Ch 02

What the fuck are the odds… Terrence thought as he stared at the Pokedex readout.

 

The little computer was currently linked to the newly filled pokeball clamped to his belt, and showing a detailed readout of her condition.

 

What drew his attention, however, was the small, but perfectly clear image of the girl to one side of the screen, which plainly showed the elaborate markings on the girl’s forehead.

 

The specific pattern of swirling black stripes and unusually red eye rings left no doubt in his mind.

 

 

Resting in the ‘ball, was the exact same mutio that had put him in the Center medward in the first place.

 

His first thought, after his raw elation at his first capture, had been to rush back to the center to submit the girl and collect some coin.

The only thing that had stopped him was the sudden thought of how he would look, charging eagerly back into the center not even an hour after leaving like some sort of hyper kid.

 

So he’d tried to squash his urge to leap about madly and gotten out his ‘dex to scan the girl.

 

He’d only spent 5 minutes dancing first.

 

And now, thanks to his patience, he had the perfect opportunity to get some payback.

 

He moved to leap to his feet, eager to get back to his parents house and his pack, with the tagchips and injector and restraints he’d need.

 

He got about halfway up before his body reminded him that it had just been savaged night before last, and without the influence of immediate threat or elation, was in no mood for vigorous activity.

 

At least, he thought as Sara gently helped him stand up and get moving down the road, the ‘girl is too damn scared to mock me.

 

O0O

 

By the time Terrence finally made it back to Brinney, it was the evening of his first day as a Tamer. He was exhausted, covered in sweat and grime, half held up by his ‘girl, and sore in places he had never before been aware of.

 

It was, all things considered, not the most auspicious start to his career.

 

None of this was particularly near the front of his thoughts just then of course. His main focus wasn’t even the pleasantly naked ‘girl at his side, but rather his room at his parent’s house, his comfortable bed, and a long, long nap.

 

Unfortunately, his family had somewhat different ideas.

 

The instant his father saw him, the large man rushed forward and pounded him on the back, laughing heartily and shouting variations of “that’s my boy” and “always knew you’d show a ‘girl a proper time of it”.

 

His mother’s reaction was more reserved, less from her lack of enthusiasm and more due to the fact that any interaction in which she wasn’t reserved was likely to end in broken bones on his side. 

 

Her firm “I’m very proud of you Son” was rather more appreciated by the boy in question. The slaps to his back were starting to make his vision blurry.

He managed to make it upstairs after only two helpings of dinner had been pushed on him, and promptly collapsed into his bed without bothering to take off his belt, empty his pockets, or in fact, remove his clothes.

 

He was so tired, stuffed, and muddled, that he forgot to return Sara to her pokeball.

 

Hours later, he drifted awake to the feel of something brushing at his thigh. Still half asleep, he reached down to brush whatever it was away, only to freeze when he felt a hand. 

 

He was halfway across the room, gun in hand, before he got a good look at the person attached to it.

 

Crouched on his bed, frozen in shock and eyes wide with naked terror, was Sara.

 

Holding his pokedex.

 

It took him nearly a minute to realize exactly what was going on and another to deal with the enormity of it.

 

The girl had been run through a level 3 Conditioning Cycle after her runaway attempt. He’d noticed it in her file, along with the notation that she’d displayed no unruly behavior, had been perfectly obedient even, afterwards.

 

He hadn’t once considered that someone in the Indoctrination center had screwed up.

 

It didn’t take long at all to build up to a boiling rage.

 

“Put it down.” He said flatly, not bothering to lower the gun.

 

“I…Sir…I…” the girl stammered on for a few seconds before meekly dropping the computer and lowering herself to the floor.

Terrence stood up and carefully reached for her ‘ball, making sure the muzzle of the gun didn’t move from her chest. 

 

After Sara had disappeared into the capture beam, he slumped. He had just enough energy left to grab his ‘dex and key her ball for a level 4 cycle before he sunk to the floor and leaned back against the bed.

 

He dropped the gun and cradled his head in his hands.

 

 

Terrence had wanted to be a tamer for years, since he could first remember watching the Council matches. His father had warned him that it wasn’t easy, and his mother had given him a thrashing when she heard he was going to take the tests, just to make sure he knew what he was getting into.

 

But he’d never thought he’d have a ‘girl, a tame ‘girl, who’d been run through the months of League indoctrination, run out on him.

 

He checked his watch.

 

 

After a moment’s hesitation, he decided to grab a shower and climbed to his feet, shucking his jacket on the way.

