Lifted Soul
They say that in older times, people sealed the dead with valuable metals and gemstones. Egyptian sarcophagi encased in gold, the embalmed corpses silently wrapped in death bonds with lustrous rubies. The bodies of old kings floated out to sea in oil-annointed coffins and ignited as memorial pyres, the tattered remnants of their fingers forever locked around jade-studded chalices.
Their eyes are sealed over, their flesh slowly disintegrating to dust, but their cold dead brows wear their magnificent crowns one final time. Gravestones erected over the final resting place of the dead, cut from marble slabs and etched with the names of departed souls in molten silver. Even Eterna City has some of those- I saw starving Rattatas desperately clawing at the stones, all skin and bone, unaware that death was at their side.
I've been to the local graveyard once before, when my sister Tess died three years ago. She always was good with electricity- she helped fix up the power lines when a storm knocked down some of the poles. She fixed my broken radio so that I got more than just those tiny crackles of eerie static from an obscure radio station from Solaceon Town; she got our family's heirloom clock running again for the first time in almost twenty-three years.
And then came that night when I found her laying on the floor of her living room, cradling her head and crying for the voices in her head to stop- as if we were children at home again. 911... ambulance... emergency room... and the diagnosis... radiation poisoning. Some doctors claimed it was because of that eerie office building that stood next to her house, the one with the large 'G' logo. I remember their ashamed faces, because they had that same logo on their coats. But there was always something off about the reports... as if they were trying to hide something.
Their security was very tight. I tried to get a look inside; I asked Tess's co-workers, and they said there were no abnormal levels of radiation around the building. But their words were lost; the press couldn't resist the chance of a scandal. I remember a scientist with purple hair and red glasses, standing outside the office building, making resolutions to clean up the facilities. Any inquiries as to whether the scandal was covering up an even darker secret... well... no one ever wondered about it, then. Not even me. And then, after a week of fighting for her life, with doctors at her side... Tess passed away.
My name's Keith Plater. I work as a cashier at the local Poke Mart. I've kept my head down for years, even now that the Galactic building has gone silent.
These days, I usually take walks in the Eterna Forest to calm my head- usually with my Leafeon, Jen. There's nothing around us but the wind whistling through the trees, the soft rustle of Pokemon in tall grass, the gentleness of the woods- so peaceful, so calm, quiet as the grave. Nothing at all like the lively hustle and bustle of Eterna. It's cool and dark too, and the leafy canopy overhead casts intricate shadows across the ground.
I carefully kneel down and scratch Jen behind the ears, and she purrs like a kitten. A Leafeon's cry is musical and alive to my ears, fills me with something soft and fluffy- and for a moment, I look around the woods and it seems brighter, greener, warmer- but the moment quickly passes. The cool air's refreshing against my skin, and the silence of the woods is more soothing than any music. Green, but not too colorful- that's the way I like it.
The sky's growing dark, the wind's starting to pick up a bit, and I can hear some of the wilder beasts of the forest beginning to stir. I tug on Jen's leash gently, and we head back through the forest towards Eterna. The canopy's shadows always create an intricate pattern, like ice-crystal lattices that form during the winter. Even these winds of autumn are brisk and penetratingly cold, though, and we hurry back. But as we approach the mouth of the forest, I slow my pace and glance towards the Old Chateau... because I think I can see a light flickering from one of its windows. There it is again. Thrice fast, thrice slow, thrice fast... and now it's gone.
The Old Chateau... It's this old, creepy mansion that was built and lived in about sixty years ago, until the owners supposedly died of influenza a few decades later. I don't know much about it, except that my sister was part of a team about five years ago that was supposed to renovate the building- but the renovation team ran into too many problems, and the project was eventually called off.
Tess once mentioned a strange phenomenon about the electricity... diverted currents... phantom pathways... self-inversing polarity... I wish I understood her explanation better. It was her last project before her death.
I haven't thought about the chateau in years. But tonight, I feel drawn to it, as if some part of my sister might still be lurking there. The mysterious light inside the mansion... Was it that phenomenon?
