u/Immediate-Engineer85

I made it to the writing of 3rd arc of PMD:Misregression to the Mean and this guy finally showed up in the plot. I couldnt wait to begin to write all things with him cause he naratively chalanges main character a lot and shows her from more vurnable side in way it wasnt shown too much before.

I wont be saying a lot of things cause i dont to spoil thw specifics but i will describe him shortly cause i feel lile i didnt quite make it on paper. And because my handwriting kinda sucks.

This character is basically cross between police inspector, interogator and psychiatrist. In a way. Not in acuuratly direct sense.

Rex is responsible for checking all processes in the section of the prison where S rank criminals are kept and his responsibility is to figure out everything about criminals he questions and get to thier moral core so they can get into state when they are capable to be redeemed. They have to figure they made a terrible mistakes and feel remorseful. And on top of that he has to stablize them though countless talking sessions so they could be doing socialy productive work with rescue team to make up for the damage they have done. And without "freaking out" a lot in a process.

But because he is a strict relic with dry humor a lot of criminals get stubborn and resist his tactics. However most mons dont even know he can read thier aura, thoughts and intentions cause Lucarios are rare in the Riverby city which makes them lose to him in persevirance in a long run. And Rex never rushes. He slowly makes criminals give up and open up by themselfs.

Also this Lucario has no central spiky thing. It fell off with old age. And spikes on the paws got much shorter and now they cant stab.

I think he looks kinda cool:). And generaly i like him conceptually. Hopfully i wont mess him up in a future. I am pleased how he debuted and hopefully his characterisation will stay consistently solid.

Chapter 22 "Mindgames"

Evergreen prepared herself morally to face this so called inspector Rex. She was certain that calling him interogator would be a bit more accurate though. Because he is going to ask her questions and do "funny things". She wasnt going to tempt herself with believe that he can end up being someone decent enough. Interogators cannot be. Being ruthless is thier main job.

For now Evergreen mostly followed team MALANOAR's lead. She didnt have a proper escape plan and was still in her semi-panic bloodlusting state which didnt help her much with planning so for now she had to hope she will make it through safe and sound. Usually captors prefer to drug on suffering for many days so she figured she can have time. At least this Rex guy will have to give rest to her just to rest himself instead of going on for days if he is that sadistic.

Evergreen and the rest made the way to the second tower on East side. From here they had to make thier way up. And so they did.

- (Keep it cool. Keep your guard up. The second you are in dont say anything handy to this guy and dont you dare to freeze. The second he tries to attack make sure he will regret for the rest of his life...)

Evergreen made some sort of plan if anyone can call it that. Mostly it was a tactic which success could depend on many factor outside of her control and she knew that. Breath in, breath out. That was the only thing she could do for now to keep her nerves in check and to get rid of the panic leaving only impulse to hurt if neccesery.

- !

While going up Evergreen noticed more familiar faces. Team Astral Step and the big pokemon they were druging along. This other pokemon was a Gliscor. It was massive near 4 meters tall including tail in to calculation and it was restrained much more than Evergreen was. Its tail had some sort of heavy iron ball tied to it. There was a muzzle on its mouth too and its claws were restrained with so many layers of silk that it could make a nice pillow. And its eyes were glowing red.

- (Alpha...so this world also has them, huh. Primal mutation. Normally it occurs when surrondings get more dangerous. Nature makes pokemon with much bigger sizes than normal more common to account for hardships. To think of this...its strange that its the first Alpha i have seen so far. In general. I wonder if it has to do anything with politics or hybreed nature of the wotld makes it so rare. Realistically there should be a lot more.)

Evergreen was thinking. She got distracted for a moment from the interogator she is about to face. And upon her distraction she realised that she wasnt restrained to the max possible degree. Its not like she didnt know that but now she saw some more of the captors capabilities. And it made her more nervous.

- (For now i am going to observe you. And then i will use the time you will give me to formulate what exactly i am gonna do. You are not intelligent folk so its a matter of time when i will break out of here. Even without tools i will crack your primitive security and containment measures.)

