The Four Mirrors
Sequel to 'Legacies'
By MMM/AJ

A/N: This chunk is specifically dedicated to all of my fans who were saddened by Tanis's death. I'm glad that you loved him so much, and I'm sorry that I had to kill him off like that. Don't worry though, he might get a few sporadic re-appearances again in the future as a spirit, much like Mewtwo and Ai have done over the course of the whole trilogy.

Chapter XVII – OIV

Medical science has made amazing leaps and bounds both during and after the reign of Ares. During his rule, Ares made it a priority to carefully study the physiology of their race. His scientists used the most advanced scanning equipment and super-computers to map the nervous system down to every single neuron in an attempt to better understand their psychic powers. Their cybernetics department benefited tremendously as a side effect. With every single nerve fiber mapped all the way to their input location in the brain, scientists were able to hook artificial implants up to the nervous system with such accuracy that these implants could send sensory input to the brain just like a normal limb. The results were prosthetics with pressure and temperature sensors that could nearly perfectly mimic the touch sensing abilities of normal limbs.

The first thing that came to Opulous as he crept into consciousness was a set of terrible searing pains all over his body. His face, shoulder, and tail all screamed at him at once, almost like they had been crushed. He felt as if he had died and been dragged down into the pits of hell for torture, except that his eyes were still closed tightly and he couldn't see anything.

Then the pain began to slowly fade away, it was replaced by a soothing wave of cool relief that seemed to come out of nowhere. For a few moments, a soothing numbness filled his left side, causing a respite in the tenseness of his muscles. Next he felt a strange tinny feeling in his left arm and tail. It was an indescribable, unfamiliar feeling that was almost like a chilled tingling, but it didn't tickle at all.

Then he realized something on top of all this, he was floating suspended in liquid! He opened his eyes and immediately recognized the inside of one of the medical capsules in his father's med-lab. He also immediately noticed a funny quality in his vision, almost like a thin light blue filter on a camera lens. He blinked his left eyes, and the blue went away for a moment. He lifted his left arm up to feel his face and what he saw made a spurt of adrenaline course through his system in shock. He had a cybernetic arm! His regular flesh and blood arm was gone, replaced by cold, smooth steel. He tried to turn his head to see where it melded with his body, but monitoring wires attached to his head and body restricted his movement. His breath quickened, but oxygenated liquid moved much more sluggishly than air and it made him feel like he was suffocating. He began to thrash around inside the capsule in panic, and his tail struck the glass wall and broke right through it.

The oxygenated life support fluid quickly drained out of the hole that Opulous' tail had made, and the drains in the bottom of the capsule opened up as the whole thing performed an emergency shutdown. Opulous spewed the fluid out of his lungs and coughed violently to expel the last few remnants of it as the doors of the capsule swished open. He fell to the floor of the capsule, still hacking up more of the fluid, and heard the dull clack of metal on concrete when he caught himself with his new arm.

"Opulous, are you alright?" Melicia's voice said out of the blue.

Opulous looked up and saw Melicia hurrying across the room towards him. He noticed something bizarre and slightly unnerving in his vision, there was some sort of readout above her head when he looked at her! Vital signs like pulse and temperature blinked above her, and a little reticule-like object pointed at her. She reached down to help him up, and he reached up and pawed at the air where he saw it.

"What's wrong?" Melicia asked, seeing him waving his new steel hand in the air near her head.

"I see something…almost like a phantom sensor readout hovering over you…" Opulous said quietly.

Opulous blinked forcefully a few times, and the readout disappeared. "Now it's gone!" he added.

"That must be a function of your new cybernetic eye." Melicia said.

"New cybernetic eye?" Opulous whispered in shock.

Melicia gestured towards the glass of a nearby capsule, and Opulous walked over and stared in awe at his reflection. A whole third of his face was gone on the left side, replaced by a sleek layer of light blue steel. The metal had been molded to match the shape of the face nearly perfectly. It was segmented to appear fluid and organic, almost like reptile scales except larger and less regular in shape. His left eye was gone as well; it had been replaced by a cybernetic one that was the same shape and color as his original eye. It was made from delicate glass lenses and a mildly glowing purple pupil made of the finest flexible silk-steel. He could see it move and adjust as he focused, and when he blinked he saw an eyelid made of the same smooth silk-steel close over it. He also caught a glimpse of his tail in the reflection and saw that it too had been removed and replaced with a robotic version.

