The Subjugation (2)

As Gengar and I walked farther and farther into the tunnel I kept thinking about how much dirt had to be moved to make a hole this big. There were no large piles of dirt outside so where did it all go? After making it about one hundred and eighty feet down I found out where the dirt might have gone. There was a huge chasm expanding deep into the ground, even with my night vision goggles I couldn't see all the way down, the far side was around three hundred feet away and cliffs and tunnels could be seen covering the entire visible area.

This partly explained how the nest could have so many Pokemon in it, with all this area they wouldn't need to spend any time digging out their nest, all they would need to do is hunt, sleep, and breed. Following the cliff I made my way deeper and deeper, exploring the larger tunnels I can across. I snuck by thousands of Pokemon as I went, the deeper I went the older and larger they got until I started seeing Arbok even bigger than the one that attacked the kids.

Every once in a while I would look down the cliff to see if the bottom was visible, looking up I guessed I was about a thousand feet lower than the top of the cliff where I started. Looking down again I could just barely make out the bottom but it was still to far to see clearly. Making my way along the cliff again I saw the first Totem Pokemon, it was roughly twice the size of the one that attacked the kids and it's aura was incredible. Even I felt a slight chill down my back when I saw it, but I also knew that this wasn't the Sovereign. There was still a long way to go before I reached the deepest part of the nest.

After sneaking past the first Totem Pokemon and making my way deeper I took a short break. Looking at my watch I saw about five hours had gone by, I had stopped at a spot in a tunnel where a couple of boulders blocked the view. After making sure there were no Pokemon nearby using my mini-map I had Gengar cancel his Shadow Sneak so he could rest and recover some of his energy. We each ate a bit of travel ration to keep us in top condition and ready for anything. Judging by the time the subjugation would start in about ten hours and I had only made it about a third of the way through the nest, I needed to go faster.

After our quick break Gengar and I began to travel a bit faster, only slowing down when a large group of Pokemon or a Totem Pokemon was nearby. Our new rate of travel paid off, we made it down to the bottom after only eight more hours. But it was not all good news, I had counted no less than thirty Totem Pokemon at the bottom of the chasm and the combined aura from all of them was making the air hard to breathe. Even just walking, it felt like I was trying to walk through deep water, every step took extra effort. This far down the cliff there was not an Ekans to be seen, every single Pokemon down here is an Arbok and they are all huge. The one that attacked Jake would only be a quarter the size of the ones down here.

Not far from where the path down met the bottom there appeared to be a cave. Making my way slowly across the chasm floor passing by and between hundreds of Arboks to the cave I looked in and froze. It was a short tunnel leading into a chamber where a massive Totem Arbok lay curled up and asleep, surrounded by even more Totem Arboks.

The Totem Pokemon in the middle was most definitely the Sovereign. Doing a quick count there were an additional twenty-three Totem Pokemon surrounding the Sovereign making a total of sixty-two Totem Pokemon not counting the Sovereign. If the Totem Pokemon outside this chamber were huge the ones inside could only be described as HUGE, and the Sovereign could only be described as GIGANTIC. The Sovereign had to be at least two hundred feet long and the others were about half that. These Pokemon were literally monsters, if they made it out of this nest there was little that could get in there way.

'Allister, what are my odds right now?'

'Your odds of success and survival are still around 97% if you only plan to place your bombs and leave. But there is only a 2.5% chance of your bombs affecting the Sovereign and other Totem Pokemon in this chamber.'

'Is there anything in the shop that could take these Pokemon out?'

'Only one and there is a 80% chance of it working on the Sovereign and 95% chance of it working on the other Pokemon.'

'80% and 95% is a hell of a lot better than 2.5%. Show it to me.'

[Calcium Cyanide Powder diffuser....500,000 SC]

'Are you freaking kidding me!? 500,000 for something that is not even guaranteed to work? And what is Calcium Cyanide anyway?'

'Calcium Cyanide is something I learned about from your son's memories. I can't talk to him yet but I can see inside his mind. The world he is from is far more advanced than this one in science but also far less advanced than this one in technology. And yes 500,000 is appropriate for this device because it incorporates knowledge from another world, take it or leave it. It's not like you use the SC for anything else anyways.'

'Alright, fine. You win. Purchase it.'

[Ding.....Purchase successful item available in Item Box.]

