"You absolute idiot!" Switch snapped. "What were you thinking?!"

Vector wasn't in the mood for his tone. His head hurt, and he groaned as he placed a paw above his eyes. Had he hit his head on something? He couldn't remember.

"Where am I?" he mumbled.

"Your room," said Switch. "The unown have been bringing berries into it by the bucket load for the past hour."

Vector ventured to open one eye. Switch was crouching as a talonflame beside five heaping plates of berries. Bucket load was clearly an over-exaggeration.

"How long have I been out?" he asked.

"Oh, I don't know." Switch rolled his eyes. "What time did you decide to jump through the freaking window?!"

"It's not like we're miles up off the ground!" Pain radiated through Vector's head again and he placed a paw back over his eyes. "Give me a break. I was doing an experiment."

"Seeing if you could bounce?"

"No! Trying to find out if I need to be conscious to erase those cracks!"

Switch's beak snapped shut and he stared at the meowstic for a moment. The silence drew Vector's eye onto him and he sighed.

"What was the result?" Vector asked.

"They were all still there," Switch told him. "A small net of them just below the window. They curved up towards the sky which was how I was able to drag you out without touching them. I was too worried to really process that you fell through them if I'm honest."

Vector clenched his teeth together as he pushed himself up. "So that answers it then."

Switch rushed to the bed and adjusted the pillow so the meowstic could lean back against the wall.

"That explains why Leaf caught it," Vector went on. "I have to be conscious, don't I?"

He found a plate of berries deposited on his lap and absently picked one from it.

"I guess so." Switch shrugged then let out a sigh. "Things just keep getting more and more complicated."

"I'd say they're getting simpler, but whatever." Vector took a huge bite from the sitrus berry and grimaced at its sour flavour. "I mean... we now understand why Leaf caught it when Pixel and the unown didn't." He looked at Switch, now crouching on the floor, out of the corner of his eye. "And we know that even if humans do eventually catch it that you won't."

Switch made a thoughtful noise and gazed at the top of the wall. "Good point."

"But it's not just being unconscious that causes it to fail," said Vector.

Switch snapped round to look at him again. "What do you mean?"

"I remember seeing those cracks above my head," Vector explained. "It's very vague, but... it seems to be if I'm in the process of passing out then it won't work."

"Oh, I don't understand that at all," said Switch. "I don't even understand why you need to be awake either, but there we go."

"Neither do I," said Vector. "And I guess we'll never know."

He finished off the sitrus berry then chose his next one carefully, selecting a maranga from beneath a heap of pecha berries. As he took a bite out of it, finding it much more pleasant, he turned his attention back to the talonflame.

"Who else knows what happened?"

"No one," said Switch. "Gyro told me you'd demanded he only tell me, so I kept it to myself. Pixel and Retro have no idea, and Gyro told the rest of the unown to keep it under their metaphorical hats." He paused. "X found that very amusing. I think he might be stringing it into a new pun."

"Well, you need to have some humour these days or you'd just cry."

Vector tried to push himself up but Switch leapt to his feet and shoved him back down with a wing.

"Where do you think you're going?"

Vector blinked at him. "I was getting up."

"Not a chance. You need rest."

Vector closed his eyes and pushed his wing aside. "I have stuff I need to do."

"Oh really?" Switch's beak crinkled into a frown. "Like what? Force yourself to faint again?"

Vector stared into Switch's livid, yellow eyes then shrugged. But before he could say anything, Switch waved him off.

"K is beside herself right now," he explained. "When she found out you curing her caused you to black out she genuinely thought you'd died! She blamed herself! Of course I didn't tell her it had anything to do with that because I wanted to put her mind at rest, so I had to tell her it just makes you rather tired and you overdid it. Not quite a lie, but I'm still not happy about it. However, there was no way I was going to tell her that curing the virus and erasing those cracks is slowly killing you!"

