The Third Shadow

Almost nothing is known about the Shadow Triad. It's actually embarrassing how little I can put down in this report; rest assured if I was in a position where I could research this perpetrator to the fullest extent without losing the target himself, I would. Since I can't, actually capturing the target takes priority.

Which means this section stays infuriatingly empty.

None the less, there are things that have been confirmed that I can record here, even though regretfully it consists of nothing new and is already on file back at our headquarters.

Their role in the first attempt at taking over the region was a quiet, steady presence at Harmonius's side. They themselves did nothing major like blowing up a lake or subjecting a city to subzero temperatures, but given they served as Getsis's personal enforcers and spies, there's no chance they had miniscule roles in the operation. They took their orders directly from Harmonius and nowhere else.

Blair Black's account of them was brutal and chilling. They would teleport to him and escort him to Harmonius or the younger Harmonius to speak with them. Harmonius was especially disturbing in these confrontations; while Mr. Black's account is mostly of Harmonius (he's rather fixated on the man for reasons I personally find concerning but that's for another report or my private journal) he does note how unsettling the Shadow Triad is and how frightening their abilities are, as well as how upsetting it was that they would abduct a child, bring that child to a power-hungry madman, and then let him rant to that child with no apparant emotions or opinions.

However, while the three certainly traumatized the boy, the trio never battled him.

The young gym leaders of Striation and child who would be faced with Unova's next crisis were not so lucky.

When Harmonius was defeated, Harmonius vanished before the authorities could collect him; according to Mr. Black, the Triad themselves complained they were not responsible for this outside of initially rescuing him from the castle, and were rather upset about it because they wanted to be at his side rather than follow his orders to not look for him. Two days after this they attacked the Maize triplets, three of the youngest of Unova's gym leaders at the time. They were not after the boys' lives but rather their dignity, defeating them swiftly and taunting them before disappearing as quickly as they'd arrived.

Mei Ivory would be among the first to see them when they resurfaced two years later, first spotting them on the infamous Plasma Frigate. Unlike Mr. Black, she would face them in battle many times, starting with the second time she encountered them, at Opelucid, during the tragedy of its freezing. She fought to prevent the theft of the DNA Splicers but, while successful in defeating the one she faced (the First Shadow) she was not able to stop him from teleporting away to rejoin the other two, who already had the Splicers.

She would fight them again on the Frigate itself when she slipped aboard; reclaiming the Liepard one of them had abducted from her best friend's little sister, she moved on ahead to face Harmonius.

But after defeating Harmonius, the Triad once again swooped in to save him before authorities could take him.

We interviewed the girl many times about the above, but it wasn't until we were wrapping up that she admitted she had something new to tell us; for months she had been meeting with the Triad at Icirrus City. Once a month one of them would appear there and battle her, hoping to restore Harmonius's will to live by defeating the trainer who had bested him. Thoroughly alarmed at this development, the IP immediately set up surveillance of the city, but somehow, they knew she had told us and never return.

I grilled her personally about why she hadn't done anything. As someone with the power to save Unova, she could have apprehended them or at least informed us of this sooner so we could ambush them ourselves when they showed up to meet her. All the girl would do was cry.

I highly doubt she was actually collaborating with the traitors or had any sympathies to Plasma, but given her apparent extreme attachment to the younger Harmonius, it is likely that she had some sort of similar fascination with the Triad and the Triad, sensing this, used her to their own ends- which they were actually honest with her reguarding.

Since that last meeting between them and her, however, nobody has seen them... until I spotted this one, several months ago, wandering the wreckage of the world.

He has done nothing but wander, though lately he's been spending an unusually long time in the Aspertia area, specifically, in the school and the gym that attaches to it.

Given that there is no headquarters properly working for me to take him to, I've decided to observe what I can before eventually capturing him, in hopes of providing more details that weren't known before. I'll figure out what to actually do with him once I have him in custody. For now, I observe and record.

--Special Agent Dove, International Police

The Third Shadow is... perhaps one of the most disturbing perpetrators I've encountered thus far. It's not because he's particilarly sadistic or delusional or anything along those lines; it is because he is so. Utterly. Lifeless.

No, really. It's eerie. He seems devoid of all purpose or humanity. Unlike other humans whom I have observed after the end of the world, it's not as if he merely lacks something to work towards but still behaves like a human being. There are no games he plays with himself or his pokemon, no jokes that he makes, no hobbies he engages in, no interests that pepper the content of what he says. There's barely even a personality there. A human in the apocalypse with nothing in particular to do will, I have noticed, talk to themselves and their companions; they will find or make things to do in the absence of any long-term goals. They will talk about things they enjoyed before the end of the world stole that away from them. They will reference their favorite things. They will invent random challenges for themselves.

