Wednesday, October 19th, 302AS
15:11
Isis, Jade Islands League
“What about a rock or ground type?”
“I said I wasn't against it when you brought up dark, water, steel, and flying Constance. But I need to get a non-com slot before we can add to the harem more and to get that I need a lot more bounty points. So we're here at the pokecenter to see if there's any bounties to go after that are in our range while out hunting ferals.”
“I'm sure if you talked with Azar she would hold onto me for you so you could-”
“Constance.” Vince's alpha fell silent. It wasn't the first time since the day after the Vampire attack that she brought up getting rid of her, Hana, or both for the sake of Vince getting more fighting pokegirls in his harem. And although he was sure both Azar and Aiden would be happy to take temporary possession of both of them, Vince didn't like that idea. They were his pokegirls, and they'd stay in his harem.
Not that Constance didn't think she had a good reason. Without any magic to her command she had started focusing on the visions of the future that constantly seemed to be flitting through her mind. She couldn't make sense of any of them yet, but apparently a lot filled her with feelings ranging from apprehension to dread.
“...Or maybe a dragon type. They're supposed to be some of the strongest breeds and I think you could gain one's respect with your traits.” Vince groaned to himself and then stopped his TickTock by placing his hands on her shoulders.
“Constance, look- Ho-ly shit!” Not anywhere near the argument he had wanted to make, the last two words escaped Vince's lips when the point of a sword breached the block walls of the pokecenter they were just outside of and cut the air between the two of them. Vince had the balls for Ava and Verse ready to release for a fight when the sword tip stayed where it was, and excited shouting started to come from inside. Calling upon all the survival tactics he had learned while journeying as a tamer and then hanging up before they could even say hello, Vince ran through the double glass doors to discover what the commotion was.
The lobby was ringed along the walls with nervous and excited tamers, only one of them with 'girls out to fight. The 'center attendant looked to have some kind of fuzzy ears, but was wearing a headpiece that concealed anything specific. Whatever breed she was, she was chewing her fingernails with an anxiety stricken face. The center of all the attention was a Very Near Human pokegirl struggling to free a sword, presumably hers, from the bulletin board she had ran through up to the ornate hilt. She gave off a definite Edo vibe. From way her brilliant teal colored hair cut in a Hime style, or a style where the bangs were cut one level length, the hair in front of the ears another, and then all the rest a third length that fell behind her back, to her loose, flowing silk clothing, to the shape of her ghostly teal eyes, the pokegirl clearly at least had a lineage dating back to the Asian league.
Vince ran a scan with his pokedex to confirm the excited whisperings he had overheard from the two nearest tamers. The pokegirl was a Samurai, and given the way she was acting, a near if not completely feral one. She was trying to say something, shouting in her frustration as she made attempt after attempt to start the sentence, only to be cut off by the one boldest tamer giving his Ursine the order to attack. The bear pokegirl charged forward, throwing a massive furred fist at the unarmed blade user. The Samurai responded by grabbing the wrist of the larger ground type and twisting her body to throw the Ursine over her shoulder and into the wall that held her weapon. The fighting type pokegirl gave her weapon one more tug, this time the blade working itself out by just a few centimeters, when the Ursine started to struggle back to her feet and her tamer was about to send another pokegirl, this time an armored up Valkyrie, into the fight.
Vince watched, unsure of what to do or whether or not he should participate when his eyes fell on the Samurai again. “Please, listen, that... that man!” She shook her head in confusion again and went back to struggling to free her blade. “Please, he... my master...” She looked just as desperate as she was confused, trying just as hard to say whatever it was she had to say as much as she was struggling to free her weapon.
Vince cursed a familiar pull at his heartstrings before stepping forward and shouting, “Alright, STOP IT!” The outburst must have convinced everyone that he had some kind of authority, because everyone in the room listened. Cautiously, he stepped towards the highly evolved fighting type.
“Vince! What are you doing?!” Vince just waved a hand dismissively at Constance before going back to focus on the Samurai. She was watching him, her eyes sharply focused on him with each slow step he took. But she wasn't tugging at the hilt of her sword anymore and she stopped shouting out nonsense.
Finally, Vince was within arm's reach but he refrained from touching her. As gently as he could manage he asked, “What are you trying to say?”
“My master... my sisters... He. He killed them.” Vince's eyes darted to the skewered bulletin board. The hand guard was blocking most of the image, but Vince knew what the poster was. The Samurai had ran her weapon straight through the portrait of Vsevolod's head.