Opulous brought his tail around and stared at it intently, now more fascinated by the amazing technology than scared or shocked. His new tail was segmented too, made from rings of interlocking steel. He looked specifically in between each of these rings and studied the joints, which were made of powerful yet flexible bands of silk-steel that apparently acted like muscles. This gave him the exact same range of motion that he had had before; it was a miracle of technology that he had only read about before. Barely visible along the length of the artificial tail, several small blue LED lights glowed from inside like runways.

"This is amazing!" Opulous said in a hushed voice as he flexed his new limbs, which barely made any kind of noise.

"Aren't you upset that you lost your real limbs?" Melicia asked, looking confused and upset.

"Not really." Opulous replied, fascinated by the flexibility of the robotic appendages. "But what happened to them anyway?"

Melicia looked away suddenly, staring down at the floor with fresh tears in her eyes. Opulous suddenly noticed that her eyes were bleary, damp and red from recent sobbing, and the readout appeared over her head indicating a quickened pulse and increasing stress levels. He walked up to her and tried to look her in the eye.

"What's wrong? What happened?"

Melicia squeaked in sorrow, her voice cracking a few times before she spoke. "A bunch of human ships attacked us. They carpet-bombed out entire yard, destroying the house and all the bunkers except this one."

Opulous felt as if his blood had frozen in his veins, at least in the still organic ones anyway. He grasped Melicia's shoulder tightly with his organic arm and asked "What happened to the others then? Where is father? The brothers?" he demanded.

"Cygnus got caught with shrapnel and nearly died from a punctured heart, but we managed to get him to one of these capsules in time. Venius, Nolus, and my sisters and I made it through unharmed, but…"

"But what of my father and your mother?"

"They're both dead." Melicia choked as more sobs welled up in her.

Opulous let go of Melicia and stood these dumbfounded, trying to comprehend the loss. She reached up and clamped her arms around him, seeking comfort as the sobs came freely. Opulous returned her hug silently, still shocked silent by what she had said. He couldn't believe father was gone, it felt like he had been talking to him only hours ago before going down to the research bunker to study. It struck him as bewildering, even incredulous that someone could be there one moment, and gone the next. Where was his sense of security, if life could be so cruelly cut short? He felt Melicia's tears running down his shoulder and wondered if his new eye could cry as well. They stood there that way for a long time, sharing their sadness and comforting each other as best as they could

Eventually Opulous broke the mournful silence to speak, "Where are the others now?"

Melicia hacked on the sobs to stop them so she could speak. "They're in…they're out in…Venius took them up into...into the mountains to hide. I v-volunteered to stay here with you…with you until you were well enough t-t-t-to leave the capsule." Melicia stammered incoherently.

"How long have I been in there?" Opulous asked.

"N-n-nearly a day and a half." Melicia said, getting her stutter mostly under control.

Opulous felt awestruck again, he hadn't even known that he had been stuck in there until now. It wasn't like sleep, when you could vaguely feel time passing, even if it was at an accelerated rate. He had been out so cold that it was like he had skipped forward in time.

"You've been in here watching me the whole time?" He asked.

"Yes. The readout on the med-bay kept saying you were in a kind of coma, and it couldn't tell me how long before you woke up. The others brought me food and water yesterday, but Venius says he only has so much stored away in his mountain hideout. He said that if you didn't revive soon, we'd have to leave you behind!" Melicia said with disdain in her voice.

"It's alright, I understand. But please tell me, why was I put in the med-bay instead of psychically healed?"

Melicia frowned. "Those bombs had some kind of horrible energy pulse in them. It burned out the parts of our brains that control psychic energy, leaving all of us powerless. We had to put you and Cygnus in the bays and they gave you the artificial limbs. When Cygnus came out of his med-bay though, he had all his powers back. The machine had performed a very minor surgery on his head too to heal that part of his brain. He then psychically recovered the rest of us so we could regain our abilities too, but by then your new limbs had already been fully attached. The readout warned us not to open your pod before it was done, so I stayed behind to watch you."

Opulous smiled. "Thank you. I suppose we should go back and see the others now?"

Opulous and Melicia walked out of the bunker and flew together up the nearby cliff face towards Venius' hideout. It was dark out now, and the sky was beautifully clear above them. Their home had always been far away enough from any cities to avoid light pollution, but there was something about the crispness of the stars tonight that caught Opulous' eye. He stared up at them and noticed that he could see them with much greater clarity with his new cybernetic eye. He picked a single star out of the thousands and stared at it intently, letting Melicia lead him by the hand. Suddenly his new eye zoomed in considerably on the star as he concentrated on it, acting like some sort of telescope. It zoomed in strong enough for him to see that it wasn't really a star at all, but a large human ship in orbit above them, its engines glowing brilliantly. Again a readout appeared next to it, telling him the size, class, and allegiance of the ship. It was an American carrier, and it was heading east several hundred miles per hour. He watched it until they arrived at the cave entrance, at which point his eye zoomed out back to normal vision.

