Voiceless

Afternoon, June 4

Alto Mare

Kai had lost his voice.

Lips pressed into a thin line, wearing heavy black shades, a blue cap, white shirt, and blue jeans, he roamed around the laneways of the Water City, sensing its joys and distress.

Suddenly, a little white bird approached him, flying over the canal. Kai stopped and watched it. The white bird had some type of box clutched under her belly. When she fluttered to just above Kai's head, she dropped the box. Kai caught it, still looking at her.

He could sense no emotions in her. No life. For feathers, she had thin inconspicuous folds.

It was a paper bird. An Origami.

'Quite a unique and useful Ability,' Kai thought, as he saw the paper-bird diving into the canal after serving its purpose.

Kai brought the box up to his face. Over it, in bold lettering, was written - Pokemon Cards For Beginners. The information over the box said that it had 50 cards, covering major local Pokemon and their next evolutionary stages. He opened it and took out a card.

On one side of this card was the image of Pokemon and its name, and some stats which might as well have been random numbers. But the thing on the other side had much more meaning to him. The backside of the card had the data related to the Pokemon's general abilities, its type, and against which type it was stronger and weaker. It wasn't much, but with no Pokedex, Kai could use it to know what he was dealing with, or if it was worth devouring.

2 more nights had passed since his first nightly adventure.

Kai had refrained from devouring any Pokemon which didn't suit his fighting style or whose abilities might not benefit his other Abilities and Skills. Anything less than the level of Snake Instinct and Filth Manipulation didn't seem worthy to him.

Then there was the matter of Pokeballs. None of the Pokeballs had Stats over them, and collecting them for trading purposes wouldn't have worked either. No one in this world had Pokeballs that they couldn't operate. To have such Pokeballs on him was nothing but a clear sign of stolen goods.

Kai stared at the Pokemon Center ahead and continued after a brief pause.

He took a deep breath and entered. The sudden surge of emotions and the many magical beasts' presence hit his face as fresh as the morning sea breeze. Nothing seemed to have changed. But only he knew that the drop in his uncontrollable urge to devour all the happiness and blood essence was considerable.

Kai walked to a bench in the corner and sat down, spreading the cards on the table in front of him. His teeth clenched tight, and his chest pounding hot, Kai tried to focus on learning the info on the cards. But even he wasn't unaware of the surrounding tension.

If before there was a sweet taste to the happiness in this place like cool river water, then now there was a bitterness mixed in it. A bitterness because of fear.

And this type of happiness tasted the best, Kai found out, to his dismay.

His hands trembled as he lifted one card after another, memorizing the details, confirming it with the prey he had already fed to Selene. A boy and girl came and sat down close to him. From their clothing, they seemed like local Pokemon Trainers, but it was what they were discussing that caught Kai's attention.

"It happened again last night," the brown-haired boy said, frowning.

"What's the count now? 5?" the green-eyed girl said with apprehension.

The boy nodded, taking out a poster issued by the police. "Including the one from last night," the boy whispered, "the local police have found 3 citizens and 2 foreigners in a complete mental-breakdown state. All with their Pokeballs lying by their side and their Pokemon missing."

The girl shivered. "And…" she trailed off but continued after a choking gulp. "… that sign. The 'R'."

The boy turned over the poster where the gruesome image of the sign in question was printed, along with the details. "They found the letter 'R' written by their side… in blood," he told her. "Some locals are saying it was the Pokemon's blood."

She gasped, her hands covering her mouth, and her face going pale in shock and fear. Kai shuddered, sensing her emotion.

"But why 'R'?" she questioned. "How can someone be so cruel?… so pathetic."

The boy shook his head. "All Pokemon are so gentle and loving," he said, looking at his Pokeballs. "I can't even think of something like that happening to us. Sigh! Yes. That 'R'… Have you heard about Team Rocket?"

"Is it them?!" the girl cried in shock. "But weren't they caught around a year ago?"

"Yes, they were," the boy said, folding the poster and putting it in his back pocket. "They say someone from Team Rocket is doing it as revenge. The Police haven't released it yet, but my brother told me they found a letter in the morning after the first attack."

