Disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon or anything involving the overall franchise. I do however own several characters and a good deal of mythos that will be introduced throughout this story.

A/N: Yay, a Pokemon story! For all Zenkyoshi readers, this is a certain character's backstory. For all non-Zenkyoshi readers, this is merely a standalone tale of two friends as they try to figure out what in the world is going on around them. This story is intended to take place in a version of the Pokemon anime universe. Primarily Kanto.

Well, here is the start. Enjoy!

Mew Heart and Shade's Touch

1 - Fate

Shor Vintell remembered darkness, pouring rain, flashes of lightning. He remembered two people sitting in the front, both speaking in soft, caring adult voices. He remembered the pattering of heavy droplets outside, the warmth within, and the hum of the car's motor as they traveled.

He couldn't remember the actual crash.

The memories blurred together. Screams, vertigo, a burst of light and flame. A screech of twisting metal, smashing of glass. Sharp pain in his left arm. Then silence.

In the direct aftermath, it marveled him how much the adults tried to shelter him from the reality. But he already knew it. Even at that very young age, he somehow knew that his parents would never return. Their souls had left for the unseen realm beyond. They and their pokémon were, to put it bluntly, dead. All taken from the realm of the living in the same accident.

He found it very funny and a bit confusing that the adults were spooked by him.

He looked normal enough; tousled brown hair, blue eyes, a sturdy frame and healthy glow, as the matron said. But the other children at the orphanage found him strange. He acted out to make up for it, being loud and boisterous while trying to act as normal as possible. But he never shied away from his affinity for ghosts and the dead. He was proud of it. He could make sense of what others couldn't, understood distraught pokémon when no one else could. So what if kids stayed away from him? So what if the older kids shoved him around, called him names, made fun of him for being the ghost boy?

The matron had only smiled, comforting him. "Never forget who you are," she had told him. "Be proud of the gifts you have."

She was the one who introduced him to pokémon battling. She had been a Master in her younger days.

It became his greatest dream.

He watched videos, live broadcasts, and even visiting trainers in the town. He read books, studied strategy, all while living days of traveling and fighting in his head. It all acted as an escape from the names and whispers of the other kids, but at the same time helped him remember that the older he became, the closer he was to starting his own journey.

It helped that his parents had been renowned trainers as well.

Sometimes he wondered if that was why he survived the accident. Whether by some lucky mistake or the thread of fate, he was alive. He was grateful for that. And he would continue to live.

He was older now, but memories of that day were still fresh even if seven years had passed. He remembered every day he awoke in the orphanage and looked at the scars on his left arm. He remembered every time he looked at his trainer's license, felt the pokéballs at his hip, and hoped he was honoring his parents' memory.

He was going to become a Pokémon Master. He would lead a team to victory, and he'd prove that he could be the greatest trainer of them all. He'd show everyone back at the orphanage. He'd make the matron proud. And he would do it all with the help and support of the pokémon with him, with their friendship and strength.

It was a long road, but Shor was more than ready. This was his life, and he would be the one who wrote his own fate.

Nicole Wang remembered darkness, pouring rain, flashes of lightning. She remembered tall, unfriendly people, shouting in loud angry voices. She remembered water drenching her clothes, mud squelching beneath her bare feet, and the echoing chorus of gunfire and animal cries.

She couldn't remember how she got there.

There had been a hole. She remembered that. There was bright blue light, falling, and then abrupt blackness and cold. And then suddenly came the wind, with the sky pouring down on top of her and tall dark trees looming everywhere around her.

There had been loud shots nearby, in tandem with the sounds of angry men and monsters. She had run away, tripping over tree roots and scraping her hands and knees while leaves and low-hanging branches whipped her face, but the sounds were always there. She was soaked, lost, afraid, and she screamed for her mother and father, but they never came.

Then the creatures had appeared.

In hindsight, she wondered why she had been so afraid of them.

She didn't remember how they had gotten back to her home, only that her parents were baffled and didn't want them to stay. She did remember Charmander defending her, tiny and orange in his attempted ferocity. She remembered Scyther standing by her in the darkness of that forest, just out of her first molt and wielding little blades. A tail flame warming the three frightened younglings as they hid beneath giant leaves. They told her of scary men with metal tubes that shot fire. A couple years later, she could accurately tell them that those were called guns.

Their existence with her changed everything. She learned their strengths and weaknesses, control and nature. They picked up on things humans said and did when she couldn't, and taught her how to tell what people wanted or expected, even if from a nonhuman perspective. People yelled at her a lot less and were nicer when she took their lessons to heart.

She took care of them, no matter what they needed. She snuck them out when they needed a night in the forest, gave them food and taught them how to live amongst humans. They behaved well, and her parents let them stay. They still had to hide when guests came over though.

But really, they were her closest friends. She still had trouble making friends at school, and her siblings were too far apart from her to play like she wanted. These two pokémon were an inexplicable part of her life, and somehow they had come from that dark forest to live with her.

She was older now, but seven years had not dimmed the reality of that night.

She still wondered what that place was. She had been a pale, black-haired little girl, gaining no impression other than what the terror of that night had brought. Charmander and Scyther had been too young to recall it other than as the forest they were born in, with lots of other pokémon. They had described what they could, and what of their families they could remember, but they had lived nearly all their lives with her. They were content. She was too, but that didn't stop her curiosity.

But for now, she had enough in her life. School, homework, flute lessons, chores, whatever other tasks her mom wanted her to do. As long as she could keep going, day after day with her dear friends, she knew she would enjoy whatever time they spent together.

Nicole had no mind for the future. She just wanted to get by, live each day as it came, and arise to greet each new one. Whatever fate had for her, she would meet it with ready, welcoming hands.

Somewhere in a void beyond, a singular presence waited.

It was at home in the darkness of absence, enclosed and insular as it was. That realm was nothing yet everything, and for one such as itself, this was where it had come into being. It became. It grew. And in time, it would escape to a realm filled with life, in order to feed on that vitality. Worlds would fall to its presence. And from it, it would beget more like it.

Once upon a time, there had been many. Guardians of the worlds felled them. Now it was the last.

One day, it would no longer be alone.

It lay in wait for its promised day.