After crawling through the narrow tunnel at the mouth of the cave, Opulous and Melicia emerged into the main chamber, which had apparently been turned from an impromptu study hideaway into an impromptu home. Opulous had been in the hideout once before when Cygnus and the others had been arrested, and back then it had been sparsely furnished with a comfy armchair and some lighting. Now there were blankets crumpled up everywhere, in corners and against the walls. He saw his brothers and cousins all there, all either sitting or laying down to rest. Venius was lying on a blanket asleep on the floor, Nolus was sitting in the armchair, Cygnus was sitting by the wall, and Tamista and Satoria were standing together talking next to a new mini-fridge. They stopped talking and rushed over when they saw Opulous.

"We thought you might never wake up!" Tamista said, clamping her arms around him.

"You were so badly torn up when we found you! We thought for sure that you would never survive!" Satoria added, hugging him too.

Opulous felt flushed at their expressions of affection, he hugged them back but couldn't think of anything to say.

"Shhh, don't wake Venius." Cygnus said softly, standing from his seat and walking over to them.

The sisters still clung to Opulous, and he noticed something amazing as they did. Both his arms, even the cybernetic ones, could feel them pressing against him.

"Hold on a second…" Opulous said, pushing himself free from their grasp.

The sisters looked slightly hurt at how rough he shoved them, but he was overwhelmed with curiosity. He held his new arm up in front of them and laid his regular one on top of it heavily. Amazingly, he could feel it, just like normally! He tried knocking on his knew arm with his knuckles, and he could feel that too! His curiosity and amazement peaked, so he turned around and slammed his new arm against the stone wall of the cave. Surprisingly it didn't hurt, but he could feel the rough texture of the stone and the pressure with which he had hit it. The others winced painfully and Venius bolted upright in terror.

"They're coming back for us!" Venius cried out, jumping up and running for the cave's exit.

"No Venius, calm down! It was just Opulous!" Cygnus said anxiously, grabbing and restraining Venius to keep him from bowling everyone over on his way to the exit.

"Opulous! I have to save him! I have to…" Venius trailed off. He blinked his bleary eyes a few times and stared around for a few moments. "Oh."

"Nightmare?" Cygnus asked.

"…Yeah." Venius mumbled. "…Good to see you awake again Opulous."

Venius trudged back over to the blankets he had been sleeping in and laid back down silently, having nothing else to say.

"Why did you bang your arm against the wall like that?" Nolus asked curiously. "You didn't dent or scratch your new arm did you?"

Opulous looked at the arm and saw a tiny scratch. "Because I wanted to test something. This is one of those arms dad told us about in science class, it has the same kind of hyper-advanced neural cybernetics that integrate so well with the nervous system, allowing it to feel sensations just as well as a normal arm. And yes, I think I did scratch it a bit." Opulous said.

Cygnus grinned widely and slugged Nolus lightly on his good shoulder. "There's the geek I know and love! Always doing absent-minded experiments at the least appropriate times."

Satoria suddenly clamped onto the both of them in another hug. "I'm so glad, to finally see someone smile again." She said with tears forming in her eyes.

Opulous felt a little awkward, he never really hugged anyone very often, especially not in groups. It was warmly reassuring though, so he returned it as best as he could.

Chapter XVIII – CV

Cygnus stood alongside his brothers and cousins in the diffuse sunlight and looked on sadly as the funeral began. A single, mostly intact slab of concrete had been chosen from the wreckage of their home for the service, and a large heap of branches and kindling had been piled on top of it. Underneath the wood rested the last few remnants of their father, which Opulous had reluctantly dug out from under the rubble. They had all agreed that cremation was the most honorable thing for Tanis, and Cygnus and Opulous had built the pyre together.

Slowly Cygnus stepped forward and raised his hand. A flicker of pyrokinetic flames appeared in his palm, and he lowered them down to touch the tinder. The fire started out small and harmless looking, but quickly spread across the browned leaves and wood to consume as much as it could. Cygnus took a few steps back to his place between Nolus and Venius to watch the fire as it grew. The smoke curled and shuddered as it rose into the sky above their wrecked home, and Cygnus felt tears coming again. He steadied his voice as best as he could before clearing his throat to speak.