Third Shadow does none of this. He works only for his own survival and that of his pokemon's. And that is all. He wakes early, scavanges for food, travels until about late afternoon, finds or makes shelter, checks his equipment and perishables, scavanges again if neccesary, ensures a water source, makes a fire, eats, and then goes to sleep. These actions aren't always quite in the same order, but it's the general gist of how his day goes. He will speak to his pokemon at the only mealtime he takes to ensure the bug is healthy, ask if he needs anything, and then will leave him out for a time before recalling him and retiring for the night.

He behaves like a robot, but even that isn't quite accurate. Perhaps he is depressed? He's obviously not suicidal; if he were he would be dead by now. Considering that he seems like an empty shell, a ghost! Now that is an accurate description! He is like a ghost, drifting from place to place. I will mark it down that he likely is, in some capacity, depressed. I doubt he realizes it, which is probably of some boone to me.

I will also note that he's not oblivious to the fact that he's being followed. He is, of course, trained as a ninja. He can teleport and is psychic. He can appear out of thin air when there were no shadows to hide in, and he's surely been trained to hear minute sounds even other humans generally can't or disregard. Maybe he's more suicidal than I thought. Or perhaps he doesn't realize he is and simply doesn't care as long as I don't attack him. He's very hard to decipher because he doesn't say or do much that gives me a lot to work with.

He doesn't appear to have capacity for anger. At least not anymore. Reports from Mei Ivory about his prior behavior (and it must be added for fairness's sakes that, being identical triplets in identical clothing, it was hard for her to discern who was who unless they had to battle and she was able to tell them apart based on their pokemon) indicate he was... maybe not prone to fits of rage, but definitely not someone very difficult to rile up.

The Maize triplets' (reluctant) account of his prior behavior does indicate he was at some point petty, vindictive, and vicious. They admitted to their faces, and with no remorse whatsoever, that they targeted the Maize boys after Harmonius was already exposed in his first takeover attempt purely because they needed to relieve stress and knew they could take the boys in a battle. They were exceptionally callous about it. But also not particularly excited, either. These three are fucking creepy and I don't care if I include that in this report because I'm probably the only one who's going to read it.

His loyalty is another matter to ponder over. Both Blair Black and Mei Ivory have noted that the Shadow Triad are ferverantly loyal to Harmonius because, they claim, he saved their lives. As much as I am loathe to admit it, there exists the possibility that they are victims of Harmonius's manipulation. If a man who raised his son with the express purpose of molding him to be the perfect tool could carry out that kind of long-term plan, then it wouldn't be exactly surprising for him to do something similar with the Shadow Triad. Nonetheless, it remains a point that the Third Shadow holds that kind of favor in the highest regard, to the point of then pledging his life to someone who would do that for him... or appear to have done that for him.

(I am very suddenly and annoyingly drawn to the realization that the Shadow Triad could have caused the Maize boys serious harm. Why didn't they? What they did was cruel and deliberate, but they didn't take any kind of revenge against the system that had beaten them when it would have been so easy to slaughter the three young gym leaders with their pokemon disabled. Why spare them?)

Come to think of it, Mei Ivory even specifically stated that the Third Shadow told her 'I have no problem with you.' What a strange thing to specifiy right before fighting someone who had consistantly meddled with Plasma's plans. 'I have no problem with you.' Why wouldn't he?

It's not even the strangest remark he's made to her, either. At Icirrus City, each one appeared to her monthly until she told someone of them, at which point they stopped appearing. When battling her, at the start, he said, 'Battle for Harmonius! This is the only proof that I'm living now.'

At his loss, the Third Shadow remarked, apparently somewhat sadly, 'I'm only a shadow, after all.'

There are only twice that the Triad has appeared to someone not at Harmonius's orders. The first was to the Maize triplets. The second was to Ms. Ivory during that period of time they would fight her monthly. The former was out of cruelty and spite, while the latter was a desperate attempt to revitalize their leader by defeating the girl who had bested him. As I remarked earlier, it's puzzling they didn't simply murder anyone during any of these encounters. The Maize triplets had lost. The girl happened to come across them by accident the first time and it would have been easy to kill her before she realized they were even there. Perhaps the latter can be explained by the following logic: to kill her when she had no time to react may be seen as not a fair fight by Harmonius, whereas defeating her honorably in battle would truly prove to him that all was not lost and that someone could in fact be powerful enough to defeat such a trainer.