Evergreen was certain. Its a matter of patience and power to find a way out. She will escape eventually. But now...she is standing before the wooden door. She is about to face the inspector.

- "Come in. And try to behave yourself...not like you usually do. If i were you i wouldnt try to pull off anything like you did with Storm. At least if you dont want to be in more trouble than you already are. Rex is strict and he wont go easy on you if you will be testing limits. Punishment will be proportional to your mishaps. "

Flare Jaw warned Evergreen once Yin opened the door. Taking a deep breath Evergreen came in while the door closed behind her. And right away...she got so many reasons to panic.

She saw the inspector. It was a Lucario. Quite litteraly the worst pokemon she could see in this position.

- (Ugh, ofcourse it had to be a Lucario. Swanna, Duclett Swannna, Duclett...)

Evergreen immidiatly began to fill her mind with thoughts of the very specific evo line. Back in her world she was very scared to get into interogation room and face Lucario. At some point it became a common practice to use such pokemon to drag any sort of info out of prisoners. Normally fair and just pokemon became the symbol of oppression in a decade. Pokemon tend to obey thier trainers regardless of thier actions and personallity.

Lucarios were rare example when pokemon would actively work against thier trainer if they do something unjust. But...even thise pokemon are afraid of pain and torture. So they can be forced to work for evil. And some...are generally sadistic. Its not unusual for a pokemon to have some sort of deviation. Even for Lucarios although its rather rare. This specific breed was used to control the healthy ones and so Lucario became a tool of oppression.

In this instance Evergreen was certain she most likely deals with a sadist. But its fine...she can be a sadistic one too. At least that was a common thought she was trying to calm herself with back then. And its clear she was going to do this now too if needed. But for now she had to hide the fact that she is a human from other world entirely...because Arceus knows what it will lead to. And generally hide as much details about herself as possible.

Not counting Lucario Evergreen noticed the other things too. The room was made out of bage and brownish rocks as the rest of the building and it was rather dark and empty in here. There was this ancient sort of lamp on the celling which was giving off light with pieces of charcoal. But it was too weak so room without windown was quite dark making Lucario that was sitting at the table even more intimidating.

- "Evergreen, i presume. Take a sit. I am going to have a talk with you. We are going to discuss a lot of things."

Lucario was rather calm and his voice already sounded strict. It was common thing for this species. Especially for old ones. And judging by ruspy voice this one wasnt young by any means. He was much older than Blade from team Astral Step.

Evergreen took a sit on the stump which was playing a role of a chair. It was a bit too big for her. And a bit too small for Lucario. It seems like this room was supposed to be the most optimal size for any mon in here but it ended up mostly inconvenient for the most.

- (Swanna, Duclett, Swanna, Duclett...)

- "Allow me to introduce myself. I am Rex the inspector of this section of the prison. I heard a lot about you. Your profile is somewhat unusual. Not every day we have to invent the new category for the criminal to measure amount of trouble they are in. But thats besides the point. Allow me to ask, how are you doing, Evergreen?"

- ...

It was clear Rex was trying to force some sort of small talk. And judging by slightly ironic tone he was rather condencending in a way. Almost like doesnt treat Evergreen seriously.

She herself chose not to answear. He should know that she isnt doing fine. No one does in such situation. So she gave him silent treatment while examining his appearance. This close she could confirm that this Lucario is old. He had lots of long furr and his central spike was absent.

- (Its common for Lucario's spikes to fall off with age and some external factors. Hm...his eyes dont shine with faint red light. Is he also blind? He must be real ancient relic, huh.)

It was hard for Evergreen to not think about anything else but Swannas and Ducletts. She used to observing everything. And on top of that...she figured it wont be important anyway. His age is obvious so the fact that Evergreen noticed that wasnt supposed to say to him anything new.

