[The Call] ingot sack, my beloved

A faint whirring sound came from the doors before they slide into their cavities, hissing as forcibly slowed into their place; the laboratory must have been fairly new - or perhaps had gone unused for a couple of a years - because usually the self-important scientist types that frequented Cynic’s various bases would defile a loved one’s ashes if it meant achieving a perfectly quiet and stable work environment. Donnie swallowed back a laugh, and let out a small burp; some bespectacled dude in a lab coat looked at him from over the rim of his glasses, and Donnie had a winning smile ready for him - all the man had for him was a deep sigh.

“Gotta a fresh delivery from Thunda’dale fer’ ya’,” Donnie told the man, not quietly, as his words echoed through the room, bouncing off the bare, white walls like a winning game of pong. 

“Thank you-” the man replied, his words heavy, like he really had to fight to get them out, and then continued, “Please take them into room B - on your right - and leave them before the Guardian Uxie. Further instructions, if any, will await you there.”

Shifting the sack of metal to rest more comfortably over his shoulder; he had been given something to carry them in, but had lost it on the bullet train and made do with an unused - in the sense that Donnie had dumped all of its contents onto the ground - vegetable bag in its place. The ginger man flicked the probably scientist a two-fingered salute, and then trudged through the corridor, his steps squelching loudly and leaving heavy traces of the infamous murk on the floor - which was the laboratory manager’s fault, they didn’t have a doormat for him to try his shoes off with - as he moved to the room labelled with a capital ‘B’.

Pressing his entire body against the door was the only way for Donnie to get a hand close enough to the sensor to open the door without placing his ingot sack down, so that’s what he did, even if it meant when the door did open, he nearly fell forward. Thankfully, the moisture still on the bottoms of his shoes allowed him to slide forward instead - it almost looked on purpose! - until he was flashing a beaming smile to the room and all within it. No one even looked up at him, which was saying something because not only had he just looked really cool, but there were also around fifteen people in the room, maybe more. 

Rather, everyone’s attention was centred wholly on the skeleton of what would probably be a grand machine of some sort once more work was put into it. Not everyone working on it looked to be in the… typical attire for a laboratory setting, but Donnie shrugged it off - they probably just got out of their day-job and didn’t take the time to change for their mad scientist antics. 

Taking extra-large steps and saying ‘excuse me’ loudly anytime he moved between the workers, Donnie made his way through the room, stopping just before the floating creature, situated off-centre in the room, eyes closed and unresponsive. Its colours were dull, duller than Donnie thought that Guardians were supposed to be, and it looked smaller - and certainly lighter - than the Kwebbles. Rolling his shoulders before stretching them high above himself, Donnie let out a breath. 

“Dose’ are fer’ ya’, buddy!” Donnie said, as if the Pokemon would talk back to him. “Now, I ain’t a machine guy m’self, but, uh, even a brief lookit dat’ ting’ over dere’ is enough t’ see it’s a real mess.” Donnie paused, waiting to see if the Pokemon would reply. When it didn’t, he clapped his hands together. “Whelp, I’ll leave dat’ t’ th’ nerds t’ handle. Take it easy, bud-

“Stronger.”

The sound flashed through Donnie’s skull like a clap to the ears, and left him feeling just as disoriented. Mouth half open, Donnie blinked slowly and looked over his shoulder at the Uxie. “Uh… was dat-”

“Need… stronger…”

And for whatever reason, that made sense! Donnie understood immediately, there was no question about what was needed. Heat rushed across his palms and scorched his face like the kiss of a burning sun. It was at that point that Donnie realised he was holding a blowtorch in one hand, and was dragging his ingot sack around the ground behind him like a lumpy shadow with the other. He’d only ever looked at blowtorches, he didn’t know how to use them-

“Stronger.”

“Stronger… yeah, stronger,” Donnie agreed.