[Thank You For Your Business]

'Really Allister, was that last part necessary?'

'I have no idea what you're talking about.'

'Fine, can you mark on my map the best places to put the bombs and the item I purchased for best effect?'

'Sure, no problem.'

Seeing a bunch of black dots appear on my map I gave Allister a quick thanks before moving to place the bombs. The device for taking out the Sovereign had a kind of fan on it and some kind of spout. Allister told me how to aim it and I placed it just inside the chamber and off to one side from the tunnel before backing slowly away. Then making my way back the way I came I placed the bombs and armed the detonators according to the locations on my map.

I was about half way done when the Pokemon near me started to act up, the main force must have started the attack. Knowing I didn't have much time before the Sovereign and Totem Pokemon started to move I began to run and place the bombs as fast as I could. I had placed about three quarters of the bombs and could only see Ekans around so I figured I had gone far enough. I placed and armed the last of the bombs along the cliff, put on my mask, and started running.

When I was about a hundred feet away I detonated the bombs, I call them bombs but I guess they are more like canisters, when I pressed the button to set them off I heard a loud whooshing sound and saw a cloud of gray powder fill the air. At that moment a bone shaking roar sounded from deep in the chasm and I almost locked up from the terror that sound filled me with. The only thing going through my mind when I heard that sound was run. Run. RUN. Don't stop, don't look back, just run. There was no fight or flight, there was only flight. That sound was filled with anger and hate, I have no idea how a sound can have feelings but this one did. It alone said that whatever made that sound was coming to kill.

I had calmed down a bit by the time I made it to the top of the cliff and I paused, I could hear gunfire ahead of me and I knew that if I went to much farther I would end up getting shot on accident. I figured my only option if the Sovereign was hunting me was to hide in one of the smaller tunnels that the Sovereign was to big to fit in. I headed back down the cliff and ducked into the first small tunnel I could find. After making sure there were no Ekans hidden in the dark I settled down to watch and wait, I expected to be there for a while.

Six hours. It took six hours before I saw the first person pass the tunnel I was in, when I called out to them I nearly ended up getting shot. They jumped about a foot in the air and spun to face me while leveling their gun right at my face.

"DON'T SHOOT. I'm a Ranger."

They called for a light bearer to come forward and I removed my night vision goggles so they could see my face.

"What the Hell are you doing down here. You scared the shit out of me."

"Sorry about that, I was on detached assignment on the Commandants orders. I was on my way back up when I heard the shooting so I settled down here until I knew I wouldn't get shot by accident."

"You almost got shot anyway. My heart is still racing."

After a few more words I made my way out of the cave to give my report to the Commandant. Making my way up the tunnel was difficult because it had become slick with all the blood from countless corpses, everywhere I looked there were bodies of Ekans. I also had to be careful because not all the Ekans were dead a few times I had to jump away from a snake that tried to bite me. There were crews going around and collecting, tallying, and finishing off the survivers but it was going to take some time.

After nearly an hour I made it back outside unfortunately the air wasn't any fresher outside because there were even more dead bodies outside the cave. Another twenty minutes of walking and I was finally able to see the command tent, I announced myself before being allowed in.

"Haha, Green you made it out. I'm glad to see you."

"Yes sir. I would have been out sooner but I had to wait for the front lines to stop shooting so I didn't get killed by accident."

"So, the big question. We're you able to make it to the end and were you able to place all the bombs?"

"Yes and no. Yes I made it to the end and no I wasn't able to place all the bombs properly."

The Commandant leaned back in his chair before waving me towards the seat across the desk from him.

"Sit and give me a full report."

So I did, I began telling the details of my exploration and descriptions of the sizes of the Pokemon I saw, I spoke for nearly two hours before I was done.

"You're telling me that the Sovereign Arbok is twenty times larger than a normal Arbok? That's not possible, there is no way I would believe that."

"Believe me or not Commandant, you'll know the truth when we recover the body."

"You seem awfully sure that it's dead."

"Yes. When I saw how big it was and the size of the chamber it was in I placed ten canisters inside to have a higher chance of success."

"Smart thinking. We'll know soon enough, the clean up will take a while and we want to make sure we get all of them. Get some chow and rest up, you've done more than enough for today."

I managed to make it back to my tent before crashing onto my cot and falling into a deep sleep.