Jen hisses as I approach the the mansion's front fence, her leaves and fur bristling and her paws digging into the turf- straining against her collar. Great, she doesn't want to go in, and I'm wasting daylight struggling against her. Sighing, I tie her leash to the old fence in front, then carefully slip through the hole in the wall where the wooden gate used to stand.
The moment I pass the fence, something feels off. The front yard has long become wild tangles of untamed grass that brush my thighs, and the ground is crunchy with cast-off Kricketot shells- but there are no Kricketots here, or any other Pokemon that I can hear. The walls of the mansion up ahead are weathered and peeling with faded red paint, casting uneven shadows across the ground as I shuffle towards the front doorstep. The eerie windows stand out from the rest of the building, with their violet curtains that seem to glow as the sun sets, gently rippling like a tattered dress. I have a sense of cold dread, like seeing a black widow dangling in midair.
Finally, fear gets the best of me, and I stop dead in my tracks. I scan my surroundings with both ears and eyes for anything else that might be skulking around- I flinch at an odd sound from behind, then relax as I realize it's just Jen mewing and trying to get away. I swallow, though my throat's growing bone-dry. "Come on... ghosts aren't real," I mutter, willing myself to move. I take a deep breath, and take three forced steps forward until I'm up against the old house's wall. Feeling numb, I sidle my way towards the door, slowly pushing its wooden surface open with a creak.
The moment I step inside, I notice the faint odor of some leaking vapor from deeper in the old house, and a chilly breeze whistles past me. Inside, the air's almost as cold as a refridgerator, and I can hear the skittering of Spinaraks and tiny Weedles across the floor. It should be pitch-black inside, with the crystalline chandelier and the candle-holders long gone dark. But I can just barely make out the faintest outlines of the room, as if the entire chateau's interior itself is glowing ever so subtly- but without really glowing at all.
My eyes follow the faded gray carpet up the foyer's two staircases, thick with layers of dust. The oily smell steadily grows stronger as I venture deeper into the house. Colonies of Gastlys have thrived well in this rich, gaseous air, and I can all but see the faintest outlines of their eerie spherical heads in the far corners of the dark hall. There's two staircases that lead up from the foyer's first floor to the second, both symmetrical in appearance and eight feet high. My palms are growing slick with sweat, every floorboard creaking beneath my shoes, every step I take like the throb of a beating heart. And though the layer of dust that's settled in the five years since the renovation team seems undisturbed, I feel as if there's another prescence lurking nearby. Everything- from the grandfather clock in the corner, to the gilded banisters- seems to be watching me.
There's four doors in the foyer that I can see, not counting the front doors. There's a door up near the top of each stairway on opposing sides of the room, a third door between the two staircases, and then a fourth up on the far side of the foyer's second floor, its door frame cut into the once-ornate wallpaper. I carefully ascend the left-hand stairs and approach the door in the west wall, taking care not to disturb the Gastlys floating in the room and doing my best to ignore the eerie oil paintings that hang on the walls.
The door opens easily with a shudder, revealing a storeroom with about thirty stacked cardboard boxes lining hte walls. There's also a small gilded tray resting on one of the boxes in the middle of the room, offering a small palm-sized rectangular object wrapped in yellow wax paper. When I unwrap it, it looks like a bar of chocolate.. except that it's colored a dark violet. When I notice the bone-dry bite marks out of one corner, I nearly retch and hastily set the candy bar down, hurrying out of the room. Ugh, disgusting. To think that there had been a bar of chocolate just laying there for more than thirty or fourty years, rotting away until it had turned purple.
In my haste, I completely forget about the Gastlys in the foyer and slam the door shut, riling up the mysterious fog. Rattled, the eerie pests begin flitting around the room in a wild panic, filling the air with a obscuring haze of black and violet that makes me gag. As I wait for the vapor and the Gastlys to settle down, I glance down at my watch- only ten minutes have passed since I entered. This mysterious haze is thick and violet, not transparent the way it should be.
