First one head rose, then two, then three.
"Where..."
"are..."
"we?"
One head turned to look around the dank chamber that they were in. There wasn't much to see, and for some reason, they couldn't turn their heads all the way. There was also some strange, muffled growling somewhere nearby.
"What is..."
"this..."
"place?"
The Hydreigon known as Struve tried to raise its heads further, and stretch its wings to try and go on a surveying flight, only to find that neither would move fully.
"Interesting," all three heads said at once.
Their eyes were starting to adjust to the dim light, and they could see several things: stones, chains, and several other pokemon.
Including one battle-scarred Rhyperior, who was held in place by several thick steel rings.
That's when it hit them.
"We were attacked," one head remembered, "someone ambushed Myles and brought us here."
"The question is, where is here?" another head wondered, "I don't remember any dungeons like this in Johto or Kanto."
"You're assuming that we're still in either region," the third head offered, "we don't remember how long any of us were knocked out for - we could be back home in Unova for all we know."
"Either way, I don't think it wise for us to stick around and find out," the first head decided, "let's blast out of whatever's holding us down, shall we?"
Struve readied a Dragonic attack, but before it could strike, the mystical energy rebounded upon itself, knocking the wind out of the dragon. At the sound of this, the growling stopped for a moment, only to start again.
"Again, interesting," all three heads mused, "it's commendable of our unknown assailant to go to such measures, but they can't last forever."
"Actually, they can."
The Hydreigon turned to the source of the new, deep voice: a Dusknoir restrained to their right.
"I've been awake for some time now, Hydreigon, and I can tell you that the humans are ready for just about any attempt you can make at breaking out. And if they think you're close to escape, they'll just restrain you more and more until you end up like poor Avsa there."
He indicated (as best he could) the Vaporeon restrained nearby the two, which had been making the growling noise. It was also held down by so many chains that Struve could only identify as a Vaporeon from its tail (and even then, it was jagged enough to make it rather unrecognizable.
"Well, clearly..."
"you know more about..."
"this imprisonment than us, ghost."
"Care to tell us more?" they asked simultaneously.
The Dusknoir gave a harsh chuckle.
"To put it simply, we are the results of more of humanity's mistakes. Some cabal of humans has been abducting trainers left and right, though even I am not clear as to why," Struve grunted at this sentiment, but the Dusknoir chose to ignore it, "they've been hunting my trainer and I down for quite some time - at first it was because of that Vaporeon, but it eventually reached a point where she was more of a prize than the Vaporeon, and eventually overwhelmed myself, Avsa, and three comrades of ours."
At this, he pointed in the general direction of three more imprisoned pokemon: a Sigilyph with an interesting color scheme, a large Krookodile, and a Ninetales.
"I would assume that you were in the same group as that Rhyperior, the Mandibuzz, the Sharpedo, and that Cofagrigus that were brought here along with you, Hydreigon," the Dusknoir continued, "and I didn't see your trainer, mind you, but I have no doubt that-"
"Myles!?"
The three heads had spoken so suddenly that the Dusknoir was taken aback. "Well, if that is his name, I would assume that he is wherever they are imprisoning the humans. Given that you and your cadre arrived not too long after me, your trainer is probably nearby mine."
The Hydreigon was only half listening (or rather, one-third listening.)
"Myles is here..."
"and if they are treating him as..."
"someone that ambushed us might..."
Struve stopped himself. Then, the middle head slumped in defeat.
"There is nothing we can do to save him, and that is what is going to hurt him the most."
----
It was the voices.
There were many voices, all going about in what seemed like an endless cycle. Saying things about being the first to go, losing pokemon, torture, going after-
Eventually, the voices were too much for Caitlin to ignore, and she awoke.
That's what it felt like, of course, but when she actually opened her eyes, she saw more or less total darkness. She could still hear the voices, though. It seemed like that was all she could hear.
Hoping that she could learn a little about what was happening, Caitlin started to get up, only for something to stop her movement. She tried to get up three more times, and on the fourth try, she realized this was getting nowhere, and decided that maybe one of her pokemon could help.
"Mohtrek," she said, "would you mind picking me up? My limbs don't seem to be responding at all."
No response. "Mohtrek," Caitlin said, turning to face behind her shoulder where her Sigilyph usually floated, "if you're making a joke, it's not fun-"
The word died in her throat as she saw nothing but a stone wall.
It came rushing back to her by then.
"That's right," she recalled, "those green freaks kept attacking and attacking, and eventually..." she looked around the stone room, "well, I guess those bastards succeeded."
Furthermore, the fact that her Sigilyph (and, from the lack of any other non-human sounds nearby, her Dusknoir) were nowhere near her indicated that it wasn't just Avsa that they were targeting.
"Wait a minute," she realized, reaching toward her belt, "if they're not here, then are any-"
Nothing.
"Damn!" she growled, "They really were ready for this, weren't they?"
Her eyes scanned the cell, and hovered over its occupants in particular. Some of them looked like they'd been in the place for months, and others looked like they'd only just been brought in.
Eventually, she saw that her closest cellmate was a tall, thin boy, wearing what appeared to be a jacket of some kind. From what Caitlin could tell, his lack of any words so far indicated that either he was unconscious, he just didn't want to say anything, or he was dead.
"If I had Zrantox, I could find out for sure," she muttered, "oh well; guess I'll be doing it the hard way..."
The boy was close. Not close enough that Caitlin could reach him with either restrained arm, but close enough that she could try and wake him up by kicking him.
She did so, kicking out at the nearest part of the boy's body: one of his legs.
The effect was immediate: the boy's eyes opened, and without warning, the boy let out a loud yell in pain.
Perhaps three seconds after he had woken up, the boy stopped the yell, and immediately tried to grab the leg that Caitlin had kicked. Thanks to his restraints, this failed, and the boy winced as the leg suddenly stopped from the chain.
Now, a sensible person would have known that kicking someone to wake them up was high on the list of bad ideas, as it could result in any number of unknown effects. A sensible person might have also noticed that one of the legs of the boy was bent badly to one side, and thus kicking him there would be even higher on the list of bad ideas, (unless you were the sadistic type.) And anyone would have known to, at the very least, not talk to the boy, and let them realize what was happening to them on their own.
Unfortunately, Caitlin wasn't in the most sensible mood, not when she was in an unknown stone room, separated from her pokemon, especially the one that seemed to be able to reason with her the most.
"What the hell was that all about?!" Caitlin yelled at the boy, "just because someone kicks you in the leg you freak out like that? What kind of a freak are you?!"
The boy looked at her briefly, and then closed his eyes, and started frantically saying one word under his breath: Struve.
"Kid, our pokemon aren't here," Caitlin said, assuming that Struve was the name of one of his pokemon (it certainly sounded like one,) "the scumbags that imprisoned us here took them all from us."
Upon hearing this, the boy's eyes widened, and he simply sagged in defeat.
"Useless," Caitlin muttered, "I hope the rest of these cellmates are actually smart enough to figure out a way out of wherever the hell we are."