“You saw him? You know where he is?!”
She nodded her head. “I know. I know I know. I just can't-”
“You've gone feral.” The pokegirl's eyes widened in shock and horror. “Let me help you, I can get you healed and tamed then we can talk to the poli-” Vince jumped back as another, shorter blade flashed through the air. Two halves of a thrown pokeball clattered against the wall, the Samurai sheathing the smaller weapon and the tamer with the Ursine and Valkyrie cursing the failure of his attempt at stealing the capture. “I promise I'll help you.” Vince held out a pokeball, and, with one glance at the tamer anxious to throw another of his pokeballs, the Samurai touched the one in Vince's hand and was taken in by the capture beam.
Overtop of more cursing from the tamer with the bear and winged pokegirls, Vince requested she be put through a healing cycle before checking out a taming room with heavy restraints. Then as he sat and waited he started to fill out the paper work for adding a non-combatant slot to his harem as Ava went about removing the sword from the wall.
Taming the Samurai out of her feral state was a morose process, made even more awkward by Ava there guarding over him when normally she would be jumping in to participate. Even taking the fact that the Samurai was locked in restraints into account, her reactions to Vince's ministrations were underwhelming. Even as she built up to her release she made no sound louder than a stifled moan, and when her orgasm came to her the cry she let out barely breached the level of one's speaking voice. As Vince let her out of the restraints, she began sobbing quietly, finally going to kneel on the floor with her hands covering her face.
Part of Vince's brain, desperate to lighten the mood in the room, offered making a joke about him being that bad of a tamer, but he really doubted that was the reason for the fighting type's depressing state. “My apologies, sir.” She wiped tears away with a deep inward breath that she held. “It's just, all of the memories now, they came back to me so suddenly. It's like I lived through it all, again.” Vince wasn't the only one desperate for a little fun to be introduced to the atmosphere. “I didn't want you to think that I was reacting to your...” Her words trailed off as she struggled to convince the muscles in her face to pull themselves into a smile that never came. “If you don't mind, I'd like a chance to clean up before you take me to the police.”
“Yeah, sure.” Vince nodded.
Vince sat down on the edge of the mattress as he heard the sound of running water coming from the bathroom attached to the taming room. He had lost two pokegirls and it had completely crushed him. He couldn't imagine what this Samurai must be going through, losing what could very well have been everyone in her life. The frightening thing was that her eyes didn't seem alive. Her body was warm, she was breathing and had a heartbeat, but there just wasn't any life left in her. Vince's musing was interrupted by a knock at the door.
Verse came in, followed by a couple more OfficerJennies in uniform and another police pokegirl, or a human woman now that Vince thought about it. given the way the three pokegirls were on their toes around her and the decorated uniform, that was probably the more realistic option.. “Tamer Vincent Flare?”
“What do you want with him?” Vince replied. Verse gave him a startled look.
“Your OfficerJenny has told us about your bloodcurse, and since she lead us to you I'm just going to go by her word. You are currently in possession of the Samurai pokegirl that caused the incident in the lobby earlier today?”
“Yeah, she's in the shower right now, then we were going to come see you. So why don't you go wait for us?”
“I'm afraid I have to take her into custody. You will be reimbursed for her market value.”
“Yeah, no.” Vince's response made Ava snort in laughter and everyone else's eyes bug out.
“You don't understand! That pokegirl destroyed league property and threatened the lives of humans along with the pokecenter staff!”
“My pokegirls have done more damage than she did and I just got fined for it. And as for her threatening anyone, 'taur shit.”
“Tamer Flare, her, and now your, behavior is completely unacceptable and if you don't hand her over to my custo-”
“She knows where Vsevolod is.” The police officer didn't continue after Vince's interruption. “Yeah, she made it here, after her master and the rest of his harem were killed, while feral. To try to get help, I'd imagine, or let you league people know what happened and where the bastard is. So I'd think that the reason she was acting like she did is because she couldn't afford to get caught until she found someone to help her.”
“And you just happen to be some bleeding heart tamer who will go out of his way to do that?” The officer sneered.
