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Tavish, who was taking his turn on foot at the time, instantly noticed the tattoos on the duo. Nonetheless, he continued ahead without breaking his stride, waving Trouble on with his hand, as he prayed to himself: No one do anything stupid, no one do anything stupid. Seeing the truck, his expression changed to a look of bewilderment. They drove it...onto a mound of dirt...and it got stuck there. Riiiiiight. Do they really think I'm stupid enough to believe this? This has the makings of a trap all over it... Despite his thoughts to the contrary, Tavish kept a friendly smile on his face as he slowly walked towards the two, Trouble keeping pace behind him. "Noo tha's an interestin' conundrum yae find yersaelves in, aye? Hoo'd yae manage that?" Tavish stopped short of the two, taking a closer look at the car. He looked back at the two, and he proffered his hand to them. "Aye, ah think wae kin help yae oot. Ah'm Dirk Tavish. Yae are...?"

Only the observant would notice that Dirk was subtly positioning himself so that Trouble(and by proxy, the kids) were behind him, and that his free hand, while tucked into his coat pocket, was just out enough to be both within easy reach and easily able to move to the .357 on his hip, under the coat.

I hope I'm wrong about these two...

The woman holding Alyssa knew she shouldn't have, but it was almost impossible not to let her head turn towards Oddjob as he broiled one of her scythers alive, the two of them crashing to the ground such that the now nearly-finished lizard was sitting triumphantly, if tiredly, on the blackened bug's head. Then, she had to change her line of focus again, everything moving in slow motion, to watch as the remaining two crumpled under the flurry of psychic attacks and very real bullets that rained in on them. Finally, she turned her head specifically to Paul and took in the man's words as best she could. They were muffled through the thick, black plastic of her helmet, and by the faint, softening cushion of blood loss. Her center of gravity evaporated while her lifeblood leaked from a dozen tiny and another dozen not-so-tiny holes in her arms and leggs. Odd... the kevlar should have made sure it hit nothing vital... but thinking about it, there was an awful, biting pain in her neck... had the collar come loose in the excitement?

She knew she was fainting before it happened, and Alyssa knew before she did the full reason why, as warm liquid trickled down the young woman's back. The biker readjusted her grip on the younger girl. She breathed deeply. It wasn't helping. Because when she breathed back out, her vision was blocked with a light speckling of blood. "NO!" she choked out as blackness closed in. She stumbled sideways with Alyssa, keeping the pistol exactly where it was. She whispered furiously as she realized she was going to fall. "No. So close..." And then, in another slow stumble, she fell sideways and backwards away from her charge, landing strangely quietly.

---

Ian's plan worked remarkably well, though it didn't fully eliminate the threat. The rage-maddened onix had no clue he was coming, and two of them shrieked again in pain, rattling Toby's skull and making Juno cringe while Erin and Sparks again shivered as the sound traveled down their spines. The third managed to resist the blow and attempted in vain to send another spray of stone up at the retreating dragonite. The rocks crashed back down harmlessly. The other two snakes grumbled angrily and tried to push forward against Ramsden ((who, by the way, don't worry, still has a chance to evade the previous attack)) to tackle the puny human.

---

The man who'd been speaking to Dirk gladly took his hand and shook it firmly. "Dirk Tavish! B'lieve I saw somethin' about you in the papers 'fore all this nonsense began. Workin' on some kin'a fossil machine, right? Name of Bill Bluesholler." He pronounced it Blues Holler, and for a fraction of a second, his eyes flickered to Tavish's hidden other hand, but then he was immediately friendly again. "Tha's my brother Rory, and we were just out off-roadin'. I know, not th' most practical thing nowadays, but ever'one needs some time off now an' then." Rory waved over at the young'ns in greeting with a grin, making sure the barrel of his gun remained pointed at the ground as he did so. "Oh, and I'm terribly sorry 'bout the guns; gotta keep armed, you know's well 's any of us, an' figgered we might pick up some rations, if'n anythin' showed itself in this wasteland, eh?"

Now this was interesting. Schraeder, who had always been the type to stay silent and observe everything around him unless approached - after all, seeing things meant knowing things before others, and knowledge was power - had seen Dr. Terrian cruising through the sky nearby. The man had already saved him once, so Schraeder's immediate reaction was not of fear, but instead fascination. What was this man doing?

Good thing he hadn't opened his mouth; his question was answered quite promptly. Schraeder was the last to exit the car, and after hearing what the doctor had to say was rather put out. He had never really allowed himself to feel inadequate before, any more than was necessary, but he came very close as he stood in that clearing and watched as the Pokemon were released. He felt like he was missing out on something important.

Of course, Dr. Shonevsky had something biting and firm to say to Dr. Terrian. Schraeder smiled to himself. Ulysses was a man that Schraeder could respect.

"Schraeder, keep an eye on him. He can't be trusted." That was what Ulysses said to him - at least he wasn't completely forgotten.

"Yeah, that's what I keep hearing," Schraeder said in mock annoyance, though his humor at the situation was evident. As the Pokemon began to emerge and take the field, Schraeder stepped to one side. He stood roughly halfway between the two parties, forty feet or so back from what would surely be the epicenter of their battle.

The young man laid his eyes on Terrian. Even after the doctor began to berate the raichu - somewhat comically, even - Schraeder didn't allow himself to be distracted. He aimed to learn everything he could about this mysterious man.

After all, knowledge is power.

After ten years of nothing but pranks and scraps, and thirty long years focusing and honing his skills, Djinn didn't need to be told this was a prime time to strike. He lunged across the grass, and immediately Ulysses felt the ghostly chill evaporate to be replaced by the natural cool of the atmosphere. Synapse on the other hand would be receiving a black-purple fistful of ether-induced ice if it didn't dodge the gengar's first assault.