 

He’d got down to his trousers when he paused with his Tamers belt in hand, looking at the second ‘ball, the one with the mutio. He pulled it out and tossed the belt onto his bed, then grabed his ‘dex out from under his shirt and linked them.

 

He grinned.

 

 

Every pokeball sold in the Indigo League was programmed to run an automatic level 3 on a fresh capture. It was supposed to make it easier for the indoctrination staff, or for the tamer if he wanted to keep her.

 

Definitely going to keep this one. He thought. 

 

His pack was where he’d left it, sitting next to his desk. He’d planned, what seemed like an age ago, to go to the pokecenter, the day after the party, not as a patient, but with all his gear, and to set out this morning, with a well tamed ‘girl, south along the Detroit-Scarlet Route.

 

Instead, he’d spent a day laying in the medward, another shambling home, and had nearly lost his starter and his ‘dex all at once.

 

He pulled an injector, already loaded with a tagchip and linked the needle sliver of electronics with his pokedex. It only took a few seconds for his personal data and preferences, both the ones set by himself, and the non-editable ones preset based on his examinations, into the device, and another for a safety check to ensure the device was transmitting.

 

He closed out the ‘dex’s link and tossed it on the desk, then shed his pants and picked the mutio’s ‘ball back up.

 

 

He hit the release.

 

O0O

 

Dark 

 

 

 

Fuzzy Thing. Hurt. Prey taken.

 

Dark.

 

Long Long Dark.

 

 

Time.

 

 

 

Pause.

 

 

Time and Change.

 

 

Certainty. Content.

 

 

Time.

 

 

Impossibility.

 

Time.

 

 

Joy. Content. 

 

Right.

 

Pleasure.

 

Time. Repitition.

 

 

 

 

Light.

 

She was in a cave, strange shapes and smells everywhere. Light from the small sky glow shone through a gap in the wall.

 

It was so strange she didn’t notice the scent of the man behind her as he stepped up, pressed something just behind her ear.

 

She felt it though. The sensation was like being gently cuffed by a Queen, and she screeched.

 

She whirled, ready to sink her claws into this pain bringer and tear it/them with her teeth.

 

She froze as she saw him, his scent was thick in the air.

 

 

A torrent of impulse washed over her, and she hesitated, wracked with indecision.

 

Then the figure grabbed her and pulled her over a soft rock shelf. 

 

Bed the word drifted through her mind, pulled from the dark that had changed her.

 

She struggled, but somehow found herself unable to truly attack, instead wriggling like a helpless pup.

 

It felt right.

 

She felt something close over her wrists, and then warmth between her legs.

 

Her new Queen, new master, buried himself inside her, and she screeched loud enough to rattle the clear stone that filled the gaps in the walls.

 

She felt something take root inside her, spreading slowly as the heat built between her thighs. It spread further and faster as her master took her roughly, until she stopped keeping track of time.

 

A hand snaked under her, and pushed firmly on the top of her crevice.

 

Her body tensed, the bed creaking under her as she tried to pull her arms from its grip, and her master grunted something that sounded half pained.

 

Then she felt warmth gushing into her, and something she had never known, that her time in the long dark had barely hinted at, washed away the world.

 

O0O

 

Terrence didn’t give the girl a chance to orient after releasing her. He stepped up behind her softly, pushed the injector behind her ear, and pressed the button.

 

There was a sharp crack as the device shoved the small chip through the pokegirl’s flesh. It was quickly cut off by the screech that tore its way out of her throat.

 

She whirled around, and for an instant, Terrence forgot everything he’d ever learned as raw fear spilled over in his mind, the flashing eyes and bared teeth reminding him uncomfortably of his first encounter with this ‘girl.

 

Then he saw her hesitate, confusion flitting across her face, and his own training took over. He grabbed her by the hair and shoved her over the bed, trusting that the Capture Cycle would have done its job of temporarily weakening her. Her wrists he locked down to the bed frame for safety’s sake. And then he was ready.

 

A single long, slow breath and he shoved himself inside the girl, elation filling him even while he winced away from the earsplitting shriek she let out.

She felt as he remembered, cool and slick.  Without the distracting feel of teeth in his shoulder, and claws raking over his chest, it was wonderful.

He thrust savagely. In his head, he knew that even weakened by the injuries she’d taken before capture, and further by the Conditioning Cycle, he still wouldn’t be able to really cause the ‘girl pain like this. 

 

In his heart, it didn’t matter, he felt like he was taking some measure of revenge.

