Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

There are conflicting reports. Some say that Mewtwo was created from the fetus of a pregnant Mew; the embryo altered during development. Others say Mewtwo was a clone; the genetic material taken from an eyelash from the fossilised remains. The remains were found in a shrine, and the prehistoric art is verified. But so is the Kanto Incident.

How can they all be true?

…

Mew watches from the holes in leaves, eaten away by bug-type Pokemon. They slide, unnoticed; a sypher of air, between branches.

Their shadow is dismissed as imagination.

The shrine has stood for centuries.

Mew prefers to dream. The last, or perhaps the only, they cannot recall, it is content to sleep beneath the ocean and drift in the bubbles, their powers subtle and gently rhythms through the rapidly changing planet. The planet that has long since outgrown it.

But sometimes they awake and they watch, for something tugs at them.

There are humans at the shrine, but they do not pay tribute.

They come to study.

It isn’t until later that they realise – they’ve taken the remains.

And the pain makes them dive themselves back into the ocean for another good year.

…

They take the slab itself, and it is undamaged for the most part. Mew perhaps can forgive. Will they take care of it, they wonder, as they drift into a slumber that thankfully takes the ache away too.

That is not what happens.

For the first time in thousands of thousands of years, a millennia, their mind registers the presence of … another.

And at the bottom of the ocean, their eyes open.

“Mew.”

…

Once, a storm so powerful raged on this world, killing almost every living being in it. The tears of the surviving Pokemon revived them.

Mew was powerful enough to destroy this planet and remake it again. They could re-arrange minds and memory, and with a blink, shatter reality.

But death couldn’t be defeated.

Their child died.

They were so small. They didn’t understand.

Mew was the most powerful Pokemon in all of existence, and it meant nothing.

…

They cloned a creature from the remains, and it only vaguely resembled a Mew. Mew itself? They couldn’t remember if there had been others. Their presence was like a gong, a drum – their psychic signature wasn’t exactly modest!

And Mew was furious for a moment.

Life was sacred, and here this clone was turning it into a folly.

“No clone will overpower the originals!”

That upset the clone a lot.

The clone.

Their child’s likeness.

It wasn’t hard to start fighting at all.

…

Some can be saved, and some not. Life is fickle. But the clones are alive. They are living, they are real, and they are Pokemon.

Opposite them, Mewtwo drifts, realisation upon them both – it is not how you are born.

Mew stares into their face, and remembers those violet eyes and that brow, but it is not the same. Their child is long gone, and Mewtwo is not them. Tears cannot bring them back.

But Mewtwo can live, and be free. It is not their fault.

Mew comes to love them all the same.

...

At first, part of them thought of him as an abomination.

It was unlike Mew, to feel anger, or rage, or such things. They were above good and evil, a separate force, the beginning of the story. Not its antagonist, or protagonist. They were friendly, and enjoyed company, but sought it very rarely. They were perfectly content to be alone, as They had been before life on this planet grew so vast and variant.

Their past They recalls in blurs of shallow emotion. Though gentle, they’d never had emotions than ran too deep. Not anymore.

They recall, however, the ache of the emptiness in their belly, the loss of something, a part of their that had been stolen away by fate. Long, long ago. That little sprout of life that had grown from their own had died, and after the sorrow faded, they were glad to have the silence. The sleep.

But then, something pulled. More powerful than any psychic type Pokémon, something that – for the first time – was equal to them. A curious sensation.

They followed it like a red light shone at cats, and spent a while surveying the strange island. The billowing windmills that allowed them to forget their uncertainty for a moment.

And then, the recordings.

Replication. Stronger copies. Many attempts failed.

They had been cloned. And at first, in that lab shaped with unnatural design and unworldly construction, with no real-life face to put to the knowledge, they’d felt...

Invaded?

The first time They saw him, it was like their thoughts and feelings did not want to settle upon him. They repelled like the wrong end of a magnet.

He’d attacked them. Looked to them with rage, and loathing, and utterly childish tantrums. They started giggling.

They had come here to right a wrong; nature had been trespassed by human hand, but They couldn’t help but giggle. Mewtwo was so young, over four times their height but so new and silly.