I've still found no sign of that mysterious light source, and it can't be a power surge, because my sister wouldn't have been on that team at all if the power lines hadn't eroded away. Crawling on my hands and knees so as to not disturb the swarm again, I make my way towards the door at the far back. Scowling at the vapor-cloud that fills the foyer, I proceed through the door and close it behind me.
I'm standing in the center of a long hallway now, and there's four doors on the other side of the passage. Maybe, they used to be bedrooms once. Like the foyer, this hallway is as visible as if the walls were glowing- but again, they aren't glowing at all. I approach the first door and try to open it- it won't budge. I peek into the next door, and there's not much inside but a bed and some drawers that are empty. There's also an odd purple poster on the opposite wall, seeming to stare at me solemnly with its beady red eyes and its crude teeth. These people sure had some weird tastes. Shrugging, I turn to leave the room.
A tingle of panic runs down my spine as I touch the doorknob. I feel as if I'm being watched, almost like being caught in a car's headlights late at night. Frowning, I glance around the bedroom again- but there's nothing that could be watching me, except for that scary purple poster. Feeling thoroughly mystified, I return to the hallway and close the door behind me securely. "Ghosts aren't real," I mutter again, trying the next door.
In the third bedroom, I see the usual furniture- but this time there's a television set up against the far wall, cold and dead. For some reason, the TV gives me goosebumps, even though it's long-dead without any reception or electricity to feed it. But there's something alluring about this screen, too- something mystical that leaves me staring at its dark-blue surface, searching it for answers like a crystal ball. At one point in time, I think I can see a flicker of life play across the screen for the briefest moment. But it's completely dead.
Suddenly, I hear footsteps somewhere, and I finally look away from the TV, frowning. It sounds like it's coming from the fourth bedroom- it sounds like someone in slippers, perhaps, a young female voice humming to herself. I think I hear her door groaning open, the girl exiting her room, and the door quietly closing again. Frowning, I leave the TV room and return to the hallway again- but there's no sign of that girl now, and the fourth bedroom door is locked. Odd. Is there someone else in the chateau, or is my mind just playing tricks on me?
I glance at my watch again- twenty minutes have passed since I entered the house, and Jen must be losing her mind out in the forest. I leave the hallway and return to the foyer, again forgetting to not stir up the Gastlys as I slam the door shut. Coughing and spluttering through the clouds and the swarms, I approach the door on the far right, feeling the old velvety carpet beneath me as the hissing creatures float overhead.
As I touch the doorknob, I nearly soil myself, and I can feel my pulse rocketing. The metal doorknob is faintly warm to the touch, as if someone had tried to open it recently- and I can make out the vague outlines of shoeprints on the carpeting just in front of the doorway. Someone really is in here, or at least was here, maybe a burglar. The door's locked and I can't get in, and I'm beginning to hope the burglar is long gone- when suddenly, I hear footsteps coming from the room on the first floor. Oh, no, the burglar must still be here!
As if my mind hasn't already gone numb with silent panic, the Gastlys above me cackle quietly. I hear the other intruder talking to himself, and his voice carries an oddly refined Kalosian accent that sends chills down my spine for some reason that I can't fathom. I lay down and press my ear to the carpet and listen closely to the mysterious man down below. It sounds like he's wearing black polished shoes, carefully pacing around the room in a slow but deliberate circle, his footsteps in eerily perfect rhythm.
The intruder is muttering something about food and drink as he walks around the room, mentioning 'Madames' and 'Sirs' and all sorts of fancy titles under his breath. Frowning, I can hear the 'chink' of china platters and glasses on a wooden table, occasionally followed by a 'pop' and a flowing sound that makes me think of a someone pouring wine. Maybe that's a dining room, he's hungry, and he's getting himself food? But why would anyone want to eat food that's been lying around in this house for decades? Eating twigs and berries in the forest outside would be safer, even with the high risk of disease.