Ulysses remained silent, contrary to what Hollywood liked to present in their pokémon battles. Those trainers were always looking fierce and determined, calling out suggestions and support to their pokéfriends. The geezer wouldn't say a word unless Djinn overlooked some obvious weakness or needed some warning. Otherwise the gengar was free to do as he would. That was how Djinn functioned best, and Dr. Shonevsky was one to respect that, although he did have one thing to say.

"Djinn, he's faster, and undoubtedly unnaturally strong. Be careful for once!"

"GEN!" was the ferocious answer.

Jason watched as the raichu started choking, and as Djinn attacked. When Synapse turned towards Joy Jason's eyes narrowed. "Mist, you know what to do," he said, as the misdreavus floated forward, her grin absent for once. Even she understood the severity of the situation. A black and purple ball formed in front of Mist, and she fired the Shadow Ball at Synapse.

Djinn wasn't harmed in the slightest by this move, although he was visibly irritated by this turn of events (no pun intended). After some wiping and shaking the problem came free, solid things tending not to stick to the ghost for very long. With a low growl, he lunged skyward. As he came to the apex of his climb, the gengar went into a twirl, which gave him a little extra momentum to put behind a sizzling black-purple orb of ether- the infamous shadow ball.

The attack that struck Djinn had, in fact, hurt him, but not hard enough to prevent his next attack from being just as devastating as it would be normally. The raichu was faced with an incoming sphere of dark energy from his upper seven o'clock and a second from dead center at twelve o'clock; he did what any stumbling mouse would do, and with a swift burst of type-neutral energy, darted to his right - after a nearly imperceptible twitch cocked Dr. Terrian's head half a degree to the right, and then back to normal. As a red-orange blur, the sickle-tailed rat suddenly took off in an zig-zagging arc towards Mist, covering the distance in seconds, and upon reaching the skirt-like ghost, leaped in the air towards her and finally belched out the grass that had been blocking his throat, but not in an entirely physical manifestation: miasma-like, violet-edged sludge poured forth in a toxic mess, aiming to drench the ghost. Synapse's flight took him within roughly five feet of Roger and landed him facing the magnet's right, two meters in front of and two meters that direction from him. This whole time, Terrian had not moved a full inch from his frozen, statue-like stance, arms crossed and face brightly in a half-smile.

---

The forms behind Alyssa and Paul shifted slightly. One was clearly badly wounded, and was having difficulty even getting to his knees. The other had gotten to his knees and was looking at them, but it would do him little good from a three-quarters of a mile away. Neither was fighting-fit.

---

A few of the Minutemen joked and jostled as they walked - very carefully - through the minefield that was Paul's front yard. That's not to say the backyard or the surrounding hundred meters in every direction was less of a minefield; merely that they approached from the front. A few carried a map among them, tracing their path as they walked. Two of those were carrying tremendous, towering backpacks full of supplies in case they were given leave to stay longer than a few hours. Most of the group of half a dozen were between twenty and thirty, and another two grinned and watched them from the porch. It was by no means a disrespect to Paul - it was a field trip through the home of the most feared and most respected man second to Brighton many of them had ever heard of. One of them grabbed his radio as it went off and spoke into it. Immediately, his mirth vanished. "He's what?" he asked, covering one ear ostensibly to mute the growing buzz of an engine coming from behind him. The young man's face reddened and his voice shook with barely-contained anger. As soon as he extinguished the connection, he marched his way back the way they had come, fiercely beckoning the others, a few of whom were looking in confusion at an approaching figure in the distance beyond their Jeep. Uncertain and putting hands to their weapons, they followed. He growled, loudly, "Brighton's de-"

A noise not unlike a silenced machine gun rattled out through the field. A number of darts bored their way messily through the unprepared soldiers' flesh, but this was by no means the main target. The mines littering the ground went off in a furious display of deadly pyrotechnics, the concussive force of some knocking the group of soldiers stumbling into another and quickly wasting their bodies while the two originally sent to watch over the house could only look on in horror as their friends and teammates were torn apart. When the smoke cleared, both backpacks' contents had been torn open, and while five of the six were dead and limbs were missing on some of them, one remained struggling. One of those at the house ran out to him, having already memorized the path, and knelt down, holding his bleeding head as the man grasped at him and stuttered, "I s-s-saw b-beams... p-pokémon in the backpa.... backpacks..." He went limp just as the man back at the house barked out a command to halt. Fifty meters away stood a man who had clearly arrived on a motorcycle during the explosions. His unruffled tie and dirt-free, pure white shirt mixed poorly with the detonated mines and the corpses. He stood at a halt, an expression of pity drawn lightly across his face. His cap and glasses remained on, and his explanation was the same: “I’m looking for Paul McCulloch.”

The demi-corpse-movement caught both Paul and Zoidberg's attention. The latter sent a warning to Paul, while Paul was already switching stances and aiming. There was motion, but neither appeared to be a threat. Zoidberg, finish the truck, Paul commanded, standing. "Dido, let's go check this out," he told her, leading the way, rifle to his shoulder and aimed downrange. The ACOG bounced with his steps, leaving it near but certainly not on either of the two.

What was it he was looking for here, anyway? He might be able to get one or two of the bikes into the bed, but what would he do with them? Sell them? It was an option, not one he much liked, but an option. Too much trouble, under the circumstances. No, it would be easier to just raid for ammo and food. Food was also valuable, and it tended to be lighter, and ammo was something Paul just always felt like he needed.

As he approached, he called out to the incapacitated foes: "Hands in the air where I can see them, sit up or kneel as you are physically capable. If any of you make a funny move I will shoot."