Now of course, Harmonius being Harmonius, I doubt that would have made any difference unless it was he who defeated her. Having lived with him for many years, they undoubtably knew this. But they were desperate enough to attempt it and that's what matters. It is worth noting that Third Shadow has therefore proven that he will not only resort to illogical actions when desperate enough, but will actually act on his own-- something very rare indeed.

In current day, it explains how he is still alive. Though without anyone to dictate what he's supposed to do, he's at least used enough to acting on his own to ensure his own survival, even if that's... basically all he is doing.

But once again... there was no reason for them to spare the Maize triplets. I am continually irritated over not knowing why they did.

He's been lingering in the Aspertia City Gym for awhile now. He looks at the books as if curious, but doesn't touch them. It's really creepy. He's really creepy. Clearly he has an interest in them to some capacity but he doesn't act on it; I suppose it's not important enough to him for him to do so. This isn't the first time I have witnessed him taking an obvious interest in something, but he never looks further into it. Not ever.

Third Shadow will occasionally become highly distressed for no apparent reason, during which his psychic powers, as mentioned earlier, will go awry, snapping small trees and crushing random objects; I have once watched these terrifying, untapped abilities crush a van. This happens most often at night, when he was sleeping just a few moments ago. The logical conclusion would be nightmares. It's not only these that set him off, though; I have seen him throw fits like these in the middle of the day. If not for the fact that they happen at night so often I would suppose he were trying to weaponize his abilties but was struggling to get them to do what he wanted. He does not scream or cry. He is utterly silent. The only signs of distress at all (literally, the only reason I label it as such) is the fact that his breathing grows quick and erratic and he curls in on himself and folds his arms over his head. If standing he will drop to a crouch. If sitting he will draw his legs in and then cover his head. If laying down he will curl into a ball.

He has been attacked by survivors a total of five times since I began to follow him and observe. He made quick work of them. Interestingly, he handled the human survivors himself (with his knife and his hand-to-hand combat skills) while his Accelgor handled the pokemon aggressors. And this is interesting because it wasn't as if his pokemon handled the pokemon so that he was free to handle the human. No. These were all seperate incidents. Twice he was attacked by a lone human, once by a group of three, and twice by a lone pokemon, each. He made no move to handle the pokemon even when it was apparent they were out for his blood; it was his Accelgor who took care of things.

He stood for a long time staring at the bodies before moving on.

My current conclusion: Third Shadow was a bit strange even by Shadow Triad standards. Likely has suffered a major shake-up in his recent life due to the fact that he is entirely alone and seems to have no current purpose. Possibly depressed. Appears to suffer nightmares and breakdowns for little reason. Is unwilling or unable to use his knowledge of fighting against pokemon. Unwilling or unable to use his psychic abilites to harm anyone at all despite the fact that even untrained, those powers could easily kill a man. He seems too listless to bother with the spite he has displayed in past interactions. Has a vague curiosity about some things but rarely investigates.

-- [url=???]Shadow Triad[/url]: They don't treat one another as brothers in any interaction I have heard of them. They tend to not talk to one another in the presence of others. The two exceptions was the encounter the Maize brothers recounted and Ms. Ivory's later confession. It gave the impression that they must in fact discuss things with one another and come to decisions as a group, given that they all decided to go to the Striation Gym and give the Maize boys a hard time and later accosted Ms. Ivory repeatedly, but how frequently they spoke to one another remains a mystery.

-- [url=???]Ghetsis Harmonius[/url]: Apparently saved their lives at some point, which is why they are so loyal to him. Potentially manipulated them at some point. In every account but one, anytime they showed up anywhere, Harmonius dominated 80% of what they spoke about. Given how utterly paranoid the man could be about everything EXCEPT what was a danger to him, their untrained psychic abilites may be due in part to him? His purpose for placing Natural Harmonius as the puppet Champion (with the intention of making him a puppet king) of Unova was to persaude everyone else to release their pokemon, thereby leaving him and his followers the only ones with pokemon... which would mean he and his followers would be the only ones with access to exceptionally strong weapons. In the form of their pokemon.

Psychic powers honed as a weapon would make pokemon unnecesary if one meant to attack him. It's only a guess at the moment, but maybe they weren't taught how to weaponize those so that they, too, would be rendered weaponless if their pokemon were taken? Given that Harmonius did have that great honking Hydregion which hand-to-hand and knife skills would do little against...