The footsteps stop, I hear him turn around smoothly, and he begins to mutter in more urgent tones- almost as if he's talking to himself. Great, I'm stuck in an abandoned house in the woods with some ghostly household pests and a schizophrenic. Then I hear him rushing out of the room into the foyer, though I can't see him because the Gastlys still haven't frigging settled down yet. Uh-oh! I can hear him coming up the left staircase! His voice is clearer now- he's calling someone's name in that odd foreign accent; it sounds like he's calling for someone named Toby. Shoot, he must've somehow realized that someone else was inside, or maybe he has an accomplice hiding around somewhere! I can't let these intruder catch me, no matter what.
Swallowing, I race down the right-hand stairs, only catching a brief glimpse of the man's long black coattails and balding gray hair as he vanishes into the cloud on the other side of the foyer. Kalosian accent and fancy clothing? What's going on here? I rub my eyes with a sigh. The fumes must be getting to me, because I can't hear or see the intruder anymore. I may as well check out the room on the first floor between the stairs- sure enough, it's a dining room.
A cool breeze blows through a window as I enter through the open doorway, revealing a glimpse of twilight beyond the tattered violet curtains. Something's wrong here- the dishes that the man was setting out are all still there, but they're not scattered at random the way a burglar searching for valuables would have gathered them. They're laid out as if the man was preparing the table for dinner. Even stranger, the plates, silverware, linen napkins- all of those things are coated with a thick layer of dust. The wine glasses are all empty and dry to the touch, even though I heard the man pouring out wine. I can see the wine bottles he used, but they're all dusty too. The entire room looks as if it hasn't been disturbed for a long time.
My heart skips a beat- I feel clammy all over, chilled to the bone, my pulse tingling and shivering as I glance around the room, taking in the Spinarak-web-strewn surroundings with a much more sinister light. Every shadow seems to conceal a hideously glowing face. I bolt out of the old dining room and back into the foyer, my heart racing a mile a minute. "Ghosts don't exist," I repeat to myself again and again as I run up to the front door and lean against it, gasping for breath as if I'd run a marathon. I must've just been imagining things. Ghosts aren't real- I know that for a fact.
Taking a deep breath, I head back to the bedroom hallway to go look for the other intruder. To my surprise, the first and fourth doors are now unlocked. The first bedroom has no clues to either the intruders or the light from the mansion, but it does have five cardboard boxes on the floor that used to hold conventional appliances. Inside the fourth bedroom, the walls aren't even glowing-without-actually-glowing-at-all. It's completely pitch black, the way an old house without electricity should be. And even though that odd effect was nice to have in the rest of the house, I feel a bit relieved that there's nothing supernatural about this room.
Then I accidentally get a static tingle as my hand touches a metal railing on the wall, just barely illuminating the room for the briefest moment. I catch a glimpse of a leather-bound journal laying on a desk nearby. Picking up the book, I leave the dark room behind me and flip through the journal- there's a name on the front, Sandy. I curiously eyeing the flowery cursive words written in faded graphite. One odd entry on a random page catches my eye, and I read it aloud to myself:
"The TV seems to turn on at random times of the night. Daddy says he doesn't know how or why that happens. Sometimes I hear voices at night from that TV, and it scares me. I hope he sends Alain to town to fix the TV soon..."
Then, at the bottom of the page, in misshapen letters: "Don't forget about me."
Was this what I'd seen in the forest? A mysterious TV that seemed to come to life on its own? Logically, that's impossible, but perhaps it's related to that phenomenon...
I decide to go check out the TV room again before I leave. My watch says that thirty minutes have passed- there's maybe five minutes left of sunlight. I return to the hallway and open the third door- ...oh my god.
The TV is no longer dead. The entire screen's flashing blue before my eyes, illuminating the entire bedroom. Words in bold white text are slowly ascending from the bottom of the screen like credits rolling up at the end of a movie, the walls all around me and the floor beneath the TV all seem to be creaking as if the screen is rocking back and forth. I stare at the words that play across its surface, not comprehending what it might be doing, but gripped by some unnamed fear.
