The Viterals

EPILOGUE: Three Months Later . . . (Durin Hayline)

Another Eevee—not the original Eevee given to Bambi Hayline for her tenth birthday, (that was now an Umbreon) and not the Eevee scooped up on the forest floor by her brother, Yumin Hayline, or the one recovered by her cousin, Zakana Hayline, or the three taken into care by trainers, Makua Church, Farore Aggagol, or Lyres Goevern—it was not any of those Eevee. This was the seventh child, born of the original Eevee owned by Bambi, ripped from the arms of Rocket member Isaque Finn, with enhanced Viteral technology.

Durin Hayline, father of Zakana and Kirish, had seen them, even from the jail cell. He had seen the Clamp Balls and what they could do. They had stolen all his Pokémon from him and changed them. Some of them hung in bubble-cells scattered around this massive room filled with halogen lights. Milky, silver liquid filled the bubble-cells while the Pokémon rested inside. Their eyes were shut.

At the head of the room, there was a single cell atop a pedestal. This bubble-cell seemed more important than all the others. The Eevee inside opened its eyes. From the dome above, from the sunlight now streaming into this place, everything lit up. The light was blinding.

Durin considered the Eevee, the things he had been told about it. He did not yet know that it was the daughter of the Eevee he had acquired for his niece, Bambi.

The young man standing next to the bubble-cell told him.

"You were able to secure such a wonderful specimen, Durin." The young man spoke as though they were friends. He stared in Durin's direction though not directly at him. "I've never heard of such a prolific birth. I wanted all of those babies, you know."

Durin did not know. He did not care. He had been drugged and beaten to the scrawniest excuse of a human and none of his Pokémon could help him now. His bone-white knuckles pressed against the cold, steel, jail floor. The skin stretched and fresh blood leaked out.

"You're an abomination." Durin's voice came as a whisper. He wanted to shout it.

"I'm not all that bad." The youngling with broad shoulders, and a sharp jawline was on the cusp of manhood, a mere eighteen years old. Durin knew his history. He could see it in his blank eyes. A boy of eighteen destined to live up to his father, and more impressively, his grandfather's legacies. Though the ideals and dreams of the founder, this boy's grandfather, had not played out as he had wanted, the boy pushed onward with his plans. In the quiet space of this massive room, Durin had seen and learned things. His name was Aaric. He was the only child of Isis and Isabel Brodeur. Isis, the son of the Pokémon Peace Prize winner, Brock Brodeur had changed the plans of his father just slightly. And now, upon the subsequent generation, Aaric had changed them even more. The vision had fallen a long way from the vision tree. Brock's genius was legendary. Durin knew of the stories, not just from books, articles, or modern medicine and unbelievable breeding revelations and techniques now accepted as law, but because of Brock's close childhood and long time friend, Ashtyn Ketchum, whom Durin once had a correspondence with.

Ash, like his dear friend Brock, was now dead. Durin wasn't sure if this would keep him alive longer or not. He, with his secret research of Legends, was the link between Ash, the greatest Summoner this world has even seen, and the Viterals themselves, sworn to harvest the vitamins from Pokémon for all time.

Would there even be time? Would the Viterals know of their evil before it was all too late?

Durin didn't know. He didn't have a voice anymore. He couldn't speak, couldn't talk sense into these people. They wanted only one thing, and that was a monopoly on the entire world. The plan, if it worked, was unstoppable. Durin could not fathom a way to end it. Not with these Clamp Balls, not with the new things they were constructing with all the vitamins. How was the growing organization of the Viterals under the spell and direction of a mere child? A boy the same age as his nephew, Yumin, or his son, Zakana! What else would come from such a leadership?