtful. “Six AS, I believe.” He nodded. “Yes, six AS.” His ears flicked. “Before we go, I want to return to Caomh Sith for a day. The family could use a briefing, you need some time off and we both need to refresh our supplies. I’m getting a bit tired of fish myself.”
Jamie grinned. “You won’t get any argument from me. I think I’d commit mayhem for some ice cream or chocolate.”
There was as chuckle from his grandfather. “Oh, just for the record, I need to say something to all three of you.” Madison looked up as he smiled warmly. “No matter what anyone else may say, circumstances required that I throw you all into the deep end of the pool on this trip. I want to tell you that all of you rose to the challenge admirably. I’m proud of the way you handled everything and I wanted you to know it.”
“Even me?”
“Ginevra, you did a wonderful of job of obeying my orders while keeping Jamie alive. He never even got seriously injured.”
“He fell off that mountain.” Jamie closed his eyes and sighed loudly. Ginevra ignored him. “He was injured then.”
“Yes, but he was never in any danger of dying because you were out of your pokeball and watching him. Thank you.”
The demoness cocked her head and suddenly wheeled to face her tamer. “You should say thank you to me more often. When I am master, you will say it every day.”
Jamie nodded slowly. “If you become master, I won’t have much choice, will I?”
“You will have no choice and that is as it should be.”
Madison edged over next to Kerrik. “They’ll keep this up for hours if you let them.”
He regarded her curiously. “Are you trying to get me involved in a discussion between a tamer and his alpha? That’s not my business and, personally, I find such displays of affection to be rather amusing. It’s rather obvious that they are very fond of each other.”
“I do not like him!” Ginevra rounded on Kerrik. “Stop saying such things!”
“Of course not.” He smiled slightly. “Now that we’re done cuddling, it’s time to leave.”
Ginevra hissed angrily.
***
Kasumi sipped at her tea and put the cup down. “I will miss my family.”
Shikarou frowned and turned to Kerrik. “Will she have to stop visiting them?”
“I don’t see why she would. We’ll even be making occasional trips back to this world to see what’s going on.” Kerrik grabbed a biscuit and settled back. “I’ve got a couple of entry points plotted out that shouldn’t be developed for at least the next couple of centuries.”
“You could also plot one out on the space station.”
Kerrik blinked at Pythia. Since the news had hit, Branwyn had reinstituted the policy of Shikarou having an ever-present guard. He, of course, was taking it with as much grace as possible. Today was Pythia’s turn. “What space station?”
She smiled. “Sukebe had a station in the asteroid belt. That’s where I came from. Didn’t we give you access to the records?”
In the display on the wall, Aggie shook her head. “It never came up.”
“I’d like the information on that, please. It could be absolutely perfect.”
The dire wolf gave him a curious look. “When would you like to see it?”
“I’d like the information now, but actually visiting it will wait until we get back. It’ll be my reward for a job well done.”
***
One moment the hillside was empty and covered only with moonlight and the next someone stood there. Kerrik looked around slowly and then ghosted forward and up to the crest of the hill. His ears rotated slowly as he tasted the air. Finally he stood and clipped a mike to the collar of his t-shirt. “Status report.”
A soft feminine voice replied from the mic/speaker combo. “Scans of the area indicate the closest feral is six kilometers to the west and the closest human is twenty nine kilometers south of you.”
Kerrik nodded and cast the portal spell. It spun open and he stepped through onto the island that had a couple of kattle still clinging to life on it. He looked around again and closed the gate. Then he cast a different spell. A portal sprang up, but this one was multicolored, flashing through all the colors of the spectrum. Slowly, different portions of it stopped changing, until finally everything was still, visible as a riot of color that he could read as easily as any book. After one final, thorough examination, he stepped through, carefully keeping the portal open as he did so.
It was winter and snow covered the ground in a silvery blanket that glittered softly in the evening sun. Clouds in the distance heralded the promise of more snow that night. Kerrik’s ears rotated at a soft noise and he slowly turned to behold a vast sea of white draped, shaggy forms, the closest of which was less than four meters away.
