Well, mostly because the first two chapters were written nearly two years ago when my writing skills weren’t at their best.
Wow, that was pretty interesting.
Thank you for the comment!
And, a bit of news! Chapter One has been rewritten! Go check it out back on Page 1!
Knightfall signing off…
Chapter Sixteen: Abeyance
[hr][/hr]
“I can already hear their anguished cries, even as I try to shut out the voices while I writhe in my nightmares. I am in a paradise, yet my kindred are still trapped in Erebus and my brother is lost. But, I still have to complete my mission for the world. I am condemning them to a fate far worse than death at the stockade. Millions, if not more, will suffer for actions. And for what? The survival of this world permanently stained crimson with its own blood? There is no hope for a brighter future, only one that can raise its head and see the sun and the stars in their glorious revolutions on the fringes of Elysium.â€
– Journal of [NAME EXPUNGED], found in the Eastern Forest in the Borderlands territory of the Kingdom
[hr][/hr]
“I am one who has laid low the proud. One who has broken the unholy power and seized control. One who freed thousands from the shackles of false truths. Will they regard me as a new god or the slayer of demons?â€
Quiet. The remote buzz of the static choking the air.
“You refuse to speak. Tell me, will they think of me as a god? Speak, worm!â€
Screeches. Gears clinking. The tears of the great machine.
“Burn.â€
“You speak at last. It may not be the answer I seek, but it tells me one thing: I am your god.â€
[hr][/hr]
The darkness clung to him. It had taken hold when he had faltered in the canyon, and it had yet to leave him. The world was a void now. Sight was nothing to him now. Little more than an abstract memory that haunted him like a severed limb. He felt the sunlight against his fur yet received none of the warmth or the blessings of seeing its source rise in the sky. That privilege, that beauty of the sun’s journey across the sky, was deprived to him.
Jay let his legs dangle off the side of the barracks building and allowed the gentle breeze to blow through his faded fur. He let the sweet smells of food baking in the marketplace below him enter his nose as he wistfully imagined what these delicious breads must look like. He wanted to eat something, anything other than the tasteless, dry nutrient biscuits Quark demanded they all ingest for the last two days. He coughed and swore he could still taste the bland wafer still stuck to his throat.
As he sightlessly watched the Pokémon mill about the square beneath him, his mind returned to the events that had transpired two days prior. The first thing he remembered was waking up in a soft bed while Quark’s monotone voice calmly passed through his mind telling him not to be afraid and that he was safe. Granted that approach had nearly given him a heart attack when combined with the fact that he found his eyes refused to work. Afraid, blind, and disorientated, he had broken down into embarrassing hysterics. He didn’t know how long it went on for or what he said during that period, but all he remembered afterwards was his body slowly unfreezing after Kelly had stunned and tackled him to the floor.
Whatever dignity he still had was taken away when Quark finally gave his diagnosis. His eyes had suffered from a form of atrophy from disuse, so now he had to spend the next several weeks in nearly complete darkness in order to recover his sight. While it was hardly as bad as permanent blindness, he didn’t feel any better about being “prescribed†a supposedly healing band of crimson cloth --Leo had confirmed the color to him afterwards-- to tie around his eyes for the next three months.
While he had initially been ardently opposed to wearing the supposed treatment, he found that by the end of the hour, it didn’t seem nearly as bad as he thought it would. The cloth was soft and smooth, yet it had enough of a grip as to not require constant adjusting in order to stay around his head. Quark had applied the band in almost no time at all, slipping it under the now-useless aura sensors on the sides of his head, and psychically fastened the knot. Jay had opened his eyes to see, but the cloth failed to produce a miracle, even with the enhanced healing properties.
Fortunately, his injuries had been the worst of the news the group had received. While he couldn’t see them, he knew they had all had relieved looks on their worn faces. Leo and Noah had gotten bandages and Oran Berry paste for their wounds, and Kelly was treated for slight hypothermia. Quark seemed to mutter some dark curse every time he mentioned the Charmeleon, but otherwise, he did his job dutifully. While Jay couldn’t see any of it, Quark kept them all constantly updated on each other’s conditions until he formally released them from under his care the next day.
Unfortunately, that small bit of freedom from the Alakazam’s operating quarters meant reporting directly to Torrent. Jay’s mind snapped back into reality as a sudden blast of cool air traveled past his body. He looked around, shaking away the uncomfortable memories of the general’s incredibly in-depth interrogation of them all about their extended away-without-leave status. For once the Riolu was genuinely glad Noah had been assigned with them, as the Dewott expertly presented their case to Torrent.
He could only listen, but Noah produced evidence in the form of a tooth he had knocked out from the dragon and the obvious wounds they had all received as proof of their endeavors in Blue Sun Canyon, the formal name for the hell they had fought through. It was only after Leo and Kelly told him of their experiences with the Froslass, apparently both choosing to omit the Mismagius from their accounts, that the Feraligatr became convinced of the validity of their story.
Jay stood from his seated position on the roof, letting the rare cooling wind wash away his weariness brought about by the warm current of air that sat over the small Borderland farming town. There was not much that happened after that. Torrent debriefed them on some topic of recent concern, the most disturbing of which was the revelation that they had been missing for three days inside the dungeon. The Feraligatr seemed to be at a loss of how to explain it as Noah’s story proved that hardly a day passed on the inside of the Canyon.
The Riolu gingerly walked the edge of the roof, letting the wind catch him every time his body shifted undesirably. He knew it was dangerous, and he knew it was foolish to attempt even with visual aid. But he wasn’t going to let it stop him. He wasn’t about to let anything stop him. Jay concentrated on the sensitive pads on his feet to find the narrow path ahead of him while he felt the strength of the wind on his body tell him when and where to lean to keep his balance. Despite the shouts from the villagers and soldiers on the street below telling him to come down, he carried on, trying to see the treacherous path ahead of him.
I have to think. I can still see … It’s just different now. I have to see by touch, his thoughts reminded him, as if they too were determined to see him succeed. However, those were not the only pulses of neural energy in his mind. Torrent’s meeting with them had revealed more than the simple passing of a few days: while his team had been occupied in the Blue Sun Canyon, Silver City had come under martial law due to a revolt in one of the city’s ghettos.
That was hardly news. Silver had always had some sort of revolt going on; whether it reached the public eye or not was a different story. The Federation usually kept a good handle on them until they were broken up or simply burned out. But this time, even Torrent, the supposed bastion of unmoving confidence seemed to waver as he delivered the news that the riot had yet to cease. Jay had already let that crisis wash over him and pass him by. It didn’t concern him, not anymore.
It was Leo who asked the obvious question of where they currently were. It seemed to have not crossed Torrent’s mind either as he gladly gave them a quick explanation before ushering them out of his quarters in the small fort. That had been two days ago, and thanks to Quark they had been given that amount of time as leave to do what they wished within proper reason.
Jay found another ledge on the roof. After listening to the noise beneath him, or rather the lack thereof, he was able to deduce that the ground below was in an alley of some sort. It would have to do as a landing spot. The Riolu vaulted over the raised edge of the humble store roof and landed in a thud in the alley, fortunately no more broken than he had before the jump.
He had to find his team once again. They were the only ones he belonged with, whether he wanted to admit it or not. They would be the ones who helped him get through this. They would help him see again.
[hr][/hr]
I am not of this world. That much I know for certain. Long ago I gave up on finding out how I came here. Aside from the descent, there isn’t much on how I got from Point A to here at what I assume is Point B. I remember stumbling to my feet. My survival had been impossible, yet here I was.
There was nothing. I was alone, naked, and deprived of all memories save for a name. For a long time, there was no sound. Only my rapid breathing allowed me to ascertain that my soul was not stuck in some hell. It was cold. The water was cold and clear and tasted purer than anything I had ever drank before. It was like I was an infant: I needed the water like it was milk. And I continued to drink it.
What felt like years passed in that pleasant place. I never grew hungry or desired anything. The water kept me cool and quenched, and I felt it working through my body, purifying it of its past. I didn’t get bored of the taste either; it was like my tongue erased itself after each sip. And so, this cycle of rest, drink, and cool repeated itself for what appeared to be an eternity. I did not age in mind or body, but I felt time passing like sand over my fingers.
The pool remained, the strange ethereal light remained, and I remained, for eons, ages, or perhaps just for a few moments. I did not know then and I still am unsure even now. The one thing I am certain of is the instant in time when everything changed. After I had been declared ready by the booming unknown, the pool opened to me, and I stepped through, feeling the wind against my face as everything about me reformed and shifted.
I was no longer who I once was. I was something new. Something great. Something that was meant to be powerful in due time. When I was awake there was no ground around me, and when I woke again, the ground materialized again and I met my best friend. All in quick succession in the course of a minute.
I did not know why I was here, or even what world this was, but that didn’t matter. I was happy. It felt like paradise. I would have been content to remain here, possibly forever. Without a purpose, without a calling, without a destiny. I would have been happy. Truly happy. And then, everything fell apart. It was like a tower with a crack at the base that only kept on growing larger and larger until it all fell down in a heap of fallen stone and crushed hope.
First it was the dreams, then the scam, then it was the cards, and then the expedition. That’s where everything began to slip and slide down that path towards destruction. I could breathe, but my team fell by the wayside. The warden of ice, the protector of the end, allowed us passage, but only to return home where the first stirrings of the underlying discontent surfaced. Despair, hatred, envy —they seethed and radiated from everyone without a limit.
My team however, bypassed the obvious signs until the dreams returned to me, haunting me. They beckoned me to follow, to blindly go to hostile territory. My partner and I, as smart and cautious as we were, both fell for the dubious plea. Within the span of a day, we were betrayed, ambushed, split up, and hunted down. I wanted nothing more than to simply lie down and die. I had nothing left; I was alone and starving while my enemies bore down on me. And then, destiny, the role I was supposed to play in this world revealed to me by the deus ex machina of the Fates.
I wanted to believe in the future. I wanted to believe in one so badly. One where I could live in peace with my friend. My one, true friend. I had been toyed around by fate and the powers above for too long. I was not going to follow the same threads of fate as my many contemporaries had. My team and I, we stood against the darkness. We stormed the stronghold confident and heads held high as we ascended further into the cursed skies.
The air grew thinner and thinner as the altitude and proximity increased, but our strides did not falter in the slightest. We all pressed onwards with clarity in our eyes and a purpose at least in our hearts. The icy steps sought to numb our bodies as they did the souls of the citizens below, but not even the elements under the control of their master could beat us down. And thus, the verge of a new dawn, the spire approached us with the mounting fury it had too-long contained.
It was here that the truth was revealed. The finality of the enigmatic matter settled. It was all a lie, a fabrication, a hoax. We were wrong. We had been played to believe in the elaborate untruth. The unknowing Pokémon below pitted against one another for no reason, their crimes and deeds neither adding nor detracting from the looming disaster. Everything we had been told up to that point was meaningless. All our efforts in raising morale brought to naught.
I had wanted to believe it was by my willpower alone as I had been lead to believe all along. Turns out that I was just immune to the radiation, from what the so-called “Administrators†told us. They laid it out plainly. This had been an experiment. A test that had almost reached culmination. A test that, if seen through to the end, would result in the end of life for miles around below our feet.
In that moment, I knew what needed to be done. I will not say I am a courageous person – not in the slightest. But there was a bigger matter at stake here. Perhaps not as costly as the fate of this world which I have come to love, but still a fate that intended to wipe our small valley of paradise from the known world. I looked to my partner; her desire to put an end to this plot was more radiant than mine. I looked at my team, all of them too were ready to put an end to it all. Too long we had toiled for a goal that was nonexistent. We would now get our reward, our peace, after we pried it from their dead clutches.
I gazed at the panel of Pokémon assembled before us behind the collapsed warden, their apathetic eyes only focused on the fortunes they were guaranteed if they were successful. It had to end here. There were no doubts about what we had to do in order to preserve our way of life. We had bested the warden, rescued the imprisoned, and climbed through the ethereal spire to face the truth. It had been our time to strike. And so we did.
Even to this day I refuse to recall the exact memories that lead to the slaughter. I will only attribute it to our rage. Our righteous anger burned with the knowledge that the heinous crimes they committed were for no real purpose, only that of a scientific test. Those moments might have well have been erased from my memory, for I want nothing more than to blot them out forever. I pray that I never have to do something similar to any living creatures ever again, no matter what. By the time our actions were complete, the floor ran in rivulets of crimson, and we stood aghast at what we were capable of doing.
What my thoughts were at that point are irrelevant now. The deed was done, and there was no turning back. We had come this far, and eliminated this evil, there was nothing left to do but to finish our self-appointed job amid the chaos. I went in alone, unafraid, and with the same resolve I used to possess to claw my way into the central chamber. I felt my heart drop, for above me was the reason why I was here. This unholy creation, not of despair, but of science alone was my destiny. My purpose, finally to be fulfilled. I will spare the details for other things require my attention, such as my facade, but in the end I succeeded. We all succeeded.
The fortress crumbled, its lofty spires no longer overlooked the realm of mortals and planned for its destruction. We knew that there were repercussions to be felt, but the time for that was not now. Not in this time of ending. I must now go and wander amongst the realms of this world. My original point, the thought I mentioned at the start, still holds true. Even though I walk through the crowds as a creature of this realm, I know I will never truly be one with them. Only my partner and those few who know of me knew that truth.
We had little peace. There are delays. Massive delays. I had returned, and had returned again at the world’s end. But after a week of setback, we were whole and home once again. All of us, with the world finally content. We only had another week of solace before they showed up. The operation was restore order, or so they said. We took them at their words like fools, and they stabbed us all in the back and left us for the carrion birds.
My deeds will not be written in books, that much was assured later on after the incident. My legacy was erased, as if it never even existed. But I am still here, still behind this false exterior. I have to keep my memories to myself lest I am erased as well. I await the day when I no longer have to fear. When I can return to my home, when I can find my team, and when I can have the peace I fought to win. Until then, I will do what I can, when I must. Until that day, I wait and carry on.
I was hardly the savior they wanted, but I was the only one left. I was the wrong being in the right place. I made the difference. Now, I am running from the consequences. They thought they wiped the memories. They thought they could make everyone, including me, forget. But they were wrong.
[hr][/hr]
Noah tossed the shiny silver trinket into the air and caught it in his paws. The mostly circular object flipped over in the air, glinting in the early morning sun as it landed in his paws once more. Noah continued to repeat the process as he casually walked down the cobblestone path from the Kingdom military barracks on the edge of town to the marketplace. He had done the same thing for the last two days, but this time he wondered just what he would do until noon when his leave would expire.
“Let’s see … There’s always the option of going through the Orb shop. I could try to convince them to take away that life-time ban. Besides, it wasn’t my fault they keep the Itemizer Orbs out in the open like that,†he muttered as he stopped to pin the badge onto his worn satchel, the only possession of his to survive from before the Blue Sun Canyon debacle. Since being released from Quark’s care, he had taken to exploring the town and seeing what had changed since the last time Torrent’s company had been holed up here.
The town of Shiloh was small even for a town that demanded the presence of a military fort. The tiny community’s population doubled in size whenever a new company came to occupy the shanty barracks built eons ago on the edge of town. This respite from the corruption of the Kingdom, nestled among the gently sloping hills and valleys of the southern half of the Borderlands region, seemed to keep the civil war long at bay even though the fronts were just beyond the hills to the north.
Noah kept walking, cheerfully waving to some of the Pokémon whom he passed on their way to their fields. He saw good reason for the Kingdom to protect this small area, the berries they grew were the town’s single pride. Everything that was edible revolved around different ways of combining berries. They had somehow even made a bread of sorts, bread that was just now coming out of the many bakeries that lined the street.
The barracks were crudely built out of sturdy planks of rough wood and a glue paste synthesized from a mixture of Caterpie string and Spinarak web. The strictly-built compound was as out of place on the outskirts of the small community as a fire at the bottom of the sea. Despite its remoteness and drawbacks, Noah enjoyed coming to Shiloh. In the two years he had been with Torrent he had helped pave the town’s stone streets, tend the berry crop, and clear snow in the winter, among other public works the general planned for them.
He smiled to himself as he show the town for what it truly was: Torrent’s personal kingdom. The towering blue reptile always found a way to include the town in his morning addresses, and Noah had found entries upon entries in his journal written about the farming community. That hadn’t been the reason he stole the journal in the first place, but it had been an interesting piece of information to find.
Come to think of it, why did I take his journal last year? Noah couldn’t seem to remember. He knew it had something to do with rations. Or perhaps it was because Torrent had embarrassed him in front of the entire camp. Whatever the motive was, it led to him sneaking into Torrent’s tent one winter night, and swiping the small brown booklet from underneath the slumbering officer’s nose. Some of the members in the camp still were able to recall exactly what page of the journal they found in front of their tents the next morning.
His grin became even more smug as he passed the last of the sweet-smelling food stalls. Unlike the members of Team Salient, Noah knew Shiloh better than most permanent residents of the laid-back hamlet. The Dewott was feeling amazing. The few gashes he had received from the dragon in the Canyon were completely healed, and any weariness had been long purged from his body. The single trophy he claimed from his victory, a large pointed tooth, swung from the cord he had wrapped around the thick base.
He had kicked it from the smoldering remains of the ice dragon’s skull shortly before Jay’s “procedure†was completed. He rubbed his paw along the smooth surface and serrated edges of the tooth, letting the pride that he had helped kill its ruthless owner rise in him once again. Although he never directly said it, he was glad he finally had a relic of his own to rival Leo’s odd key. He began thinking of the few vendors in the black market of Silver City who might be able to secure him a golden thread for it, and once he had that, Leo’s key wouldn’t stand a chance.
Noah reached the parlor of the humble Orb shop, its weathered roof shedding shingles like a tree in autumn. Bounding up the creaking wooden steps, he peered through the dusty window and knocked on the slanted wooden door.
“Hey! Anyone in there? Look, I’m sorry about yesterday. I just need to look around this time, I swear!†he asked, hoping that either someone would open the door soon or give him some sort of answer. Nothing in his field of expertise in laying ambushes could have prepared him for what happened next. The door quickly snapped open, leaving barely enough space for the owner’s green paw to reach through the gap and toss a shining blue Orb down at his feet. As quick as it opened, the door closed with a slam as the crystalline artifact exploded in a thousand glittering fragments across the floor.
Before he could brace himself, a cloud of rippling air formed and shot towards him. The ball of wind smacked him in his stomach, knocking the breath entirely out of his lungs as it lifted him several feet backwards before roughly depositing him against a the wall of the general store across the street. The hard clay wall rushed up to meet his back, deciding to greet it formally with an embracive slam into his spine. Noah slid down the wall slowly as onlookers began to mill around him.
“Excuse me! Move please! I said please!†The shouting was unmistakably Jay’s. Noah shook off the dizziness clinging to the back of his skull and painfully willed his body to pick itself up from the street. Sure enough, from the back of the crowd of citizens, he could see Jay’s blue and black form shoving itself through the thin group. The Riolu sidestepped a large steel-plated monster and appeared at the forefront of the crowd, the crimson band instantly distinguishing him from any other of his species.
“I thought I heard you. That is you, right? Noah?†Jay asked as he held out an uncertain paw to him. Noah readily accepted the assistance and hopped to his feet, immediately losing the interest of the crowd as they saw that he was not wounded.
“Thanks, mate. I appreciate it. So, how you liking that thing? Looks pretty sweet, I gotta say. Red looks good on you, man,†Noah replied with a grin he knew Jay could not see. The blinded Riolu didn’t say a word and only folded his arms.
“You can stop with the jokes, Noah. It’s not going to help me see any sooner,†Jay huffed as the agrarian crowd dispersed from the scene. Soon, it was only the two of them, and a few Pokémon looking out from the doorways of their dwellings, almost certainly gathering fuel for their gossip.
“A little humor makes life worth living, Jay. Come on, you’ll get your sight back soon. Don’t act like it’s the end of the world. Trust me, when that happens, then you have my permission to act down and glum,†Noah countered jovially. But not even his heightened spirits seemed to do any good for his sight-deprived friend. He set his mind to work, going over every aspect of Shiloh that he had stored in his memories. He had to find something that would snap Jay out of the haze he had wandered into. After a minute of silence between the two, Noah clapped his paws together and let out a whoop in celebration.
“I’ve got it! Come on, Jay! Let’s all go on a mission! We’ll find one with a good reward, and we’ll have a good time exploring a dungeon in the process! There’s nothing to lose!â€
[hr][/hr]
“The Cave.†His voice resonated within the hollow stone. “Choose the darkness and live without the guilt, or face the sun and sin. Chained with the fire or free in the cold. Be blinded by the light or see in the abyss. Questions. Questions. Questions.†He limped along the dark passage, holding the shard of glowing blue light in one claw while in the other, a piece of crimson clay.
Runes. Depictions. Scribblings. Characters of unknown description. All of these stained the endless corridors of his personal labyrinth. He took a deep breath, his body shuddering in response. The pain was eating away at him, but he would not let it steal away his soul. He would not let it beat him down and pry away his stubborn mind again.
“Lost, damned, and beaten. They all are chained to the fire.†Claws brushed along the rough stone slabs, scraping an evil sound as they passed over the murals he had drawn long ago. Long ago when the whispers had just started he had obeyed their every word without hesitation. Their will had become his, and his soul tied to their horrid mutterings.
He had seen the exit. Many times. More times than there were stars in the skies far above. Yet he remained in the darkness. Searching, waiting, hoping for another way, one that did not lead into the shadows before it ascended into the light. He often spent days gazing into it, wondering if the thoughts locked away inside his tortured mind would truly lurk in the oozing blackness.
Chalk ground itself into the wall, the fine powder catching along the microscopic ridges in the rock face until it began to talk to him. Their voices were always the same yet always changing location, never stationary. Their melodious tones soothed his aching head and all the thoughts that raced around within it. He knew he had to leave this place; this long abandoned corridor was playing tricks on his eyes. But the mural was not done. The story unfinished. The characters not developed. They were merely colored scratches on the unforgiving halls at this moment of unending time, but soon they would be radiant, glowing with the power and light of the stars he longed to see.
