11-08-2016, 12:59 AM
(This post was last modified: 01-17-2017, 04:07 AM by Enzo Matrix.)
In one swift motion, Matrix shoved the front door of his home open. The sunrise was calm and peaceful, but he felt anything but relaxed. He had thought about the raid of the Liberation Front’s hidden base all night, and especially just how quickly and accurately they had retaliated. He was all for team spirit, but he expected it to go both ways. It was time to find Mewtwo and set the record straight.
He didn’t have to look very hard. Before him, there was the physic-type leader of Cinnabar standing in the dirt clearing before his house. He could admit that the first two times Mewtwo had managed to sneak up and project a mysterious air about him, Matrix had been thoroughly impressed. Time had passed, and he knew a little bit more about Cinnabar, and the Omniverse as a whole. Now, the whole act just made him angry.
“Good,” Matrix said as he descended the three steps and joined Mewtwo in the clearing. “We need to talk.”
“You’re right,” Mewtwo’s voice telepathically boomed into Matrix’s head. Again, originally intimidating. Now, not so much.
“You told me not to bring my fights here,” Matrix started. He wasn’t much for playing conversational ‘chicken.’ “You told me Cinnabar protected its neutrality, and that if anything followed me here, I was on my own.”
“And I meant every word of it,” Mewtwo snapped.
“And yet last night, after I nearly died projecting a Cinnabar citizen, Liberation Front assassins nearly killed me right here!” Matrix shouted in his deep, heavy voice as he pointed to the dirt between the two. “So it’s a one-way street, then? If your issues end up on my front door, that’s just fine?”
“While you were gone, we were dealing with other foreigners,” Mewtwo retorted, his own anger slipping through his usually calm telepathic demeanor. “Cinnabar has been a nearly forgotten island in the Vasty Deep for some time, with a token Imperial presence. Now we have diplomats ashore and all manner of individuals running around. The only one of us that has spent extensive time away from the island is you!”
“Foreigners?” Matrix scoffed. “What are you talking about?”
“As I said. The Empire has men on the island as we speak. A woman pretended to be interested in helping us, but betrayed us and ran off with them,” Mewtwo answered. “It happened almost immediately after you left.”
“And I had nothing to do with any of that,” Matrix responded. His hand twitched as he resisted the urge and instinct to go for his gun. He couldn’t believe he was being blamed for other peoples’ malicious actions just after his own heroic ones. It was why he never let himself get close. People – whatever form they took – only disappointed.
“I know of your travels to the Dataverse,” Mewtwo pressed his accusations on strong. “And I know of your journeys to the Graveyardverse. You have interacted with a great number people not from this land.”
“And I shared the name ‘Cinnabar’ with none of them!” Matrix shouted back. Surely, it looked odd, with him being the only one capable of vocalizing his words aloud, but he really didn’t care. He couldn’t believe he was being accused of whatever the hell Mewtwo had on his mind when he’d been the one nearly killed the previous night. “Maybe it’s time for you to accept that this island is a little more well-known than you’d like.”
Mewtwo didn’t answer. He didn’t move at all. He just stared directly into Matrix’s eyes with a powerful and piercing gaze. That was a little bit intimidating, still.
“Who is Wartortle?” Matrix demanded. Regardless of what he was up against, he wasn’t one to back down.
“You met him?” Mewtwo took a slightly less aggressive tone inside of Matrix’s mind.
“No,” Matrix firmly answered. “But I met the ones that believed in what he said. Believed enough to leave this island.”
“Wartortle created something of a schism between our people,” Mewtwo remarked. “Even those that didn’t leave talk about his words, from time to time.”
“Tell me about the Liberation Front,” Matrix requested in a low, deliberate tone. It was all he could do to keep from demanding it out loud.
“Cinnabar and the Liberation Front is a close, personal matter,” Mewtwo replied very quickly.
This just caused the anger to boil within Matrix again. “A matter that came to my front door last night.”
Mewtwo paused. The green prime had a good point, at that. “Wartortle was once a resident of Cinnabar, like many of the members of the Liberation Front.”
“Tor, the Blastoise, for instance,” Matrix ventured to guess. “I did meet that one.”
“Yes,” Mewtwo confirmed. “They all believed that this small, forgotten island in the Vasty Deep was not good enough for us. They believed that we should strike out and use our powers to claim a far more impressive land. Perhaps even an entire verse or more.”
Matrix nodded, crossing his arms as he listened.