Brown eyes met amber for a long moment, as the beast raised its head slowly and sniffed the air. The beast knew, as it did when it had observed others, that this new creature was a predator and yet that, for the moment, it posed no threat. Finally, the beast turned and went back to grazing.
Kerrik watched the buffalo for a few minutes before bounding up the snowy hill to the crest. He dropped his backpack and dug out a golden sphere. “Status check.”
The same voice spoke again. “There are no electromagnetic communications within detectable range. Many large creatures are located around you up to two kilometers away, which is the limit of current scanning capability. However, launch of the spy satellite or release of this unit may detect some outside the current range, which is quite limited.”
He nodded. “Launch satellite.” The sphere lifted from his hand and drifted away until it was far enough for a safe launch. It turned straight up and accelerated hard, disappearing almost instantly.
“Satellite will reach optimal altitude in fifteen thousand and three hundred seconds. Scanning systems coming online.” There was a pause. “There is no electromagnetic activity within five hundred kilometers of your location.”
Kerrik dug four more gold spheres from his pack and launched them in turn. Finally, he removed a dark gray sphere that was twice the size of the others. “Initialize.”
The sphere lifted off and hovered. “Initialization complete. Status nominal and ready for deployment.”
“Double check the flight plans.”
“Flight plans verified. The device is ready to be deployed.”
He nodded absently. “Deploy the device.”
It quickly moved several hundred meters away from him, climbing as it slipped sideways. Then it shot upwards at over a hundred gravities acceleration, breaking the sound barrier in less than half a second. It was starting to glow as it flew out of sight. Once it reached space, it would increase its acceleration to over two hundred gravities as it began its journey.
“Target acquisition is estimated at 9.8 million seconds.”
Kerrik frowned as he converted seconds into something more useful. “Over a hundred days. That sounds about right.”
He bounded down the hill towards the portal and crunched to a halt when he realized that it was surrounded by buffalo. His eyes narrowed. “Food, you’d better move or I’m going to have much more for breakfast than I thought I would and Helen will be cross at me for not eating her cooking.”
He waited for a couple of minutes as the buffalo drifted away before racing for the portal and through it, only to skid to a halt, cursing quietly. The next half hour was spent chivvying a lone buffalo back through the portal to where it belonged.
When done, he perched on a rock where he could listen to the waves washing against the rocks. “Status report.”
“Processing.” Several seconds elapsed before the voice spoke again. “Fifty satellites are in long distance geosynchronous orbits and seven are in polar orbits. All are functioning normally and onboard clocks indicate that the first of them was deployed roughly a thousand years ago. Data download and processing will take several thousand seconds. Beginning.”
Kerrik waited patiently, only his ears moving from time to time as his hair shimmered in the breeze.
“Analysis complete. I am ready to display the movements of the first generation legendaries.”
He stirred and removed his pokedex from his belt. “We’ve got a lot of work to do, so let’s get started.”
***
“More waffles?” Helen slid four of them from her tray onto his plate.
“Thanks.” Kerrik reached for the butter. “That’ll probably be enough.”
“That’s twenty. I’ve been counting.” Nanu flashed a smile at him. “I’d burst if I ate that much.”
“Helen’s a good cook and I like to do her cooking justice.”
“How can you eat that much food?”
He shrugged. “Wolves eat a lot at a sitting, in case they don’t get a chance to eat later. I guess I’m like that.”
He blinked when Helen settle down next to him. “What happens if this world doesn’t pan out?”
Kerrik put down his fork and straightened up to look into her eyes. “I am not going to stop searching until I find you a new home. If this one doesn’t work, then I’ll keep looking until I find one that does.”
“Then I’m worried about nothing?”
“You are worried for a very good reason,” he corrected gently. “All of you know that the family is up for the axe in just a few years. I’m worried too, but I have the means to stop it from happening and I am not going to be off this island for more than an hour at any time, just to make sure I’m here if they try anything early.”
“We could stay and fight.” Nanu picked up her tea. “We’d win too, but nobody wants the body count it would entail.”