He was theirs, in a way. Not even a fraction of their age, even.

But then a burning energy struck their back, and They answered with silent, blank faced resolve. The fight began, and their mind went blank. How strange. They should be more unsettled, furious even. But wasn’t They? They were attacking, and aiming to win...

The boy had been hurt.

Their tears healed them, and everything in their mind flipped. Usually, they were ‘in’ on fate’s little games. But now They found themselves at a loss, unsure. If they were not Pokémon, how could their tears heal the dead like they had done so long ago?

It was simple. They were real, and so was Mewtwo.

When they left, Mewtwo was confused, and perhaps a little annoyed, by Mew’s behaviour. They hovered around its head, bobbing their nose, giggling at their frustrated scowls. But Mew told him of the world, of the old days and the new, of legendary Pokémon. The clone’s temper mellowed, and in the face of true leadership their dramatic flair became more of a virtue than a vice.

They were proud of them.

Very much so.

Chapter Text

The machine took around a decade to make. It had four outer layers of electromagnetic caging; all the highest anit-Psychic power augmentation, and various disrupting elements to stop the telekinesis abilities of any kind of Pokemon in that type.

In the forest, far from civilisation.

It was built, strangely, like and flower – or perhaps a flytrap. The layers of flexible metal and glass-like outer material lay flat for now, but when the target got near enough, it would fold in to trap them.

Any time now.

Dr John Laurent oversaw its construction, and was proud to be at the site, in hiding with the aid of several of their employee’s Pokemon.

He resisted the urge to tap his pen against the clipboard.

They’d tracked down the location, strangely, by following the previous sightings of Mewtwo. But for once, the clone wasn’t the target.

It was what followed it.

One of the troops on the other side of the gorge, nodding. The light caught on their visor before they went back into cover. Something was coming.

Anticipation made the scientist’s brow grow slick with sweat. Any moment…

And, with a sound he could not describe, it appeared.

Something small. Inexplicably plain in design and demeanour. Mouse-like, but overall feline. Just as simple as the many cave-paintings depicting it so.

Mew.

He didn’t have time to awe over this rare, world-changing thought. For he knew its existence was proven, he’d studied the files himself, and seen the proof of its clone.

It hovered just a few yards above the intended radius of the trap, leisure and languid. It seemed perfectly at ease. The air didn’t even tremor as it moved.

It shifted, spinning aimlessly as it floated –

The machinery worked fast. The first field snapped up – electrical currents shooting out to erect a burial-ball around it. The same fundamental energy as a Pokeball.

Mew crooned in mild surprise, eyes staring into the scientist immediately, to then turn to the left as the two outer shields swung up to cup around the magnetic field. Then, lastly, the outer caging.

The creature regarded them with curiosity as they came out of cover. Dr Laurent allowed a smile. He came to stand at the head of the assembling humans.

“You didn't make this hard, my little friend.” Indeed, while it was sleeping, the means to overpower them were being built.

Mew continued to stare.

Then it lifted its paws to its mouth and …

Giggled.

Then, growing quiet, it let its limbs fall back to a neutral position; tail swaying behind them.

A relaxed stance.

The glow was so subtle at first he didn’t see it. Pink and bright, it gradually grew more powerful, completely indulging the miniature thing.

It’s blue eyes glazed over.

It stretched out its limbs, and sound vanished. All Laurent felt was his ears popping, then a sensation much like being hit by a current in the water.

The machine collapsed. But there was no crash.

The machinery, every little bit of it, in a single second – turned into a tiny particle. No bigger than a grain of rice. Every kind of material reduced to it. With all the different materials, the colour range was impressive. Almost art.

It slithered like a sand castle collapsing underwater, with little resistance.

The humans were on the knees, disorientated. When the hearing, ringing and unpleasant, finally returned, Laurent managed to raise his head.

Mew hadn’t moved. They waited for him to meet its eye, then …

Winked.

“Mew!”

They arched in the air and swooped off. Never to be seen again by the man in his lifetime.

When, dejected, they went to find their vehicles, the humans would find their cars and trucks, and even their aircrafts some miles away, were also reduced to piles of dust.