Vector narrowed his eyes into a leer and his words came out slowly, laced with a warning. "I never told you that."

"No. But when you told me you were dying I just strung the two together. The evidence is all there, Vector. And to be perfectly honest, until we can find some way to do that without it draining your life away, I think you should stop." Switch turned his tail on the meowstic and strutted to the far end of the room where he lay down against the wall.

Vector was silent as he stared at the talonflame, watching as Switch tucked his head beneath one of his large wings. It was too much to ask. Retro and Pixel wouldn't be the only ones to lose family or close friends, and they certainly weren't the first. Other pokemon would experience that heartbreak, or already had. What the world needed was hope. Hope that there was an end to all this. No, he couldn't quit now. Too much was at stake.

"I can't just stop," he said.

"Why not?" came Switch's muffled voice.

"Because the world is suffering and for some reason I can neutralise it."

"Well I'm not happy that we rescued you from doctors who planned to risk your life to find a cure, and you're now doing the exact same thing!" Switch snapped his head back up, the feathers along his neck erect like red daggers. "We saved your life and now you're just going to throw it away by saving part of the population?! There's no way you're going to survive long enough to get the antibodies to everyone, especially not if wiping two pokemon clean causes you to pass out with exhaustion!"

Vector stared back down at the plate of berries, his appetite wiped out as he tried to control his temper. Switch's words had struck a raw nerve, but the human had a strong point.

There really was no point. He needed a better plan.

"No," he said flatly. He pushed the plate to the side and slipped from the bed, giving the talonflame one last sideways glance as he made for the door. "I guess you're right."

...

Pixel moved through the tunnel, feeling a lot better after a nap. She was hoping to find Vector and Switch and make sure they were okay and as she reached their room she found the door open. The bed was unmade but empty, and she spotted the dozing talonflame curled up in the far corner, his head buried beneath his wing. A small smile played at her lips and she pulled the door to quietly.

When she strode into the main cavern the only pokemon there were the unown, busying away at their computers. The newly revived K and Gyro were hovering by the coffee table sipping cups of tea, nattering quietly amongst themselves. They looked up when she entered with smiling eyes.

"It's so nice to meet you!" said Gyro. "We never really got a chance to introduce ourselves, did we?"

"No, we didn't." Pixel smiled back and clasped her paws behind herself. "I'm Pixel. The two friends with me are Switch and Vector."

"Oh, Vector's the one who has the counter virus?" Gyro asked.

"Yes, that's him. Retro's been calling them antibodies but... I guess it doesn't really have a name."

"Well, it doesn't matter." Gyro closed his eye. "I think you already know this, but you know... manners and all that. I'm Gyro and this is K."

The K beamed. "So totally awesome to meet you! And I love your scarf, so kool!"

"Thank you!"

Pixel absently fondled her scarf as she looked around the room at the unown. So far it was only Gyro who she hadn't picked up an odd vocal trait from. Even Alarm screamed from time to time, which she guessed earned her the name (or nickname) the others called her. She found herself wondering if there'd been more unown living here before the virus hit, or if their group had always been relatively small. Nevertheless she didn't want to ask perchance it was a bit of a sore spot.

Her eyes went to the tunnel leading out and she wondered if maybe Vector had passed through here. She hadn't seen him anywhere else in the cavern.

"I'm sorry, but I'm looking for Vector," she said. "Have you seen him?"

"Saw him a bit ago," said Amp. "He went outside."

"Outside?" She placed a paw on her chest and looked back to the exit tunnel. "Did he say where he was going?"

"Oh yes, I made sure to ask. He said he wanted to go on the roof," said Amp. "I didn't question why. I mean, it's just a grass mound. It hardly has much of a view. Especially at this present moment. It's mostly just cracks and twisted tree stumps."

"Yes, it's hardly x-traordinary," said X. "I would describe it as x-tremely dull and somewhat..."

"Distressing?" Gyro offered.

"I can't pun that," said X. "Give me time to think of something and I'll get back to you."