"TOBIAS ELKWOOD
MARY ELKWOOD
DREW ELKWOOD
SANDRA ELKWOOD"
It isn't until the fourth line of words begins to appear that I realize the words are names. With a jolt, I make the connection between the fourth name- Sandra- and the owner of the journal I found in the little girl's bedroom- Sandy. The chill in the room grows deeper and deeper, the corners of the room more and more sinister as I stare at the screen. Were these these the names of the people who lived in this house? What's going on?
ALAIN ISOLE
Alain... Sandra's diary suggested he had been a servant of some sort. I suddenly remember the Kalosman from the dining room- he hadn't been an intruder after all... he'd been the Elkwoods' butler. Oh god... but this couldn't be true. Ghosts weren't real! They weren't! Shuddering for breath, I glance back at the television screen. It's writing out more names now, perhaps other servants to the Elkwoods...
CHARON CHRISTY
That name sends a chill down my spine... In a flash, I remember a purple-haired man wearing the G logo, standing in front of that mysterious office building. Were they connected? But then comes the final name- and it steals my breath away, freezes my every thought and wipes it all away.
TERESA PLATER
The entire house rumbles. Sandra's diary falls from my hand and lands on the floor by my feet. My entire body has gone numb with horror, all my fears banished and forgotten and replaced with grief. Tess didn't die because of any stupid Galactic outpost! Whatever was lurking inside this television, it was pure evil. It killed the family of this house, killed all the servants- and somehow, I knew it killed my sister too. Oh my god- oh my god- oh my god-
"Who are you? What did you do to my sister?" I croak hoarsely, staring at the television, slowly regaining awareness of my surroundings. This room- this house- it doesn't seem so scary anymore, neither the spider webs nor the eerie shadows. "Answer me! What'd you do?!"
The names on the television flickers, then the screen shows Tess on that day five years ago when she and the other surveyors investigated the Old Chateau. Sinking to my knees, I watch through tears as my sister and the team glances around the foyer. I watch Tessr pick up the candy bar, unwrap it, and then nearly fling it away- just as I had.
She hears the footsteps of Sandy's ghost and then calls to the others, who are all still on the first floor. I watch as she examines the dining room and catches a glimpse of A's ghost, who walks past the table towards the cupboards on the left side of the room and vanishes. I see her entering the TV room, five years ago, examining the television screen with a frown.
Onscreen, something shoots out of the television as Tess touches the TV, knocking her back. She gasps as this 'something'- all that I can see is a cloud of blue sparks- flies around the room. My sister quickly pulls on her rubber gloves, cursing herself for not having them on already. Then this- 'thing'- it flies at her, and she yells.
The entire screen flickers and goes hazy. I hear an eerie sound that sounds like radio static. Then, the image slowly refocuses itself, and I see Tess at home, reading a newspaper and sitting on the couch. She looks two years older now, just like the day she died.
My sister walks over to the window and opens it to get some fresh air. The camera- or whatever it is- zooms in on the window, which faces the Team Galactic building that stands next door to her. I see a tiny window that looks like it might be in the basement opening. Then, that ominous cloud of blue sparks emerges from the basement and floats into Tess' house.
My fingers dig into the carpet, my breath still. I see Tess blink and turn around towards the mysterious nebula. As she sees the sparks, the newspaper falls from her hands, and she screams as the camera feed fizzles and dies.
I'm screaming too- no, not screaming- a terrible hoarse sound comes from my throat as I grip the carpet more tightly, transfixed. Every fiber of my being wants to hit the terrible television and smash it to pieces, to reach back in time and save Tess. But nothing I do will bring my sister back, and that horrible fact claws at my insides- the television looms all the more sinisterly.