- "I was told you can be a silent type. I suppose its quite logical that someone like you will try to appear tough in the situation like this. After so much damage you did it must be dreading to face the consiquences. Perhaps you thought you are invincible and everyone is below you in every regard. Must have been quite a shock to learn that you are not a genius and not some sort of unstoppable force. How about we talk about it? What do you think will happen now? How do you feel? And perhaps maybe you will tell more about yourself so we could know for sure what to do with you?"

-...

In a way investigator was mocking Evergreen. Perhaps tried to expose her ego, damage it and make her cooperate with him. But despite thise words stinging they didnt strike a nerve hard enough for Evergreen to talk or change course of thought. She will be thinking about birds until situation doesnt call for anything else.

- (Not a chance i tell you anything, bozo. I know your type. You will be able to bet either nothing or nothing but get the data on birds or...if you will do anything funny you will see why everyone struggled so badly to catch me. I dont pitty elders, old fart. I will break you before you could ever sense its comming.)

Evergreen thought. She decided to let him know that its all either pointless or results a commotion which this old Lucario wont handle. Its clear Evergreen mental readiness to strike to death and persived necessety to hide information resulted in a conflicting nature of her actions. Both shooted each other in a foot. She didnt notice it though while being mostly desperate and waiting to see some sort of reaction.

- "I see. You are stubborn type. Its about to be expected. If you werent you would be here much earlier. "

Lucario didnt react to her thoughts at all. Almost like he didnt read them. Evergreen was a bit confused but chose not to change her tactic regardless. She knew that interogators pull off lots of tricks to make people talk. Pokemon are unlikely to be an exception in this regard.

- "However i have to warn you. Its in your best interest to cooperate and talk to me. If you will be giving silent treatment we will have to asign the measures and punishments judging from our assumptions. For example, if you tried to kill guilmember Storm in cold blood out of bloodlust its a mounth in isolated cell while being guarded by the strongest teams. "

- (?! How does he know?! It was a few minutes ago!)

Evergreen felt her heart skipping a beat. Realistically Lucario should not know that yet. And yet he does. And it cant be because of Aura read. If he was here all this time he couldnt realistically feel it. Its too long of a range.

- (....! Kadabra! Damn it!)

- "In the cell made out of material that was generated by legendary pokemon Regirock and Registeel upon thier death. They made a hard material no pokemon in here can scratch or break. I suppose you dont like this cell all that much but for now i see no reason to weaken your containment measures."

- "Your silence confirms that we need to make them more strict. Especially if you tried to kill a guild member out of malice. And its not taking into a count your other actions yet. Inluding your tendency to eat pokemon parts which raises all sort of concerns. Perhaps we could even apply all restraintment measures as well just like we did with a Gliscor you saw. He is rather violent and very unstable type. I have a lot of reasons to belive you can be the same. Unless you want to prove me otherwise and maybe talk."

- "...Tch, fine. Lets talk...though there no need for that"

Evergreen gave up on silence. She had little to no reasons to belive that Lucario wont punish her either way. She didnt belive Rex is being honest or just. But she was aware that he can weaponize her lack of response sinse he decided to push this interogation this route. There was a chance he wont but oh well. Now its clear that she has to talk to have some minimal damage control.

If he wants to talk this badly then he will be able to bet on some response. The blandest and the the most correct ones he could ever imagine. Unless it will fail then he will get edgy ones. Or just plain, old violence.

- "There are a few things i want to ask. How do you feel? You seem to be a little on edge".

-"...You know exactly how i feel. You are a Lucario. Everyone would be on edge if we would be stuck here."

"The most correct ones" was quite an overstatement. In reallity Evergreen could mostly withhold herself from the most venomous insults of hers but still ended up being rude either way.

- "Hm, i see. Then i will ask a better question. Why did you attack Storm? You must be aware its a serious action which leads to serious consiquences. You seem to understand that to some degree and you seem to be aware of moral implications of your actions. Why would you choke him and keep doing so knowing he can die?"

- "...You know the answear. Kadabra told you already."

-" Kadabra?"