“Not just that,” Vince spat back at her, “but I had a pokegirl die because of him and another one mind fucked so bad she can't even take a piss without an Alaka-Wham using her like a psychic puppet! Then he was about to experiment on me and give the rest of my pokegirls to his hired goons! I probably would have wound up a pokegirl getting fucked along with the rest of them!” Verse started to step away from the actual police while Ava shifted into an aggressive stance as Vince's voice raised. “So it's not out of my fucking way AT ALL to do anything to help bring that fucker in! And if it comes down to helping that Samurai, or handing her over to you to be fived or pokepowered, guess what fucking side I'm going to pick.”
There was a click and then the sound of sliding steel as everyone turned to see the Samurai standing just outside the bathroom, dripping in a towel, a third blade shorter than the one that had been driven into the wall but longer than the one she had cut the pokeball with ready in one hand and the sheath held down in the other. Both OfficerJennies went for their guns but the human woman waved them down.
“Well...” Her eyes flicked from Vince, to the Samurai, to his Blazicunt, and finally over to Verse who looked about ready to faint. “given the fact that she has possibly vital information, and your willingness to pay for the damages... I'll contact my superiors and see if it can't be arranged for you to bring her in for an interview.”
Vince watched the two OfficerJennies and the policewoman's back until the door shut behind them, then cursed to himself. “Damnit! Did I just volunteer to pay the league money?!”
Verse was more concerned about a different matter. “You weren't really ready to fight them. Please tell me you weren't really ready to fight them. Do you know how much trouble you could have got in? I wouldn't have been able to fight for you Vince! I would have had to fight with them! PLEASE tell me you weren't serious.” She stared up at Vince for a good minute before she came to terms with the fact that he wasn't going to deny being prepared to fight. “Thousand gods, and anyone else listening... please spare me the fate of having to arrest my tamer.”
“You really would have sided with them? That would be the right thing to do?”
“VINCE! I can't do right or wrong! It's LEGAL or IL-legal! I-I want in my pokeball. Please. Put me in my pokeball.”
“Fine.” Vince recalled her and snagged the leg of a chair with his foot. Yanking it close enough to sit in, he straddled the seat while leaning his arms and chin on the back. Ava came over and started kneading the muscles in his shoulders and back with her palms, a little bit of heat just adding to the relaxing effect. Vince closed his eyes to focus completely on the feeling. When he opened them, the Samurai was kneeling in front of him, still wrapped in her towel.
“Hey,” Vince started to ask, “what's your name anyway?”
“Yin Zhi, sir.”
“What do you want to do after you talk to the police? Is there anyone in your master's family you'd like to go to? Of course, I'd love it if you stayed in my harem. My alpha's been bugging me about getting another combat 'girl anyway.”
“Truthfully, sir...” She sighed and straightened her pose, “I wish I had died with my harem sisters, fighting to protect my master. I wish I could take my life with my own blade because I failed to do that. But my master wouldn't wish for me to do such a thing, so I will endure. If you will take me, I will be honored to be your servant, even if my honor died with my master. I do wish to return to the hometown of my master at some time though.”
“Yeah,” Vince was stunned by how frank she had been. “Yeah, I don't see a problem in heading there. Not going to be doing much beyond feral hunting for a while anyway, and it's not like we can't do that anywhere.”
-
Sunday October 23rd, 302AS
13:20
Isis island, Celaeno region, Jade Islands League
Vince was sitting at the trunk of a tree, so much that he practically laying down on top of the base of the roots. They'd taken a break for lunch, but since they were foraging to save money and everyone's meal consisted of nothing but one Great Grape, the duration of the break was quite excessive. So Vince was staring up at the canopy of leaves over his head and watching beams of green light tinted by the chlorophyl lance through as the wind shifted the branches.
A pinprick feeling in his mind caused him to glance to the side, where he spotted Reshmi slowly stalking forward in her tauric form. Vince felt a jolt of surprise as their eyes locked, normally he couldn't hear the Arachnae moving at all when she was using her spider-like legs. How did he know this time? “Heh, what are you doing over there?”
“I was trying to surprise you... Did you hear me?” Vince shook his head.
“No, it was just this feeling I had. Like,” Vince extended an arm in her direction and pointed, “Reshmi. It was just like someone did that in my head.”
Reshmi dove for him, shifting to her taming form as she landed. “Vince! You know what this means?!” Vince replied with a monosyllabic sound of confusion. “The bond! It's developed more. We know where each other are now!”