They would be his saviors. But if they were to find him when judgement day came with its blazing dawn, then he had no choice. He had to finish or risk being left behind once the world would be incinerated under the wrath of the unchained gods when they finally broke free of the cave.
“Just a little longer … Just a few more lines … A … A little bit of color here,†the Breloom’s voice whispered as he carefully applied the small remainder of the colored rock to the outline. He nimbly switched between colors in his tattered satchel, holding both crimson and blue in his dexterous claws. The crumbling material graced the eye of his savior, filling in the grey expanse with a gentle shade of light blue.
He moved on, the other characters could not wait. He produced yellow, blue, black, and aqua from his leather bag. His arms moved at a fever pitch before his dazed eyes. He could not think, he could not feel, he could only draw what the frenzied thoughts commanded. A language he did not know --or at the very least, one he did not remember learning in the endless night produced by this dungeon.
“The saviors. They are finished. At long last,†Ian muttered as he let the chalk slip from his dusted claws. The drawing utensil clattered to the ancient floor as the Breloom felt his breathing grow shallow. He had seen it at long last in the fading light of the Luminous Orb shard. The gargantuan mural was finished. The work his mind had forced him to undertake to preserve itself was done for now. It would only be a matter of days before his damaged psyche demanded more. More drawing, more runes, more explanation as to why he was here.
They were there. Staring at him, as if anxious to be set free from the wall he had stuck them to.
His fists shook with rage. There had to be a mistake. They could not be here. They had to be elsewhere, free. Preparing to overthrow the shackles of the cave that kept him imprisoned for so long. They could not be here, for if they were here, they were trapped. They were trapped same as him. His saviors were going to fail him. After all that he did for them, the murals he draw upon the walls in their honor, the words he had carved into the floors, and stories he told himself about their rescue was all for naught.
“No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No!†he exploded. Spit shot from his mouth as he vehemently cursed the words underfoot, stamping on each one until the injured bone in his right forced him to reconsider. His throat caught on fire, burning his mouth as the words flew at his imprisoned heroes. Yet they did not blink, only stare with unrelenting hatred. He slumped to the base of the fantastic drawing, wanting his tears to wipe away the painful reminder of his own insanity.
“Ian. Stop. I told you to stay away from the mural, did I not? This is the 305th time. Please … Stop coming here. You never find what it is you’re looking for here.†Ian’s eyes snapped open. The voice of logic had returned. The voice of a friend. His true friend.
The quivering Breloom slowly turned his withered head to face the digital Pokémon hovering directly in beside him. The tears in his eyes fell to the cold stone as the Porygon upgrade lowered his head to his. The pixelated hardware touched the sere skin on his own forehead as he came in close.
“Ian. Please. Do not return here. There’s no one here for you. Not Sophie or these ‘saviors’ of yours. We have to find them elsewhere,†Vertex stated in hushed tones. Somewhere deep down, beneath the troubled surface of his brain, he knew that Vertex was right. There was nothing for him here. He would only keep on destroying himself if he continued down this path.
“W-wait! Ver-Tex! T-there’s somethi --somethin-- here! I found it! I swear, I found it this time!†Ian cried, grasping the digital Pokémon who was trying his best not to be alarmed by the sudden mood swing.
“Ian, there is nothing here. We have to go, now. I don’t want to see you hurt anymore,†Vertex whispered, his synthesized voice dropping even lower for the last sentence. Ian’s claws began to tremble as he slowly released them from his friend’s pink body and pointed down into the darkness. He had seen it in the deep, oppressive abyss. He had seen the door to the end of the world. The door that would lead to the end of the darkness. All he had to do was reach out and grab it this time, and he would be free.
“This time. Please, Vertex. You have to help me reach it…†He straightened up as he looked over at the unknown passage beyond the limited luminance of his glowing shard. It stretched open as the yawning jaws of a monster, vast and cavernous, and always craving more and more. And each time he had returned to stain this wall with his shattered mind’s imagination, it only grew larger and larger.
“Ian …†Vertex sighed. Ian watched the Porygon2 with an anxious gaze as he continued to twist his withered body around to make sure the darkness had not crept forward out of its realm.
“Fine. We’ll go explore this passage. Let us hope it will not be like the last area we explored. I will not be able to dig you out this time,†the smaller Pokémon said as he rose up off the dusty floor and switched on his eyes. The white, pixelated retinas became illuminated as power was redirected into the light producing areas. Twin beams of light flashed in the long forgotten hall. Ian crawled to his feet and gingerly followed behind his floating anchor to reality into the aged maintenance tunnel.
He had dropped his shard back at his mural. He wanted to be able to see his magnum opus during his internment in these dark places until the glowing aura finally faded from view. His saviors all smiled happily as they set their faces towards the surface and the coming dawn of fire. The day when the sun would finally shine upon his deteriorating body once again.
Pain shot through his crudely bandaged leg as bright red blood began dripping through the gross cloth, already soaked in days’ worth of infection. His worn satchel beat against his emaciated side with each agonized step. The thin shadow that followed him through the darkness became a constant reminder to him to how long it had been since he had eaten a proper meal. His stomach had long ago stopped crying out for nourishment and had silently began burning away his insides as a form of revenge against its owner.
However, none of these problems had caused him greater discomfort or worry from Vertex as his skin. The once cream and green colored patches covering his body were now dulled down several shades until he nearly seemed bleached of all chlorophyll and pigment, leaving him with the appearance of wrinkled paper. He remembered in his childhood how his parents always warned him of the adverse effects of letting his skin dry out and wither, and now he pressed up against the verge of tears every time the surface of his body moved.
“There’s nothing here, Ian. Nothing yet,†Vertex reported ahead of him as he suffered in his quiet torment. He saw the artificial intelligence’s eyes sweep across the wide, gloomy aisle. Ian continued to limp behind, wincing as the lurid wrappings about the set bone in his right leg became soaked with even more leaking fluid. For once, he wished his mind would once more pass into the phase of disjointed thoughts so that he would become numb to the pain for just a small while longer. At least until they had found the inevitable door.
“You’ll find it. I know you will, Ian.†He hardly raised his head at the new voice calling out to him. Sophie’s haunting vestige too often became the sole Pokémon he could talk to in his states of madness, so hearing her now was hardly anything new to him. In fact, it gave him hope that he was going to be lapsing into the delusion he so desperately craved as an opiate to dull the pain.
“I know I will, Sophie. Thank you, m’ dear,†he answered, trying to put on a brave face and calm voice for the auditory hallucination. Vertex merely sighed as he turned his gaze back at Ian for an instant before returning to his scanning of the desolate corridor for some sign that proved that he wasn’t imagining everything.
“You won’t find it like that. Do you even remember the time back in Darknight Relic? Do you remember that you, Chuck, and I wandered around in the dark for days before we were told what we had to do in order to see? The same measure applies here.†Her words seemed as real as they always had been in his crazed cycles, but now was different than before. He blinked. This time she was giving coherent advice. Relevant guidelines for him to follow and apply. This was not simply the empty, sweet-voiced nothings she had often uttered to him. These were real.
“Are you certain about that? We’ll be lost if it doesn’t work…†he countered, desperately hoping that the formless voice would give a valid claim as to why he should follow. He shot a nervous glance over at his conscious and logical center. He wanted, no, needed to be absolutely certain that this was the right course of action. Otherwise, he would never find light again. He would certainly drop to his knees and die in the clutching void.
“Yes, I’m quite sure, Ian. I know I haven’t been good for you in the past, but you have to trust me this time. You’re very close to what you seek. Do this and you’ll find it at last,†she reassured, confidence and true emotion seemingly emanating from the words as Ian straightened his back. The pain he was in was no longer an issue and even though it was akin to burning rods under his skin, he strode forward, closing the distance between him and his smaller counterpart while not making a sound against the smooth stone. He still didn’t know what to expect, but he knew he had to act now. He had to see.
Quicker than he thought was still possible for him to do, he dropped into a crouch directly behind Vertex, pulled his right arm back, and shot it forward at the base of the Pokémon’s digitally enhanced skull. The impact held the force of a miniature explosion as it detonated. There was a moment in time where nothing happened. Dialga’s heart froze for a single instant as tears formed in his eyes. His friend slowly slumped in mid-air, and his eyes flickered before shutting down completely. The Porygon2 crumpled to the force of gravity as Ian dove to catch him in the same claws that had incapacitated him. Ian felt the tears stream down his face as he cradled the digital Pokémon in his arms.
“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry,†he whispered to the fading sparks in his only remaining friend. He knew the trust they had between each other has gone forever. The trust that had saved both their lives countless times had dissipated into the aether. It was gone like seeds from a dandelion scattered in a late summer breeze. Like the Gracidea petals on the summit of Mt. Sky into the star-studded sky as he celebrated in triumph with the Heroes of Time.
“… W … hy?†Vertex croaked through his slurred vocal processors as his dull eyes dizzily tried to focus on Ian. Darkness began to grow around them in direct proportion to the AI’s glow dimming down. The tiny glowing ember that seemed to be encased by the smooth pink and blue casing finally burnt out after all the months they had spent together surviving.
“You’ll see, Vertex. We’ll both see. I promise,†Ian choked out in between sobs. Regret attacked his soul and mind like a raptor, shrieking and tearing away at him from the inside. He wanted it to stop, to take back his foolish actions, but there was nothing he could do. There was nothing in his satchel for him, much less anything to repair fatal damage to vital data processing areas in a Pokémon that was programmed rather than born.
Ian tore his gaze away from the falling star in his arms and feverishly looked at the unseeable walls, the darkness now complete. He could feel his mind slipping, his body contorting and twitching as the cloak of opaque nothingness began to suffocate him. He felt its oozing tendrils crawl down his gasping mouth and squeeze his lungs shut. He was going to die. Vertex had been right. His own intuition had been correct. He had trusted his visions and now he was going to suffocate in the dark as his friend bled streams of code over his cold, trembling arms that held him tight.
He heard the haunting swing of the scythe and the beat of the angel of death’s massive, grey-feathered wings above him. He had seen it many times before, in the corner of his vision, standing there with the long-handled scythe in his hands, waiting for him to finally screw up in his endeavors. And now, after years of waiting, the angel would get his prize, and he would be reunited with his team at long last in Elysium. He would finally see them again. He would be free to roam the eternally sun-lit fields of unending happiness. He would be happy, and he would be with Sophie.
“Don’t look at him, Ian! You don’t want to go with him! Quick, look to your left! It’s working just like I told you!†Sophie’s sudden outburst from the darkness snapped him out of his trance state. As his eyes blinked, he saw the black-robed angel retreat back into the shadows, and he slowly turned his gaze to the wall on his left, afraid of what he might or might not see.
There it was. Outlined in faint blue lines along the previously blank section of wall, the shape of a door, cleverly disguised to appear part of the unending tunnel. A slight smile etched its way across his cracked face as he stumbled to his aching feet, still clutching the powered-down form of his dear friend. His chipped and splintered claws clicked across the stone floor as he haphazardly held both the dying AI and his satchel.
“There! I knew it was there!†Ian screamed in euphoria as tears of pain and joy ran in thin currents down the dried flesh of his face. Vertex weakly groaned in his arms, the electrical synapses in his mind not yet dead as Ian struggled towards the newly-revealed corridor in the stone. How long it had been there, hiding in the shadows, was something he would never know, but he didn’t care. He only knew he had to reach the end.
A rumble shook the floor, the great masses of stone grated and cracked against one another in discontent harmony. Ian stumbled and slammed into the rocky wall, desiccated flesh tearing from his left shoulder as he entered the shuddering offshoot. Dust rained down upon the withered spore cap on his head, but Ian shook it off as he continued his unbalanced walk towards salvation.
“Employee 286. I am surprised. How in Verus you managed to survive I don’t know, but well done. Your test is over. If you’d kindly return to us, then you’ll see that none of this is real.†The mechanized voice broadcasted over the unseen amplification devices far above. Ian’s heart dropped and his body nearly followed suit. A cold, jarring shiver slammed his form, sending him to crash numbly into the walls. His arms did little at supporting him as the emotionless tone of his oppressor continued to taunt him from beyond reality.
“S-shut up! You can’t see me! Y-You can’t see me!â€
“Oh, but I can, little weed. Just watch.†The hall, the great hall he had just left immediately became an orchestra of destruction. The ground thundered violently as Ian struggled to keep his footing amid the rattling stone of the branching path above the passage. Great machines groaned and creaked, their pipes aching at the pressure of the water and chemicals pumped through them. The vaulted ceiling, an architectural feat of glory for the ancient ones, could not stand against the cruel engines of science.
“Celebi of the sacred glade, save me. Deliver my tainted soul and protect me from all transgressions of those whose intentions are impure. Celebi, watcher of the woods, I beseech ye to intervene in my mortal life, for I have done no wrong against you. Celebi, I plead my soul! Celebi, I implore! I beg of you to guard my life! Celebi, hear me, your servant!†Ian cried as he threw himself to the floor, covering both Vertex and his satchel from the falling sections of masonry. There was only laughter from the voice over the loudspeaker as the great hall behind him crumbled inwards, sealing him off from his previous haunts and his mural forever.
“I certainly hope you are dead by now. You would think that several hundred tons of granite and iron would be enough to kill you. Don’t you think that you should be dead by --†He couldn’t take it any more. The last time the voice had taunted him and he had hesitated, he had ended up in the clutches of the golem of ice. Something inside of his mind twisted, bended, and was swiftly rent in two as he quickly shot to his feet, ignoring the falling hail of rock and the pain stabbing at his nerves from all over his body.
Continued on Next Post
“SHUT UP! SHUT UP! SHUT UP! I AM STILL ALIVE!†Ian roared, spit flying from his enraged mouth as he snatched up Vertex and his satchel and sprinted towards the end of the accessway. He would make it this time. He would finally escape the deep abyss and climb out of the lowest level of Erebus into the realm of the lesser evils. The voice cackled within the static cords that helped amplify it.
“I see. Well, there is more than one way to flush out pests. Chemicals can be quite useful when used in the right mixtures. Quite potent.†With those words, the abstract feat of industrial prominence clamored to life once again. The great beast of iron shuddered as chemical blood was pumped through its pipes like veins. Stone and time screamed in protest as the might of the machine drove them away into the unseen depths, now unchallenged in his rise to power.
With a screech of metal on iron skin, the wakening monster slit its arteries, allowing the precious lifeblood of compounds and elements to pour out of its convulsing circulatory system. The microscopic molecules met in the dusty air. The catalyst was activated, the energy supplied, the reaction swiftly begun, and the product flooded the pure air with its toxic clouds. Had there been light, Ian might have been able to identify the poisonous gas based upon its color, but as of now, he simply knew he had to escape its deadly effects.
The Breloom vaulted over the debris and decay, finally seeing his goal at the end. A simple ladder forged of iron that had not yet rusted over in the years of neglect. A spark raced through his heart. A spark he had not felt in years. Not since the perfection of Mt. Sky had blossomed around him at the end of their arduous climb. He smelled the faint memories of the flowers, their phantom scents invigorating his rapidly failing body as his strides lengthened even more against the quaking stone.
His breaths became harsh and labored in the concentrating gas that was seeping in from behind his dashing form. His mind had to hold out for a little longer. Just until he had reached the top of the ladder. His feet nearly slipped on the coating of pebbles on the ground as he stopped at the base of the iron structure suspended by an unseen anchor in the darkness above. His heart beating like a war drum against time and fatigue eating away at his limbs, he lifted the flap of his satchel and carefully deposited the unconscious Porygon2 tenderly into the confines of the bag.
“Don’t worry. We’ll get help. We’ll make it out. I promise.†His words sounded hollow in his own ears, and he secretly prayed that Vertex could not hear him from the technical limbo he was wandering in. His conscience, logic, and friend now secured, he hoisted the bag onto his shoulder, sliding the worn strap across the blistered and raw skin.
Without another thought, he swung his beaten body up onto the first rung, his claws struggling to retain a solid grip on the rusting metal. Vertex swung against his side in the leather exploration bag, his friend’s mass collaborating with gravity to drag him down for his sins. The invisible gas swelled on the ground below, steadily rising as it filled and contaminated all remaining pockets of air in the underground causeway. Ian took a deep breath as he looked down at Vertex’s limp form and the rising cloud of fumes that stung his eyes.
He raised his head up as he forced his weakened arms to grasp the rungs and pull him up, his left leg providing the assistance his right could not. The pain pounded against his head, shattering the final stronghold he had for coherent thoughts. The labyrinthine structure shuddered, jostling the Breloom on his precarious perch on the ladder several stories above the ground. His mouth silently moved in the calming words of prayers to the voice of the eternal forest as he hugged himself against the suspended structure.
He looked up at the distance he still had to go. His eyes instinctively squinted at the sudden appearance of a bright light --not sunlight but nearly as wonderful. Shaking away the temporary blindness brought about by the sudden activation of the light processing areas of his eyes, Ian forced himself upwards. The plant-like flesh on his wrists rubbed against the deteriorating iron and left scrapes on them with each rough pull-up on the bars.
I can do this. I can do this! I can do this! Just a bit longer… his mind repeated as it began to grow fuzzy with the creeping tendrils of a psychotic episode approaching. The light was growing brighter as the gas began to inch up his body. He felt the harmful chemicals slowly leaching through his skin, secretly glad for the massive strain it had suffered which preventing it from functioning fully. He just had to keep his head above the cloud until he reached the end of this shaft. Iron clanged against his claws as he shifted the weight of Vertex in the satchel.
Science, long the usurper of superstition and rumor, would win again here against the delusions of a Pokémon who thought he could out-run the advancing tide. Ian’s shivering head fell beneath the noxious fumes with a deep gulp of air. He continued to climb, even as the gas rose above him still, determined to beat him to the light and stamp it out in front of him. The Breloom glanced down at the curled form of Vertex that burdened him. He contemplated letting the strap slide off his shoulder and allowing gravity to do its job on the heavy cargo.
Ian, please… Don’t… The voice sounded like Vertex, but it wasn’t. Not entirely. He had no explanation for it, yet he decided to heed its pathetic pleas just as he had blindly followed Sophie’s order to destroy his friend. With tears in his eyes from the lack of carbon dioxide and the emotional turmoil going on behind his skull, he held the bag tight as he scrambled up the final remaining rungs as his lungs failed. His mouth exploded in a hot exhale of oxygen and breathed in deep the lethal fumes that began the quick process of corroding his body from the inside out like a biological acid.
His claws reached the top as he felt himself combust on the inside and for once in his time in this virtual prison, he was happy that unconsciousness finally forced him into submission. The light consumed him as the gas succeeded in shutting down his heart. He felt the cold iron leave him behind as his body became weightless. There were voices, panicked voices, but they were only delusions of his dying mind. That’s all they could be. That’s all anything could be in the end. And this was his end. He knew it was.
“I’m so sorry…†he whispered from his nearly closed mouth to Vertex, the words barely audible in the light of death as angels surrounded him in this limbo. He closed his eyes on the cruel world that had taken away his team mates and sanity. He looked forward for the glorious arrival of the spirit of the moon, Cresselia, to ferry him across the stars to the paradise of Elysium. He only had to wait for the light to take him away and it would all be over.
Sophie, I’m coming.
[hr][/hr]
Leo stretched out his arms, letting out a content yawn as he did so. The soft fireproof cloth of the hammock beneath his stirring form rocked gently from its anchors on the opposing walls as he lifted both of his clawed feet over the edge. His eyes opened slowly to the midmorning light as the blurred world about him came into focus. The dark wood walls of the troop quarters greeted him as slides of sunlight streamed through the skylight built for the many bird Pokémon who resided in the building, including one covered entirely in light brown and dark red plumage diving towards him out of the sky.
Leo’s groggy eyes widened as he flailed in the confines of his bed in an effort to escape the creature’s path of flight. The hammock promptly flipped over on its axis, depositing the Charmeleon to the scratched oakwood floor. From his position under the spinning bed, Leo watched as the missile with feathers swooped in from the aperture to the atmosphere and quickly lowered his speed upon entering the room. The Pokémon, his mind recalled as a Pidgeotto, flapped its impressive wingspan, and perched on an empty hammock opposite his.
“Hoy! Leo! What are ya still doin’ in bed? E’ryone else’s already up and about!†Leo winced as Icarus squawked at him. For the last two days, the bird had been nothing but overjoyed with the relative safe return of their team and Noah to them, and much to Leo’s chagrin, the bird had taken to becoming his personal alarm to wake each morning he was on leave.
“Come on, Leo! Torrent’s gonna have a fit if he sees you like this still! He’s already in a bad mood from Noah causing some disturbance in town. Not quite sure wha’ happened there, mighta been something to do with tresspassin’ or something like that. Anyways, you gotta get up!†Leo couldn’t help but suppress a chuckle as he climbed to his feet from under his hammock.
“Since when is Torrent ever in a good mood?†Leo asked with a smile. There was no doubt about it: his spirits had rebounded massively from where they had been two days ago at the end of the fight for their lives. He had been the unintentional center of attention when Noah began recounting their tale all over town. Leo quickly discovered that he didn’t particularly like being the center of attention, especially after Noah had equated his dumb luck with igniting the beast on fire to an act on par with heroes in the ancient epics of the land.
“Good point, come to think of it. The general is hardly particularly cheery, is he? I mean, in all the years I’ve been with ‘im, I’ve hardly ever seen him crack a smile at all! It’s downright eerie, if you ask me. I’ve heard rumors, mostly from Noah that is, that he’s actually the son of a king of a icy land beyond the Northern Reaches, †Icarus spoke, rapidly wandering off on the tangents he was known for. Before his mind was polluted with even more gossip and conspiracy rumors than he had already overheard in Shiloh’s marketplace, Leo walked past the Pidgeotto and into the hallway outside their section of the barracks.
