all furniture has been pushed to the side, turning the basement into one empty corridor from one wall to another. on one end was a target dummy used for police dog training while on the other had a silvally.

"aight." kyle dusts off his hands after pushing one last furniture away from the target range. "let's see if one of these are defective."

some of them were taken from questionable sellers, most notably the black market that kyle still visits from time to time under a guise. he gets less competition taking things from there as opposed to the internet after all.

he takes a silvally memory from a cd rack just beside him and starts from the bottom. walking over to the silvally, he taps a certain point by its temple to prompt it to open up its drive, where kyle inserts the said memory.

"just, uh, lower the intensity, okay? multi-attack."

a pink blast from the fairy-typed multi-attack scorches through the room. the target dummy is left in cinders, rendering it unusable for other tests. the smell of burning now lingers in the basement.

"a-at least it works."

he's not excited to test the other memories.

kyle observes the dummy that was eviscerated by the move, getting closer to observe it. the burns were reminiscent of a moonblast more than a hyper beam or fire blast from what he can tell.

"that's, like, pixelate, right?" kyle asks himself, though he's positive about it. "except, it only works with that one move, and it depends on the memory. that's how the document says how it is."

he immediately goes to a laptop that's on top of one of the couches pushed to the walls for the demonstration. he scrolls down the file as best as he could with a track pad, until he gets to the part where it says it.

with his suspicions cleared, he turns back to his silvally.

"can't you, like, nod or something so it feels like i'm talking to someone? it says here that your supposed to have above average intelligence compared to regular pokemon."

the silvally turns his head around kyle and then buries his beak with his arms. at least it shows that the artificial pokemon understands what he's saying and that he's just being plain stubborn.

with finally enough free time accumulated from suspiciously frequent overtime at work for someone like him, kyle finally decides to dedicate the afternoon in his basement.

climbing down the stairs with a can of charja-cola brand energy drink and a few bags of chips, he shoos the dogs nipping by his ankles. the silvally on the basement perks up its head from its nap, watching its trainer descend to hang out with him.

kyle casually drops a toy by its feet as he walks by. "you really should be out more," he berates the pokemon in jest, getting no reaction from it as the silvally already was gnawing on the toy.

he pauses to take in the sight, smiles and huffs in relief, and then goes to a pc situated nearby.

after unloading his snacks on the table, he opens up a document on the screen alongside various other notes. comparisons and observations he's made from the previous years were all listed in an organized manner, all in an attempt to unravel more of his silvally's biology.

he runs the necrozma memory again in the drive, comparing its contents with the other dark-type memory he had. the content didn't make much sense, which he attributes to not being an expert in the first place.

giving in, he turns to his silvally. the pokemon stops and holds its head high, eyes staring at kyle's. "you sure you can't make another one like this?" kyle asks, to which he gets a response of the silvally coming back to play with its toy.

kyle goes back to the basement bringing with him reference books on one hand and a cup of coffee on the other. he turns to his back as a mightyena closes the door behind him. "thank you," he says softly.

underneath the stairs, he was greeted by his silvally lying on its bed. its only greeting was a raise of a head before it lowers it back on its talons as soon as it acknowledges kyle.

he sighs as he goes back to the table with his computer.

"don't you have a usb port?" he casually asks his silvally, who pays no minds to its trainer. "this would be much easier if you had one."

arms stretch as he boots up his computer. kyle's own set of notes pop up on the screen alongside a particular file to be cross-referenced. another screen appears when he runs a reader for a disk.

"time to get another crack at this." he turns to his silvally. "i'm getting a custom program burned on this memory just for you if you're not cooperating."

the silvally doesn't stir.

a pang of annoyance comes at the non-reaction. he gets back to work on trying to decrypt the memory, armed with only self learning and articles from the internet. if no progress was being made, he suppose he can come to an expert as a last resort.

the silvally sleeps on the ground, unfazed by its trainer bothering him.

kyle sits beside the silvally, trying to chip away from the black armor forming on its hide with a screwdriver. the curious memory was held and activated, with the artificial pokemon shifting its appearance according to its rks system.

"i just need a chip, please..."

he tells his pokemon as he attempts his best at making even a nick. unsurprisingly, the tool barely makes a scratch, leaving the surface of the black, crystal-like formations smooth as ever. they seem familiar, but kyle can't recall where he's seem them before.

his efforts are disturbed when the silvally jolts awake. it looks at the door leading away from the basement and bolts towards it-- a behavior kyle is unaware of. he follows it upstairs, surprised at the development.

it glares at the mightyena in the same way it glared at any other ultra beast it has fought before. there's aggressive barking that comes from the other party in retaliation, and only then does kyle recall things about whiskey.

he's a shadow pokemon.

with a heavy sigh, he steps in between his pokemon. "no fights in the house," he demands. it's enough for both of the pokemon involved to get back to their senses, weighing their natural response to conscious thoughts.

kyle shoves the silvally back to the basement while the other pokemon wandering around his house soothe the agitated mightyena as they corral it back to the yard.

he makes a mental note of the encounter, noting that his pokemon hasn't reacted aggressively towards any other pokemon he had outside of his naganadel and his solga-

he supposed it makes sense that the black crystals surrounding his solgaleo was similar to the ones that appear whenever his silvally dons the special memory he has. it makes sense, given that it evolved in the same phenomena that gave them the memory.

kyle seats his silvally down the basement once more, its memory once again applied to it. the same black crystals cover its hide, though it seemingly seems docile without any external factors in play.