Sure enough, Vince felt this intense feeling of happiness fluttering in his stomach as the Arachnae gazed into his eyes waiting for his response. Somehow he knew now the feeling was from her and a sense beyond his sight, smell, and touch let him know she was right there. “This is great, Reshmi!” They kissed deeply, joy and lustful passion building in each other and growing more in response to the feelings they could feel in the other.
The sound of Constance clearing her throat caused them to cease before things lead to a full blown outdoor taming. Dejectedly, the TickTock informed Vince that he had a new message on his pokedex, and that the time he had alloted for the lunch break had expired. Then she set the pokedex on the grass in front of them and walked over to the rest of Vince's harem. Yin Zhi nodded to Vince's alpha as she started giving out instructions, and the Samurai moved closer to Vince and Reshmi to take up guard position.
Vince felt two pangs of guilt, one was his and the other Reshmi's. He quickly pecked a kiss on the Arachnae's top lip and then asked, “Mind getting my 'dex for me?” Reshmi crawled off from on top of him to fetch the multi-purpose electronic device. Flipping the lid open he keyed up his inbox to view the new text message. He smacked himself in the forehead with the case of his pokedex after getting one sentence in. “Fuck. I forgot about taking Hanako for her checkup with those researchers.” He stood up and raised his voice so his full harem could hear. “Okay girls, change of plans. We've got to get back to civilization so we can set up a checkup for Hanako. Keep an eye out for ferals to catch and let's move.”
-
Tuesday, October 25th 302AS
14:14
Isis, Jade Islands League
With Hanako blissfully playing with patterned wooden blocks under the observation of the researcher's assistant that teleported in, Vince was free to talk with his new shadow. Yin Zhi had been silently two steps behind him the entire day, and the day before that from when he woke up to when he went to sleep. Since he didn't know much to talk about with her yet, save for her tragic past (not that he thought that would be a good topic of conversation), his mind went to the most obvious thing about Yin Zhi. Unfortunately for him, it seemed that aspect was a little more complicated than he'd ever expected.
“I don't carry a katana, sir.”
Vince ran his fingers through the hair on the side of his head once. “I thought that's what those kind of Edo swords were called.”
The fighting type touched the hilt of the medium length blade. “This is a tachi, an older style sword that's a little longer than a katana. It's also worn with the blade down hanging off of my belt. A katana would be tucked in the belt with the blade up.” Her hand moved to the shortest of the blades, also hanging at her side. “This is a kodachi,” she then moved her hand to the hilt of the longest sword, the one with the ornate hilt, “and this is my odachi. They're all used differently and none are a katana.”
“Do you know a different style for all of them?”
For the first time since he'd obtained her, Yin Zhi managed to smile convincingly. “Actually, the style I was taught uses all of these. It's a very esoteric method that's mostly kept within the family it originated in. The story is that the father was a swordsman, and became obsessed with the idea of surpassing pokegirls in ability. He was prideful, and although he mastered and invented many techniques, he never succeeded. The son, learning from the folly of his father's pride, consulted his own pokegirls in how he could improve. The style grew more and the son came very close to claiming victory, but still fell short. Then the grandson taught his pokegirls the style, and never lost a match until the day he died.” The smile faded as the story continued. “Although I was born parthenogenetically, the Samurai that birthed me then had a daughter sired by her master. He raised us with his pokewomen at his sides, and we were treated well. I was given to his greatest pupil, an adopted son.” A sigh trembled out of her frame.
Vince watched the Samurai close her eyes and focus, and the grief that had washed over receded when her eyes opened again. “If you want to cry, you can.”
“Thank you sir, but I will cry at a time it's not inconvenient for you,” was her answer. Vince couldn't think of anything to say back to that. Marveling at her strength of will, he reached up and stroked her cheek. Her eyes drifted shut again as she murmured. “You're distracting me from my duties, sir.”
“Vince?” The researcher's assistant had lead Hanako back over to him, “I'm all done with Hanako. Compared to the rate she had been learning at, there's nothing abnormal about how she's developed since her last check up. I think the effects of the T2 have finally worn off, but we'll need to track her for a while more just to be sure.”
Vince nodded. “That's good,” he said without really being sure if it was good or not. “I'll try not to forget about the next one.”
“I can understand why you may have been distracted. Based on what I can gather from what Hanako was talking about during the activities, it sounds like you've been having a rather rough patch of your adventure. She mentioned though that you're now her father?” Vince nodded. “Well, that's,” the assistant paused to try to come up with the right word, “not usual... But she seems very glad that you've adopted her in such a way.” The assistant nodded and then said his farewells before calling for a teleport back to Allat.