“Thoughts on what we deserve aside, I argued that we did not need to subject our citizens to a fruitless war when we exist just fine here,” Mewtwo continued. “Perhaps even better. There is nothing advantageous about where we are. The Empire’s blockade isn’t concerned with the island itself, just our people. That much we can never avoid.”
“So Wartortle left,” Matrix concluded.
“Quite abruptly, and quite violently,” Mewtwo answered. “In the end, he and his followers went underground, and we continued like always, though we have dealt with his people on Cinnabar ever since. The Hypno that abducted Vulcan’s son being just one example.”
“So the three that ambushed me and AndrAIa last night could have been regular citizens?” Matrix asked.
“It’s possible,” Mewtwo admitted. “We would have to see. Where are they now?”
Matrix’s only answer was to allow an orb of Omnilium to emerge from his palm. With Mewtwo’s nod of understanding, he re-absorbed the rainbow glob.
“Who was the girl? The one that betrayed you?” Matrix asked, changing the subject. He’d heard enough to understand the situation with the Liberation Front.
“You don’t know her?” Mewtwo responded with a question of his own.
“Why would I?” Matrix countered with yet another question.
“She looked to prove herself to gain refuge here,” Mewtwo explained, breaking the chain of questions. “Much like you did. I had something more elaborate in mind, to make use of her powers. But she had other plans. She left with the Imperials.”
Matrix silently processed that information.
“Sabrina,” Mewtwo continued. “She knew me from the realm before this one.”
Matrix nodded, not really knowing what to make of that bit of information. The world before the Omniverse was irrelevant to him, unless it was Mainframe.
“I had nothing to do with her showing up,” Matrix responded. “Neither did AndrAIa.”
Mewtwo crossed its own arms. “Trust is hard to come by. You can forgive me for being suspicious of an ill-timed arrival like yourself.”
Matrix glared at the Pokemon hard. “I just expect some level of support when it comes to-“
The distinct sound of an explosion caught the attention of both primes. Mewtwo and Matrix both looked in the direction of the sound, realizing that they were looking in the direction of the main town of Cinnabar. Mewtwo closed his eyes, while Matrix took a few more steps to end up beside the purple and white Pokemon. Mewtwo then opened his eyes and dismissed his frustration, and turned to stand beside Matrix. Neither quite processed that it was the first time that had happened, metaphorically or not.
“What was that?” Matrix asked.
Mewtwo’s sigh was another telepathic feat that Matrix heard within his brain.
“More trouble.”
At least some things never changed.
He didn’t have to look very hard. Before him, there was the physic-type leader of Cinnabar standing in the dirt clearing before his house. He could admit that the first two times Mewtwo had managed to sneak up and project a mysterious air about him, Matrix had been thoroughly impressed. Time had passed, and he knew a little bit more about Cinnabar, and the Omniverse as a whole. Now, the whole act just made him angry.
“Good,” Matrix said as he descended the three steps and joined Mewtwo in the clearing. “We need to talk.”
“You’re right,” Mewtwo’s voice telepathically boomed into Matrix’s head. Again, originally intimidating. Now, not so much.
“You told me not to bring my fights here,” Matrix started. He wasn’t much for playing conversational ‘chicken.’ “You told me Cinnabar protected its neutrality, and that if anything followed me here, I was on my own.”
“And I meant every word of it,” Mewtwo snapped.
“And yet last night, after I nearly died projecting a Cinnabar citizen, Liberation Front assassins nearly killed me right here!” Matrix shouted in his deep, heavy voice as he pointed to the dirt between the two. “So it’s a one-way street, then? If your issues end up on my front door, that’s just fine?”
“While you were gone, we were dealing with other foreigners,” Mewtwo retorted, his own anger slipping through his usually calm telepathic demeanor. “Cinnabar has been a nearly forgotten island in the Vasty Deep for some time, with a token Imperial presence. Now we have diplomats ashore and all manner of individuals running around. The only one of us that has spent extensive time away from the island is you!”
“Foreigners?” Matrix scoffed. “What are you talking about?”
“As I said. The Empire has men on the island as we speak. A woman pretended to be interested in helping us, but betrayed us and ran off with them,” Mewtwo answered. “It happened almost immediately after you left.”
“And I had nothing to do with any of that,” Matrix responded. His hand twitched as he resisted the urge and instinct to go for his gun. He couldn’t believe he was being blamed for other peoples’ malicious actions just after his own heroic ones. It was why he never let himself get close. People – whatever form they took – only disappointed.