The black-and-white haze on the screen slowly clears, then reverts to the list of names in white. Slowly, as if typed, white text begins to scroll across the screen again below my sister's name. Blood is pounding in my head and ears as it adds a new name to its long record of victims:
KEITH PLATER
I hear it again, the sound like radio static, except it's a bit more musical and clearer than that. Clinging to the floor, I hear the static cry five times in a row. The image on the TV dies completely, and at long last, a mysterious creature emerges from the demonic glass screen.
EXPERIMENT 209: ROTOM
I stare at the orange light-bulb-shaped body with its two blue lightning-bolt rotors, gazing with beady electric-blue eyes at me. "Roootom!" screeches the tiny body. I jump to my feet, quickly backing away towards the door. This is the demon that killed my sister, this neon-bulb poltergeist that lives within a TV. This is the murderer! This!
I pick up Sandra's diary and swat at Rotom, but the tiny creature shoots around me and jabs its rotors into my shoulder. A painful shock runs up my arm, and I scream even as I fall to the floor, swiping at it again and again. "Bzzzt!" it chirps, darting in and electrocuting my knee, unleashing painful flame up and down the limb.
Howling in pain, swiping at Rotom, crawling out of the room, I claw my way out into the hallway. The demonic little gremlin laughs and flies into a fan at the far end of the hallway. With a click, it transforms until it has a head like a fan with two revolving wind-rotors, blasting me with thick gusts of air that rip at my jacket as I struggle towards the foyer door. Desperate, I fling the book at the fan-Rotom and jam its turbines, sending it collapsing to the floor with angry chirps and beeps.
As the Rotom struggles to extract itself from the fan, I hobble on one good leg with one good arm and a wind-sheared jacket coated in Spinarak webs. My jumbled mind tries to make sense of everything as I stumble towards the stairs. The images and the sounds, all caused by Rotom. Ghosts are not real. But Rotom remembers them all, as perfectly as the day it slew the family of the Old Chateau.
Suddenly, the locked right-hand door flies open to reveal Rotom in what appears to be a washing machine. Burbling with glee, it streaks off towards the front door and slams it shut just as I reach the foot of the stairs. Before I can do anything, Rotom's door swings open and spits hydraulic bursts of soap and water at me. Screaming as the hot wash-water splashes on my skin, I crawl back into the dining room as the Wash-Rotom flies after me. I stumble up onto one foot as feeling slowly begins to tingle back into my arm, though the place where I was jabbed are still painful.
As the Wash-Rotom lunges at me, another batch of soap and water churning in its chamber. I grab several of the dusty plates and jam them all into the chamber just as the door opens, then try to slam Rotom's door shut again on itself. I can hear all the plates shattering in the washing machine's chamber, the fragments gumming up the drainage and causing backflow. Squealing, Rotom collapses on its back with a tremendous crash, going from hot wash and cold rinse to cold wash and hot rinse in seconds.
It glares at me as it floats out of the now-useless washing machine and enters the refridgerator in the far corner. I jump up onto a chair to dash across the table and towards the dining room entrance, but Rotom quickly shoots towards the door on its refridgerator wheels and blocks off the door. Gulping, I quickly jump back down and duck behind the chair as both freezer and refridgerator doors are flung open, unleashing a fierce blast of icy air that coats the table and chairs and walls all around me in a thick layer of ice. Wine bottles shatter all around me as their contents freeze, forcing the glass bottles to burst as Rotom's doors slam back shut again.
Breathing hard, I see a candlebra lying on the floor nearby. Did Alain leave it here, all those years ago before Rotom killed him? No matter. I grab the candlebra like a trident and slam it into the refridgerator's coolant tubes as Rotom flings its doors open again, bashing them again and again until they spill their icy coolant fluid everywhere, rendering it useless. Thank god for all the warning labels on the Eterna City Poke Mart wares, or I'd never have figured out any of this on my own.