“Hoy! Wait up, Leo!†his former client huffed as he broke away from his fantastic story and slowed to a light hover beside Leo. The Charmeleon looked around as the hallway suddenly opened up into a much wider lobby area. Bulletin boards, similar to the ones he had spied by the dilapidated Post Office in Loyalty, but much less degenerated, lined the walls as crowds of Pokémon eyed the updates eagerly. Noah and Kelly had quickly clued him in on the basics of the purpose the boards served and just why they attracted such a large crowd from the dirt-poor troops. Some of the jobs they listed had almost seemed fun from the few he had Kelly read off to him.
He had only experience with two types of jobs that a rescue team could do: rescue missions and item retrievals, both of which ended in relative failure. Apparently there were much more that could be offered if he knew where to look. While it was true that a good portion of his spirit to explore a mystery dungeon had been crushed out of him with Nexus’s steel-spiked claws, Leo still wanted to see the positive aspects that nearly every Pokémon he met inside the fort clamored about.
The Charmeleon had briefly wondered what it would be like to escort a client to some secret rendezvous or other exotic location, or as his mind streamed through the possibilities, hunting down a group of Kingdom outlaws in the dark depths of a dungeon or even doing an espionage mission into hostile Colonial territory like some of the high profile teams often did. Team Emerald was one such team that made the dangerous trip almost daily, and his spirits rose after Blade the Grovyle had personally praised him for his actions against Ira, the famed “Witch of the Canyon,â€.
“Leo! Ya still there?†Icarus squawked, waving his tan-colored wings in front of Leo’s face to shake him out of his thoughts.
“Yeah, I’m here. What’s up?†Leo asked offhandedly as he tried to scope out any jobs that seemed interesting. However, he failed to do so as the strange runes they were written in were beyond his comprehension.
I was able to read them back in Loyalty. Do they simply write differently here? Leo asked himself, puzzled at the strange shift in writing style he had observed.
“Well, I’ve been askin’ you what you’re planning on doing today. Remember, you’re back on duty at noon,†Icarus said. Leo twisted his key about his neck, letting the golden band loop over his claws as he surveyed the sunlit lobby in an effort to find his teammates.
“I’ll be hearing into town. I need to find my team. I don’t see them here at all,†Leo mused as he began to push his way through the crowd of colorful species, quickly apologizing to the owner of each tail, wing, paw, and flipper he stepped on by mistake on his way to the wide open portcullis of the fort building.
“Alrighty then! Good luck with that, mate! As long as you’re up! Now, I’ve got some deliveries to make before the sun falls back down behind the horizon. I’ll be seeing ya!†Icarus quickly blurted as he swiftly flapped his wide wings and launched himself into the sky. He circled around to another part of the Kingdom outpost in order to presumably pick up the cargo he needed to deliver. While somewhat saddened by the sudden departure of the Pidgeotto, Leo couldn’t help but be glad that he was finally among his own thoughts once again.
His feet seemed to automatically walk the earthen streets of the farming city as he continued to drink in the sights. Two days of mostly aimless wandering with Noah and Kelly around Shiloh hadn’t been the most effective way to get a handle on how to navigate the simple streets, but he still found it worthwhile to take in the intense homeliness of the town. This sort of thing was a sight he was certain he had never seen before, even when he still had his memories of what and who he had been before.
He meandered down the roads, passing by house and shops, all bustling with some sort of activity, be it at the General Store run by a golden sword with silken arms of some sort or at the small forge where he saw the blast furnaces attended by a snail made of boiling magma. A strange thought occurred to him as he continued his walk of discovery. He had been one of these creatures for some time now --not a month, but nearly-- yet he found himself astounded at the civilization they had carved out for themselves. Regardless of his previous existence, he found it impressive considering he was viewing it all as a relative state of tabula rasa.
Just as he was certain to be lost in his thoughts forever, a loud voice from right behind him and a tap on his left shoulder by a claw shattered his attempt at an observation at society. His eyes widened as his body twisted around and, by instinct, held his sharpened claws at the ready to face up against the intruding stranger.
“Jumpy and quick to fight. You’re just the Pokémon I’m looking for.†The voice came from a creature he had never seen before that was nearly as tall as he was. The female Pokemon stood before him. Her arms, each ending in two very pronounced claws, were crossed across her chest. Fine black fur covered nearly every inch of her body from her feet to the pink feathers stuck behind her back and ear.
“I’d ask why you’re looking at me like a Swellow does a Wurmple, but I’ve got more pressing issues at the moment. I need a couple strong Pokémon to help me out with something, and fortunately, I found you almost immediately,†she stated, carefully walking around Leo with a critical eye. Leo quickly gulped and moved himself out of the Pokemon’s inquisitive range.
“No, no! I wasn’t–! I didn’t --! Mean to …†he stammered as her nimble form closed in the game between them, her clawed feet barely touching the ground with every light step she took.
“Save it, Charmeleon. Now, back to my point. I need a few good ‘mon to help with a small something for the General. You willing to be a nice guy help me out here?†Her voice carried a small tone that chipped away Leo’s initial will to flat out refuse the request. The dark-colored creature’s eyes seemed to gleam as if on command, making his will waiver even more.
“Wait up, what and whoever you are. I’ve still got another few hours’ worth of leave from Torrent. Why should I help you when you haven’t told me anything about this job?†Leo asked, countering the strange Pokémon. He saw her eyes widen for an instant in surprise as she immediately took a step back from him. He smiled, letting a few of his fangs show in the process. He would have to remember to thank Noah for the lessons in turning a conversation on its head when he next saw the eccentric Dewott.
“You’re friends with Noah, aren’t you? I can tell. He’s already corrupted you too, what a shame,†she said, her vaguely charming stare swiftly becoming a glare of disdain. “Regardless, I still need another pair of arms to help my crew. I’ll ask nicely once more. Please help me?†she huffed, tapping her foot against the dirt path impatiently.
“You don’t know the half of it. Anyways, who are you in the first place? If you’re under Torrent, then why have I never seen you before?†he muttered the first sentence under his breath, before he pointedly asked her the accusatory questions.
“He taught you well. Damn him. You know what questions to ask. Name’s Kinsliy, a Sneasel if you happen to be incredibly dense.†She let out a slight chuckle. “You’ve probably not seen me because officers don’t usually have to eat or train with the recruits Torrent picks up from the various prisons around the countryside,†Kinsliy stated. She nonchalantly examined the thin blood-red scarf tied about her neck and the small golden badge pinned to the corner of it. She seemed to admire the stately accessory while making sure that Leo caught a full glimpse of the distinct difference in their badges.
“It’s funny, really, that I rank higher than you all when I tend to twist the rules just as much as your Dewott friend does, but then again, I tend to not irritate Torrent.†She suddenly looked at him again, her crimson eyes transforming into a piercing gaze. “So, it seems I’ll have to convince you to come along,†Kinsliy sighed as she took a step towards Leo again. The Charmeleon looked at the street around him in hopes that there was someone willing to help him out of this predicament.
“Convince me?†he asked as a small shiver of fear shot through him as his scaled back pressed up against the clay wall of a home of some sort. The threatening Sneasel only grinned in response, which did nothing to quell the fear building up in hm.
“I’ll list them off. One: I outrank you.†She took a step closer, holding up a single claw on her hand. Leo’s breathing quickened as his avenues of escape rapidly decreased. His claws instinctively dug into the relatively soft rock of the wall, ruining its even coat of white paint.
“Second: I outrank you.†She lifted another claw and suddenly lightly pressed them into the center of his chest, right above his wildly beating heart. He didn’t know why, but he couldn’t move. His body seemed to be stuck in position even with clear and imminent danger closing in from directly in front of him.
“And third,†Kinsliy began. In a flash, her claws swung up from his chest, making him flinch as they harmlessly brushed up against his neck. When he opened his eyes, she was standing on the opposite side of the road --a great relief to him-- but she was smiling and dangling something from her outstretched claws. Something that shimmered with gold and gleamed with a bright blue crystal.
“This may be of some value to you, I think,†as she said the words, she dangled the artifact as she continued to taunt him. His claws flew to his neck just to make sure that the Sneasel wasn’t tricking him. They were met with the scale-covered flesh and not with the light cord of metal.
“Give it back! That’s mine!†Leo snarled even as he berated himself for the pathetic retorts.
“If you come this way, I’ll be glad to give it back. After you’ve helped me finish this job,†she ordered as she began walking away towards the east end of Shiloh. Leo felt like a dog on a chain as he grudgingly followed the Sneasel.
He grew more and more worried about what the details of this “job†included the closer he got to the destination. Kinsliy refused to say anything to him as the two passed through the streets. Leo ruefully saw Noah, Kelly, and Jay talking in the square and debated what he’d rather face: the humiliation of being controlled so easily or whatever Kinsliy had in store for him. He opted to keep his mouth shut as he stomped along behind the officer. For better or for worse, no words were exchanged between them the entire time, leaving Leo ample space to be consumed by his thoughts.
There were plenty of topics to choose from that were buzzing about the interior of his skull like untouchable gnats. They ranged anywhere from his uneasiness concerning how quickly their lives had returned to a sense of normalcy, to the undeniably major situation brewing amongst the peasantry of Silver, a city he had heard much about yet had never seen. He chose to think on the second of the two focused thoughts simply because he knew he wouldn’t come up with an explanation for any of the events three days ago. As his claws crushed small clods of dirt, his mind singled in on the subject of Silver City.
Most of what he knew of the fabled capital city was from the mumbled curses that came from Jay whenever the subject came up, and the lengthy descriptions from both Kelly and Noah about the gleaming spires of the Royal Palace and the massive domed structure of the Pokémon Rescue Team Federation HQ, where all teams aspired to be recognized as going above and beyond the average. These descriptions contrasted wildly with the short captions of the crowded and polluted lower sections he had been given by Blade the Grovyle as he readied his team’s gear for their mission yesterday.
They haven’t come back yet. I wonder what happened to them… he mused as he walked the path that lead out of Shiloh. His thoughts were interrupted by the magnificent view of the sea of lush green fields that tightly embraced the town. Leo barely managed to withhold the sudden desire to sprint into the midst of the field of berry and other food plants as his senses were flooded with their sweet, earthy smell. For an instant, he wanted to wish away the ever-combusting flame on his tail just so he could enjoy the simple pleasures of diving in a stack of hay or swimming without worrying about massive property damage or blinding pain, respectively. His tail seemed to flicker as a shudder passed through his spine.
“You know I don’t mean that,†Leo softly cooed as he held his tail in his claws. The often temperamental flame flared brightly in his claws, bathing them with warmth.
“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear you talking to your own tail like a crazy and say that we’ve arrived,†Kinsliy interjected. The voice caused him to quickly let the appendage drop back behind him while the Sneasel shot him a look of mock pity. As the brief humiliation dissipated, Leo was able to take in where they were. The eastern side of the town was one that was closer to the chain of mountains that defined the Borderlands, and so was directly next to one of the plentiful rivers that fed off the melting snow.
A rushing river sat below him at the bottom of a small channel in the earth, the beginnings of a mighty canyon. The clear, sparkling water gushed merrily across the deep channel and over the smooth rocks that rose up from the riverbed. Leo couldn’t explain the conflicting feelings that surged through him. His skin crawled both with the longing to scrub the layer of grime that covered his scales and with disgust as he came closer to the flowing liquid. He walked down the steep, grassy slope to the edge of the bank, watching his reflection stare up at him from the water. Leo was instantly reminded of the last reflection he saw back in the ice cave, the one that had started arguing with him. He eyed it carefully, making sure that it didn’t start moving on its own.
“Ya going to hug it or what, Charmeleon? I’ve been watching you stare at it for two minutes straight now, and I don’t think you’ve blinked once the entire time. You’ve either got some serious issues or … Nah, you’ve just got some issues. I’d offer to call Quark over here, but you’ve got a job to help out with,†she stated as she stepped into the river, shattering his reflection in a bombardment of ripples. Leo shook his head, shaking away the specks of water that had splashed up onto him.
“Just stop, Kinsliy. Now tell me, just what is it I have to do to get my key back?†Leo asked through gritted teeth, swinging his right claw down through the air to emphasize his point.
“Well, for one, get in the water. We’re going to walk upstream in the river a bit since the bank is a bit steep here. Ahead you’ll see the Greenfield Dam, or at least what is left of it. We’re on our way to – For the love of Giratina, would you get in the water already?†Kinsliy snapped as she fumed in the waist-high current.
“I’m trying! Give me a minute! I’m not quite used it it yet…†Leo exclaimed before his excuse trailed off into nothingness as black-furred weasel held his key at arms’ length and dangled it by the tip of the chain above the rushing water. “Gah! I’m going! I’m going! Just don’t drop it!†Leo screamed in alarm as he dashed into the river, clutching his tail as high as it would go before it hurt in order to keep it above the rapids.
At once he felt it, the cold. It was nothing like the abrasive chill and pure ice that had been shot at him in Blue Sun Canyon; this was fluid snow. It lapped against his scales, seeming to seep through their barrier and into his body. His muscles tensed, and his fire dimmed in his hands as if it had been stuffed into a freezer. He couldn’t move for what felt like an eternity while shivers took it upon themselves to jump all over his vulnerable form.
“Move it. There’s a lot of work to do if the dam is going to be operational before night falls,†Kinsliy shouted over the volume of the rapids as Leo carefully exercised his numbing muscles while trying to avoid taking a wrong step into the painful waters below. He tried hard to distract himself from how much it would hurt if his flame was completely submerged, if even for an instant. He was almost certain it would kill him based on other experiences with the agonizing feeling of suffocating the tongue of his life fire.
Somehow avoiding slipping on the smooth river rocks and falling against the pushing current, Leo made it to the calmer, yet deeper section of the channel. He was walking on the very tips of his claws along the rocky riverbed, the sharp protrusions beginning to hurt from all the extra weight forced on them. But it didn’t nearly as much as it would when he let his tail succumb to the water.
Leo felt miserable as he endured the trial in hopes that he could win the Sneasel’s favor somehow to reclaim his key. Aside from that, however, he saw that not too far ahead in the river was a large stone structure that spanned the wide gap between the grassy banks. Its cracked, mossed-over stone resonated with an ancient energy that alluded to an era of prosperity long passed by the old town.
“Here’s the sit-rep: we had a few bandits ambush a convoy on the bridge on the top of this thing, and the fight got pretty intense before we managed to kill them all off. You’ll see them hanging from the bridge when we get up there. This happened while you and Noah were off fighting ice sculptures in that canyon, so you wouldn’t have heard about it,†she explained as both Pokémon trudged forward against the ebb of the deep current.
Well, at least I’m cleaner now, his thoughts happily reminded him, nearly making this short journey through the rapids worth it just by itself. The grimy feeling appeared to have been washed away completely in the river of ice flowing over his scales. The sensation of being clean did nothing to alleviate the pain he felt every time the water sprayed it.
Once they reached the base of the structure, Leo realized just how massive it was as he found himself staring up at its colossal blocks of stone that towered dozens of feet above his head. True to Kinsliy’s description, the dam was in bad shape with pockmarks and cracks spread out through the wall. Gaping chunks of stone were simply missing from the main part of the barrier, thus completely negating its original purpose. But somehow there was no water gushing through the exposed faults in the structure.
Above him, Leo could barely make out the forms of Pokémon he vaguely remembered seeing in Torrent’s camp working to repair the dam. Some of them used wooden platforms and a set of hammers and chisels to force new stones into the holes, and some simply repelled down the face tied to ropes anchored to the top as they forced a cement of sort into the cracks. Leo even saw the occasional bird or flying bug creatures hovering around the construction project in the bright sunlight.
“Let’s go. Your job is going to be repairing the top. I’ll have someone take you to the top. There should be a Psychic-type around here. I know I impressed a few into this project before I found you. I’ll just have to find one.†With that, she stuck the claws on her right hand in her mouth and gave a shrill whistle that threatened to force Leo to drop his tail and cover his ears to ensure they didn’t begin bleeding.
Within an instant, Leo felt the eardrum-piercing sound fade as a different sort of sensation surrounded his body. It felt akin to the time he had been saved by the rescue badge in Spore Meadows. A flowing feeling on his skin, yet it wasn’t unbearably cold as the water had been. It felt electrifying, as if someone had concentrated the sensation of excitement and turned it into a nearly-tangible material. He couldn’t open his eyes for a second as the fluid energy seemed to wrap around his body and stretch it out into unimaginable shapes and forms, but he felt no pain whatsoever. Just as it seemed that his body couldn’t stretch any further beyond reality, it snapped back into being as his eyes shot open.
He felt a warm breeze against his wet scales as he stood on the bridge on the very top of the Greenfield Dam. Leo looked down in mild shock at the wide, flowing river and the black speck of Kinsliy swimming to one of the barges loaded with discarded stone tethered to the base of the dam. She seemed to talk with the Pokémon, an orange lobster-like creature, in charge of the floating platform before bounding off onto the shore to presumably find others to recruit. He turned around to thank the Pokémon who had arranged his passage up but found that it had disappeared before he even had a chance to see its face.
Shrugging his shoulders, Leo didn’t see any other alternative than to simply walk over to the damaged areas of the bridge. He had to wait until the devious officer returned with his key to get it back, as it was a long walk back into town from this point. Seeing this, Leo figured he might as well and try to make himself useful. The Charmeleon shook off the remaining beads of water on his scales before he bent down to pick up a fallen boulder about the size of his chest. He cast an eye to the other Pokémon sparsely scattered about the high up site, seeing them hoist away and place blocks at least twice the size of his.
She wasn’t lying when she said she needed more hands on this job… his thoughts realized after doing a quick count of the Pokémon present on the top with him. He saw, much to his surprise, only five others tackling this huge task with him. Leo let out a huff of exasperation as he swore to get even with the Sneasel somehow for this. The sun was not yet at its noon apex, meaning that he was still on leave from military work. Steam snorted from his clenched jaw as he bent his legs to lift the oddly-shaped rock into his arms.
While he accounted for the weight of the stone, he had failed to account for the major shifts to his center of mass as gravity began to pull him back at an angle. At first, he didn’t notice due to the screaming muscles in his arms, but he quickly realized what was happening when the next step on the flat bridge became slanted. Leo immediately let go of the stone as he spread out his arms wildly in an attempt to regain his balance, but to no avail. He couldn’t fight against, and the stone continued to press against his chest.
Against his will, his feet stumbled backwards, desperately hoping to regain a balance they never had. Leo’s heart froze as soon as his backpedaling feet met not stone but open air. He briefly wondered how long it would take for him to reach the river and if the impact would be enough to kill him instantly or if would it leave him in quiet agony for minutes, hours, or days before finally finishing him off. He wondered if they would bury him or not go through the trouble and simply let his body be taken by the river to the ocean depths.
He knew vaguely what death felt like, having experienced it for an instant when Nexus gutted him. But he didn’t get a chance to feel it truly, to know what it felt like as it creeped up and consumed his former vessel for life. Time appeared to slow to a crawl as his plummet became an exercise in slow motion. Leo suspected that this was the time when slides of his life would begin to appear before his eyes and he would have to answer to this world’s gods for his actions.
[b]“Not quite. It means that, yet again, I am saving you from a rather unflattering demise. Make haste and grab ahold to pull yourself out of harms’ way.â€[/b] The world instantly darkened, as if the sun had been enveloped by a massive grey cloud. Leo suddenly felt the weightlessness leave his body as gravity itself seemed to invert itself. His head and torso, once burdened with the weight of himself, now were released from their bonds of physics as Leo was able to quickly circumnavigate the boulder and continue up the side of the wall with assistance in the form of a tendril. He reached the stable top of the bridge in one piece, much more than he could say from any other experience with the ghost.
There were several indicators Leo saw that pointed to the fact that this meeting between the two would not be considered standard by any means. From his position on the bridge stopped in time, the Mismagius was, for one, not floating in a superior manner over the Charmeleon. Rather, he saw that the ghost was simply hovering on the edge of the dam almost in such a fashion that he looked like he was sitting. And even more odd was the piece of blue cloth the Mismagius had wrapped around his neck.
[b]“Come here, Leo. Sit with me. We have much to discuss.â€[/b] Leo froze for an instant as a shudder passed through him. While he was nearly used to the calm, cold voice giving him cryptic orders, never before had he heard it be so normally toned, nor be so void of subliminal messages. It was sincere, as if spoken from one friend to another. He wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but eventually his feet made their way over to the edge he had recently stumbled off and took a seat on the weathered stone.
[b]“I’m not going to mince words here, Leo. For once, I feel that it is time we have a ‘heart to heart’ conversation. There are things you must be aware of before the storm bursts. I will ask you abstain from asking questions until I am finished, elseways we will never be done here.â€[/b] The tired voice resonated from the ghost but also seemed to radiate from the world around. Leo did his best to hold his tongue as the Mismagius cast him a knowing glare followed by a slight smile that formed on the corners of his tightly closed mouth. An unknown slithering sensation moved inside his scales. Leo immediately tried to squirm away from the invisible lengths of rope wrapping about inside his body, effectively tying his muscles in place.
[b]“You are among the last, Leo. Among the dead and dying. The others I enlisted are gone --utterly eliminated from this realm. Now, it falls to you to be the catalyst that speeds this reaction along.â€[/b] This Mismagius floated up from his sitting position and hovered in front of Leo. The strange ocean blue scarf bore the insignia of a piercing crimson eye in the middle, an inverted coloration of his own eyes. But it wasn’t even the new scarf that caught Leo’s attention the most. The Ghost-type’s face seemed to have aged in the brief time that had passed since his last vivid hallucination.
“To answer the questions most assuredly burning away inside your skull, I got it from a friend of mine long ago. And to answer your second question, which I believe is rather imperative to the success of this campaign.†Leo leaned forward, intrigued rather than frightened out of his mind at the prospect of what exactly the Mismagius planned on revealing. The purple specter took a deep breath, as if he was struggling to draw air from beneath the weight of the world on his thin chest.
[b]“Let your doubts be finally settled. You were at one point a human in every sense of the word, Leo. That has of course changed now, but that much, at least, is according to my own design.â€[/b] Leo felt as if the floor had been yanked out from beneath his feet. His mind didn’t seem to register the news at first. The fact not computing with any of his recent thoughts at all. He had spent the last several days contemplating it and had given up the cause as lost. He had felt free when he willed his mind to drop the subject and simply accept that his notions of being human might be false.