"Dad, you were the bravest and most loving person I ever knew." He began, his voice still a little unsteady. "Every day, since I was a little kid and my memories were foggy and unclear, you were there to help me. From the time I broke my knee playing swordfight for the first time, to the time I failed my first exam, you were there to help. I know that I was never really as smart as Opulous and the others, and that must have been a disappointment to you, but you never once turned your back on me when I needed your help. You helped me study, defended me to the last in court when I broke the law in New Saffron City, and even helped me recover after the trauma I endured in their prison."

By now the fire had grown to full size, it burned brighter than what little sunlight was filtering through the thick clouds that filled the sky above them. A bitterly cold autumn wind blew around them; it sent chills along their bodies and made the fire bend over like a penitent monk. What few leaves that remained in the trees fell around them, and Cygnus continued.

"There isn't much I can say to do your memory justice. You did more things in your lifetime than I ever could dream of: battling Ares and saving three different worlds. I know I'll never fill your shoes completely, but I want you to know that I'll try my best. I'm going to live the rest of my life to the fullest and carry you in my memory in the hopes that it will inspire me to do as well as you did. I'll miss you dad, but I know that wherever you are now, it's a better place."

Cygnus looked at his brothers as he finished, and he saw that all of their faces were streaked with tears. Opulous only had one; his robotic eye was incapable of producing them. Melicia had clamped her arms around Opulous again, sobbing openly almost as if she were providing substitute tears for him. Cygnus gestured to them to indicate that it was their turn to pay their respects.

Opulous spoke next. "Dad, you were always a role model to me, and the quality of yours that I admired most was your intelligence. You built everything from an energy channeling system for the Blue River to an antiviral nano-robotic treatment system. I idolized you for it, and for my entire life, I strived to be as intelligent as you. I was always spending my time huddled over my desk, studying into the wee hours of the morning and gobbling up as much knowledge as my mind could hold. But now I realize that maybe it was somewhat of a mistake. I never spent as much time with you as I should have. When you were out playing Holoball or Swordfight with the brothers, I stayed inside to study. Whenever you had one of your music parties, I stayed home to study. I never really was as close to you as the others, and now that you're gone it fills me with pain of regret. I'll never get another chance to play a game of Holoball or anything else with you again."

The fire was beginning to die down a little bit now, and Cygnus felt a few icy raindrops splatter on his head and shoulders. He started to cry like his brothers now, openly and freely, as Opulous continued.

"Cygnus said it well when he talked about your memory though. I'm going to follow his example and carry it around inside my heart and mine for as long as I live. Every great thing about you that inspired me as a child will live on, and every loving thing you ever did for all of us will be remembered."

Opulous bowed his head gently to indicate he was finished. He closed his eyes and all seven of them remained silent for several minutes before Nolus began to speak.

"I don't really have much to say." Nolus said, stuttering slightly. "The others summed it up pretty well I think. But there's more I can add."

Nolus paused a moment as if willing up the courage to say something. "Opulous always admired your intelligence, but what always struck me as your greatest quality was your selflessness. From the beginning you dedicated yourself to helping others as much as you could. You spent so much time and effort helping put a stop to Ares' cruelty, and you never lost sight of the smaller things along the way. You cared for the people whose lives you touched, and you even cared for all the Pokemon you ever met, no matter how insignificant or weak they might have been. When three of Ashley's Pokemon were slaughtered by Ares' Acolytes, you helped her give them a respectful burial and service, when other people might have regarded it as inconsequential. You never ate meat during your life and strived to teach us not to as well. Just like Opulous, I idolized you and vowed to live up to the standard you set.

Nolus paused again. "I remember the time when Venius got attacked by those humans out on the forest trail. I never told you, but I was there listening when you had that terrible fight with Aunt Shakara afterward. I saw the anger that you and she were capable of, and it tore apart my childish visions of your perfection in a heartbeat. It left me terrified that you might get in a fight with her again for many years of my childhood, and many times I tried to put myself between the two of you if you looked like you were getting upset with her. One time you asked me why I did this, and I lied. I told you that I just hated fighting. Though that's not untrue, I was always scared that you might find out that I had eavesdropped on you that night. There was always a part of me that wanted to apologize for it, and now that I've lost my chance, I can only say it now after the fact. I'm sorry Dad."

Nolus finished his speech, and another few minutes of silence followed. It was obviously Venius' turn, but he refused to say anything. The mood of sadness was so heavy upon their hearts though, that they didn't really care whether he said anything. They were all too absorbed in their own mourning to notice.

The rain had begun to intensify now, and the fire quickly died down as it finished burning what was left. Once the fire died, