Regice stood in front of Howard and Laurence like a guardian deity, standing as if protecting the two from the raging stone construct. From a casual perspective, it looked fairly even, but Howard knew differently.

"Shit." If this Regirock was the original article, it would've been operating at maximum power. It would have a core, a Power Spot backing it up, and more. It would not be the imitation that the Regirock that Howard had fought would be. It'd be far worse.

Meanwhile, ice faired poorly against rock, and Regice lacked a core. It was running on auxiliary power. Laurence and Howard would have to hope that Regirock's hand would be stayed by its fellow automaton. Immediately, the two golems began to flash at one another, sending hundreds of messages in their strange language.

Then, the flashing stopped. Silence.

SMASH. Regirock's heavy stone fist buried itself in Regice's chest.

"REGICE!" Howard screamed as ice shattered and splintered. Regirock dug its heavy fist around in the body of Howard's golem, as if searching for something. After failing to find it, it tossed the golem aside. As Howard screamed, Regirock turned to face him and Laurence.

Its fist cracked Howard's rib cage as the golem punched him past Laurence and into a wall emblazoned with runes. His back snapped like a twig.

Splatter. Howard's blood joined the archaeologists that littered the chamber.

"Ha... ha..." Howard's breath was light as his lunges rattled. His eye found Laurence. The doctor stood alone against the encroaching golem's march. "Laurence... run."

Yet there was nowhere to go.

---

Laurence Whateley

He'd only have Regice to bet on hope, the only Pokémon he felt could have even stood a chance against the raging golem. Anything else would have been useless...And while there was little to show that the Pokémon he'd unleashed would listen to him, it did seem to recognize its current wielder. A series of unintelligible beeps sounded once more, each rapidly going as they conversed before something ungodly had been heard.

The sound was similar to glass shattering, perfectly uniform and yet devasting simultaneously. The sights followed such too, the translucent shards of Regice caving into one another as if he were nothing but grains of sand pieced together. The destruction left a bloody mark on it, courtesy of the newfound pieces of bloody material that the Regirock had grafted onto itself. Laurence damn near wanted to hurl, the only pieces remaining stained with a tint of red. Almost immediately, Regice was lost.

ün ün ün ün ün ün AAAAAAAAAAAAAOOOOOOOOORRRRXT 01001000

That cryptic sound came again as if it were confirming the death of its fallen opponent, and quickly it turned its front to them.

ün ün ün ün ün ün

For a large being, it moved surprisingly fast, the rock platting sending Howard flying towards the corpses almost immediately, Laurence watching as the man nearly was crushed under the force of it. Another crack sounded out, this one just as grotesquely musical as Regice’s final appearance.

"HOWARD!"

Laurence turned around back to face the behemoth of stone as it rose its fist, ready to send him too back to his maker. His legs urged him to move, but the signal to his muscles died along with his chances of surviving it. He looked at the creation in fear, as it came down with its heavy hand–

Simulation complete.

He let out a hard gasp. His body, taut and plucked, as if a violin. He wanted to vomit–No, he did vomit. The goggles felt suffocating, a feeling that he could only associate with how his patients must have felt during surgery, before some poor scientist went to pull them off of him, commenting on how he should drink some water.

“Ye–yeah…Water please…”

He managed to speak, his voice hoarse and broken. But, as he waited for such, he could only see his vision fade a bit. In a brief moment of lucidity, his head turned to Howard, the only outline of his figure still as ever while he dreamt through the simulation, and soon enough, the man passed out too.

howard slayte