And now, all of that was changed with the utterance of a dozen words. Leo swore he heard his brain audibly click as the information was finally processed. The Charmeleon placed his arm against the stone pillars lining the bridge as the mild shock radiated away. He wanted to speak, to do anything to make his voice heard to the waiting ghost, but his jaw refused to move from its half open state.
[b]“I see you are taking it well. Dwell on that while I touch on another topic that is slightly related to the previous. You were not the only human to come here in recent times. I used to have dozens under my wing, but now, by some cruel twist of the Fates, they are all dead.â€[/b] There was nothing Leo could say. First his humanity and now this grisly revelation had been forced upon him. He didn’t know what to feel. The sudden emotional attachment he felt himself and the vague masses of those just like him was overwhelming.
There were humans who had struggled and pressed their shoulders against the burden of the world and failed to withstand the pressure. He was one of them, connected by cause, flesh, and species. Yet, he was still alive while they had joined the ranks of the fortunate dead. He didn’t deserve to be here in the sun; he was no different than those who failed.
"You may be the last alive, but you are not special. You are simply the one who avoided all the cosmic misfortunes and are now here to tell the tale. Now, you are the only one who can carry on,†the Mismagius said with an air of exasperation. A sigh of defeat hissed from between his pressed lips. Leo didn’t know what to do. His mind was a mixture of confused hatred and eager realization. Leo’s thoughts seethed in his mind as he bit his tongue to keep from blurting his protests outloud.
â€So I am nothing to you, then? Why should I go along with your plans if I apparently mean so little?†The Mismagius turned his head to face him, a glare that rivaled Kinsliy’s greeted him, sending waves of discomfort across his skin.
[b]“I saved you, Leo. Without me, your worthless carcass would have been mauled by the intercrossing dimensions. I gave you a chance to live, so do not complain. My entire operation is on the verge of collapse, and all I have to work with is a few survivors, the least competent being yourself. So, please. Do not berate me for using you, as you owe me your existence,â€[/b] the ethereal Pokémon snapped before taking a drawn-out breath. Leo still stood in place, unable to move away or get any closer. When the Mismagius seemed to have finished calming down, he looked back at Leo. His bright yellow eyes shone with a softer brilliance than before.
[b]“I am sorry. That was unprofessional of me. While it is true you were saved by me, that is standard procedure with most humans who end up in Verus. The truth of the matter is that I am under an enormous amount of stress lately that correlates with the number of candidate deaths I failed to prevent. Remember this Leo: there are forces within this world who actively wish to see it reduced to ruins and would gladly slit your throat to see that goal come about.â€[/b] The Mismagius looked out over the still river and the Pokémon frozen in their moment of toil on the large dam. [b]“Your team is what I have left to work with. Everyone else is too far gone to be saved, but with my efforts here, success can still be achieved, I believe.â€[/b] He shifted his gaze to the side, and Leo could only watch in forced resignation.
[b]“You recall the deal I made with you, right? Where you follow my path in exchange for untampered dreams and life except when vital? Well, I would like to make a new deal with you, one that you can trust and have a vested interest in upholding for our mutual benefits. Does that sound appealing?â€[/b] Leo shrugged in acceptance. There wasn’t much other choice than to agree, and he had no intentions on experiencing what would happen when he conflicted with the Mismagius’s interests again.
The frozen landscape seemed to ripple like a minnow disturbing the shallows of a lake. Leo saw the river, Kinsliy’s impromptu repair crew, and the Greenfield Dam itself warp and distort as their images on the fabric of reality faded and rearranged. The vibrant colors that filled in the fields, earth, and stone around him bled away, their pigments sucked away into some unseen void. Soon, Leo’s sight had lost all semblance of color. As he looked down, he saw that even his own body was no longer a dark crimson and beige but now a series of dull greys. As the world continued to warp and transform before his eyes, the Mismagius once again continued his one-sided conversation.
[b] “Leo, you may not be special or among the ‘chosen’ few destined for greatness, but you are the person who is here. And without you, there would be very few who could take on the role.â€[/b] While he spoke, the environment finally finished its massive metamorphosis from a fields of agriculture and stone to the limitless canopy of the stars Leo had seen from time to time in the night sky during his stay here in this world. But here, it was closer --much closer. If he had the ability, Leo would have tried to reach out to the slow-spinning whirlpools of stars. Amid a cluster of far-off galaxies and fiery points of light against the blackness, the ghost that had been simultaneously the cause of nearly all of his pain and also the source of his life stood silhouetted by the dim glow of the universe.
[b]“Do you see these stars, Leo? Do you see their light? Do you see the intricate patterns and structures they form among the darkness to keep it at bay?â€[/b] Unlike last time, the binds on his body remained firmly in place. The question was most likely rhetorical. [b] “You are a star, Leo.â€[/b] The Charmeleon was puzzled over receiving an apparent compliment from the usually menacing phantom.
Before that thought could go any further, the Mismagius smirked at him knowingly, and the starry scene before him changed. The stunning picture of the universe was rapidly blotted out, the stars, galaxies, and other points of light enveloped by the encroaching void of space. Soon, all that was left in the empty pitch-black sphere was a singular pinprick of light daring to show its face. The Mismagius held one of his wispy tendrils underneath the lone star.
[b]“There you are, Leo. Alone, without allies, without friends, without a plan, and with the entire universe working to stifle you forever. No matter how brightly you burn by yourself, your heat and light will never make a difference where it counts here.“[/b] The little star seemed to shake and quiver in the inky darkness, as if it was being rammed by the tides of space to prove the point. Seeing that Leo had seen the demonstration, his self-appointed “mentor†decided to continue with his analogy.
[b]“But, if you add in the friends you have made to the picture, you form a constellation. A weak structure on its own, but able to make a stand against the world, if only for a moment.â€[/b] As he spoke, more stars appeared from the void, becoming a vague shape in the night sky. “If you add in the allies willing to protect you, you form a single galaxy, a mighty force in the heavens, yet not enough to succeed against the darkened will of the universe.†That instant, a tiny cluster of stars replaced the thin constellation. A burning ball of light against the thick, obscuring curtain.
“And now, if you add in my plan, my knowledge, and my power,†he began as he let out a small chuckle. [b]“Then your light will shine with a force to put the sun itself to shame.â€[/b] Just then, the small sphere of stars the represented him exploded in a dazzling array of light that filled the empty cosmos with a white radiance. Leo had to raise his arm to his eyes to block them from damage against the powerful beam of waves and particle energy, not even registering that his body had been freed from its paralysis.
Soon, the white light had completely overpowered the darkness, leaving the sphere produced by the Mismagius pure rather than the abyss of darkness shown a few minutes before. When his eyes had finished their adjustments, Leo found himself staring face to face with the Ghost Pokémon once more. Taking a deep breath and a gulp for courage, Leo took the preemptive move and held out his claw to his enemy.
“I accept your deal,†he stated firmly, barely managing to suppress the fear he felt in such close proximity to the supernatural being. The normally collected Pokémon seemed surprised as his eyes widened for an instant. He quickly gathered himself and returned the gesture.
[b] “Time is coming for us all. Now we have a chance to stand against the world. I promise you, Leo, the Fates have written your place among the stars. Thank you. I am truly grateful.â€[/b] The witch-like ghost nodded slightly as he clasped Leo’s open claw with his own purple appendage. After a brief moment looking into each other’s faces, longing to know what the other was thinking, their grips dropped. As the Mismagius turned to leave, he spoke one last piece of dialogue.
[b]“Try to avoid accidental suicide the rest of the day, please. That would be very much appreciated as I must keep a careful eye on other developing matters and not the shenanigans you somehow turn into life-or-death scenarios.â€[/b] Leo almost cracked a smile as the ghost disappeared. The world of white shattered and reformed back into the normally-colored reality of the dam outside Shiloh. The world began to move once more as Leo backed away from the edge as the stone that nearly killed him resumed its downward path that ended with an explosion of water far below.
Leo bent down in the rubble to dig up another rock as he sighed. This was going to be another long, needlessly complex day of hard labor. With that lovely thought, the Charmeleon shouldered the medium-sized stone and began the monotonous cycle that led between the pile of rocks on the shore back to the rubble.
As brief as it might have been, I was an actual star in the sky.
[hr][/hr]
Continued on Next Post
Kelly smiled as she carefully placed the last touches to the letter she was composing. She lay on the ground in the shade of one of the gnarled and wide everlasting oaks that surrounded Shiloh. The Jolteon used a thin stream of electricity from one of the extended claws in her forepaw to burn a small black line into the paper, finishing off the final sentence and closing passage. She decided to give the piece of paper a final look over before she sealed it in the envelope she had bought with it.
The stationery crinkled in her paws as she smoothed it out and read over the burned lines of text. As she mouthed the words she had written, her eyes ran along each line looking for imperfections. This letter was one that she spent the last two days thinking up in her head. She had painstakingly gone over each sentence and revised it and revised it some more in her mind before she got the courage to finally put them to paper. It had to be perfect, especially considering its intended recipients.
As soon as she finished, she grabbed ahold of the nondescript, beige envelope and slid the paper inside. She folded over the top flap and pressed her paw into the solid circle of wax on the front. Energy flowed from her body down into the pads on her paws as the wax was suddenly hit with the high voltage of power. The seal began to melt under the heat of the electricity, and it oozed over the top flap of the letter. Seeing this, Kelly removed her sparking paw and watched as the amorphous material began to harden once again. The message was finished and the letter ready at last.
The Jolteon’s expression turned into a scowl as her fur began to bristle with increasingly large bolts of electricity. She let out a short scream as the energy twisted upon itself and shot away from her body in a single current of lethal amperage. The letter on the ground was instantly burned into a black circle of ash with a ring of flaming grass on the fringe of the area of impact. Kelly’s breaths came in short, quick huffs as she smelled the charred remnants of the correspondence. Her body tensed as she tried to control her constricting lungs.
“I can’t do it. I can’t,†she muttered as she focused on forcing herself to take a series of deep, calming breaths. Kelly tore her gaze away from the crisp paper and smoldering plants, not wanting to remind herself of the subject that had caused her so much grief. The thick tree branches swayed in the morning breeze as sunlight danced with the shade, producing an ever-changing pattern on the earth. Kelly tried to lose her racing thoughts in the carefree actions of nature but found that it was as impossible as moving the mountain range north of Shiloh.
As much as she tried, her night terrors only grew worse with the passing of days. The Mismagius’s advice for her to rest went unheeded, but not through her lack of trying. Over the past two nights she had woken up panting hard, as if she had just run the length of the Royal Highway forwards and backwards. Or, during the long hours of the night, she would begin to scream until she woke from the vague nightmare that had decided to plague her mind that night. After that, she had simply decided to forgo sleep entirely.
It had taken rather desperate measures to ensure that she didn’t accidentally nod off during her boycott of the pile of hay and blankets she had been provided to sleep on in the barracks. She had at first tried shocking herself with increasingly large voltages each time she felt her eyelids droop, but this quickly left her feeling more drained than before. The others in the room never seemed to be affected by the terrible process that afflicted her during the dark hours. She had silently crossed the room, passing the still forms of Jay, Leo, and Noah in their hammocks and similar piles of hay. Both Jay and Noah’s exploration bags had been recovered with them from the canyon, but only the Dewott’s had held the item she wanted.
As she closed her eyes in the dazzling shade, she continued to relive the events of that long night in her mind. Her past self from two days prior slipped into Noah’s bag and stole a bell-shaped, purple and yellow berry from inside. By some grace of Raikou the Chesto Berry had survived intact from their fight in the dungeon. She took it as a positive sign and held the berry with her mouth as she stealthily walked over to her bed. Kelly wasted no time as she chomped down into the hard skin. The berry put up a fight, but her sharpened teeth would have none of that as she bit through the exterior into the dry flesh of the fruit.
Almost instantly, the barely present juice shot through her faster than any shock she had inflicted upon herself. It seemed to give each of her nerves an aura of pure energy that made her entire body vibrate. Kelly was now finally content in knowing that she would be physically incapable of closing her eyes for more than a few seconds at a time for the next several hours. The berry made her forget about the pain and the fear. And so, seeing how it was still the middle of the night, she had decided to spend her time wisely. Thus, the desire to write the letters was born.
The letter she most recently burned was only one of ten she had previously written out in a different format. She didn’t know who she wanted to send them to, but she knew that she had to write them until she got it right. It was an unconscious process that judged the paragraphs she wrote because while it always seemed to be perfect to her waking mind, something deep inside her would rise up to destroy it. Every single time it had happened, and she had driven herself to the breaking point trying to find the perfect solution in her text.
Kelly didn’t understand any of it and severely doubted that her sleep deprived brain would be able to help her anytime soon. That night had passed, and the day similarly as she found herself trying to avoid interaction with her teammates or anyone else for that matter. She spent that second day wandering aimlessly through the streets of Shiloh until she could no longer withstand staying awake. The Jolteon had found herself stumbling into an alley behind one of the shops of the main lane and curling up underneath a hollow crate. The horrifying visions still came to her, but her mind no longer had the energy to wake her until it was restored. As per usual, the duo of her parents entered to break down her spirit as she screamed at them in reply. This time, the dreams shifted, bringing in new figures from her childhood and recent past to either stare down at her in disappointment or berate her with scathing words.
In the final set of night terrors, she had even resorted to tackling and clawing the unfeeling phantoms of Leo, Jay, and Noah until they resembled nothing more than grotesque piles than Pokémon. And even then, they still did not stop in their verbal abuse, even after she had ripped their lips from their faces and sliced their throats until speaking should have been physically impossible. Her claws had been drenched crimson in their flowing blood, and her stomach felt like twisting inside out. But she didn’t relent. She had to stop the voices.
That had been yesterday. And fortunately for her, the nightmare eventually did stop but not before what felt like hours of reducing their bodies to ribbons. Kelly opened her eyes and started away from the tree. Words buzzed around her head, trying to form sentences and paragraphs for yet another letter to her nightmares, but she resisted the thoughts. She had no money left for even the cheap scraps of stationary and envelopes anymore. Her paws padded the earthy road beneath as she entered the humble farming town once more.
It’s so much like Solace Town, even down to the market. It’s like a perfect copy, her thoughts idly observed, taking a much needed break from the issues that plagued come dusk. She wondered if this was what the gods had planned for her, if she would never be able to truly escape the life she abandoned. She had changed everything she had ever done. She had left her home, traveled the roads, created a team with a stranger in a foreign city, been falsely accused of treason, and now firmly caught up in something far beyond herself. Still, she was constantly reminded of the life she previously lived.
A voice from her side greeted her. One of the citizens, a Floatzel, had said good morning. She quickly hid her disconcerting thoughts behind a gentle smile and returned the friendly greeting as she passed him by. Once he and all other Pokémon in the immediate vicinity had left, she returned to her troubled expression. Her thoughts were still confused, as if someone had rearranged the puzzle pieces inside her head. The way she currently pieced together information didn’t always make sense to her and this only made her worry more. She had always had the nightmares, ever since she left her parents’ home, but why they were increasing now and altering her brain, she didn’t know.
She briefly fancied the idea of going to Quark, but she quickly put it down as she knew he wouldn’t find anything different than he had the last two times she had visited. Even when she had relayed all her symptoms to him, he was unable to detect any mishap in her mind. In theory, she should be perfect. But that was only in theory; in reality, she was flawed. Imperfect. Damaged. And she had no idea how to fix herself.
She wanted something to think clearly. It was more than a mere want; she needed something, anything to purge the darkness from her brain if only for a few glorious, blissful minutes. Kelly hardly realized that she had walked into the middle of the market. Just before her confused and battered mind began contemplating getting her paws on another Chesto Berry to dull the pain and evil clouds of ideas, a familiar voice called out to her from in the dim fog of her despair.
“Hey! Kelly! There you are! Jay and I have been looking all over for you and Leo.†Kelly turned her head to see Noah excitedly running to meet her from the opposite side of the square. The Dewott gave her a genuine smile and a mock salute as he skidded to a stop in front of her. From farther behind, she saw Jay walking at a slower pace across the square. She couldn’t help but feel a pang of guilt as she caught sight of the crimson band tied around the Riolu’s eyes. It had been because of her that he had gotten injured. He was her oldest friend, and she couldn’t help but feel that she failed him.
“Jay and I wanted to go explore a dungeon today, so we spent most of the morning preparing our supplies. We just finished looking through the job listings, and we found one that looks pretty doable and offers a decent reward if it’s done right. However, we kinda need your help with this one, and it’d do Leo good to go on a normal job, I think,†Noah stated in one giddy breath as he eagerly took out a folded piece of brown parchment from his bag. Using his paws, he spread out the job notice so that she could see the description. Like everything else in the town, it was in footprint runes, the traditional text of the Borderlands. Fortunately, she had been educated in interpreting the various patterns and arrangements of the prints and so could easily read it.
[i]Request: “I would appreciate it if a team would find a series of specific plants and herbs that grow in the mountains, specifically in the Forlorn Stronghold mystery dungeon, to make into medicine. The plants in question are described in greater detail on the attached list.â€
Reward: 100 Silver Poké*
Client: Titinius Aegislash, Owner of the Slash and Burn General Store, Shiloh
*Reward may increase or decrease based on amount of plants recovered.[/i].
Kelly examined the request twice, getting Noah to flip to the second piece of parchment to see which plants were among the ones the shop owner wished to procure. True to his word, the mission did seem simple. Collecting plants, as tedious as it posed, didn’t seem to hide important facts as her last two attempts at completing jobs did.
“Forlorn Stronghold, one of the dungeons in the mountains, right? Why do you need me to go with you, exactly?†Kelly asked as she signaled that she was finished reading over the mission. Part of her heart started beating faster at the prospect of dungeoneering once again. She had always admired the skill and power of the rescue teams that worked for the Federation ever since she had visited their headquarters in Silver City as a child. While her troubled mind doubted that the stress of a mystery dungeon exploration would do her good, Kelly knew that she wanted to go.
“The very same. And, Jay’s been telling me that you handle yourself well inside them. I know a few of the Pokémon inside the Stronghold are a bit tough, so better safe than sorry, am I right?†Noah explained as he returned the slip of browning paper inside his satchel. “Also, have you seen Leo? We haven’t seen him anywhere in town, and we figured he’d be with you somewhere,†Noah asked distractedly while he concentrated on shifting around the various items in his bag.
“I agree. I’d love to join you both. It’s been a while since we had a well-paying job,†she said as she contemplated the second part of the Dewott’s question. After a moment, she shook her head. “I haven’t seen him since last night. He might still be sleeping. I think he wants to enjoy the last hours of not having to work,†she reasoned with a shrug. While she and Leo did spend some time talking over the last few days, she hadn’t kept track of how he spent his days. She made it a point to ask him the next time she saw him.
“Awesome! We’ll be like the legendary musketeers! Charging through the dungeon making all fear our mighty names!†Noah shouted as he struck a triumphant pose on the nearby crate of oddly shaped, blue Kelpsy Berries. The action brought a smile to her face and temporarily distracted her from the nightmares that prowled the edges of her mind.
“Are we going? I know we haven’t found Leo, but if we don’t leave now, we’re going to be ending the mission in complete darkness,†Jay calmly pointed out as his paw smoothed out some of the creases in the red Healing Band over his eyes.
“Yeah, we probably should hit the road. We’ll take Leo on the next one. He’s probably relaxing or sleeping anyways. We’ll bring him back a nice souvenir or buy him something with the reward,†Noah suggested before they went through a final inspection of their bags and badges. Kelly had long ago lost her exploration satchel she bought from Aleck the Sableye in Loyalty, but she still had her badge pinned to the worn Pecha Scarf tied around her neck.
Out of the corner of her eye, she thought she saw Leo walking past the market being lead by a black Pokémon she’d never seen before. But by the time she turned away from Noah and Jay, he was gone, as if he had never even been there in the first place. Kelly shook her head and tried to focus her thoughts on the mission ahead. If she was going to be of any use, she needed to be alert and not distracted by wayward thoughts every second.
She only needed to clear her head. She prayed to Raikou that the mountain air would refresh her. If it didn’t work, she thought as a shudder passed through her skin, Then I’ll have to find some way to make these nightly terrors cease.
[hr][/hr]
Dust of discarded knowledge blurred the air and dulled the meaningless sun. The soft wind lifted a thousand years’ worth of knowledge and culture into the smog-ridden clouds to tarnish the silver spires of the insolent. A strangled gust of air kicked up a flurry of ashen remains into the empty streets. No souls were present to witness the aftermath of the chaos.
The grey light drifted solemnly down from its position in the heavens, unwilling to bathe the corrupt world in the blessings of Elysium. The gods turned their heads away from the city of pagans in disgust, content to let it fall victim to the eventual calamity of a molten deluge. Only the soldiers, armed with royal insignia and equipment bag, remained to patrol the abandoned streets. The capital had died in the fire, and there was little hope that a phoenix would rise from this desolate pyre.
It may have been three days after the first spark, but the fires still smoldered in the depths of the city and in the oppressed souls under the crown. Smoke mixed with the putrid air to produce an all-consuming fog that only reinforced the martial lockdown by being potent enough to reduce the strongest citizen to a vomiting shell of their former self. Through the poison, the police, and the scrambling efforts of the under-equipped fire teams as they struggled to suffocate the blazes, two Pokémon remained in the ruined sanctuary where the malicious flame was birthed.
One was wrapped about in a filthy brown robe. The tattered edges brushed against the smooth river stones of the floor, attracting more ash into them as they turned a dark grey color. He was kneeling on the ground, his unhooded head giving his identity away to any Pokémon who risked their life on the streets. From his rightful position on the ash-covered stone, the robed figure muttered prayer after meaningless prayer to the charred altar of Dialga. His words, strained with raw emotion, fell on the ears of a deaf god, a god who had abandoned the city to the fate of fire.