-- Natural Harmonius: They seemed to have a measure of respect for him, but Natural Harmonius has also mentioned that they would bring him to his father when he tried to escape. It's unclear if their respect for him was genuine or if it was something Harmonius brainwashed them into. Furthermore, it's unclear if they held any kind of affection for the young man. Did they do what Harmonius wanted them to at Natural's detriment because they cared about Harmonius more, or did they merely felt powerless to stand against him? I suppose it doesn't matter to me either way because he's just as guilty as they are, so their opinion of him says nothing about their morality or Third Shadow's specifically, but it would be helpful to know which Harmonius they held more loyalty for. My money's on the elder Harmonius.

-- Black, Stone, Belle[/url]: I don't believe they felt much of anything towards Mr. Stone or Ms. Belle, but for Mr. Black they seemed to have some kind of emotion, at least. They were not happy about their master's defeat at his hands... but strangely took no revenge against the boy despite the fact that they did show up at one of the bridges to hand him some stones Harmonius had collected and give him some cryptic words. They were never vicious or harsh in their wording with him, surprisingly, but had no qualms about routinely kidnapping him so their leaders could speak with him.

Mr. Black was definitely traumatized by this, but remains resistent to that reality, focusing instead on his hatred of Harmonius and his obsession with Natural Harmonius as a coping mechanism. Perhaps thinking too much on the people he used as tools to harm him proved to be too painful, unless they were someone who Mr. Black could, in his head, twist to be an innocent victim- the way Natural Harmonius is capable of pretending to be.

After all, focusing on someone who seems to be an innocent victim gives Mr. Black someone to protect, instead of thinking about the soulless monsters that abducted him, sometimes at the behest of said supposedly innocent victim. Focusing on Harmonius might involve thinking on someone who had directed the trauma, but it does also give the boy one target to focus his rage at instead of three, and it's objectively less frightening to think of encountering Ghetsis again (in the state Mr. Black had left him in, anyway) than it would be to think about three potentially vengeful, ninja-trained psychics who can appear out of thin air.

-- the Ivory twins, Jeon: Mr. Ivory had little contact with any of the Plasma takeover attempts.

Ms. Ivory and Mr. Jeon, however, are a different matter entirely. They both fought with these perpetrators several times. Mr. Jeon understandably despised them. Ms. Ivory's feelings, though, after all was said and done, were a bit more... difficult to parse out. I regret not grilling her even harder, to be truthful. I allowed her to simply not answer me a few times. I would not make the same mistake again if I had the chance.

That being said it's my opinion that similarly to Mr. Black, the girl struggled very much to cope with the enormity of what had happened and what she had been dragged into. To that end she turned to imagining victims where they were none, latching onto certain perpetrators linked to or rumored to be linked to Plasma and either excusing away their involvement, being irritatingly obtuse about what involvement they may have had, and seeking them out after the fact, likely in an attempt for closure. She never said whether or not she saw Natural Harmonius again so my guess is that she didn't, given that she admitted (eventually) that she'd seen the Shadow Triad again.

She didn't get the closure she wanted from the Shadow Triad. Unsurprising because there's nothing they could have given her, but she was too young and blind to understand that.

-- the Maize triplets: They literally teleported into their restaurant to toy with them. Probably one of their most disgusting acts of power play, and one of only two to date not done on Harmonius's orders. Out of character for them and rather disturbing.

-- Dr. Gannon: No conclusive evidence was ever found linking him to Plasma, though Mr. Black claims that he had proof at one point before it was lost. Ms. Ivory did not mention him in her interview and disappeared from home before rumors of his involvement among law enforcement began to surface. Mr. Looker of the IPF effectively put an end to any further investigation, as even he wasn't able to find anything, but still, I wonder. Mr. Black doesn't seem to be the kind to make up something for no reason and Ms. Ivory was a traumatized young girl who was far more occupied with Harmonius's involvement and was hyperfocusing on that to the point that she spoke of almost nothing else. It's entirely possible Dr. Gannon was involved. Perhaps Third Shadow could tell me more if I could only somehow get him to talk.

-- the Gainsboro twins: Records I've dug up from Harmonius's private stash of documents indicate that for some reason they were sent to harrass the Subway Bosses at some point. There was water damage, though, and I couldn't discern why. Only that it had something to do with Dr. Gannon. This may be worth looking into, if possible.

-powerful psychic, likely to a terrifying degree, but has no control yet over this ability
-his teleportation is more erratic the worse his emotions appear to be
-his Accelgor is oddly protective of him; I have watched him pop out of his pokeball several times at night to watch over the human for a few hours before returning to the ball to, presumably, sleep
-rarely communicates with his pokemon, but always makes sure to ask him once a day how he is feeling and if he needs anything; the Accelgor responds in kind with short, basic answers and requests
--despite the very quick conversations it's never tinged with resentment or hatred