 

 

Eventually, his mind won out, and he paused for a moment to steady his thoughts.

The ‘girl was trembling under him, arms pulled high by the cuffs around her wrists, skin slick and gleaming, the line of charcoal black scales that swept up her spine shining in the pale light, a small hole in the small of her back where he’d shot her that had already clotted over.

 

Good enough. He decided.

 

He reached under her and felt for her clit, fingers sliding on the scales that covered her below the waist until he found it.

 

Then he shoved himself forward again, as hard as he could, and pressed hard on the nub of flesh until it flattened against bone.

 

She didn’t make a sound, but he could hear the bed groan as she tensed, back arching, shoulders heaving, head buried in the sheets and feet scrabbling at the floor.

 

Then her walls clamped down around him with almost bruising force and he came.

 

Once he’d recovered and picked himself up off her, he starred down at her shaking form, still dead to the world as the shock of her first proper taming took her.

 

Got her this time.  He thought with a grin. It was dark humor, and the sex had made him ache all over again, but he’d take what he could get.

He retrieved her ‘ball and returned her, the restraints falling to the bed with a faint clatter when she vanished, then dug a towel out of his closet and headed for the bathroom.

 

After the last few days, he really needed a wash.

 

O0O

 

By the time he’d hauled in a pail of water from the pump near the door, given it a few minutes on the stove, scrubbed himself down and sluiced the tiles of the washroom clean, it was nearly dawn. He stretched as he went back to his room, feeling far more human than he had in the last few days. He took a bite from the ration bar he’d grabbed from the kitchen on his way up, and started pulling clothes on.

 

By the time he was dressed, and had repacked and checked over all his gear, he could see the sun starting to come through his window. He clipped his belt on, slung his pack and shoved his pokedex into the pocket of his coat before creeping back down the stairs.

 

He wanted to be out of the town before his parents woke up and forced enough food down his throat to keep him from leaving for another day.

The morning air was chill with the first hints of winter, and the still air smelled of salt. He trotted easily down the single road that ran through town, and over the wooden bridge that crossed the briar river to the south.

 

He stopped well short of the edge of the cleared zone that surrounded the town. He’d spent more than enough time in the Center medward already.

 

He turned away from the flash of light as he released the mutio from her ball and then waited for a moment for her to get her balance. She was probably still in taming shock, and in most circumstances he would have let let her ride the trip out in her ball. 

 

But since Sara had turned out to be unreliable, and he didn’t feel like walking through the wilderness for hours with nothing but a gun to protect him, he would have to make do.

 

Speaking of my gun he thought, and pulled the thing from it’s holster. The girl gave a start and hissed, but didn’t try and attack.

 

The gun was a boxy, unlovely thing with three magazines that lay lengthwise along the barrel, and looked like nothing so much as a metal brick with a handle jammed onto the back of it. 

 

While he unclipped two of the three magazines and refilled them with the Electric and Poison rounds his father had given him, the third he intended to leave as KE, he started in on his new ‘girl.

 

“Come here.” He said, best to start simple with a newly tamed feral. The bonding made them loyal, the conditioning reinforced that, and let them understand speech, but there was no real getting around the fact that they just didn’t think like people. That was one of the biggest hurdles most tamers had to deal with in training. It was all too easy to forget that the cute, tiny little thing that would curl up in your lap and beg you to take her was also a very capable predator, and thought like one.

 

The girl came, the muscular, wing like gill fins hanging from her breastbone swinging beneath her as she slunk easily along on all fours. She stopped about a meter away from him and sat, legs folded to one side and palms on the ground.

 

“Mili” he said firmly, tucking the gun under his arm for a moment to free his hand and point at her, “Mili”.

 

The girl pointed to herself, and then hesitantly nodded. The second gesture was probably unfamiliar, imprinted by the capture cycle.

 

He focused on putting the magazines back in, and tested the selector switch beneath his thumb to make sure they were properly seated. Then he tucked the gun back into the holster under his left arm and turned his attention back to the ‘girl.

 

“Water needle,” he said firmly, this time pointing at a small rock about 20 meters away.

 

The conditioning that gave ferals language was far from perfect. It usually took days or weeks before one could hope to convey anything complex, and longer to actually start making the things civil. And there were some things that no real amount of repetition of conditioned knowledge could explain. 

 

The Cycles did, however, work hard to make using the girls reasonably easyto use for a tamer who was doubtless busy trying to survive. When Terrence had captured the mutio, the ball had scanned her, determined her breed, and linked with his pokedex automatically. The dex had then linked to the League Datanet and pulled down a copy of the Mutio program, which it then sent to the ‘ball. That program, aside from being tailored to work with the mutio’s specific mindset, implanted a list of command words, from “come” to the various special abilities the breed had.