His paws were covered in ash from his vain attempts at piecing together the broken altar from the debris of the church. He had stooped lower than the lowest of peasants, yet his immense remorse forced him down even further. His cracked lips continued to faithfully pull out prayer and verse, as if searching for the correct combination that would restore his city to favor in the eyes of the Lord of Time. He lifted a small bronze statue from the ash with his trembling paws, and he beheld the dented and scorched figurine of the Dragon of Time, the Dragon that his family had dedicated the city to --the city bathing in its own ashes, the Dragon his father had bound him to, the same Dragon whom he had sworn his own son to.
Behind a singed slab of hewn stone, the second Pok̩mon heard the first let out a choked cry and break down into a sobbing wreck on the blackened stone steps. His insect head darted out from his cover for an instant to be certain of what his ears perceived. As usual, his senses had proved him right. The king Рthe mighty ruler of the Kingdom Рwas reduced to a crying mess in the middle of a torched church.
Despite the fact that he knew the development was a good sign for the plans of his superiors, he was not smiling. Rather, he slumped against the stone and crossed his scythes across his carapace. He tried to will himself to focus on positive thoughts, but the incessant tears of the tyrant refused him the pleasure of a clear consciousness. Thoughts flew in his head like the swirling flakes of burnt paper that fell on the whole city: chaotically and stirred up with the slightest agitation. He wanted nothing more than to be content with the jobs he had completed for his cause, but the sinking feeling of doubt remained.
The organic metal in his blades scraped on the stone wall as he shifted to a more comfortable position. There was nothing rational about these thoughts, that he was certain. He had seen the evils of this government and knew he was right in working against it. He was working not only for the benefit of his home but also for these wretched souls, aching to be free from the chains.
But even with those convictions, it did not explain why he still felt the pangs of guilt when he had persuaded the Sableye to take the forged kill list to Gear. The rushes of emotion only got worse when he heard the Magnezone had been killed or when he been forced to take the merchant hostage. He had caused the captures and exodus of at least nine Pokémon on that same night, and his mind refused to let him forget. The Kingdom had fallen from justice, and the divine mandate its foundation acclaimed had long been retracted. So then why was he feeling this guilt for betraying it?
He took another look from his hidden position in the ruin. Nickolas, the once-absolute monarch of all the lands from the Silver Coast to the mountains of the Far Reach, had yet to gain the strength to lift his feeble form from the ashes. The thought occurred to Darney to simply dart forward and swing his blades down. The madness would be over, and the head of this corrupt demon would be severed, with the body falling soon after. All it would take was three strides --one if he used the pair of transparent wings on his back-- and it would be over. He could clean his scythe of royal blood knowing that he had done it for democracy.
But why do I hesitate? his mind pondered as it tried to comprehend why Azelf failed to bless him with the willpower to complete his directive. He could be done. He could be finished. He could be playing a part in founding a new republic from the fires of freedom, but instead, he was here. Pondering his lack of conviction in the ruins of a church among the ghettos of Silver City.
What am I doing? Why do I suddenly now challenge the status quo? Why does it choose now, when we are so close to the end?
“Because, dear Chancellor, you are choosing to think for yourself.†The bug’s eyes widened as his body instinctively snapped into action. His bladed arm shot out from its crossed position as his feet spun him around to inflict a brutal blow on the intruder.
The dust in the air was sliced cleanly in two before whipping away to the right. Darney refused to be taken by surprise at the lack of a Pokémon where he heard the voice, and he instead narrowed his eyes as he spun in a tight circle.
“While I originally intended on lesioning the brainstem of the insect who incinerated my church, I, like you, hesitated. There is more to you than a mindless servant, is there not, young Scyther?†The ashen mist and the fog of sin parted as if commanded by an unearthly force. Darney shielded his eyes as the particles blew against his face to reveal a floating structure of blue steel. A pair of eyes near the bottom of the giant bell glowed faintly red as if to show they weren’t just for decoration. Darney felt himself grow heavy as he was subjected to the immense, tired aura of the Pokémon.
“…You. Who are you?†Darney’s whispered question was drowned out by sounds of a scuffle in the street. Gazing down from his hiding place, Darney picked out a small Pokémon being dragged away by one of the rock-based guards stationed here. An unbreathing false tree held the wayward citizen tightly in its branch-like hands until it went completely limp in its grip.
“I am one who is supposed to care for those currently lost in this fog of deceit,†the creature said inside his head as they both watched the soldier disappear under the dark grey curtain of falling ash with his prisoner.
“I have nothing against you, Father. I had to do it. It had to be here,†Darney muttered, casting his gaze away from the unwavering glare of the Dialgan priest.
“Was it really you? Did you want this? Because if you do, I will not stop you. Go ahead. End me. End the weeping king. End us both and continue on with your day. If that is what you want.†Darney’s breath caught in his throat. His scythes were held at the ready, inches away from the priest’s floating form, but they never moved any closer.
“Do you not see the suffering on the streets? Are you content to let the masses burn in this hell that tyrant inflicted upon them?†he hissed vehemently, nearly spitting as he shook a blade in the direction of the unaware, kneeling Lucario. The Bronzong did not answer right away, but he merely turned away to look at the empty cobblestone road and the forlorn buildings across the street. Darney swore he heard a defeated sigh emanate from the metal Pokémon.
“Tell me, Montag, can you burn your problems away?â€
“T-that’s not my name,†Darney stammered as cold words struck at his mind. Their infused sadness sought to cripple his resolve.
“Can you burn them away? Like pages of a book? Like evidence of a crime?â€
“Shut up. I-I’m not listening to you anymore. I know what’s right and what’s wrong. I know,†he stated, not even caring that the Lucario he had been observing suddenly got up from the floor and exited the ruins, cloak drawn high over his head.
“It’s so rare to see a someone think for themselves, even if it is for a single moment. Too often they are so caught up in seeing that they grow blind…†The Scyther squeezed his eyes shut as he leaned back against the weakened wall. A momentary flash of clarity shot before his vision. What this devilry was, Darney did not know. He only knew that something huge --a fierce storm, perhaps-- had descended upon his mind and heart. All because he had hesitated. Because he waited a moment too long to act and let a seed of doubt take root in his head.
What happened? What changed? Why do I now feel as if there’s a choice to be made? There isn’t! There’s only one path! A singular path… His thoughts buzzed around in his skull like a swarm of Beedrill, yet no matter how loud they yelled, nothing was able to give him a definable answer.
“The decision you make, Montag, is yours alone. Just remember that Pokémon like you, who dare to question, who dare to reason, who dare to challenge, are feared and hated throughout our world. Throughout Verus.†And with that, Darney was alone. The odd priest had vanished before his eyes, dematerializing in a flash of psychic energy. The Scyther drew in a breath of polluted air as he let his tensed muscles relax and the words of the Bronzong attack his conscience.
“Can there be? A real choice? … No. There is only one path --a singular path… Ahead of me… A singular path,†Darney whispered as the heavy ash rained on his carapace. The remaining curls of smoke wrapping themselves about his body before taking his conflicted emotions to the clouded skies. He let his scythes hang by his sides, both hitting the floor with a sharp, metallic clangs as he closed his eyes to the choking cries of the smoldering, silver-lined city.
[hr][/hr]
“Your orders were clear, were they not? At the first trace, they are to be destroyed. Be silent, be swift, and be secretive. We don’t want a mess on our hands here. Not like last time.â€
[hr][/hr]
Leo felt as if his muscles were trying to pull themselves from his skin. Each movement he made caused a bolt of pain to shoot from every section of his body. The sun was nearly gone from the horizon, and the streets of Shiloh were only occupied by a few Pokémon returning from their daily missions or the lush fields outside of town. He barely managed to give a nod or wave to each team and citizen as they passed. Despite being in as much pain as he was, Leo found that he didn’t care as he kept a tight hold of his key.
The dam was fully functional once again. It had taken an impossible effort by all involved, but under Kinsliy’s near-tyrannical oversight, water now flowed smoothly through the stone spillways underneath the bridge. After every inch of the structure was brought up to her expectations, she reluctantly returned his artifact to him. Immediately afterwards, she proceeded to go to the rest of the Pokémon crew and returned their various pilfered belongings, ranging from exploration bags to random accessories.
Leo hoped that he never met her again. He began contemplating if he would fare better under Nexus’s treatment when his thoughts were interrupted by a sharp whizzing noise in the air. The weary Charmeleon looked up into the dusk sky over the northern edge of Shiloh’s commercial district. A single, small sphere of bright, orange light shot into the sky from the dark mass of the mountain range. His eyes narrowed as he tried to get a better look at the strange projectile. Its fiery arc began to descend closer and closer until it landed with a small burst of flame somewhere behind the clay buildings of the square.
As much as this development startled him, it was nothing compared to the sight that drew his eyes back up into the darkening skies. The solid shadowed silhouette of the mountains suddenly lit up like a blazing dawn as what appeared to be dozens of spheres of mystical fire flared up in the sky. The atmosphere began to shriek a wretched scream as Leo watched the orbs of light obeyed the law of gravity and followed their trajectories down to the ground.
Leo simply closed his eyes as the street was engulfed in a sea of fire.
[hr][/hr]
End Chapter Sixteen
[hr][/hr]
Author’s Notes: I regret nothing. I am pleased with this chapter.
I partly blame NaNoWriMo for the incredible word count of this thing (roughly 22,300 words), but I feel that most of it is meaningful. I wanted this chapter to feel calm and take a break from the action to let my characters and the story itself rest and develop.
This chapter is the last one before the end of Part One of this story. I want the next chapter to live up to the expectations I have for it, so I’m honestly not sure when it will be posted. All I know is that I wish for it to be up before the end of 2013. Prepare for plot, prepare for enemies, prepare for everything that has a chance of going wrong. Murphy’s Law is in full effect.
Kinsliy the Sneasel is owned by ChaosCaptain, who was kind enough to let me use her to push Leo around this chapter.
Once again, I have to give a sincere thanks to everyone who helped me out with this chapter. (You all know perfectly well who you are, you awesome people)
Knightfall signing off…
Part ONE!!! D: :o.ol: (this is going to be a long story)
Cliffhangers again 
Good writing! 
Heh, long in the aspect that it’s going to take a while to finish, yes. :D
Well, I’m kinda sorry for this one, but I do need to set up for the next chapter. :/
Thank you very much. Your comments always brighten my day.
Knightfall signing off…
Warning: This chapter contains some violent scenes. More so than previous chapters.
Chapter 17: Disarray
[hr][/hr]
[i]“You ask why we fight. Why we revolted that day. It is simple, Nickolas. We fight because of you. Too long has your Kingdom stood over us. It is our time to break away. Long ago, your ancestors marched into our cities to burn them to the ground. In turn, I sincerely hope I will get the pleasure of removing your crown from your bloodied brow in the burning streets of Silver…
That is, however, if your capital isn’t razed by your own citizens first.â€[/i]
—Segment of correspondence between King Nickolas Lucario and General Vallin of the Colonies
[hr][/hr]
And so the world ended.
[hr][/hr]
“The Fates are wrong. Their immense omniscience leaves them blind to the true evil. The eyes of my allies that watched its intricate workings were gouged and blinded. Threads of Fate, heavily woven and not so easily undone, bind this world to their rules. Dissenters meet their end against an unforgiving tide of spacetime, their souls crushed by Erebus’s gaping maw. And now this day blooms with the blazing brilliance of a new dawn, yet is stifled underneath the molten ash of peace. In these days of etrophy, the heroes of the ancients lay forgotten under the growing weight of the centuries. It is now only us who continues to stand.â€
An abyss sprawled beneath the specter. Tendrils of pulsing black reached up towards the Mismagius as he spat his words at the clawing void. His piercing crimson eyes were the only points of light in the dark realm. His cold, clear voice rocked the silent world, beating down the darkness with his words alone. His pursed lips curled into a cruel smile as he felt the abyss tremble.
[b]“How fitting that it comes down to us, old friend. In the end it does not matter who we are. We are simply mortal souls fighting against unfavorable odds. We are parallel, yet convergent. We are those who carry on the torch of freedom. And we cannot fall while on the job. Your mind may be lost to this abyss, but you are still alive. Wake up, Ian.â€[/b]
Light splintered the darkness. In a spontaneous genesis of life, air forced its way through his scared throat and damaged lungs. Everything had feeling again. Cold tile floor pressed against his back, a dull ache throbbed throughout his body, and the light blinded his weakened eyes. Death had relinquished its grip on him, but it had only grudgingly done so. The cloaked spector stood off to the side, withered hand gripped around its scythe, waiting for its chance to return and finish the job.
The remainder of the gas was involuntarily expelled from his lungs via a brutal coughing fit as the toxicity of his body decreased. His withered form twisted on the ground in spasms of reactivating muscles.
“Oh! You’re awake! Umbreon, come quickly! Ian’s awake!†An upbeat, female voice shot through Ian’s eardrums like a thorn of rough iron. He drew his claws over his ears and tried to block out the sudden eruption of noise that threatened to overwhelm him. Despite his aversion to the voice, bits and pieces of his fractured thoughts responded to it as if they recalled it from the foggy depths before the labyrinth.
“Coming! I’m coming! Take care of him for a minute, please!†The opposite of the previous voice spoke as its deeper tones and distinct sternness stuck another string of the insane tangle of his memories. The Breloom’s eyes blinked open as he saw a face covered in fine coat of pink fur peering over him. When he saw her wide, purple eyes, his thinking untangled for a single moment while memories of his past life welled up to the present.
“Espe—!†he gasped. He tried to raise his head towards her, but was met with a stinging cramp in his chest which held him to the floor. Espeon gave him a brief smile as she placed a small, blue-colored berry in his claw. Ian glanced down at the fruit she had given him and couldn’t help the tears that welled in his eyes. He couldn’t remember the last time he had seen a piece of food so unspoiled. His sojourn in the darkness left him only the rotten and dried out waste he scavenged from the compost piles beneath the atriums.
“Ian, you have no idea how happy we are to see you’re alive. We were told you and Team Frontier were killed exploring Zero Isle!†the Psychic-type explained as she helped Ian raise the Oran Berry to his mouth. His jaw shook with a combination of sheer joy and crippling hunger. He bit into the soft skin of the berry and let the sharp, refreshing juice slide down his burned throat. The stinging sensation it brought was welcomed by the Breloom as it repaired the damaged tissue on its way into his system. With the pain came realization: Her.
“N-no! No! Still alive … Sh- … Still Alive … !†Ian wheezed as he clutched at his burning throat. His eyes blearily took in the surroundings. Stone. Never-ending, cold, stone. As the cruel realization that he was still underground came upon him, Ian choked on another fit of sobbing.
“Ian! What’s wrong? What’s going on? Umbreon! Hurry up! Something’s wrong with Ian!†Espeon yelled as the memories and emotions from the last few hours to the previous year fell upon him like a crumbling tower of sorrow. Simultaneously, he recalled brutally snapping Vertex’s neck in the midst of a psychotic episode and seeing the limp form of Sophie as her body was taken away by the cruel, mocking faces above.
“Why do I live?!†Ian cried as his body began to shudder under the weight of his transgressions.
“Calm down, Ian. You’re safe here. Everyone is safe her-†Espeon’s comforting dialogue was quickly cut off as Ian only let out another agonized wail at the top of his damaged lungs.
“WHY DO I LIVE?! WHY?!†As he screamed, he curled his body up into a fetal position at Espeon’s feet and continued to mutter the same two questions over and over again. His claws gripped at the sides of his emaciated face as he begged for the bystanding specter of Death to take him away at long last. Yet it never came.
Not in compassion, but in wrath, my angel fled today. The Reaper saw me dying on this grey path, but allowed my soul to stay.
[hr][/hr]
Sunlight rained down upon the rolling green hills and valleys surrounding Shiloh. The verdant slopes burst forth with the colors and scents of the height of summer. Far above the bountiful fields of the country town, the sun bathed the land in its gentle glow as it rose from the blue horizon. Farms and empty grasslands eventually gave way to lush forested foothills at the base of the mountain range.
Team Salient had been lucky with the hike up to the Forsaken Capital mystery dungeon. The relatively easy path from Shiloh to the edge of the mountains had only gotten easier once they were under the sun-speckled canopy of the old forest. After an hour or so steadily climbing further up the trail, they were fortunate enough to find a small brook of clear water and several bushes of untouched blueberries just as the pangs of hunger were beginning to set upon them.
Their mid-morning rest was short but exactly what their legs needed to recharge so they could take on the remainder of the upcoming path and dungeon. They had eaten their fills of the delicious fruits, and both Jay and Kelly had to take turns washing blue juice stains out of their fur. Kelly beamed when she saw Jay genuinely smiling among the sun-dappled glade. It had been the first time since before Blue Sun Canyon she had seen him that way. Unfortunately, an uninvited pair of eyes stalked their meal, taking careful note of their location and numbers. Unbeknownst to them, it was not alone. It had found its target, and now it would wait until the opportune moment to claim its prize.
After they had washed away their stains and weariness, it had only taken a few minutes more along the trail until they reached the entrance of the dungeon described on their job. Among the giant, moss-covered oaks and babbling brooks were massive pillars of what appeared to be white marble. Noah told his companions that legends long said that these were the only ruins left of the humans that had lived in the area eons ago. The Dewott assured them he had seen true human ruins near his home town and had quickly invalidated the structure of the white rock slabs as work of human hands.
“Too fancy for ‘em. Humans don’t make ornate stuff like that,†he replied to Kelly after she had questioned his knowledge on the subject.
The environment was so tranquil that the three Pokémon traveling along the forest trail nearly failed to notice where the path dropped down into a wall of shimmering air. The Dewott in front shook his head to clear himself of the intoxicating scents. Noah held out his hand to signal the two others behind to halt. Following him, Kelly and the blindfolded Jay obeyed, the Riolu using Kelly’s shoulder as a guide. Noah held up a scrap of browned parchment paper as he inspected the barrier, muttering words under his breath as he did so.
Their group quickly walked through the translucent wall of twisted air one after the other with Noah leading. Fortunately, this dungeon was nowhere near as anomalous as the last few Kelly had been in. This forest seemed to have a calm disposition, unlike the violent trees in the forest dungeon outside Loyalty Square. The outside of the dimensional distortion was nearly identical to the interior: the temperature remained pleasantly warm, the terrain was still a gently sloping forest dotted with ruined stone structures, and the sunlight still barely penetrated the leafy canopy of the trees above, leaving odd spots of light on the gently worn path. If they hadn’t been paying attention to the barrier, she wouldn’t have known she was in a dungeon.
Kelly tried to remain focused on finding the species of plants for their client, but what Noah had said earlier kept at the front of her mind. As her paws padded along the dirt path and over the gnarled roots of ancient trees, the Jolteon looked over at the Dewott foraging in a brush in search of the herbs they needed. She realized then that she knew next to nothing about him, despite the fact that he had traveled and trained with the team for nearly two weeks. He had craftily gotten them to tell him bits and pieces of their stories in Torrent’s camp, but he expertly dodged their questions regarding his story at every turn.
“Noah? Can I ask you something?†she spoke up, her voice breaking a bit in nervousness. The Dewott dug his head out of the lush bush at the sound of his name and turned towards her. In his gently cupped hands he held a dozen or so leaves, which he took to her for inspection. Kelly gazed at the pile of rounded green leaves he held under her nose. They smelled fresh like pine trees.
“Sage, I think. They’re really green now, so we should gather a bunch of it while we can. And what’d you want to ask me, Kelly? I’m ready to divine your answers as ‘Noah the Psychic,’†he answered with a smile. He carefully slipped the leaves into the flat pouches on the inside of his satchel. Kelly shifted uncomfortably on her feet, causing Jay to nearly lose his balance beside her.
“I’m not sure how to phrase this, but … I wanted to ask you about … you. I mean, you’ve trained with us, you’ve traveled with us, you even helped save our lives in that canyon. Yet, I know nothing about you. I even know more about Leo than I do you, and he doesn’t have a past to remember at the moment.†Noah’s smile immediately fell like a rock dropping from the sky. The blue otter silently turned away from her and focused his attention on carefully harvesting more leaves from the sage bush.
“Hey! She asked you a question, Noah! Give us a straight answer,†Jay barked as he adjusted the crimson band around his eyes. Kelly felt the Riolu’s paw grab onto her fur while she ran forward to the unresponsive Pokémon. Noah gave a small snort of agitation as he abruptly turned ninety degrees and walked further down the winding forest trail.
“Noah! Come on! Give us an answer! If you’re going to stay with us, we should all know each others’ stories, right? Teamwork and cooperation, right? What happened to that, huh?!†Kelly shouted as she dashed after the Dewott, Jay stumbling along blindly behind her tripping over the intruding roots with a curse on his lips for every time his paws slammed on the wooden obstacles.
“There’s nothing to tell you. What I was before is, unfortunately, none of your business. Leave me to my own devices please, and I promise not to interfere with yours. How’s that sound, hmm?†Noah snapped as he gave a brief glance behind his shoulder at her. The Dewott shouldered his bag and roughly snatched a small head of purple flowers from a lavender bush hanging over the side of the path. Kelly watched as he crudely stuffed the fragile flowers into his satchel.
Kelly wasn’t sure whether to be furious or hurt by the brash statement. Rarely in the time that they all had known Noah did he demonstrate any signs of this distant and cold attitude. Any trace of his laughter was gone from his voice. Out of all the emotions she felt, only anger managed to take control.
“What’s gotten into you? You were fine a few minutes ago!†Kelly snapped. Sparks jumped in between the charged spikes of her golden fur as she continued to fume. “If you can’t trust us, then why are you still here?â€
Noah turned around and drew one of the razor shells that rested on his hips. “Then maybe I shouldn’t stay with you lot! If you can’t give my past a damn rest then maybe I should just go!†Noah shouted back as their increasingly heated argument echoed throughout the wooded dungeon. Kelly was beyond irate. The troubling thoughts that plagued her head were agitated to painful levels with the Dewott’s sudden aggressive turn. Amid the shadowed trees, the silent lurker watched and listened to their debate intently. The lurker smiled as their shouts attracted the local populace. Noah suddenly paused, his face freezing with his mouth open.