-
Vince was walking along the sidewalk with Hanako on his shoulders and Reshmi at his side, with Yin Zhi once again two steps behind him as they approached Aiden's house. A man sitting against the short wall that circled Aiden's property jumped up when he saw Vince approaching and jogged over. “Tamer Vincent Flare?” Vince raised an eyebrow in suspicion. “Good, it is you. Sir, I'm a scout for the Jade Islands Land Forces. We've located what we believe is the hideout for Vsevolod that your Samurai escaped from, but we need your help in confirming it.” Vince turned and looked at his pokegirls, who were both looking at him with the same uncertain expression. “Sir, I don't mean to rush you but the sooner you come with me the sooner we can begin our planning to take this guy down, if we've really found him.”
Vince lifted Hanako off of his shoulders and set her down on the ground. “Alright. Hanako, you go find Pritha and tell her I'm helping the JILF again. This won't take very long, right?” That was directed at the scout.
“No sir. We only need you to teleport with me to just outside the location, and from there we'll approach the perimeter of the facility we've discovered and your Samurai will confirm if it's the one. Backtracking from the memories of a feral pokegirl haven't been easy, but we're fairly certain.”
Vince nudged Hanako towards the house and repeated his instructions to her. The Flowergirl pokekit peered at the scout with a look of uncertainty and then quickly ran to the house to do as she was told. “Alright, let's get this done.” The scout nodded and released a Mooncalf and a Foxxsea.
“My Mooncalf will be able to take you and one other pokegirl, but you'll have to put the rest of your harem up.” Vince reached for Yin Zhi's ball but then paused to think. Constance had been insisting that Vince keep the Samurai out with him, even to the point of opting to stay in her own pokeball instead of having the fighting type put up.
The rebel cursed tamer plucked Reshmi's pokeball off of his belt and frowned apologetically to her. “I'll let you out as soon as we get there. That way we don't have to worry about a pissed off alpha.” His Arachnae managed to nod right before she was converted by the capture beam. The scout had an odd expression that Vince couldn't quite read when he saw that Vince was leaving out the Samurai, but taking the psychic cow 'girls hand he didn't think much of it. Suddenly Ayn's telepathic voice urgently shouted in his mind, but he didn't get a chance to process the broadcast idea until after the scenery changed and he found himself in the middle of heavy forest.
<Vince, don't! It's a trap!>
Blades flashed as Yin Zhi struck down the two Shadowcats that had been waiting to ambush them. Before the blood hit the grass the Samurai then whirled and cleanly decapitated the Mooncalf. “Shit!” Vince cursed out loud as he began releasing his entire harem.
“We should move away from here.” Yin Zhi stated evenly as the rest of Vince's pokegirls began asking more and more questions.
“I walked into some kind of fucking trap, that's what's going on. But yeah, we need to-” The scout and the Foxxsea teleported in right in the middle of them. Verse grabbed the human and spun him before forcing him on his knees while Ione ensnared the water type in her vines and then electrocuted her.
“Who set this up? Why are you targeting my tamer?!” Vince's OfficerJenny questioned the JILF scout but got no answer. She turned him around again to face her only to see his blank eyes and slack jawed expression. “What the-?”
There was one last pop as an Alaka-Wham teleported in right next to Vince. Definitely not Ayn, the psychic type grabbed Vince by the shoulder and teleported again.
Vince was shoved away by telekinesis, landing on the concrete floor of an unlit warehouse looking building. Somebody else also fell beside him, and as he identified her Reshmi instantly bolted to her feet as she changed into her battle form. Somehow she must have made contact with the red skinned psychic before the teleportation. The sound of massive, high power lights flickering on reverberated in the space, illuminating a catwalk above the two of them and the two figures standing atop it.
“Vincent Trey Flare. I had thought you were just a waste of my time back on Wadjet.” Vsevolod sneered down at him. “But when you interrupt an entire shipment of research specimens, defeat the assassin I sent for retribution, and sends countless league agents scurrying about this entire island looking for me, then I realize you've really wasted my time. And my time is valuable so I think it's time you paid for it. I had hoped to catch you without any pokegirls but no matter. A'deen outclasses any pokegirl you could have obtained.” The Alaka-Wham standing next to him lifted off the catwalk and started to levitate down towards the floor. “This ends today, Vincent Trey Flare. You end today.”