"Stuck for a pun?!" Amp chuckled and quickly tapped at his computer keyboard which brought up a password locked computer diary. "Please excuse me while I document this momentous occasion!"

A smile spread across Pixels face and she let out a small laugh. After quickly thanking the unown she zipped through the tunnel until she ended up at the fork. The path that led upwards had a little light trickling down it which grew brighter the further up she went. Eventually she found herself standing amongst lush, vibrant grass, the odd corrupted code rising up towards the canopy. Most of the mound was free from those cracks, but they criss-crossed and zig-zagged above them like a huge galvantula web.

Sitting atop a rocky crag was Vector, his eyes trailing over the cracks with a look in his eyes that Pixel couldn't quite place. It might have been sadness or general weariness. She couldn't deny she was rather fed up with how the world was herself. The world she'd known her whole life was breaking away, and if it continued much longer her whole race might end up extinct... unless they could get the cure. Even then who was to say the cracks wouldn't slowly consume them, reducing their world to nothing?

It wasn't until she pulled herself up onto the crag that Vector noticed her, a look of surprise filling his blue eyes. She smiled at him and leant back on her paws.

"You looked lonely," she said.

That look of surprise melted away to be replaced by a small smile and he copied her, leaning back to look up at those strange cracks.

"It's sad isn't it?" he said. "I was hoping to come up here and find it like Luma Island, where I could lie back in the grass and look up at a sky free from all of..." he waved a paw, "this."

She watched him stare down at his own paw looking thoughtful for a moment before he clenched it into a fist and let it drop back into the grass. Her eyes followed it, fixing on the steam-like code.

"Even if you did erase them," she said, "it wouldn't be much different. You'd still see all this code."

He nodded but said nothing, his eyes drifting to the opposite trees. Twisted trunks corkscrewing into the ground, jagged lumps where limbs were once attached, patches of sky visible between shattered branches and ultraviolet jagged lines.

"I don't really see the point any more," he said.

She looked up at him, her violet eyes wide. "What do you mean?"

"Let's face it. There's no way I can erase every trace of the virus and cracks while giving everyone in System this... antibody or whatever it is. And who's to say it's not travelled overseas to the Analog Islands?"

That thought had never really hit her before, but now it did so. The sheer notion that this horrible incident might not be contained to System made her sick. Pokemon hadn't even been allowed to leave System for fear of carrying this condition over to the Analog Islands, or further. She'd never considered it could simply go there itself.

She hunched forwards and hugged herself, the trees before her eyes unfocusing as her mind went elsewhere.

"Don't worry about it, Pixel," said Vector. "I have a plan."

She looked up at him with a start. "What? A plan?"

He nodded. "Yes. I... think we might be able to kill this virus at its source."

She felt her eyes widen and every strand of fur slowly go on end as the realisation of what he was telling her manifested in her mind.

"The source?" She shook her head slowly. "Tell me you're not seriously thinking about going into the Fracture?!"

"I actually am." When she was about to object again he raised a paw. "Just hear me out. If it originated there, then the source of those cracks might be there. If I can erase them, maybe I can erase the source of it. Which, in theory, would destroy all cracks and any further progression of the virus."

"But... pokemon might still have the virus after. It would still be contagious. It would still spread."

"They're quarantined. Any further progression can be controlled. Until we can get the cure to them anyway."

"So you're saying you'd go into the hospital ward and erase the virus from every patient?"

His shoulders went slack and he let out a long breath. "I honestly don't know. But I want to give this a go."

Pixel stared down at her paws, a rising dread growing in her chest. "Vector... no one has ever come out of the Fracture. They've sent in drones..."

"I know all that. But no one has gone in there with this... condition... before, have they? Or an immunity to the virus. What if I – or we – can go in there and come out completely unscathed?"

"I can't erase the cracks like you can. And when the unown touched the virus they didn't erase it either."