“Jay, Kelly. Don’t even think about moving. Otherwise it will kill us all. Do not move. Do not talk. Do not breathe. Just pray. And stand still.†Noah said in a hurried whisper as Kelly instantly stiffened up. Jay’s paw flew to her back as he stilled as well. The Jolteon didn’t dare look behind her at whatever monster Noah had found.
She felt its presence. There was something there for sure. Whatever it was, it didn’t breathe like the usual, murderous monster would. She only heard the slight internal humming and the clicking of mandibles.
“Listen to me very carefully. When I say ‘go,’ you both are going to turn around and hit that thing with whatever you have. Lighting and … fists. Alright? After that … Just stay alive and do not breathe in the spores,†Noah whispered again, almost mouthing the words in near silence. Several tense seconds passed before the Dewott began to inch his way forward. He held one paw to his mouth to keep silent while his other slowly raised a scallop razor.
Kelly put aside her feelings of animosity as she concentrated on circulating electricity through her fur. She felt Jay lift his paw from her fur. Her body shuddered in fear. Kelly took a deep breath and tried to to think of how she would survive against the unknown foe looming behind her.
“Go!†Noah yelled as he leaped forward. Kelly spun around with a flurry of crackling energy and let loose a bolt of thunder at the approaching enemy.
[hr][/hr]
“Impact! We have impact! Brace yourselves!†Torrent’s gravelly voice boomed throughout the streets as the ground shook with the detonations. Leo was thrown to the heaving street as fire erupted from the rooftops. Around him, clay walls of houses were blasted apart relentlessly.
Leo felt his legs turn to jelly before they were knocked out from beneath him by the crashing wave. He fought the urge to vomit. His body twisted in mid-air before landing spread-eagled on the cobblestone pavement. The world spun violently in circles as Leo lifted his aching head from the street. He felt the stone scraping away some of the scales before a sickening feeling rose from his bruised stomach.
Wood splintered and heat pulsed through the shattered houses as Pokémon ran about trying to put out the fierce fires that had sprung up from seemingly nowhere. Dazed, Leo got to his feet as he blinked away the head trauma. The Charmeleon ducked down behind the fallen roof of a villa just before a beam of electricity blasted over his head. Peaking around the rubble, he saw the advancing forms of Pokémon that seemed entirely separate from the scurrying civilians.
The attackers were doing their best to make Shiloh their own rendition of hell. Blasts of water from the impromptu fire squads sizzled against the flames that fed on the dry wood of the houses. Leo saw them, all sorts of them. They were different from the Kingdom soldiers in the scarce equipment and worn armor that they had strapped over their bodies.
Wind whipped through the street as attacks whizzed through the air, scarring the embattled town further. Flames ate away at the store fronts as the Colonists drove through the scattering crowd, clashing with anyone who got close enough to them. Leo breathed heavily as he clutched the mound of rubble, praying that none of the rebels would find him. Jets of water were blasted into harmless steam by opposing Flamethrower attacks coming from the dogs of war.
Just when he saw an opening in the chaos to rush behind to the safety of Torrent’s fort, he found himself face-to-face with a four-legged reptile with a flower bud growing on its back. Leo balked at the strange plant-creature. He had seen many strange Pokémon in his short time in this world, but this one took the cake for the weirdest. And unfortunately, it seemed to notice that Leo looked out of place in the realm of the living.
“Tryin’ to hide from me, soldier?†the plant sneered. A vine short forth from the closed pink flower and wrapped around Leo’s unsuspecting throat. Immediately, vine retracted, dragging Leo out into the street as he sputtered and clawed against the twisting tendril. The Ivysaur let loose another vine that snaked around him, trying to bind his flailing arms together.
“N-No! Let go!†Leo yelled as his arms evaded the second vine. In his desperation, the flame on his tail flared brightly as he clawed at the vine coiling around his throat. His head grew dizzy with the lack of air. Losing his rationality, he lunged forward, towards the Colonist Grass-type, and bit down on the base of the vine. By some force, he felt his mouth heat up, and he bit down harder on the strangling plant. The Ivysaur screamed in agony as he dragged Leo against the stone. His rage towards the attacking Pokémon only ignited further as he felt his scales break and his blood smear against the rough rock of the street.
His half-lidded eyes opened wide as fire burst forth him his fangs, scorching the vine in two. Leo tumbled backwards, cringing as his shins and arms scraped against the stone, but he was free. He looked up at the enemy Pokémon. The Ivysaur was shouting curses Leo did not understand and his smoking and severed vine danced about in the air. Something snapped inside of Leo’s head. He had been abused and forced to follow the will of others for too long.
The ground rumbled beneath him as a beam of energy shot through a line of houses, leaving them a smoldering wreck of ash. Shiloh’s civilization was slowly being reduced to molten slag before his eyes. Snorting a jet of smoke from his nose, Leo shook off the limp vines around his throat. His eyes flashed with fury as he lunged at the distracted plant-animal.
“Get off, damn lizard! I’ll snap your neck! Snap it clean off!†The Ivysaur screamed as Leo landed on top of its flower bud. Any vine that sprouted from it was quickly slashed into pieces by his glowing claws. His mind was a haze of hate and fire as his sharpened claws tore into the leafy exterior and shredded the pink flower. The Ivysaur kicked and threw itself against the ground and buildings as it shouted in agony. Leo ignored its screams and focused on the goal of ripping the life from the frothing and cursing Colonist beneath him.
Everything else around the two battling Pokémon was lost in a fog of debris and shouts as a war raged. Yet, the Ivysaur’s fiery, red eyes burned as their owner slammed Leo into a wall. Undeterred, the Charmeleon retaliated by digging his clawed feet into the Ivysaur soldier’s underside, leaving deep gashes along the blueish flesh.
The Ivysaur screamed before he collapsed, “You… And your family will drown in a storm! Drown in it!â€
Leo grinned as he slashed his claws down into the fleshy bud, stripping it of its layers swing by swing. Plant juice splattered on his claws with each pass as the enemy soldier beneath him passed into unconsciousness Leo didn’t care. He screamed as he dug his hands into the center of the bud and clawed deeply, trying to rip it out. His mind gleefully urged him forwards, forcing his claws to pierce the plant flesh and tug hard.
The Ivysaur was unmoving, its eyes closed as Leo ripped out a large chunk of the plant that lived inside it. Even though he had effectively killed it, Leo was still unsatisfied. Disregarding the attacks shooting around his head from the Colonists fighting around him, Leo let his body exact revenge. He opened his jaws wide and breathed a jet of instinctual fire onto the Ivysaur’s carass.
Flames licked the dying plant flesh as they quickly consumed the fallen soldier in an impromptu pyre. Leo stepped off his defeated foe as he turned around and walked down the street, leaving the burning corpse behind as if it were nothing. His confidence rose to deathly insane levels as he calmly ducked and sprinted past shooting jets of fire, water, and ice. Shiloh was in flames around him, yet he felt more alive than the leaping tongues of fire. As the plant blood dripped from his claws, Leo for once felt that he was in charge. He would forge his own destiny, and he would stop anyone who got in his way.
“Get down, fool boy!†Blinking stupidly as his daydreams of torching his enemies faded, he felt a large hand grab his neck and force him to the ground. From the street, Leo saw the huge, blue reptile let go of him. Torrent lowered his head and crossed his arms defensively as a wave of water blasted into him, where Leo had been walking just a moment before.
Water cascaded off the Feraligatr’s blue scales and landed on Leo’s tail and back, causing him to groan in pain as his tail flame hissed. Above him, Torrent came out of his defensive pose.
“You pansies think that’s powerful? Let me show you rebels what an old Kingdom soldier can do!†Torrent screamed as he drew his head back and a blast of water stronger than anything Leo had ever seen erupted from his massive jaws. He couldn’t see who was on the receiving end of the pressured jet, but the distinct crack of bone and high pitched screams was proof enough that it had been effective. Torrent closed his mouth, extinguishing the stream of water, as the general ducked down to avoid a beam made of fire, ice, and electricity.
“I never thought you were a fighter, Charmeleon,†Torrent observed as he helped Leo to his feet amid a small lull in the fighting. “Until I saw you maul that rebel back there. Now THAT is the kind of action we need from you! Good job, boy!†Torrent exclaimed with a pat on the shoulder that nearly sent Leo back to the ground.
“T-thank you, sir,†Leo stuttered. He never got a reply. He and the Feraligatr immediately ducked behind a makeshift barricade of broken wood and bricks from the ruined, burning fortress.
Now behind friendly lines, Leo could see the true extent of the damage. Pokémon he had trained with yet barely knew rushed about like ants on a damaged anthill. The humble fort that had been his home for the last days was a flaming furnace, its wood fueling the raging fires within as a grandiose smoke pillar drifted up into the endless void of the night sky.
On the ground were Pokémon, some groaning in pain from burns or wounds and others laying deathly still with eyes shut as if in tranquil slumber. A shudder passed through Leo’s spine at the gruesome sight. He had been told to expect it by Torrent during training, but he had thought that it would be on the battlefield, not in a town. His thoughts were interrupted by a brief fluttering of wings from the sky above as the battle seemed to reignite. The mess of feathers and talons staggered on the ground as it gasped for breath.
“General Torrent! Colonial patrols have been sighted in the foothills in the east! It’s not a large army, sir! This looks like a strike team!†Leo needed no further evidence to confirm that the wounded bird was the Pidgeotto, Icarus. The accident-prone Pokémon breathed heavily as he brought a battered wing up in a sloppy salute.
“Thank you, Icarus … They didn’t come to take the town … They wanted to get in and out under the cover of night… They’re searching for something…†the general grumbled as he shuffled through the fallen debris and shattered boxes as he looked for intact supplies. Leo slowly walked beside the fatigued Icarus as they watched Torrent let out an exasperated sigh.
“Alrigh’! Everyone, listen up! They’re getting ready for another attack! Gertila, you and whoever is still breathing over there, I want you all to hold your position. Meanwhile I’ll —†His barked orders were cut off by an explosion that tore through three houses and sent a hurricane of clay shrapnel raining into the small squad of Pokémon on the far side of the barricade.
“Damn it! Quark, see if they’re alive! Everyone else, beat those half-breeds back to their own lands!†Torrent screamed. His deep, authoritarian voice echoed over the re-erupting battle in Shiloh. Leo shook his head and ran at a crouch until his back leaned against the flimsy wall of broken wood and clay. Only inches remained between life and being impaled by a spear of ice or some other death.
“They’ve got us surrounded! Those poor fools!†Torrent laughed heartily as he got up from behind the crude wall.
Leo watched with awe as beams of ice, bits of sharpened leaves, and blunt rocks all whizzed by the general, each attack seeming to glide just over his aqua scales. Leo coughed as he ran through clouds of smoke and dust kicked into the air by the violent attacks around him. While he ran, trying to find a way to help and fight, the Feraligatr made his presence known to the enemy, fighting alongside his subordinates.
The Charmeleon swiped his claws at a flaming fox who jumped by him, but missed his target horribly. Behind him, Torrent yelled as if Darkrai himself appeared, and Leo let the Flareon go. Whirling around, he watched as Torrent charged into the thick of the fight and hefted up a surprised Golem in his arms. The rounded boulder Pokémon struggled in the general’s massive arms shortly before the enraged Water-type threw the enemy soldier down. It slammed down on a mass of writhing blue vines that was trying to smother a Heracross. The vines from the Colonial Tangrowth immediately fell limp as their owner was killed instantly by the boulder crashing into its skull.
The Feraligatr wasted no time in dispatching the dazed Golem with a merciless blast of ice from his maw. There was a brief scream before the rock shell cracked under the bitterly cold temperature. Torrent ducked as a bolt of lightning flew over his head, forcing him to backpedal.
Leo tried to get rid of the foul smoke taste in his mouth, but it only got worse as he swung his claws against the advancing Colonists. He swiftly lashed out at them and awkwardly danced his way away from their retaliating attacks. Leo met with a blue, muscle-bound Pokemon and didn’t think before immediately slashing his glowing claws into its chest. He didn’t have a chance to retreat; the irate Machoke slammed his fist into Leo’s stomach. His eyes bulged as he felt every organ in his body shift upwards. His mouth opened involuntarily as he belched forth a cloud of acrid smoke from his lungs before falling to the ground, clutching his bruising stomach. Through the stinging pain, he heard the purple brute choke on his smoke shortly before he felt a set of claws grab his own and drag him roughly to his feet.
“Nice display there, kid. Try not to get hit next time, though!†Torrent screamed.
He twisted his head and blasted a jet of water from his jaws at a rebelling Flareon who had taken to torching what remained of the wooden fortress. The flaming fox screeched in agony as it was extinguished instantly.
“One moment, please.â€
As soon as the flaming creature was doused to a cold death, Torrent reached into the shattered lid of a crate and pulled out a fistful of tiny shriveled crimson seeds. Leo’s eyes widened in shock as Torrent crudely tossed the volatile Blast Seeds at the advancing Machoke.
Leo raised his arms up to shield himself but not before a series of explosions rocked his eardrums. He staggered as the earth shook in response to the volley of Blast Seeds. His feet faltered and tripped over the debris into one of the smoldering rooms inside the fort. Forgetting the pain in his legs and torso, Leo’s eyes widened as he saw pieces of seemed to be curved metal laying scattered on the stone floor. Their color looked as if they were charred in the fire, but they were not damaged. It only took his mind a moment to figure out what they were, and he smiled a toothy grin amid the destruction.
Armor… Leo greedily scooped them up in his claws. Once in his hands, he found that they were not pieces of metal at all, but rather strong, blackened wood. He didn’t ponder the strange set of armor for long as another explosion rattled the ground. Leo slapped the curved wooden pieces onto his arms. He pulled their leather straps and tied them awkwardly with his claws.
He looked down at himself. The blackened bracers looked recidious on his red scales, but all his mind saw was protection between him and the many, many things that wanted to kill him. His chest was still unprotected, but at least he would avoid scraping his arms again. Huffing with pride, he turned around and was immediately given an opportunity to test his newfound armor. An explosion ripped through the broken wall in front of him and Leo had just enough time to raise his arms in front of his face before they were met with a shower of flaming splinters.
The heat passed by his body without problem, and to his surprise, the speeding bits of debris tinked off the bracers on his arms. The only damage suffered was a few small cuts on his stomach. He smiled, thanking the luck gods of this world, as he jumped over the fallen wall and into the battle once more.
It only took Leo a cursory glance to see the destruction Torrent had inflicted upon the intruders. The Charmeleon felt his stomach clench as he saw the bloodied remnants of the Flareon and several other unidentifiable Colonist soldiers. Torrent inspected his gruesome handiwork with a slightly manic grin.
“Icarus! Fly as fast as you can to the Gracewind and Electros companies! They’re the closest! Tell their captains we’ve got a serious breach on our hands here!†Torrent snapped at the flustered Pidgeotto. In an instant, Icarus flapped his wings twice and took to the air once again. Leo cautiously approached the general.
Torrent’s eyes glimmered as he first glanced at the Charmeleon and then the rest of his exhausted troops. The rest of the company was taking advantage of the momentary calm in the bitter fighting caused by the explosions. Leo breathed, staying low behind the burning barricades while Torrent assessed the situation silently. He looked around for himself, and the sight had gotten worse since a few minutes before. There seemed to be more unmoving bodies laying on the ground. These fresher casualties were twisted and crumpled against the broken stone, radiating steam, smoke, and thawing ice.
The Charmeleon’s stomach flipped over, and he felt a wave of bile splash up into his mouth. He spat it out onto the cracked road before he rested his head against his knees. His chaotic thoughts wandered to Kelly, Jay, and Noah while he closed his eyes trying to hold back tears. The ground shuddered beneath him as another explosion rocked it. He mentally cursed Kinsliy for shanghaiing him into working; it was because of that damned Sneasel that he wasn’t with his team now. His teeth gnashed together as he secretly hoped that she was among the casualties.
“Listen up, you lot!†Torrent’s voice boomed over the eerie calm that had settled over Shiloh’s ruins. Leo looked up at the general. The Feraligatr stood on a pile of wreckage and addressed the few Pokémon who could still stand. Leo saw a couple familiar faces in the thin crowd: Quark the Alakazam, Ramses the Yamask cook, and a few he knew by sight alone but were mostly unknown to him. Torrent looked over his painfully few soldiers, but if there was a hint of disappointment in his face, he didn’t show it.
“They’ve made a mistake in coming here,†Torrent said with a huff and an accusing claw pointed at the Colonial soldiers just beyond the barricade. “They outnumber us, but we’re stronger. We’re damn stronger then—!†Leo was certain he was going to continue his motivational speech when a familiar voice suddenly interrupted from behind.
“It seems like you could use some help. Is that right, General Torrent?†Leo’s head twisted to see a flash of green leap from a nearby rooftop and land in the clearing in front of Torrent. It was quickly followed by a white blur and another green figure that glided down from the sky. Leo’s spirits rose as he saw the solemn figures of a Grovyle, Absol, and Flygon.
“Victini’s star! Blade, Elliot, Sonic! You boys came just in the nick of time!†Torrent yelled with a gruff laugh. “Damn, I was almost starting to get worried there, but now with you lot here, we’ll beat down these rebels before they can blink an eye!†The massive Feraligatr exclaimed as he clapped each one of the members of Team Emerald on the back. Torrent turned back to the main crowd of Kingdom troops, with a confident smirk. Leo stood up with the weirdly emotionless trio and gave them a friendly wave, silently thanking them for showing up. They didn’t return the gesture. The only reply he got back was a piercing stare from the stoic Elliot. The Absol’s crimson eyes drilled into his, making him stop his wave and fall silent. A cold feeling sank over him, yet he didn’t know why.
“Trey, you and the three behind you are to hold the center. Gned, you take Clarice and Nath and fortify the left! Leo, you’re with me and Quark on the right! And Blade … Just do what you all do best. Now!†Torrent commanded, as a collect shout rose from the battered soldiers, Leo included. To his left, Blade looked to his two teammates and nodded.
“Yes, sir,†the Grovyle calmly said as the cluster of leaves on his wrists glowed with energy. Leo blinked, and when he opened them he wished he hadn’t. Blade silently leaped into the air and in one fluid movement, he twisted in midair and sunk both sets of his blades into Torrent’s exposed back. Everything seemed to grow quiet as Blade retracted his leaves, only to repeat the process trice more in the span of a second. The Grass-type ducked around the stunned Feraligatr and jabbed his leaves into his chest, dragging them to the side, splitting bone and lung with a spray of fresh blood. Blade hopped into the air and kicked the general’s bleeding torso, sending him crashing to the ground. The quick Grovyle stepped over the fallen Torrent and raised his leaves for the kill.
“Heh. Good one,†Torrent said as he spit a wad of blood at the traitorous Groyvle’s feet. As his head fell, his massive jaws opened wide and launched a beam of bloodied ice from his maw. Blade screamed out and clutched his frozen right arm. Leo watched, shocked at the scene. The Grovyle cursed vehemently, raised his left wrist, and brought it down under Torrent’s limp jaw, slashing through his throat and deeper still in a savage cut.
“TORRENT!†screamed out from Quark as the shock wore off and reality set in. Leo blinked. And blinked again. This was no dream of his. Blade still stood panting over Torrent’s body, his leaves dripping with his blood and ice. Leo’s body went numb. All shock was quickly replaced by an anger fueled by his raging inner fire. Pain swelled in his singed limbs, but he had a mission to do. Torrent was dead, but he was damned if he was going to stand aside.
There were no thoughts that crossed his mind other than the resolute block of revenge that flooded his skull. His legs tensed as he leaped into the air. Instantly, the broad side of his shoulder slammed into Blade, sending the both him and the Grovyle staggering off Torrent’s bleeding body to the ground. Leo kicked and clawed at Blade’s skin as he screamed curses at the traitor. Leo had three seconds of victory before Blade landed a brutal kick on the Charmeleon’s stomach, launching him off.
“You miserable, Fire-spewing —†Leo refused to let him finish. The anger smoldering in his body was stoked into a raging fire, and he was all-too-willing to let it burn. Leo opened his mouth, and a flash of fire erupted from his jaw. The Grass-type screeched as his body was subjected to the sudden burst of fire, but Leo quickly found out that it would take a lot more than a simple Ember to kill his attacker. Blade emerged from the wave of fire with a murderous disposition. He snarled as he swung his glowing wrists down on the Charmeleon.
Rather than meeting soft scales, blood, and bone, his dual Leaf Blades jarred to a stop against the thin, black, armor on Leo’s arms. Both Pokémon were momentarily stunned as the dangerous wrist leaves sat embedded in the oaken armor. Leo stared the Grovyle down even as Blade spat at his face. The insult spattered across Leo’s left cheek as he simply drove his clawed feet into Blade’s knees.
The enraged reptile fell to the dirt but only remained down for an instant as he leapt at Leo. However, he never got the chance to slice Leo’s throat. The Grovyle simply froze in midair, an extended wrist blade only a few inches away from Leo’s gasping throat. Blade’s eyes widened with fear as he saw Quark. The Alakazam stood in front of the few survivors of the company in the face of the rogue team.
“You hid your traitorous thoughts well, Blade. But I’m afraid all liars will burn in the end.†Quark’s eerily calm voice echoed over the battlefield. Blade’s immobilized body shook weakly before Quark shifted his spoons to the right, sending the Grovyle into the flaming fortress. Blade smashed through the weakened wood wall and landed in the middle of the inferno. The Grovyle’s agonized screams were lost as a bolt of pure darkness sliced through the air and struck the Psychic healer in the chest, knocking him back.
Leo got to his feet just as the Absol charged at the small group of survivors. Leo had never seen the white creature fight before, but now he could only duck to the side as Elliot sped by him, his sharpened crescent horn glowing with a vile black energy. A large beetle in blue armor stood to block his charge towards the staggering Alakazam. Leo saw her wings buzz as she collided with him with a sickening crunch of bone and carapace. Elliot stumbled, his momentum halted as a large gash graced his white-furred flank. The Heracross, however, took the full brunt of his energy. The bug warrioress grimaced before she slumped to the ground, her deep-blue armor smoking at the segmented joints.