"Oh, no!" the girl whimpered. "Don't tell me…"

The boy looked around. Kai dropped his head, minding his own business. "Yes," he said meekly. "The letter demanded the release of those criminals, Annie and Oakley. Police have yet to comment on it. But my brother thinks it's some evil tactic to distract them."

Kai marked this brother as his next victim instantly.

These two weren't the only people talking about these sudden night attacks. All around the town, this tale was being passed around with some elements missing, and some added drama. By now, all his human and Pokemon victims had given Kai 3.3 Soul Points, collectively. Not to mention the number of smaller wild Pokemon Selene herself had hunted, always returning to him bleeding, bright red blood soaking her white scales like a cloak.

'Her stomach is so full these days, -she can barely slither-,' Kai thought, amusingly. Then the amusement died, turning into a hideous scowl. 'Motherfucking….'

"Let's go," the boy said. "I hope they won't cancel the race."

"Yeah…" the girl trailed off, standing up. Suddenly, she slipped, and fell back. Flailing her hands, she gripped the first thing her fingers came into contact with.

Kai's wrist.

He could have avoided it if it wasn't for the stiffness about him because of resisting the urge to just devour everything. For him to master his hunger, Kai must remain calm and composed, without making much movement. This was one way the Blood Essence Cultivators used to maser their beastly urges in his previous life. Recognizing that he was going through something like that, Kai hadn't waited to implement his theory.

It worked.

So when her hand came to rest on his wrist, Kai didn't move and just behaved as a normal person.

"Sorry," the girl said, the boy helping her up. When she let go of Kai's wrist, she brought her hand to her face and touched her cheek. Her green eyes were staring at him hard, Kai could tell. "Your hand…" she whispered. "It's so cold."

Kai lifted his head. Behind the black shades, two hazel reptilian slits narrowed. Selene sent out another burst of soul-chilling coldness, preventing his skin from becoming red hot, and the scalding steam returned to him as summer sweat.

Boa Constrictor's blood essence had gotten no rest in the last three days. Kai had been activating Snake Instinct after every next Cooldown. The increase in its Proficiency wasn't much, but it wasn't negligible either. Plus, Kai needed to learn to use his Glitch transformation without being noticed if he would need to.

The answer was to let Selene use Soul Chill from time to time with just enough intensity to bring down the rising heat and color of his body.

The calming of his voracious appetite to devour Pokemon had come as an unexpected but not unwelcome outcome. Now that Selene was resting just left of the thing within his chest, above his heart, her coldness was also positively affecting the sudden hunger pangs of his Glitch.

'Well, by the end of this week, -I will be done with these two major issues-,' Kai reflected. 'Not again! FUCK!!'

"Umm, thank you!" the girl said, bowing a little.

Kai smiled at her and nodded. It looked odd to her that Kai didn't return her greeting; he knew. But what else could he do?

'I have lost my voice,' he remembered, as he saw the boy and the girl leaving the Pokemon Center. He canceled his transformation, and Selene stopped using the Soul Chill.

-Go. Follow them-

A mass of silver mist left his back and disappeared underground. Selene didn't need eyes to follow the prey on the ground. Her Skill, Earth Vibration Sense, let her sense and differentiate between all vibrations in a 100-meter radius using the sensory organ under her head.

-Remember the path- he hissed out a warning.

That's all he could do now with surety. Hiss. The sheer ecstasy of getting an Elite Ability and 50 Worth Points had vanished when Petyr came out of him the first night of his hunt, telling him that Kai had gone mental.

'You are using Parseltongue,' Petyr had told him. 'You are using it so unconsciously that you have not even realized it. Half of the sentence you are speaking normally, hissing out the rest. Sometimes you are hissing in between words. Are you even thinking in Parseltongue?'

Kai had no answer to Petyr's accusing question then. Now he did. And he hated himself for it. 'The weight of the problems related to Advance Emotions Manipulation and Blood Devour hasn't even lifted yet, and now I will have to deal with an ELITE one?' Kai had thought.

And when he realized that he couldn't remember if he had thought that sentence in normal speech or Parseltongue… Kai cursed again.