Kerrik glanced up when Svetlana appeared and settled next to the mini-top. She smiled. “Morning. Jamie will be along in a few minutes. Faelan is planning something sneaky with him and he wants me to pretend not to know about it.” She glanced around the room, taking in the somber faces on Helen and Nanu. “What’s so serious?”
“We were discussing what the results of staying would be.”
The megami-sama reached for the tray of waffles. “There would be a bloodbath and lots of death on both sides. We’d probably win, but we’d have to take over the league, which none of us would enjoy. We’d also set back any good we’ve done here in regards to the way pokegirls are treated. We’ve helped a bit and leaving won’t change that. Staying will.” She smiled warmly. “I’ve been doing some research.”
Nanu chuckled. “Trust me, we like you doing research. It’s a lot better than the old way.”
Svetlana nodded. “Screaming and calling everyone minions of evil never seemed to work, so I had to find something that did. Surprisingly, reasoned discourse has a lot to recommend itself. Now if only the other celestials would realize that.”
Kerrik gave her a curious look. “What’s Faelan up to?”
“He’s got some plan to get us a reserve supply of useful pokegirls. He knows I’ll have a fit if he rips off tamers, so I’ll just wait and see what he’s up to before weighing in on its morality.” She smirked as she reached for the syrup. “You and your sons don’t seem to come equipped with a moral compass, so I guess it’s up to me, Derdekea, Pythia and Dorothea to provide one.” A chuckle. “And since Shikarou has ruined Dorothea’s and Pythia’s usefulness in that regard, the job falls to me until my body completely adapts to being sidhe and I can start having children.”
“What about Derdekea?”
She cocked her head. “I’m not sure about her. First she evolved, and then she became sidhe like me, so she’s going through a rough patch. Still, she’s always had a good head on her shoulders and I hope she’ll want to help me. However, I have to remember that now that she’s become an archangel, she and Dorothea have more in common than we do.” The megami-sama shrugged. “If she won’t help, then I’ll do it alone.”
She gave Kerrik a direct look. “You could always get a celestial or two when you start accumulating a harem. I doubt it’ll take long for you to grind off her shiny bits and then I could use her help.”
He looked uncomfortable. “Right now’s not a good time to be trying to get to know pokegirls. I’ll see about it after we get settled into your new home.”
A smile flickered around her lips. “Promise?”
Kerrik’s ears went flat. Then he shook his head and nodded as they came back up. “Promise.”
Svetlana gave him a surprised look but recovered quickly. “I’ve seen you with pokegirls here, Kerrik. You’ll be a good tamer.” She chuckled when he just grunted sourly in reply. “What are you worried about?”
“First of all, I know just how dependent on their tamer pokegirls are, especially in the beginning. It’s going to be a severe trial for me to deal with that.” He sighed and looked at the three women in the room. “Secondly, Faelan and Shikarou have managed to assemble an extraordinary collection of ladies here and I’m going to measure any pokegirls against the standard you have set. It’ll be hard to find ones that measure up to that standard and I’ve never been happy with second best.”
Helen kissed his cheek and rose gracefully. “That’s sweet, but you need to remember that they didn’t just assemble us, they helped to make us what we are today. You helped make them into what they are; because of that, I have no doubt that whatever pokegirls you accept into your harem will turn out to be at least just as incredible as we are.”
“Hey, I came incredible.” Nanu tried to bristle, but her grin kept leaking through.
“I know,” Helen replied serenely, “I’ve heard you. You’re incredibly loud.”
Kerrik slid to his feet, forestalling the incipient argument. “Thanks for the breakfast, Helen. When Jamie’s eaten, please send him down to the docks. I’ll be waiting for him there.”
Svetlana watched him go, her silver eyes intent. “Ladies, I don’t think he finds fights amusing. We’ll need to remember that.”
Nanu shrugged and gave Helen a quick grin before looking at the megami-sama. “What are you planning?”