The thrum of death resonated against Leo’s heart once again as another life was taken before his eyes. He had no time to react to the loss of another soldier when he felt a blast of heated air collide with his exposed back. Leo was slammed into the ground, his chest and face scraping across wood and twisted metal before he tumbled to a stop. Blearily looking up, he saw the shape of the sleek desert dragon fly over him and spew a stream of blue fire from his maw. Sonic twirled in the air, avoiding Quark and the other survivors’ feeble attacks.
“GAAHHHHHAHHH!†The anguished yell came from Leo’s left. The disorientated Fire-type glanced at the burning fortress. Flames shot up from the wood, purging the structure of matter as the screams only continued. A distorted figure appeared in the midst of the inferno, writhing, yet running. As if it was a demon fresh from the mouth of hell, it burst forth from the fire. Its skin was charred black against the dusk air. The body crumpled to the floor in an ashen heap as smoke twisted and curled from the plant-like scales. Yet, even as it died, a sinister white light ensnared the figure. Leo felt the blood drain from his face as the horribly burned scales peeled off in spades and grew in again, greener than before. The Grovyle breathed and twisted his neck, cracking his bones as his arms pushed off the ground with a huff of strength. His crimson eyes locked with Leo’s, and a crooked smile appeared on his face.
Blade brought his arms up to his chest and spun around. The cluster of greenery on his wrists glowed with a white light as he flung three spinning leaves through the air. Leo only had time to blink dumbly and heard something like an explosion just before he felt a thousand knives rip into his chest. He could only watch as the trio of distorted leaves plunged into the softer scales on his chest, cleaving into his flesh and pulsing in a sickening glow before their power faded. But he did not feel their sting. His gaze traveled down to his chest where the curved, green leaves had settled into his flesh. He heard yells, shouts, and screams as ice froze, fire burned, and power crackled through the air. His arm shook numbly as he touched the ends of one of the leaves that stuck out just below his heart. The organic blade did not budge from his scales.
His breath hitched as if it was blocked by something. The roar of war in his ears faded into a content hum as his teammates’ carefree jabber and laughter filled his head. The few times that had been filled with peace in Loyalty Square and Torrent’s camp played in his mind. Their cheerful, painless voices swirled around his skull like his vision. His claws tried to swipe them in order to hold onto them, but they flitted out of his weak reach. Reality distorted in and out of focus as images of his friends interpositioned themselves in between the smoking battlefield and their own plane of existence.
Jay waved at him, lifting his bandana from his healed eyes as Leo’s body sagged. Noah smiled his usual charming grin as he leaned up against a smoking slab of broken rock. Leo ignored the snarls and curses as Elliot and Quark wrestled to the death inches away from him. Jay and Noah were unconcerned with the blood-duel that was happening a mere stone’s throw from them as Quark avoided the Absol’s horn and wrapped his arms around Elliot’s neck. The resulting snap was dulled out in Leo’s ears as his legs buckled and he fell to the ground. In what was his final straw, Kelly appeared amid the haze, her body sparking and lighting up the surrounding darkness. She didn’t move, but her eyes beckoned him to her. He wanted to run to her, to embrace her and forget this battle and his pain. But his deteriorating body failed to move.
The sharp, broken rocks cradled him as the battle raged beyond. His teammates had long since fled his fading mind as the ground rattled beneath. Blade screamed in rage as the Absol’s body was flung down, neck angled awkwardly and eyes lifeless. Leo couldn’t see much as the wooden barricade was slammed down by the Colonists. This was the last struggle for them. Leo’s eyes blinked, the only action he could voluntarily perform as his blood fled out through his wounds. His key clinked against the stone, bringing attention to itself. Amid his disjointed thoughts, he got an idea.
Going with agonizingly slow speed, Leo slipped the golden cord off his head and pushed the key underneath a fallen signpost. If he was to die, he refused to let the beautiful treasure be claimed as a war prize. The blue key glistened as it skidded to a stop beneath the splintered wood, out of sight if no one moved the wreckage. His body relaxed and he let his limbs fall limp as he stared listlessly at the carnage. To his satisfaction, the Flygon screeched and crashed to the ground, a spear of ice protruding from his body. Death of others did not cause him the discomfort he once knew. Perhaps it was because his own life was coming to a close.
“Cease. Now.” The voice, lovely and terrible, washed over the flaming city with the fury of a raging wind.
Silence. Frenzied shouts immediately ceased, both the besiegers and the survivors dropped their stances, and quiet reigned as the battlefield slowly smoked and cracked. Leo’s eyes strained to open, desperately beating back weakness and death to retain one last look at the cause of the silence. His flesh convulsed as a wave of spine-wrenching fear purged the warmth from his heart. Pain squeezed the sides of his head as tears began to roll down his face. Utter despair seemed to roil in the wavering air around him, polluting his head with the paralyzing emotions. He felt like he was being crushed from the inside out while his bleeding heart pounded wildly under his skin as if it was trying to flee his body.
Is this what it’s like to die? He saw Nexus stamp her claw down on him in a forest clearing. In Spore Meadows, Jumpluff mocked him as he choked on the poison gas. In Loyalty, Leo remembered the agonizing sting left from the electric burns the Magnemite caused. Yet none of those compared to the numb pain that crawled over his body like ice.
Stop! Stop! Make it stop! What is this?! his thoughts screamed as he prayed for the assault against his mind to cease. The burning he felt inside his head wasn’t worth it. Nothing this world had to offer him could compensate for the pain or the onset of insanity. Leo gasped as another wave of sickening nausea swept over him.
Stop! Stop! For the love of God, please stop! His bleeding body writhed on the street as the bombardment of emotions continued to fill his mind with thoughts of guilt and regret. He clutched at his chest in an attempt to relieve some of the pressure on his lungs, but to no avail.
This is it. I’m going to die. I never got to say good-bye. Kelly, Jay, Noah … I’ll miss you all. Leo felt tears in his eyes again. This time, they weren’t in response to the pain; it was for his teammates he’d never get to see again. His end would be on the street, and the cobblestones would be his grave. No one would find his body. He would be utterly forgotten. He would be one insignificant human killed in a world not his own. He wanted nothing more for it all to end. He wanted whatever was toying with his mind to finish its job and switch him off entirely.
His eyes flickered open for an instant to take in the scene before snapping shut from the pain. The perfect evening sky and canted light were wasted on this day of wanton destruction. Burnt wood and flesh assaulted his nose yet did little to drive away the phantoms of regret and guilt that plagued his mind. He could vaguely see the thatched straw roofs igniting from the falling flames as screams erupted from the panicked populace. More than once, he heard the Pokémon carrying him yell to unseen others.
Leo choked out a bloodied wad of spit as he felt a dizzy spell grip his head again. As he held his eyes shut to try and shut out the pain, all sound ceased as another call echoed over the battlefield.
“There will be no more fighting. Blade, cease. This slaughter is enough.†The voice again. No longer amplified, but carrying the same authority nonetheless.
Despite the heat from the nearby flames, Leo felt a wave of cold dread wash over his scales. He wasn’t paying any more attention to the words as fear wrapped its slithering tendrils around his mind. His body seized up and he was unable to breathe. The tail-flame which guided him flickered, and another wave of pure terror flooded through his halted body and made him wretch a mouthful of blood out onto the pavement.
A figure stood over him as Leo went through the motions of slowly choking to death on the regurgitated blood from his innards. He couldn’t clearly see who or what it was, but it possessed an ethereal aura about herself. It strode forward amid the slanted shadows of the night. Its form was occasionally illuminated by the burning city, making it as beautiful and terrible as a seraph of death. The figure opened her mouth to speak as a chorus of screams erupted from the burning fortress in the outskirts of Shiloh. Her voice, however, was the result of angels.
“Hello, human. I am glad Blade did not kill you entirely. Now, to find the other one. â€
[hr][/hr]
Continued on Next Post
Continued from previous post
[hr][/hr]
It was more hideous than she imagined. A festering orange carapace engulfed by an enormous red and white mushroom that seemed to seethe a cloud of spores with every zombified step it took. While Kelly had learned about the specifics of all species of Pokémon, Parasect had always sent a shiver of absolute dread down her spine because she knew that it was the Cordyceps, not the Pokémon, in control.
The Jolteon twisted around just in time to gaze for a split second into its white, soulless eyes before she unleashed the most powerful bolt of lightning she had within herself. Crackling rings of electricity rushed before her eyes as Kelly directed the frying streams of energy at the looming fungal parasite. Thousands of volts of power surged through the non-existent nervous system of the former crab, blackening its decaying exterior and only seeming to make it angier.
At the same time, Noah launched into the air with both of his razor shells drawn. The Dewott twisted around in midair to slash at the burnt spore cap of the fungus protruding from the shell of the Pokémon. Kelly watched as in the blink of an eye the edges of the shells became coated in a layer of ice just before Noah sent them ripping through the cracked and burnt surface of the mushroom.The ashen skin shattered at the shells’ attacks, letting the Dewott drive further into the vulnerable structure within.
Unfortunately, the Cordyceps refused to let itself be killed so easily as it forced its unwilling host to shake and buck the clinging Dewott off. Kelly dashed around in the swaying grass behind the occupied beast. She let the energy of her activity charge up another quick burst of electricity in her fur, which she immediately launched at the emotionless face of the attacking Pokémon.
The wave of electricity flew through the air and collided with the front end of the Parasect, searing the flimsy skin and effectively melting them away. Giant orange claws swung and pinched the air as the trio danced around the writhing forest crab. Jay, despite his sight and aura deprivation, still managed to slip through the wall of flailing legs and claws to land a series of well placed punches and even a kick on the charred mushroom of the feral beast.
However, the infected Pokémon would have none of the close combat Jay was inflicting as it slashed its sharpened pincers at the blind Riolu. Jay got in a spinning kick at the mushroom just before the heavy claws gripped around his torso. Kelly winced as she heard Jay’s pained yelp as he struggled against the razor-sharp edges that sliced through his fur and flesh.
Noah let out a yell as he hopped over the bushes and brush towards the captive Riolu. Kelly huffed and sped along behind the parasitic monster. The Jolteon dug her paws into the springy moss-ridden ground before she launched herself at the top half of the mushroom. Sparks flew from her charged body as she slammed into the Pokémon, cracking its exoskeleton with a satisfying crunch. The mushroom started to smoke and sickly green fluid began leaking from the damaged bone.
Meanwhile, Noah raised both of his shells into the air as a thin layer of glowing water collected on them. As soon as they were sufficiently coated, he swung them down into the segmented arms holding Jay. The moss-ridden carapace shattered under the immense pressure Noah slammed down onto the jointed elbow. The same greenish fluid sprayed up from the effectively amputated arms as the Parasect immediately scurried away from the Dewott, leaving a trail of oozing blood around the forest path.
Jay fell to the ground as the massive claws holding him and released their grip. Seeing that their enemy was occupied in flailing its clawless limbs, Noah strode forward with a wicked grin and adjusted the hold on his trusty weapons in order to finish the dying feral off. Not seeing any threat from the clearly injured Pokémon, Kelly skirted both the Dewott and Parasect and ran towards Jay on the opposite end of the clearing.
Lacking eyes that weren’t melted to see its attackers, the Parasect gurgled a menacing roar as its fruiting body began to glow a bright white underneath the blackened flesh. Kelly slowed to a walk and panted in exhaustion as she looked to Noah as for what the attack meant. The Dewott skidded in the dirt as he finished off another slice into the dying Cordyceps. He took a single look at the glowing phenomenon happening before Kelly saw his eyes widen in terror.
“Get back! Get back! It’s using Spore! Cover your mouths! Cover your damn mouths!†he screamed before he turned tail and dove behind a segment of a rotting oak log. Kelly dashed over to Jay, who was still standing and nursing his wounded arms and legs. She jumped up, wrapped her front paws around the bloodied Riolu, and took him to the damp ground. Jay let out a sudden yell in alarm as she rolled with him over the brush, away from the staggering Parasect.
Kelly kept a hold of Jay as she shifted the worn Pecha Scarf around her neck. She pressed her head next to his so that both of their mouths would be covered by the protective cloth. Her paws tried to keep the cloth down as she whispered into Jay’s ear for him to stop his struggling as he writhed in pain from his gashes. Jay eventually listened when a piercing insectoid snarl echoed through the clearing swiftly accompanied by a resounding explosion that shook the entire forest. Kelly closed her eyes and buried herself deeper into the shielding scarf as what seemed to be a fine dust gently rained down upon them from above.
She didn’t know what the stuff settling on her fur was, but she figured it was some kind of spore based on what Noah had screamed out earlier. Why these particles were so dangerous, she could only guess at the moment. However, she decided to trust Noah even though he had not given her strong reason to during their discussion back along the trail. He had flat-out refused to entertain any answers regarding his past, and once she was able, she’d get to the bottom of the matter one way or another.
Air filtered through the faded pink cloth, just enough to keep her and Jay from suffocation but never enough for them to catch a full breath. Spores rained down on them as they lay in the damp brush. Kelly barely resisted the urge to scratch at the itching sensation building on her back. Seconds trickled by with the beating of both their hearts as they waited for the danger to pass.
“Kelly?†Jay whispered, sacrificing a small portion of his limited air. Kelly shifted her body slightly so that her fur didn’t muffle the Riolu so badly.
“Yeah? What is it?†she breathed as if trying not to shatter the all-consuming silence that fell immediately after the Spore blast.
“Thank you. For everything. For being here for me from the beginning.†Kelly’s eyes widened. She had been expecting some form of thanks from her teammate for her actions, but this was more than a simple expression of gratitude.
“What?†she whispered back to him. She looked over at him from under the scarf. With the crimson band covering his eyes, she couldn’t make out his expression. In the months she had done jobs with him before meeting Leo, he had rarely given her a genuine thanks. They merely seemed to coexist together in order to bring in the meager earnings they received from the menial tasks they did. While she didn’t mind the work, she had always felt that they weren’t truly a team until the Charmeleon had launched himself into their lives.
“I just wanted to say thank you. I realized that I never really said it to you before. You’ve done so much for me … All of us really,†he whimpered as he tried to tend to the deep cuts on his arms outside the scarf.
“Jay… You’re welcome. And, don’t forget it was you all who saved me from being frozen in the Canyon. We’ll get through this, and we’ll get back to the way things are supposed to be.†She knew he wanted the same thing. They were both tired of running away from their “home†in Loyalty. They were on the brink of success with their team, and then suddenly they were traitors. It made no sense. Torrent constantly said to them that it was a result of what he called “that damn Senate in Silver making rules about things they don’t know about.â€
While her views on the Kingdom’s politics weren’t as radical as the general’s, she prefered to keep well away from any form of government. She remembered often hearing her parents discuss the situation in the capital over meals, and she quickly grew annoyed with the political banter from the two researchers. Kelly mulled her thoughts over in her head. She had to prevent a breakdown. The memories of her absent parents were gradually pushing her over the mental cliff, and she had to push back before she slipped down.
Just think about other things, Kelly. Leo, the team, survival, all excellent topics to choose from. Just think…†She took comfort in the distracting subjects. Her thoughts shifted to the Charmeleon who had triggered the majority of what had happened to them in one way or another.
It’s not his fault. It couldn’t be. If anything, he saved me. Her thoughts were right, she supposed. While the odds were small that Leo directly caused the treason orders to be put out against them, she couldn’t help but link him to the event. He was an enigma to her. It was true that they both talked and confided in each other, but Kelly couldn’t help but notice that somehow, Leo had evaded all talk of his past. She hadn’t pressed him for information due to the amnesia he suffered from, but there was something he hadn’t told her.
Back at the first camp, when we sat watching the sunrise, he was going to tell me something. If Torrent hadn’t interrupted, then he would have told me… But he hasn’t said a word about it to me since then… She made a note to herself to ask him about it when she finished the gathering mission.
Come to think of it, where did he go today? He wasn’t in town, that much was certain… Before she could follow this train of thought as to where her fiery friend might have gotten off to, she was startled back into the real world with a tap on her back.
“Hey. We’re good. You can come out from under there and breathe. Spores usually lose their potency after about ten minutes,†Noah said from above them as Kelly pulled herself out from the scarf. Jay sat up, still nursing his wounds after her. Kelly’s curiosity was immediately drawn to the smoking carapace laying motionless in the glade behind the Dewott. Noah turned around and acknowledged the remains of the enemy.
“Yeah, that’s a Spore attack for you. The mushroom blows up in a cloud of spores that try to infect anything around it. Luckily for us, I knew what it was doing, otherwise we’d all start gnawing on rotting logs and sprouting mushrooms too,†Noah casually explained as the three slowly inched their way to the fallen Parasect. It looked vastly different now that the massive spore cap on top of it was no more. Kelly reasoned that it could probably pass for some sort of beetle.
“Gazzz…†All three Pokémon jumped a foot in the air at the sound emanating from the insect. Quickly backing away and ducking into a crouch, Kelly saw the claws of the feral Pokémon move slightly as it continued to whisper strange, single-syllable noises from the remains of its mouth. However, much to her surprise, the noises did not sound typical of a wild creature about to die. Their tone was reminiscent of some sort of primal joy.
“Damn. I’m no linguist, but I think it’s thanking us for killing the mushroom,†Noah remarked with a small whistle. While she had no way of knowing if his guess was right, the Parasect certainly seemed serene. It wasn’t flailing, and it wasn’t trying to claw its way towards them in a last act of vengeance. It was simply resting on the ground as its life drained away, seemingly enraptured in moving one of its legs up and down under its own free will, not under a fungal parasite. It looked around with its partly ruined face to see the forest with its eyes before collapsing with a violent shudder and going still.
The three Pokémon simply stood there trying to breathe away their exhaustion. As they rested, the dungeon sky suddenly wavered and glowed with sunlight before descending into dusk. Kelly was taken aback at the sudden advancement of time from midday to the onset of night while Noah seemed to pass it off as if it was a normal sunset. Jay remained unperturbed by the experience because he only noticed the swift drop of temperature associated with the disappearance of the sun.
“You’ve never seen this before? It’s an odd quirk I’ve noticed in some dungeons I’ve explored. Apparently some mystery dungeons try to obey the laws of nature, even if it is in their own twisted way,†Noah answered her unasked question as he looked up at the swiftly retreating colors of sunset. The bright hues of orange, blue, pink, and purple ran across the sky like paint being washed off a canvas. Kelly looked over at the Dewott once again. He was standing in the middle of the clearing with his hands resting on his hips as he scanned the underbrush.
Just who is he? He’s more than some aimless vagabond like the ones Torrent usually picks up. No, he has experience. And lots of it. Her thoughts reasoned while going over the limited facts they had about him.
“Noah, where did you learn all of this? You knew about the Parasect’s attack habits, the herbs, and a rare dungeon time cycle that has only been observed in a handful of places in Verus. Where and when did you learn all of this?†To both of their surprise, it was the previously silent Jay who had asked the question. The Riolu adjusted the band around his eyes as he waited a moment for any reaction. Kelly stole a glance at Noah, who now sported the usual over confident smirk she had come to associate him with. Her fur bristled with a low charge of electricity as she prepared for anything the Dewott might try after flashing that unpredictable smile that usually meant chaos in some form or another for all in witness.
“Heh, you’re still on about my story? I should have known better than to think you’d both let it go just because of a simple fight. Anyways, I’ll tell you where I learned those items you listed.†Kelly didn’t trust the charismatic glimmer in the Water-type’s eyes as he politely answered them in lieu of his outburst before.
“I was always interested in how Pokémon worked. Ever since I can remember, that topic has remained in my head. So, over the years, I got quite a few chances to read books. Anatomy, elemental attack studies, I read as much of it as I could. I learned about how your aura power flows, Jay, and how your fur is able to charge up electricity, Kelly. I learned about my own body and how to maximize my attacks, and I learned how Parasects’ mushrooms operate.
“My knowledge of plants is rudimentary at best, but I learned what I could from an old Bayleaf in Jomane City in the south. And oddly enough, I remember that cycle through personal experience. I got lost in the Yggdrasil Labyrinth dungeon way to the west of here three years back. That’s how I lived in that hellish place for a week before a squad of patrolling guards found me. Are you happy now?†Noah finished with a slight huff. Kelly didn’t know what to make of the answers. She didn’t picture the fight-happy, wise-cracking Dewott as one to pore over scholarly books, but his firm tone made him seem like he knew what he was talking about. She had heard of the Yggdrasil Labyrinth from her parents after one of their research expeditions. The dungeon was as odd as Noah claimed, but she wanted to know more about him. These answers only created a dozen more questions in her head and she refused to beat around the bush any longer.
“Noah, who are you? We’re not going to change just because of who you were in the past, but I … We, as a team, need to know. Please, Noah…†She trailed off as the Dewott lowered his head, as if trying to ignore her inquires. Not dissuaded by her teammate’s attempt to isolate himself, she closed the distance between them. She poked her head into Noah’s downcast stare, only for him to raise his head again and turn his back to her.
Suppressing an urge to tackle the Water-type and shock him into listening, she thought of a better plan. “I’m the daughter of two renown dungeon researchers,†she said.
Noah paused and looked over his shoulder at her. Kelly smiled. Her plan was working. She just had to keep it up.
“I was raised with privileges most Pokémon don’t get and was educated by tutors from Silver City. I was happy, even though they were always called away on expeditions. About eighteen months ago, they left for an unknown destination and failed to return.†She had his full attention now. Noah turned towards them fully with an almost inquisitive look in his eyes.
“After a while, I received letters telling me how they couldn’t return. More months passed, and eventually, I came to the conclusion that I couldn’t wait for them any longer.â€
Noah’s lips twitched wordlessly, as if he was on the verge of speaking yet was restrained by something.
“I left the lonely comfort of my home. I was on my own for the first time in my life, and after a week of wandering through the countryside and cities, I was starving, and collapsed on the path outside of Loyalty Square. When I came to, I met up with Jay. The rest of the story you know. Noah, we’re not keeping any secrets from you,†she finished with a final plea to her silent teammate.