As a furiously cursing Rotom flies out of the refridgerator to go find some other terrible toy to kill me with, I get next to the refrigerator and bash at the unit with the candlebra repeatedly until the old tool breaks. Damn it. Gritting my teeth, I put my shoulder against the refridgerator and push as hard as I can, trying to block out all the eager chirps of Rotom phasing into what appears to be a microwave oven. Finally it budges just enought to let me out of the dining room, and I flee into the foyer. Behind me, Rotom and its new microwave oven are humming ominously as a fireball gathers inside the oven.
It rings, the door flings open, and the fireball shoots just over my head and hits an oil paining. Another ring, another fireball, and the banisters on either side of me explode into flame. As I race across the floor and reach the front doors, I glance back over my shoulder to see an even larger fireball in Rotom's chamber as it rubs its oven mitt hands together in maniacal laughter. No time to waste! I shove the door open and flee into the late evening air, slamming the Old Chateau's front door on Rotom for good.
My chest heaves for breath as I stumble forward into a patch of moonlight, every part of my body fatigued and sore from running for my life. I can't believe I'm free, free at last! Tess... I want to cry for my sister, grieve for her as I muddle through the overgrown grasses, limping and gasping and groaning all at once. Half-crying, half-laughing, I glance up towards the sky, gazing into the luminous full moon that rises overhead. It's late and I need to get home.
But it's not over. I'm halfway to the front gate when I suddenly hear an ominous grinding sound like the revving of a chain saw from behind the house. Battered, terrified, weary, I slowly turn around to stare as Rotom comes charging out from the side of the house in a lawn mower, chugging along with a vicious smile. "Ohmygod! Don't you ever give up?!" I scream, hobbling faster towards the front gate as Rotom rushes at me like a racecar. I'm almost there-
The lawn mower smashes into me from behind. At once, my knees buckle beneath me, and I topple to the ground with a howl of pain. Rolling over onto my back, I stare as Mow-Rotom backs up several feet, cackling like a madman on its insane wheels.
"AlL I wANted was a fRIEND, a VISitor, a trICk-or-trEATer," screeched Rotom through the roar of the lawn mower, its eyes burning electric blue. "sOMEOne who woULd STAy and plAY! NEVer lET Me ruST! BUt NO! YOu wALkeD aWAY! rEJECted mY GIft! JuST lIKe yoUR sISter!"
My throat goes dry as I stare at Rotom. The front flap of the lawn mower flips up, revealing a series of viciously whirling blades emerging from the machine's face. "Do yOU KNow HoW yOU wILl DIe?" screamed Rotom, its blades rapidly whirling like tornadoes that chewed up the grass and earth all around it. "NoT rADIaTiON poISoNiNG, thAT'S FOr suRE... ahahaHAHA!"
Crawling back on my but, I shriek as Rotom charges at me with the whirling blades, preparing to be mowed down into hamburger by a half-crazed ghost at dead of night.
Suddenly, a pair of leaf blades streak through the air and embed themselves in the heart of Rotom's motor in a cross, thoroughly gutting the lawn mower and stopping it dead in its tracks. I stare blankly as the X-Scissor attack cuts both Rotom and its body to bits, the murderous poltergeist falling to the ground with a final scream before its neon body dissapates into mist.
"Leaaa." I don't believe it. Padding through the front gate as if nothing had happened is my Leafeon, her leash severed with a leaf blade as she smiles slyly at me. "Jen?" I whisper as panic and terror lifts from me. Laying still in the grass, feeling utterly drained, I let soothing moonlight wash over me as Jen approaches me. Slowly, I sit up, flinching as I invoke one of the injuries Rotom gave me, smiling down at my Pokemon. "I... I... Jen... you saved me..."
I wrap my arms around her, and together we gaze up towards the full moon that ascends above the Old Chateau. We hug each other closer as a cold breeze blows past us, Keith and Jen, human and Leafeon, Trainer and Pokemon. But my thoughts aren't with my Pokemon tonight. Tonight, the ghost who killed my sister has been vanquished, and if anything of her was restless because of that, all of Teresa Plater has been set to rest. And so I gaze up in the sky and smile for the spirit of my sister Tess, a soul lifted to heaven on that dark night.
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