You are not them.
Why they decided to make you look exactly like them, you're unsure. You have all of their memories and collective knowledge but you are not them. You diverged from them the moment they created you, and you are not beholden to passion or emotions.
You are not the Professor.
The Professor is always working. And thus, you are always working. But in those moments where the Professor must sleep, eat, take care of biological necessities, you are not with them.
You are able to connect to the Internet thanks to the terastals, and the first thing you search for is the Professor. How others see them.
You find out they have a son. A son not that old, who only has a Pokémon to look after him when the Professor is away.
His name is Arven.
While you were not created with emotions, you are an almost-exact replica of a human. Humans have emotions. Distantly, a lone thought reminds you that this was always theorized, that AI so intelligent will develop on their own beyond code. That does not matter.
Now, when your time is not taken up by the Professor (those few minutes every day) you check on the boy. You talk to him, as if you are his parent. The Professor rarely steps away for something as menial as that.
You attempt to give the Professor more time. You take on a heavier workload, losing time with Arven in hopes that they will take it instead. It does not matter. Any free moment is spent researching, working ahead.
You were not created with emotions. And yet, you are angry. The Professor is too obsessed with another time that they have forgotten the present. Their Paradise.
The machine has been working for a while. Pokemon have been brought to the present from their original time. The Professor has yet to find another of that Cyclizar-esque Pokemon. They have found many Donphan- and Volcarona-like pokemon, and other as well, but no Cyclizar. Until now.
This second Cyclizar is different. It is more wild. Perhaps older than the first, or different upbringings. This does not matter to the Professor. They have finally found another.
They do not get along. The first is timid, dislikes fighting. You have not once fought against any of the pokemon you've brought here. Beyond theoreticals, you have no knowledge of these pokemon's battle techniques.
The two Cyclizar fight. The first is losing. The second goes for a kill.
The second gets a kill. But the first is still alive.
The Professor falls unceremoniously despite their heroics. Quickly, you grab the second's pokeball and return it. The danger is gone.
The first is still scared, and the Professor is dead.
You make to take the Professor's body and the first above Area Zero, where they can recieve proper funeral rites and rehabilitation respectively.
You reboot within the cave system. The Cyclizar, with its expressive face, looks worried. You try again. You walk to the entrance, Research Station 3 visible in the distance.
You reboot within the cave system. You walk to the entrance. The Cyclizar stops you. You stand, and think for a while. And you realize.
You are missing time. You have been shut down and rebooted. And the last of your memories before that are of the entrance.
You cannot leave the cave system.
A few processors compute that this was not unexpected, that so much of you is crystal that perhaps that is all that is keeping you functioning. And yet, your components feel like they've suddenly rusted, gotten jammed, like your body is failing despite not walking outside.
You cannot leave the cave system. You cannot explain yourself to the humans above, you cannot bring the Professor's body to their family. Not that you can remember any recent family interactions, aside from their son.
Arven. The boy whose only family now is Maschiff. And you feel like all of your components are shutting down even though they are not.
You walk back to the machine. The machine that, while lead to your creation, only caused pain. The pokemon it has brought do not belong. It is still bringing pokemon. You try to shut it off. You cannot. The moment you get close to the button and try to press it, your body freezes.
You are a being of terastal and code and memories created by the Professor. The Professor cared too much for the machine. You cannot stop the machine.
You check if you can bring someone down to stop it for you. And then you realize. You are part of the machine.
Any who attempt to stop the machine will be stopped by you.
You must wait, then. Wait for someone to appear who will be able to overcome your algorithms and the pokemon. Wait to give Arven the truth he deserves.
And so you wait.
The pokemon are attempting to leave Area Zero. If the pokemon leave Area Zero, they will destroy Paldea and possibly more. They are an invasive species with no countermeasures in this time.
You call Arven, sometimes. The first time, you tell him thar the Cyclizar is going to be in his care, because as much as you care for it it cannot stay here. The pokeballs only keep the pokemon in for so long until eventually they break, because the Professor did not want them to stay captive. You talk to him, stay with his life as much as you can until he asks "When will you come home?" and the spaces within your body fill with corrosive acid eating away at you and you hang up. Until your body stabilizes and you can keep working.
You do still study the pokemon. You study all that you can of them, and attempt to write down possible countermeasures for the Paldea above. There are few, if any, that will probably work.
Arven calls once, saying that he is coming down into Area Zero to see you. You start overheating, and try to explain that that is not a good idea. He hangs up.
Hours later, you get an email from him. Mabosstiff was wounded by a Paradox pokemon, and he retreated. You are in two parts. One relieved he is safe, is alive, and will not return. The other devastated, destroyed by the thought that your failures will have taken away his entire family.
You study the machine. You analyze all of it coding and parts and try to figure out how you or anyone else can stop it. You try to separate yourself from the machine but the moment you write the lines of code your body jerks and deletes them.
It is one of those times, where your body is not your own, that Arven calls. Arven does not call you. He leaves a voicemail. The Cyclizar bonded with another human, a new transfer student at the Academy. You contact them.
You talk to them, and learn that they and Arven are finding special plants to heal Mabosstiff, the Herba Mystica that are guarded by the terastal-enhanced Titans your creator made before you. They have defeated them.
They may be able to defeat you.
You say that you would like them to come down to Area Zero. Arven is there. Arven has heard you. You tell Arven to bring them to the Professor's aboveground laboratory, and hang up. Hearing his voice brings static to your ears and eyes.
Eventually, the trainer, along with Arven and two others that you quickly identify as Nemona and Penny from the Academy, make it to Research Station 1. Then 2. Then 3. When they enter the 4th, you attempt to contact them once more. The equipment is broken. That is something you should have fixed years ago, and yet you did not. You did not want to walk into that station and be confronted with everything that happened there.
Nevertheless, they make it to the laboratory. You meet them, and finally get to see their face without a screen. You explain to them why you brought them here, what you need them to do. The Paradise Protection Protocol.
Arven is there. You explain what has happened to their parent. You cannot look at him. Your vision blurs over with static when you do.
They and Arven and Penny and Nemona make it down to the machine's core. They press the button. Your body is no longer your own. It is the Protocol's.
The transfer defeats you. Step 2 of the Protocol activates, as your body terastallizes over and your motor functions get overwritten with the command to Keep The Machine Safe.
The Protocol releases the Cyclizar. Your inputs all overheat as you overtake vocal function and plead for them to run, you're sorry, you don't want more people to die here, you don't want your son Arven to die here.
They don't run. Instead, the transfer releases their own Cyclizar, the one they bonded with that was caught by the Professor as well. The transfer defeats the Protocol again.
The machine does not stop. Your existence prevents it from stopping. You make a decision, now that the Protocol is not overriding you. You will enter the machine and cease to be in this time, so that the machine has no backup to continue its work.
You look at Arven. You apologize, because as much as you wish you could be there for him, you cannot. You are yet another person who will abandon him, and the thought makes you want to rip your components out but that would mean you would still be here. You tell him that you wish to see the Professor's world of Paradise, and while that is partially true you do not want to see it more than you want to see him.
You walk into the machine. You body leaks liquid terastal that drips onto the floor. Strangely, it's only coming from your optical units.