“I’m not planning anything, but there’s no reason we can’t be keeping our eyes open for pokegirls that might get his attention. That’s why I’m trying to learn what he does and does not like. Apparently, he doesn’t find squabbling at breakfast amusing, like Shikarou and Faelan do.”
***
“My uncle wants to know if I’ll be available next week. I told him I’d have to check with you.” Jamie settled down on the bench next to his grandfather as Madison took up station next to him.
“Ah, his mysterious plan. What does he want to do?”
“He didn’t say.”
Kerrik nodded. “With all of the secrecy, he’s starting to make me curious. No matter, unless the league invades, as far as I am concerned you’ll be available.” He rose to his feet. “If we can’t make this world work, I’ll drop you off here and continue on my search alone.”
Madison shook her head. “We’ve discussed it. We signed on to help you do this. We want to be there until the end.”
He brushed off his knees and stood. “That’s very nice of you. Did all three of you agree to this?”
Jamie nodded. “That’s right.”
“So, that would make the tally three ayes and one no. The no’s have it.” Kerrik flashed a quick smile. “It could take years and that wouldn’t be fair to you. However, first we need to see if this new world can be made to work. I haven’t dismissed it yet and you shouldn’t either.” The portal opened and he motioned them forward. “Be optimistic.”
The island hadn’t changed and the air still held the faint smell of the fire they’d been cooking the fish on. Jamie released Ginevra who looked around quickly. “What did he say?”
“No.”
“Pity. It would have been glorious.”
Kerrik ignored them as he opened the temporal gate. Colors flashed and quickly stabilized. “Ok, when we go through there may be a herd of buffalo. They’re kind of like kattle, however we have plenty of food and you’ve eaten your fill, Ginevra.”
The demoness flashed a dazzling smile. “I’m sure I’ll get plenty to eat later on, too. It will be much more satisfying fare than that provided by a dumb animal.”
Jamie followed his pokegirls through the gate and froze. “How many of them are there?”
Ginevra was staring at the herd of buffalo, which stretched to the horizon in every direction. “An army of them,” she breathed. “I couldn’t kill them all.”
Kerrik chuckled. “Considering how many of them there are, they’d reproduce faster than you could kill.”
It was summer now and the air was heavy with the fragrance of flowers and flowering grasses. Jamie turned to his grandfather. “Where are we?”
“The plains of North America. I have to make a quick trip, stay here and don’t go anywhere until I get back.”
“Yessir.” Madison threw a salute.
Jamie just grinned at her. “Aye, grandfather.”
Kerrik cast another temporal portal spell and, once it stabilized, disappeared through it. Ginevra strode forward to examine it and jumped backwards as he stepped back out. He waggled a finger at her and dismissed the spell. “You’ll just frustrate yourself trying to cast that one. The best you’d do is convert part of the area around you to energy and kill everything within a couple of kilometers.”
Nictitating membranes flicked over her solid green eyes. “What would be the worst case scenario?”
“You convert yourself to energy and increase the energy balance of the universe without taking anyone else with you.”
She folded her arms. “This is something that I am not going to understand again, isn’t it?”
“Only if you make me explain it.”
“Then do not try.” She stalked back to Jamie and turned to survey the herd. “We should leave. I wish to eat them.”
“Ambitious, isn’t she?” Kerrik chuckled as he cast another temporal gate. Ok, I’ve done what I can for Typhonna and the other first generation legendaries. Now we just need to hope that what I’ve done works.”
“What about the other legendaries?” Jamie rubbed his fingers against the cold.
Kerrik shrugged. “Compared to the first generation, they’re pretty small potatoes, but if they become a problem I’ll put paid to them the same way I did the first gens.”
“What did you do, put them all to sleep?”
“Something like that.” He gestured. “Let’s go see how well I wrought.”
***
Name: Wolf, Jamie Harris
Age: 17
Residence: Caomh Sith, Blue Continent
Region: Scotland
Status: Active
Rank: 15
Security Clearance: Epsilon
Licenses
Tamer Y
Master Tamer Y
Researcher N
Watcher N
Breeder N
Active Harem
Species Name
Daimon Ginevra
Duelist Madison
Badges: None