"Exactly. It didn't effect them." He turned his blue eyes onto her, warm despite their icy colour. "What if the Fracture works in the exact same way? You could walk through that distortion like it were nothing but air."

She continued to stare down at her paws as his words washed over her. It made perfect sense, and as absurd as it sounded it was their best shot. If they could indeed destroy the virus at its source then it might save millions of lives in the long run.

"Okay." She let out a breath and nodded. "We'll talk to Retro. Maybe she and the unown, even Switch, might be able to help."

A soft smile spread across his face and she couldn't help but return it.

The initial shock now over, her body relaxed and she let her paws fall back onto the grass. Her right one brushed against Vector's and she felt his paw twitch, hesitating for a moment before he moved it over hers. Her arm tingled as her fur stood on end and she looked down at their interwoven paws before looking back up at him and meeting his warm eyes.

Her conversation with Retro came rushing back to her, throwing everything into perspective. The mew wasn't wrong. She had developed feelings for him, but everything that had been going on had stopped her from really acknowledging it. Now they were about to enter the Fracture. If things went wrong, she wouldn't get another chance.

In one swift motion she scooted closer to him and caught his lips in hers. She heard his breath catch in his throat as his body went tense, but it was only for a moment as his free paw moved up her arm and around her shoulders, pulling her into him as he deepened the kiss. His claws brushed over her jaw and cheek as he moved her long fur back from her face.

He paused for a moment to take in a shaky breath, then released her as his paw went to his chest. The warmth from his eyes had vanished to be replaced with worry and he wound his claws into the grass.

"I'm sorry," he said.

Pixel was still feeling rather breathless which caused her voice to waver as she asked, "For what?"

"I... cant..." He paused to take in another shaky breath. "I've fallen for you, but I..."

Pixel's heart was racing as she sat waiting for him to finish. She didn't know what to say, or what to expect. All she knew was the word 'but' rarely brought anything good after a positive statement. Her eyes wandered to the trees, once again taking in the state of the world. But nothing prepared her for Vector's eventual statement.

"I'm dying..."

Her heart lurched into her throat and she snapped her head round to look at him, her mouth hanging open wordlessly.

"I didn't want to tell you," he said. "I was hoping that... we might find a cure and it would get rid of this... whatever it is." He lifted his paws then let them fall back into his lap. "Every time I use one of those stupid attacks it left me with, or erase those cracks, or even the virus, it weakens me."

Pixel's eyes flitted left and right as she took all this in. It explained so much. His fainting spells, coughing up blood, his desperation and crankiness to find a cure. How had she not noticed? Tears stung her eyes and she looked away from him, one paw resting on the ground as she fought the urge to get up and walk away. Despite how she felt there was no way she was going to leave him now.

"That's why I want to go to the Fracture," he said. "I don't think I would survive erasing many more cracks or helping victims, but if I can erase it at its source then it might get rid of all of it, even if it costs me-"

"No." She balled her paws into fists in her lap, but she didn't look up at him. "Don't talk like that."

"Pixel, if I can help this world I will, even if it costs me my life." He took in a ragged breath and wiped a paw across his eyes. "It's my fault it ended up like this and I want to put it right."

Those words stung her almost as much as his revelation. She looked up at him and frowned. "It's not your fault. Who's to say the virus wouldn't have eventually leaked out anyway?"
He seemed to consider this for a moment then shrugged. "Nevertheless, I'm going in and I'm going to find the cause of all this and hopefully destroy it."

It was a ridiculously reckless plan, but everything he'd said made sense. The virus came from the Fracture, so whatever was causing it should be inside there, and if this 'antibody' could destroy it then it might just save their world.

Hopefully after that they could focus on trying to cure him.

She really wanted to see this through. Even if their friends refused to help him, even tried to stop him which she knew he'd ignore, there was no way she was letting him go in there alone.

She pursed her lips in thought and leant back on her paws. "Then I'm going with you."