“I know of your travels to the Dataverse,” Mewtwo pressed his accusations on strong. “And I know of your journeys to the Graveyardverse. You have interacted with a great number people not from this land.”
“And I shared the name ‘Cinnabar’ with none of them!” Matrix shouted back. Surely, it looked odd, with him being the only one capable of vocalizing his words aloud, but he really didn’t care. He couldn’t believe he was being accused of whatever the hell Mewtwo had on his mind when he’d been the one nearly killed the previous night. “Maybe it’s time for you to accept that this island is a little more well-known than you’d like.”
Mewtwo didn’t answer. He didn’t move at all. He just stared directly into Matrix’s eyes with a powerful and piercing gaze. That was a little bit intimidating, still.
“Who is Wartortle?” Matrix demanded. Regardless of what he was up against, he wasn’t one to back down.
“You met him?” Mewtwo took a slightly less aggressive tone inside of Matrix’s mind.
“No,” Matrix firmly answered. “But I met the ones that believed in what he said. Believed enough to leave this island.”
“Wartortle created something of a schism between our people,” Mewtwo remarked. “Even those that didn’t leave talk about his words, from time to time.”
“Tell me about the Liberation Front,” Matrix requested in a low, deliberate tone. It was all he could do to keep from demanding it out loud.
“Cinnabar and the Liberation Front is a close, personal matter,” Mewtwo replied very quickly.
This just caused the anger to boil within Matrix again. “A matter that came to my front door last night.”
Mewtwo paused. The green prime had a good point, at that. “Wartortle was once a resident of Cinnabar, like many of the members of the Liberation Front.”
“Tor, the Blastoise, for instance,” Matrix ventured to guess. “I did meet that one.”
“Yes,” Mewtwo confirmed. “They all believed that this small, forgotten island in the Vasty Deep was not good enough for us. They believed that we should strike out and use our powers to claim a far more impressive land. Perhaps even an entire verse or more.”
Matrix nodded, crossing his arms as he listened.
“Thoughts on what we deserve aside, I argued that we did not need to subject our citizens to a fruitless war when we exist just fine here,” Mewtwo continued. “Perhaps even better. There is nothing advantageous about where we are. The Empire’s blockade isn’t concerned with the island itself, just our people. That much we can never avoid.”
“So Wartortle left,” Matrix concluded.
“Quite abruptly, and quite violently,” Mewtwo answered. “In the end, he and his followers went underground, and we continued like always, though we have dealt with his people on Cinnabar ever since. The Hypno that abducted Vulcan’s son being just one example.”
“So the three that ambushed me and AndrAIa last night could have been regular citizens?” Matrix asked.
“It’s possible,” Mewtwo admitted. “We would have to see. Where are they now?”
Matrix’s only answer was to allow an orb of Omnilium to emerge from his palm. With Mewtwo’s nod of understanding, he re-absorbed the rainbow glob.
“Who was the girl? The one that betrayed you?” Matrix asked, changing the subject. He’d heard enough to understand the situation with the Liberation Front.
“You don’t know her?” Mewtwo responded with a question of his own.
“Why would I?” Matrix countered with yet another question.
“She looked to prove herself to gain refuge here,” Mewtwo explained, breaking the chain of questions. “Much like you did. I had something more elaborate in mind, to make use of her powers. But she had other plans. She left with the Imperials.”
Matrix silently processed that information.
“Sabrina,” Mewtwo continued. “She knew me from the realm before this one.”
Matrix nodded, not really knowing what to make of that bit of information. The world before the Omniverse was irrelevant to him, unless it was Mainframe.
“I had nothing to do with her showing up,” Matrix responded. “Neither did AndrAIa.”
Mewtwo crossed its own arms. “Trust is hard to come by. You can forgive me for being suspicious of an ill-timed arrival like yourself.”
Matrix glared at the Pokemon hard. “I just expect some level of support when it comes to-“
The distinct sound of an explosion caught the attention of both primes. Mewtwo and Matrix both looked in the direction of the sound, realizing that they were looking in the direction of the main town of Cinnabar. Mewtwo closed his eyes, while Matrix took a few more steps to end up beside the purple and white Pokemon. Mewtwo then opened his eyes and dismissed his frustration, and turned to stand beside Matrix. Neither quite processed that it was the first time that had happened, metaphorically or not.
“What was that?” Matrix asked.
Mewtwo’s sigh was another telepathic feat that Matrix heard within his brain.
“More trouble.”
At least some things never changed.