 

Mili’s head swung to the rock and her lips peeled back. A short jet of water, about the length of his forarm and the width of a needle shot out from the back of her mouth and hit the rock with a hiss. If he walked over, he knew he’d see a thin line gouged across it.

 

Good aim, he thought, now for something harder.

 

A bit of searching, and he found another rock, this one about the size of his fist. He tossed it gently a few times to get the balance, and then threw it in a low arc.

 

“Water needle.”

 

The girl’s head tracked the rock almost mechanically, then she spat out another jet that split the thing in two while it was still at shoulder height.

 

“Good.” He praised, and reached down to rub the skin where her gill fins joined her body. It was a gesture mothers of the breed used to sooth pokekits, and it worked well enough to help reinforce a tamer’s bond. The ‘girl made a sort of sighing sound, layered with odd, whistling tones he couldn’t quite separate, and her long, elfin ears drooped.

 

After a minute, he pointed to the first rock again. 

 

“Needle spray.”

 

This time she spat a dozen or so of jets, smaller and weaker. Most missed, sending little sprays of grass flying as they hit the turf, but that wasn’t a problem, the technique was supposed to cover a wider area. 

 

When she turned back, she gave him a “what the hell are we doing this for, boss” look that wouldn’t have seemed out of place on a human.

 

 

He spent another half hour or so working through the list before they started down the road towards the pokecenter, where the larger road that joined into the Detroit-Scarlet Route wound off inland. Even then, he occasionally pointed and called a command, getting her used to following his lead. Mutio had been built as pack raiders, large schools of them operating under a Dive Queen leader had swarmed over coastal towns and cities in the Revenge War, and it still happened occasionally, when a sonic failed or enough of them got worked up to just take the pain and charge past the barrier. 

 

What all that meant was that they usually had to be managed in a fight, since they were used to following orders from a higher authority. He’d heard of some tamers who’d managed to train them to work alone, but he didn’t have the skill or the time to do it himself.

 

By the time they reached Red Cliffs, the girl was panting a bit, and her skin was starting to look dry as the constant water jets drained the internal reserves she usually used to stray moist in the air. He turned off the path and led her down onto the rock shelf where he’d caught her, smiling as she skittered around the place on all fours, poking her nose into the rock as if looking for the smell of the fight.

 

That didn’t hold her interest of long though, not with her the water right there and her skin probably starting to itch.She gave him a glance over her shoulder, waiting for him to nod, before darting into the sea, vanishing in a cloud of bubbles.

 

When the water cleared, he could see her frolicking among the rocks. The water was mostly clear here, without many sediments and the he could just make out the rocky bottom some three or four meters down. The ‘girl had extended her fins, the long, translucent streamers flowing out from forearms and calves, letting her move with inhuman speed despite the deceptively slow and gentle motions of her limbs. 

 

Have to get a waterproof combead, he thought easily. The sold them at the center, and he still had some of the starting money his father had given him. He eased his gun loose and found a solid rock to settle against. The ‘girl had done well, and he was feeling a good deal more forgiving than he had this morning. He might as well let her have a bit of fun. As he relaxed against the stone and pulled out his ‘dex to do some reading, he heard a faint, complex sound drift up from the water. It was soothing, peacfull.

 

O0O

 

She was dry. 

 

For the last while, it had been getting harder and harder for her to spit water, and her skin was suffering for it. A few times, she’d considered disobeying her master. There was no threat and no prey and she was uncomfortable. 

 

Those considerations hadn’t lasted long. However strange he looked, her master was her master, and her place was to obey. She felt a warm rush as she thought it, reflexive.

 

Finally, her master led her out onto a shelf of rock, the same one he had taken her at. She crawled about it, running over the brief and unsuccessful hunt in her mind, even though the scents had been scoured away by the ocean.

 

It wasn’t long before the scent of the ocean reminded her of how dry her skin was, and she glanced back at her master, trusting him to understand her need, even if she couldn’t speak as he did.

 

He nodded, and she spent a moment wondering at how much meaning the simple movement held now, when it had held none before. Such things were not for her to think on though, hers was to obey.

 

She slipped into the water less gracefully than she would have liked. Her itching skin had distracted her from her dive. It deepend quickly, the stone falling away into a series of pillars, and she had plenty of room.