- "Dao. She tried to reason with this...guy. And she can teleport. If anyone could inform you so fast its her. "

- "Its a reasonable conclusion of yours. However i want to hear your reasoning from you. Why would you do so, knowing that your situation is rather unfortunate? Any sort of violence will not be taken lightly. I am certain you knew that the second you was caught."

- "...He threatened me. He promised to give me a hard time. You know the details. No one with good intentions threatens to starve you. And he came up to me with intent of hurting me while i couldnt escape. He wanted to take his revenge so badly. I did something any other rational person would. I attacked before he could. Or anyone else..."

Evergreen answeared. It was clear she saw herself in the right. And in the serious danger.

- "And you think he actually posed a threat? From what i know youdefeated him on multiple occasions. Why would you belive he was a threat?"

Rex asked. He sounded calm but slightly surprised that someone like Evergreen could count Storm as a real threat considering her own strength. She is no ordinary pokemon afterall.

- "You know exactly why. I have nowhere to run and i dont have petty allies who can help me bounce back. And my items were taken away. You should know...i am in no position to take chances. The second i could tell his intentions are morbid...how could you expect me to sit around and accept the torture from an incompetent bozo?"

Evergreen felt her self imposed attitude making her a bit more...bold. Being stuck inbetween fear and violent desperation...made her tactic fracture at every opportunity it got.

- "I see. So you are rather impulsive type as well. Its not a safe trait to have, Evergreen. If you will be behaving like this moving forward you will have a hard time here. I can assure you this behavior wont be tolerated and will be heavily punished. However i will take into a count your motives and condition. Sinse i am the one in charge and who will have to decide on every containment measure and punishment."

- (Lovely. )

Evergreen wasnt glad a one bit. If her life here mostly in the hands of this pokemon...she could bet that she will be punished for her thoughts too more often then not. He doesnt aknowledge them yet but he sure does taking notes. Evergreen had zero doubts.

- "I heard you. Lets discuss some other things. Specifically your actions that led you here. Your habit of eating Slowpoke tails and claw meat of Kinglers, Krabbies and Crabominable is concerning and i want to hear why did you do it. Also I couldnt help but notice that you stole a lot of items and money throught out the year. And you are charged with attacking merchants, guild members and buisness owners. And on top of that you always resisted the arrest. Tell me about your nasty habit and why would you need so much items and money for? Why did you attack everyone?"

Rex asked stricktly. Evergreen tried to make up the answear without digging to much into her own memory. Too far into memories.

- "I got attacked by a Keckleon before. He tried to scam me and convince me that i ruined his merchandize. And later on i got attacked by the bozo we talked about. And later on i kept getting attacked. Why wouldnt i be defending myself?"

- "Hm, what a curious frazing. From what i know you were attacked by a few merchants and most were expecting your attack. Most rescue teams tried to stop you in your tracks and make you pay for the damage you did. I can find it plausible that a few times it was a selfdefence. But all the other times you attacked without any sort of provocation. Especially business owners. You attacked them, took thier product and left a lot money behind. Can you explain all of this? And i am still all ears about your habit. You have to have a good reasoning for it. Otherwise its a very serious matter. "

Clearly Rex didnt found Evergreen's logic sound. She on the other hand was certain that he knows already why she did all of this. He was just playing dumb for the sake of formalities and potentially for ways to punish her for more stuff.

- (You know the answear, bozo. You well know it. I know you all are oppresive scum. The worst in a making. And the "habit"...you are just being dramatic over nothing. Like i killed someone to get the meat.)

Evergreen thought while glaring at Rex. It was easy to do sinse she barely could see his face expression. Her vision without specs was this bad.

- "You know why i did it. I told this a lot of teams way too many times to repeat myself for your amusement. I know what your kind is capable of. I wouldnt like business owners to have problems with someone like you if they would sell me things i want. If they are not fully under your grasp already. So i made it easier on them by stealing and leaving money behind. You all would presecute them if they would sell stuff to me normally."

- "And i see nothing bad nor strange to eat Slowpokes tails and Crabs meat. I didnt kill any of them for that. I didnt hurt them. I just took something that fall off of them. There is no need to be so dramatic over that."