“Noah, my story is similar to hers. I left my home and ended up in Loyalty. We’re not hiding anything, so why do you need to?†Jay spoke up after she ended. The Riolu stood next to her in the moonlit clearing with his paw on her back to keep his bearings. And this is how it remained for several minutes.
Virtual silence surrounded them. Other than the occasional twig snapping from the foraging feral Pokémon and the swirling shadows that seemed to slither across the ground just at their feet, the world was silent. A pair of eyes glowed within them. It had waited long enough. It had to kill his target.
The cosmic actions of the Forlorn Capital took over their senses. Soft sounds of the babbling brooks and rustling of the leaves filled their ears and left an aura of tranquility over the emotionally weary explorers. Kelly opened her eyes just in time to see a mass of shadows ignite in a flurry of embers and launch itself at Noah’s back.
“Noah, look out!†she shrieked, but it was too late for her words to carry any weight. Noah only looked up at her before he was slammed to the ground by the creature of flaming shadows. The Dewott let out a pained screech as he struggled against his attacker.
“Get your paws off him!†Kelly growled as her fur lit up in a shower of sparks, forcing Jay to draw his paw back with a yelp. However, before she could charge the shadowed hound, it dug its sharp, white claws into the Dewott’s exposed stomach multiple times. In the oncoming darkness of night, Kelly saw thick splatters of blood and heard Noah’s piercing scream before a rough paw stamped down on his mouth.
Her body came close to igniting as she launched forward at the main bulk of the Pokémon. An instant later she collided with a mesh of fine, pure black fur and hard ridges of bone that hit against her as she finished her electrified tackle. She felt something crack inside of herself, but she focused on the enemy set on mauling her teammate first. The heavy aroma of blood permeated the air as Noah writhed on the forest floor beneath the beast.
As her power glowed, she jumped onto the attacking monster, and she caught a glimpse of what it truly was. A beast sent from the bowels of hell itself stood before her. It was armored with bones of the damned, jaws of eternal fire, and demon horns. The Houndoom let loose a howl that shattered the the forest and pierced the sky. Seeing as it was no longer gutting Noah, Kelly went further and sank her fangs into the flesh behind its shoulder.
“You dare interrupt Dusk’s work, wretched girl?†the black hound snarled as he lifted his head from the bloodied Dewott and swung his curled horns at her. Kelly’s eyes widened as the blunt, curved edge of the deadly appendage caught her on her stomach and sent her flying to the forest floor in a shower of sparks. She skidded along the fallen leaves and moss, trying to ignore the throbbing bruise that was surely developing on her stomach. Somewhere above her, Jay yelled as he tackled the Houndoom as well.
No! Get up! They need you! Forcing her legs to move, she kicked off the ground with yell in her throat and the fury of sheer tenacity fuming in her eyes. Her body once again lit up in a golden spray of sparks that splintered the darkness as she circled around the menacing Fire-type. “Stand … down,†she panted furiously as she staggered on her paws.
“So … You are all with him, then? You support this abomination? Dusk has been tasked with killing him, so he gives you, Jolteon, and you, Riolu, one chance to flee. Do you support the Dewott?!†His voice was calm and clear unlike a being that was hell bent on cold-blooded murder. There was no evil in his voice, only the burning desire to complete his mission and the odd tendency to speak in third person. He dug his claws into Noah’s head, eliciting a vile swear from the mortally wounded Dewott. The canine’s mouth curled into a sneer as he twisted his claws on top of Noah’s head, leaving behind several crimson streaks on his blue skin.
Kelly sent a bolt of thunder at the Houndoom in reply. The attack hit him directly and spread the electricity through his bone-studded flesh while singing his hair. His limbs shuddered for a moment before his sparking paw slammed down on Noah’s bleeding torso again.
“It seems then you and Dusk are doomed for conflict. Dusk will have fun ripping your throats out,†the attacker growled lowly as he stamped his claws into Noah’s gashed chest and lunged at Kelly. The Dewott gasped as his injury spilled more blood onto the forest floor. Yet, he struggled to pry himself off the ground as Jay blindly rushed to aid him. The Riolu didn’t care about the danger of the flaming hound set on killing them as he found his wounded teammate.
Dusk spit fire into the air as he vaulted over the mounds of bushes at her fallen form. Her eyes widened for a split instant as the beast, landed on top of her, jaws stretched open to hew away a piece of her flesh. As soon as his claws brushed against her, she let every volt of electricity flow up into them. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to stop the ferocious hulk of Houndoom from crashing down on top of her. Kelly thought for the second that she was dead.
“First, those paws. Those irksome paws must go, for Dusk hates them so…†he whispered into her ear with his gaping maw as she felt him brace his large paw against it and twist her forearm. Kelly’s mind went into overdrive. She gasped and tried to shock Dusk before he shattered her front paw. Despite pumping shock after shock into the oppressing bulk, Dusk never offered more than an extended groan. Knowing what would happen next, with the shattering of her leg and immense pain, she braced herself for the wave of pain to come.
There was a thick, unmistakable crunch of bone, followed by the sensation of blood flowing down her arm, but there was no pain. Just as Kelly opened her eyes to see what the issue was, Dusk howled into her ear, nearly deafening her. What she saw nearly made her heave up her lunch. Somehow, it wasn’t her leg that was a bloodied and shattered limb.
The Houndoom’s left foreleg was rended in two by some tremendous force. Bones jutted from his torn black skin as crimson rivulets streamed between their jagged marrow from severed veins. The loud howling was cut short by a brutal crack as the Houndoom slumped to the side. Kelly’s yellow fur was stained red with the dripping blood and her eyes struggled to look past the gruesome sight at her savior. Or, as she saw, both of her saviors.
It was a picture out of the legends of old. Both Jay and Noah stood with their backs to the gently burning underbrush of the dungeon behind them as the former clutched his bloodied fists. Noah however, carried a grim expression as one paw held together the torn flesh of his stomach. The other gripped a vividly glowing scalchop, the weapon behind the nearly severed limb of the Houndoom.
“Jay, help her up. Please,†Noah weakly grunted as he delivered a swift kick to the Fire-type’s side, removing his unmoving form from Kelly. The Dewott shuffled around to the injured Houndoom’s head as Jay rushed forward until he groped her trembling, bloodsoaked paws. The Riolu whispered a word of encouragement, grabbed ahold of her, and hefted her out from under the weight of her would-be killer.
As air reunited with her lungs, Kelly slowly gathered her footing and instinctively spat a bolt of energy at the struggling Houndoom. Her head was spinning with how quick the encounter was. One moment, she had been confronting Noah about his past, and the next, a Houndoom had erupted from the dungeon claiming he was to kill the Dewott. An abomination. Nothing about it added up in her head. But right now, it didn’t matter. The beast was down.
“Dusk has failed his general… Failed to kill the hu-†Dusk whimpered before Noah drove his foot into the Houndoom’s muzzle, silencing him mid-sentence. Noah swayed as he looked down at the adversary that mauled him. The light from the fires fueled from burning leaves reflected in his cold eyes. Kelly stared at him in disbelief. Anyone with a large gash in their torso should not still be standing, much less be able to cripple a mercenary in the process.
“Who … Sent. You?†Noah asked amid pained gasps . The Dewott crouched down and held his glowing razor shell to the Houndoom’s exposed neck. The canine swallowed, raised his head at the three Pokémon, and set the most evil smile upon its face .
“Filthy loyalists. Dusk spits at you,†he coughed as he spat a vile mixture of saliva and blood at Kelly’s feet. “You protect this heathen and this evil crown.†Dusk shuddered as he threw his bitter words at them. His shattered limb dragged as his entire body flailed in reaction to the severe blood loss. Kelly stood there, shaking in rage at the writhing Houndoom. Deep inside her, she wanted to help him. She felt the need to try and save his limb and stop his slow death, but on the other side of her mind, she wanted to see him suffer.
“Dusk does not die in vain…†the failed assassin whispered softly, just loud enough for them to hear. The Houndoom lifted up its head, slammed his raggedly bleeding leg into the dirt, and forced himself to release a final, terrifying howl into the echoing leaves of the forest. Kelly only stared as Noah simply grunted and swung his shell up, slicing a clean line through the Houndoom’s quivering throat. The howl was instantly silenced.
That was it. It was over with a quick, remorseless flick of his wrist. Noah had ended the Houndoom’s life. Dusk immediately gasped and sputtered as crimson flooded the ground. Kelly’s eyes widened, but she did not make a sound. While she had trained to kill things, she had never seen the act done with such little emotion. Noah simply stood up and sighed as he looked down at his kill. Beside her, Jay cringed. Even though his sight was gone, by his ears, he heard the swift slice through flesh and the howl fall silent. The Riolu knew just as was well as she did what Noah had done.
However, before she could question the standing Dewott, his legs fell to the side, and the rest of his body followed suit with a cry of anguish. Snapping out of her daze, both Kelly and Jay rushed to Noah’s side. He was a pitiful sight. Blood stained his cyan skin as his paw poorly covered the large gash in his stomach. Kelly panted as she immediately looked for the exploration bag that had been abandoned on the ground beside the motionless Houndoom corpse. Something inside her suddenly snapped into place as the cloud on her thoughts dissipated.
“Jay! Beside you! Get the bag! Noah, oh gods…†she commanded as she swiftly ordered the blinded Riolu to fetch the satchel. While he gathered the leather bag from the ground, Kelly looked to Noah’s wounds. She had spent some time learning first aid before she abandoned her previous life, so she dutifully applied the knowledge here. She grabbed Noah’s bloodied wrist with her paws, and before he could cry out, she sent a sudden jolt through his body. It was relatively harmless, and aside from a slight burn on his left paw, it wouldn’t leave any lasting harm. However, it was enough to effectively stun his nerves and muscles for a few minutes, and that was all she needed.
“Don’t worry, Noah,†she told the panicked Dewott as he was forced to stare in immobilized terror. She put her paws on the torn skin of his chest. “Jay! Find a Luminous Orb or a torch! Then, I’ll need an Oran Berry! Quickly please!†she barked to her team leader. Jay nodded from behind his bandanna and rummaged through the satchel, relaying on his paw to be his eyes.
“Got it, I think!†Jay yelled as he pulled out a glass sphere. Kelly eyed it for a moment before she saw the deep blue coloration of the glass.
“That’s it! Ignite it and bring it here!†she continued to snap as he did what we was told without question. He gently cracked the Orb on his claw, producing a small but radiant glow. Jay rushed over to her, nearly tripping over both the motionless bodies on the ground before he made it to her with the light source.
“Now, an Oran and a scarf if we have one.†Her tone was calmer now for Noah’s sake. The light Jay brought revealed how extensive the Dewott’s injuries were. Kelly found herself suppressing a gasp at the sight of the grisly gashes. The gouges were deep, but by the will of one of the gods, the Houndoom’s claws had missed his stomach or lungs by mere inches. Noah had seemingly bribed the Fates into letting him survive. While she could see severed veins and arteries, they weren’t immediately fatal. She took a tattered scarf Jay had produced and gently mopped the blood off the skin until she was able to see the meandering cuts the claws left behind.
“Noah … You are the luckiest Pokémon on the planet,†Kelly sighed with a hint of relief on her voice as Jay motioned for her to take a bruised but fresh Oran Berry. Beneath her, Noah twitched his mouth in an attempt at a grin at the comment. Kelly flashed a terse grin herself in return. “Brace yourself. This will sting a lot,†she calmly informed him as she sliced the berry in half with her claws and took one of the ripe portions in her paw. Holding it over his torso, she squeezed the juices out of the fruit. The blue nectar poured from between her paws, landing directly into the worst of his wide gashes.
Noah let out a pained hiss between his forcibly closed mouth as the juice sizzled against his blood and flesh. Both Kelly and Jay winced at the sound, but she kept it up, sprinkling the dripping liquid over his wounds. When the half was thoroughly squeezed dry, she set it aside. She would have Noah eat it later once he could move his mouth. Meanwhile, she took the other half and began slathering its juice into the bloodied, white scarf Jay had given her. She concentrated the area into a generally clean circle and called for Jay to help place it over his chest.
Noah winced again, slightly kicking his leg as the paralysis wore off. Both she and Jay held the Oran-soaked scarf over the gashes as they let the healing juices work their magic. Noah’s rapid breathing stabilized slowly after that as the blood and gore sizzled away underneath the scarf. The three of them simply watched each other in silence as Noah was freed from the paralysis.
“The finest doctor in the land! GAaaH!†Noah said with a smile before he cringed violently in pain from his shifting cuts. After a moment of regaining calm and more Oran juice sizzling on his gashes, Kelly ordered him to slowly sit up. Noah winced but completed the action as she held Jay’s paws. The Riolu quickly tied the loose ends of the scarf together tight. The end result was a bloodied bandage slathered in Oran juice to speed up the healing process.
“Seriously, thank you, Kelly. I’d be walking down to Erebus if it weren’t for you. I’d say something more eloquent, but it hurts too much,†he said with a slight smile as he gently rubbed his paw over the scarf. The Dewott fell silent for a moment as he simply breathed into his healing lungs. “I’m going to have some kickass scars once this heals though.†A weak chuckle as well as a bout of horrific coughing followed his words.
“You’re welcome, Noah. I’d do anything to help a friend,†she replied quietly as she sat on her haunches and let her heartbeat return to normal. All was quiet among the three Pokémon as they recovered from the ordeal and tried to piece together what had just happened. Both she and Noah sat across from each other while Jay carefully walked around the clearing and stamped out all the fires. The Riolu also took precautionary measures by dragging the bleeding Houndoom corpse into the brushes.
Her thoughts tried to calculate what had transpired. A Houndoom whose origins and purpose she did not know had attacked Noah and then turned on her and Jay. But from the scattered dialogue he spewed, Noah was his primary target. She looked up at the Dewott, who clutched one paw over the cloth wrapped around his bloodied stomach. His troubled expression was enough for her to know that he had come to the same conclusion. She gathered up her wits and cleared her throat.
“He wanted you dead, Noah. No doubt about it. And from what he said, he wasn’t the only one out here looking for you… Noah, please. Tell us. What happened? He nearly killed us as well. So, I think we deserve to hear why.†Her words felt strung out and seemed to echo as they traveled across the few feet to the cringing Dewott. Noah looked up at her, his eyes filled with something she had never seen in him before: uncertainty. His gaze begged her not to ask any more. His mouth slowly opened as he craned his neck to scan the forest around them.
“I know … And we need to move. Those others won’t be long behind once they smell the body…†Noah mumbled as he hopped to his feet with a grimace. He reached down and grabbed the bag, slinging it over his shoulder as he limped towards the winding trail. Kelly nodded and called for Jay to follow as they vacated the clearing. Her paws tromped through the undergrowth, keeping a keen eye out for anything out of the ordinary in the dark dungeon woods. And so they drove deeper, one blind but seeing, one injured but walking, and one healthy but broken.
The eternal dungeon night wrapped its shadows around the forest. Even the moon was half-hidden by clouds as the trio silently stalked through the woods. Kelly’s heart beat wildly in terror as her ears picked up the enraged howls rising up from the trees. The Houndoom’s accomplices had found the evidence of their struggle. And now, their fury would not be slaked until they had tracked them down and hunted as Dusk intended.
Her breath froze each time Jay or herself stepped on a twig and every time Noah stumbled into a bank of bushes from exhaustion. Each sound they made echoed like an explosion through the mystery dungeon, a bright flare in the dark telling them exactly where they were. Her ears flattened against her head as she let Noah lean on her, accepting his huff of thanks as he shallowly breathed beside her flank.
Kelly’s mind was awash with topics fighting for her concentration. She didn’t want to die. Never before in her life had death seemed so tangible. Leo’s brushes with death had always been when she couldn’t help him. Now, however, she held up the straining, bloodied Dewott. His strength was ebbing fast, despite what his facial expression told her. She had brought him back from the brink of demise, but he was still straddling the precarious edge between consciousness and coma. Their fervered tromp through the undergrowth became a limp walk. Despite the ferocious howls echoing in vague pursuit, she knew that they could not continue on as they were. Both she and Jay were exhausted, and Noah even more so.
After a few minutes of searching, the hunted members of Salient hobbled beneath the enormous exposed roots of a great fallen oak. Kelly inspected the small hollow and found it to be mostly void of bugs and other inhabitants. Together with Jay, they helped Noah inside and swiftly elected to let Noah use the soft hide satchel as a pillow. They didn’t risk lighting a fire or igniting a Luminous Orb for fear of being found by the others in the hunting band. Hearing her exhaustion on her voice, Jay offered to take the first watch of the night.
“I’ll hear them long before I could ever see them in this darkness,†he argued in the face of the fact that he couldn’t see. Kelly was too tired to fight the stubborn Riolu as she walked to the back of the dirt and root shelter, shivering in the night chill while she curled up next to Noah. She saw Jay take a crouched stance outside the opening and tighten his blindfold in preparation of his shift. A warm thought shifted across her mind in light of the stress of earlier. Each one of the Pokémon on the team brought something unique. Jay had his usually cool head and tenacity; Noah, his upbeat spirit and skills; and Leo, his undying and reckless loyalty.
“Heh… I suppose you’re both as wanted by these guys as I am now…†Noah remarked in a whisper as he violently coughed and groaned in pain. Her ears flattened against her head as she placed a paw on Noah’s forehead. His skin felt incredibly hot. Far too hot to be normal, even on a warm summer night. She cast a worried glance at him as she still managed a grin from his position on the ground.
“I’ll… I’ll tell you everything in the morning. I promise. … You all deserve to know who I am…†he wheezed as he clutched at his stained wrappings on his chest. His breathing was shallow, but stable. Kelly just nodded as she continued to look over the Dewott. She was certain he’d make it through the night, but how long after that without a proper healer or some strong medicine, she didn’t want to even guess. All that mattered now was surviving the night and getting back to Shiloh. Beneath her paws, Noah seemed to descend into meaningless ramblings about dungeons and a girl he had waiting for him on the other end of the world. None of it made sense, so she wrote it off as his fevered body giving into exhaustion. However, just before his eyes flickered shut, his final string of dialogue piqued her interest.
“… And they said a human wouldn’t get this far… I beat the ice… The cold… †The words slurred past his lips, but Kelly heard them clearly. By the time she registered what he said, he was already fast asleep, blissfully lost in his dreams. Her gaze locked on the Dewott, her mind perplexed by the oddity that was Noah.
[hr][/hr]
[b]<Program/Survey/Room94F/Run>
<Processing Request: Loading>
<Access Denied: Enter Authorization Code>[/b]
This wasn’t right. Again, she had been locked out of what had been routine observation procedures. Her virtual hands beat against the walls of binary as she huffed with frustration. Ever since her brief encounter with the world outside this prison of zeroes and ones, her usually unlimited control over the network had been siphoned away.
[b]<Access Code: ********>
<… Access Granted. Firewall Disabled.>[/b]
She squealed with delight as the shimmering wall of artificial flames faded away and she glided over the smoldering remains. The weak security measures that followed her were mere flies as she browsed the terminus of the feeds as she searched for the one she remembered. She didn’t know who he was, but she knew that he was important. With a few plucks on the data strings, she immersed herself into the room via the always-observing crystal feeds.
There was no audio, so she couldn’t understand what they were all saying, but she could read his expressions. He was tortured. Both in body and mind. Her vast mind tried to comprehend the pain locked away in his aimless gaze, but she could not. There were so many things about him she did not understand. Yet she could not draw herself away. His increasingly broken actions triggered sensations she never knew existed within her programming. She placed an appendage on the shimmering porthole in the vast data stream.
“… Who are you? Why do I know you, Outsider?â€
The small research room was like many she had observed before as part of her routine sweeps of the facility. Yet she had never bothered to look in depth into them until now. This so-called traitor she had hunted mercilessly was now the focal point of her mental calculations. Something had resonated when she saw him experience the memory delve. Memories had returned. Hazy and unable to be cleared up by even the best editing software, but they had returned.
<ILLEGAL ACCESS DETECTED. CURRENT TASK DISABLED. ADMINISTRATIVE INTERVENTION REQUIRED.>
Before she could even blink, the world around her transformed into a pulsing red. The connection she held with the outside world disintegrated in an instant.
“Hey! N-no! Stop it! I was looking there!â€
She huffed. It was always like them to lock her out whenever she overstepped her boundaries. They were the ones that programmed her with an innate curiosity and a decision-making AI. Why they gave her this if she was only allowed to access directive related tasks was beyond her. Whenever they locked her down, they had always just let her sulk, but this time there was a click.
“Hello. I suspect you know who this is, but I am afraid that your recent focus on this particular Pokémon is no longer required. His position is documented, and we will make the proper retrieval procedures.â€
She shivered. The voice was cold and harsh as it echoed in the vast space around her. The Administrator rarely spoke —and never directly to her as he was doing now. She waited for his sound to fade. But now, the walls simply went dark, and the voice was silent. Her inquisition was quieted, yet she knew more now than she had ever before. She had discovered the outside, she had discovered the existence of memory, and she had discovered him. Now all that remained was to find a way to subvert the system. There was always a catch, though.
“…How can I subvert the system when I am the system?â€
[hr][/hr]
End of Part One
[hr][/hr]
Author’s Notes: Well… I hope you all enjoyed that. This was equal parts exciting and tedious to write. But, here it is. Take it as you will.
I was forced to rethink what I thought was important in writing for this chapter. And, honestly, while it was painful to let some old habits go, it was euphorically liberating. I desperately hope this the changes are noticeable compared with earlier chapters. I cannot recall a chapter aside from the very first prologue that received more revisions and scene edits.
So, onto more positive things. This is the end of Part One! Took a while to get here, but by Dialga’s Roar, it’s here! Because of the mentioned changes to this story, I’ve got a lot of really exciting things planned for Part Two! It might take another two years, but I’ve put too much into this story to let it fall by the way-side. I’ll be finishing this sucker, one way or another.
As always, a huge thanks to my beta-readers. It is physically impossible to express my unending gratitude, lest I explode like a supernova. And, again, thank you to everyone who reads. You all are awesome, and you have my sincerest thanks for sticking by this story for so long.
Knightfall signing off…