"do you do, uh, stuff?"

a multitude of tests were done with the pokemon that seemed to make sense when likened to that of the creature that attacked slateport, as well as what his solgaleo can do.

absorbing light to make a place pitch black, taking in energy of his avatarship, and even urging to make a wormhole on the off-chance that it could. all of them yielded no results.

kyle sighs.

he remembers how his silvally was stubborn enough to not do it and still has the ability to act like it can't even if it could. there was no way to test his theories without forcing it, which kyle cannot physically do.

kyle flips through the pages of the type:null instruction manual on his computer. while they have been provided with some components during the assembly period, only now does kyle realize that they weren't materials normally obtainable on hoenn.

past kyle being too complacent once again bites present kyle in the ass.

he turns to his silvally, who had taken a nap the corner of the computer desk. "can i just decapacitate you and attach your head back?" he asks the silvally. it stirs, but otherwise gives no response and continues to sleep.

kyle sighs as he continues to shift through page after page of the type:null manual. maybe he can compromise on a reader for the memory instead of finding a way on how to emulate the entire thing.

it's been a long while since kyle has read the manual for type:null... multiple times. he basically has memorized which part of it was located on which section of which page. still, none of it answers the questions that linger around.

silvally memories being produced on their own wasn't written on it. the key to solve the main problem they had during the darkest day was right in front of him, but at the same time, it barely scratches the surface of how many layers they need to unlock to get a full understanding of things.

he kicks back from his basement desk, taking a break from reading the manual for the nth time to see if there were any missing ciphers he's missed. his chair swivels until it hits the sleeping silvally on the ground.

while it doesn't stir, kyle stills hangs his hand from his seat and pets its head.

should he continue to try to decrypt it through cross-referencing it with what limited resources they have? or should he just trust it with a blind leap of faith next time the threat appears?

he manages to lure his silvally outside this time and having it spar another pokemon of his. written media aren't going to cut it, leaving practical experiments to be the next thing kyle has to resort to if he wants to learn more about his silvally.

it goes against his talonflame- one of the pokemon that survived its encounter with necrozma and has left it with an affliction. it appears symbiotic at first, as it gives the pokemon access to power it normally wouldn't have, but change in behavior and other truths lead him to believe otherwise.

kyle stands by the sides, with several other pokemon watching the match. his lucario stands by as a medic, which kyle guesses he would need as soon as he gets his pokemon out.

...and just as predicted, the silvally pounces the moment the talonflame appears.

the battle was as one-sided as it can be despite kyle knowing that his talonflame's performance was much better than average. its aggression wasn't even perceived as self-preservation reigns over every other sense against an entity that was seemingly made to be its predator.

the only thing wrong about it was that talonflame wasn't listed on the manual as a type:null's natural prey.

he looks at his second copy of instructions on how to build a type:null, then his silvally. the chair swivels to face the pokemon, leaving the stack of papers on the desk by his basement.

"i could make a second one of you now, by the way," he informs his pokemon. "this is a threat, just so you know."

for a moment, it turns to kyle just to yawns on his face before going back to sleep in its patchwork dog bed.

his trainer grumbles at its reaction, knowing well that his bluff was too obvious to be serious. with a heavy sigh, he picks up a transparent casing from the table and flops down on the silvally, using him as a pillow.

"oi. you and i are pretty close right?" he asks. "how come this doesn't work?"

he holds a specimen of a crystalbloom over head, protected by a casing that prevents it from withering away from any environmental changes. it should have reacted to the silvally just like what it does with his smeargle, but it doesn't.

sygna suit will be one of the things he crosses out on what a silvally can and cannot do.

the necrozma memory is attached to the silvally.

kyle watches the pokemon grow black crystals. only after taking a visit to ultra space does he connect the obvious. he has had his silvally, and then his solgaleo, and finally, a chunk of the crystal he carved out of a corpse.

a fourth piece was a treasured possession: a black knife he turned into a mega accessory.

"are you connected to galar?" he asks the silvally.

it sleeps on the floor, curled into a ball and undisturbed by the transformation that took place with its rks system.

kyle starts to stab the crystallized areas of the silvally with the same knife, finding nothing but his knife deflecting every time. it doesn't result to anything but the metallic clinks.

"i wonder if i should call that person robin as well," he asks his pokemon. "he doesn't like talking either, and he's full of crystals too. he's kinda like you."

the pokemon doesn't stir at his trainer's ramblings.