- "You know all of this. The more important question would be why are you doing all of this. But i dont expect you to give me a good reason. "

Evergreen answeared. She was holding on to her hatred to keep herself calm. She had to remind herself that she can kill this Lucario if he will choose to hurt her or order to others something inhumane. She still can perform chokehold though in other form and Strenght and Focus Punch too. She has to remind about it not only herself but to interogator too. At least she thought so. If she wants to increase the chances of him not being a problem she should make this old man scared.

- "I find your reasoning rather misguided and delusional. And your stance is rather contradicting. So far i heard only assumptions from you and excuses of your unlawful actions. Wouldnt you mind explaining why exactly you think this way? So far i have an impression that you live in some sort parallel world."

Rex found her reasoning flawed to say the least. However it was clear he wasnt expecting much else from her to begin with. He sounded like he almost rehearsed all of thise questions and statements. Or it was very mundane thing for him to say by this point so he sounds almost like he tries to lecture some rowdy teen.

- (Ducletts, Ducletts...)

Evergreen shutted out any potential for her human days memories to pop off and then said:

-" ...Its your nature. And i am not a little girl. I lived long enough to tell apart fairy tales from the truth. There are certain things that just happen. Like wicked nature of pokemon in power. I just know what kind of situation i see once i see the signs."

Evergreen's point was rather ambigious. She expected interogator understanding everything.

- "What kind of signs? Would you like to list them? Or you are certain you did? "

-...

- "Hm. I think you are desparetly trying to hide something from me. All of this that you did...what were you trying to accomplish? What was the end goal?"

- "...Its obvious. I wanted to safe everyone. From all of you and your antics while they are still...on the tamer side. Before you all can go all out. And i would have succeded eventually if not for your so called "heroine". Kind of pathetic to summon her and hundred of teams to deal with me if you ask me."

Evergreen gave her answear. And yet it was still ambigious. She was very scared to accidentally let her memories slip. And without them she just couldnt give detailed answear.

- "Safe everyone? I have to break it to you but so far pokemon had to be saved from you and your actions. You hurt a lot pokemon, you did a lot of damage. And from what i heard you had your ego pumped up from every victory. How exactly your promised solvation should have looked like? "

- ...

Evergreen didnt answear. Solvation would mean that all the oppresive scum is either inprisoned or dead. And frankly Evergreen didnt feel herself this brave to say it outloud nor think.

-" I see. You probably didnt think this through. Didnt know yourself what it should look like and yet chose to take action you deemed correct. Even though no one asked you to be a savior. If i had to assume its because there was no one to save. Maybe you even understand it subconciously. There is a reason why you have excuses even to nastiest of things. "

Rex's tone was giving off hits of mocking. Evergreen didnt like the condencention he treated her with.

- "Do you seriously want to be this dramatic over eating meat? A lot of pokemon need it for a healthy diet."

- "Healthy diet? Hm, how strange. A lot pokemon dont resort to such barbarian antics to stay healthy. Are you quite sure or you just want to appear to be better than you are? How can one tell you are not just searching for excuses and you wont be harming pokemon by cutting of thier limbs or killing them? If you didnt do that already which i find hard to belive."

- "Tch, i am not like that. I wouldnt ever do that. Very few pokemon have such incredible regeneration and highly nutricious meat. And even in case of them i wouldnt cut of thier limbs simply bwcause it would harm thier regeneration and i wont get more meat in the future."

- "Hm, so you want to tell me that its normal to eat limbs if you dont have to cut them off someone? Would you by this logic eat the furr or maybe iron spike that fell off of me?"

- "Ofcourse not. It wouldnt be digestable and would get stuck in a stomach rupturing it in a process."

- "And if someone lost thier limb during accident would you eat that?"

- "Depends on a pokemon who lost it. In most cases it would be improbable to reconnect the limb so i dont see harm in doing so."

- "Hm, you dont help your case. But i suppose there is something to consider."

- (Tch, whatever, bozo. If you wanted to just piss me off you really should have said something more creative.)

- "To think about it your desire to safe everyone on top of other things from something i fail to see seems like a deep rooted obsession. It has to take roots in a past. Would you mind telling me where have you came from? Are you alone? Do you have parents out there? Maybe friends? In order to get all of thise assumptions you had to face something. Would you mind telling me any of this?"

Lucario asked questions that he probably should have asked first. However he chose to ask them last. Perhaps lowering Evergreens guard down up until this moment. And telling details which help him out depending on how she answear this.

- "...I dont remember. I have an amnesia. Last thing i remember i woke up in the jungle forest. I dont know my parents or friends."

- (Duclett, Duclett, Duclett)

Parents, Saymour. They tried to show themself in her mind. Ofcourse Evergreen couldnt allow that to happen. But by doing so she made no lesser mistake.

- "Considering your knowledge and general attitude and its gradual progression i have a hard time beliving that you have even partial amnesia. You are very adamant on claiming that you know our so called nature despite having a significant memory loss."

-"You clearly know a lot of things judging by items you made. You clearly have presice knowledge of diffirent pokemon. And considering that area you came from has no sane pokemon you being there in a first place cant be an accident. Why do you lie to me, Evergreen? You should know lies are also not a good thing. Especially considering we reward honesty and heavily discourage any form of deciet. If i had to assume there is more to it, isnt there? "

At this moment Evergreen realized...she was trapped. Lucario made her talk. Made her show herself. And bit by bit revealed that she withholds a lot of information. Hides much deeper things.

- "...I dont know what are you talking about. I dont remember a thing. I just appeared in a jungle with no recollection about who i am. Then i just got here and thats it. "

-" Really? Pokemon with no memory, no items and lacking knowledge and experience made all the way here. Would you mind telling me how exactly"?

- "I just did! I avoided battles and fought if neccesary! I dont know a thing, i just lucked out! Stop asking me stupid questions and pretend like you know anything at all!

Evergreen got very angry. She could feel her face burning and her breath slipping away from shouting. It was hard to catch it after sudden outburst. Seems like Rex managed to strike a nerve. By calmly asking questions and then getting close to information Evergreen clearly doesnt want to share.

- "Dont shout, dear. I can mistake it for a threat. And threats usually dont remain unpunished either. "

Lucario said calmly. He didnt loose his composure even a little bit. And he wasnt impressed with her violent thoughts or tantrums. It clearly exposed his calculation that came full circle.

- "How curious, you said i know everything and now you claim i dont. In a way you are right. There are planty of puzzling things i dont quite know and the rest either. You know, i think we had a productive conversation with you today. I think now i know more about your nature. Though some things were obvious from the start. "

- "However i would like to know more. But not now, i think you had enough for today and we have absolutely nowhere to rush. You and i are going to see each other quite often starting from today. Just like with other prisoners we are going to have productive one on one conversations. We are going to figure out what is up to you and then stabilise your mind and spirit."

- " And until then you have to recieve your punishment for threating and attacking Storm and make all sorts of other questionable choices"

Rex concluded. Seems like he decided on what exactly to do about her twisted actions. Despite everything Evergreen could feel that this guy is just scaring her to her core. She was outmatched, she was outsmarted. Its not a pretty sign.

- "You will spent one day in isolated cell you are currently being held in. I will command Yin take a close eye on you during this period. During this time you will have to think on your actions and later you will have to do some labor around this place. You are physicaly strong one. We have a few things you could help out with. I think it will be productive for you and the rest of us."

- "You are dissmissed. You can go...dear."

For a second Evergreen could swear he sounded like this dreaded Raichu that caught her. This condencending "dear" which was supposed to mimic softness and maybe some sort of understanding.

In the next moment team MALANOAR came in and took her away to her cell. She was in a shock for quite a while. And it was clear to her in every possible way...

- (...I need an escape plan. I cant stay here for long. Otherwise...they will learn i am human and then Arceous knows what kind of idea they will get.)