 

The water was glorious, Soothing her flesh and eyes, filling her with life as her gill fins spread wide to catch the flow. Her mouth opened and she gulped repeatedly, compressing the water into the reserves within her body, and let her fins grow out from forearm and calf, waving the long membranes gently to float between the rocks.

 

 

Joy filled her, welling up powerfully, and she opened her mouth and sang. Notes spilled out weaving together and over each other, filling the water around her.

 

There was no answer. There hadn’t been an answer for a long, long time. But the ache that usually came when her song went unanswered didn’t come. 

 

She had a new school now, it was small, but it would grow, and she would sing for her master and her sisters.

 

With gentle motions, she sent herself drifting through the stones, sliding easily through the clear water and singing with happiness that she had found a place.

 

 

O0O

 

When Terrence finally got to the pokecenter, it was nearly noon. A quick stop by the commissary to buy a combead for the mutio and a shorter one in the kitchen for a snack barely took any time.

 

The he picked a bed in the tamers dorm and set his pack down beside it. 

 

It was time to deal with Sara.

 

The Girl appeared kneeling when he hit the release, tail neatly curled, ears cocked attentively, eyes staring blankly up at him.

 

He looked back uncomfortably. Even knowing that the ‘girl wasn’t really human, the “nobody’s here” look of a recently foured girl was unsettling.

 

“Status?” he asked. Level 4 cycles triggered substantial shifts in a pokegirls mind. There wasn’t much they didn’t fix, but they usually left the ‘girl mechanical and hard to talk to for days, even weeks afterward.

 

“I am well Master.” Sara said. She smiled brilliantly at him, but there was something too precise about the look, as if it had been machined onto her face.

 

“Good,” he forced himself to smile back, “are you ready for a taming?”

 

The girl smoothly lowered her head in a submissive gesture.

 

“As you wish Master.”

 

“kneel on the bed.” He said, and shifted her until she was at a good height. She was a small girl, and he would have to kneel oddly to tame her in this position, but he didn’t want to look at that robotic smile when he could help it.

 

“Hold her.” He told Mili, and unzipped his pants while the water girl was knelt in front of the Eva and pinned her arms. The grip was obviously tighter than it had to be, Mili’s claws were drawing beads of blood, but it would keep her from bucking at least.

 

She’s warmer, was the first thought to cross his mind as he entered her. Certainly warmer than the mutio he’d taken that morning, and a little more than the Night Nurse who’d proctored his taming test, about the same as the Joy who’d taught the taming class.

 

The whole experience was, different. The girl felt tighter, and her body felt small under his hands. The fur on her ass tickled a bit every time he slid home. She was making a sort of snuffling squeak in time with his thrusts and her tail was snug around his waist.

 

It didn’t take her long to reach her peak, and she managed a “thank you Master!” with some real enthusiasm creeping through the too sweet tone left by the cycle. Three hundred years of study had shown that there was very little, sexually speaking, that wouldn’t drive a pokegirl to orgasm given enough time, and plain sex worked as well as any sort of extreme, and much more tiring, antics on nine girls in ten. At that point is was a simple thing to flip himself from “stay up” to “get this over with”, and he pushed into her harder briefly until he came himself. 

 

She didn’t collapse into taming shock; thresholders weren’t expected to wait through the months of indoctrination without a proper taming, and delta bonds were rare enough that they rarely caused a problem. He wiped himself off on the bed sheets, pokecenters had cleaning staff for a reason, after all, and then wiped the girls thighs as well, there was no sense in having her drip all the way to scarlet. By the time he’d cleaned up and tucked himself back into his pants, he had an audience.

 

“Barely passing. I know Kristin taught you better.”

 

 

He grit his teeth before he actually said it though. The Night Nurse had a perfect memory, and it was good odds he’d wind up back here at some point, possibly injured.  And Sam, who ran the center and owned the girl, doted on her.

 

“Thanks for the tip.” He said instead as he balled the Eva. He wasn’t sure he wanted to hear Kally’s likely lecture if she noticed he’d already had to send her through a cycle.

 

The Nurse looked like she was about to say something, but a loud beeping from the pocket of her vest distracted her and she dashed out of the dorm. 

Lucky.

 

He looked up at the clock on the wall, then pulled his pack back on and beckoned to Mili. If he left now, he could probably make it to the Route by evening, and there was a good repel spiked camp where the roads met.

 

AS he left the building, he looked out at the forest in front of him, smelled the ocean at his back, and smiled.

 

Not bad, he thought, not bad at all.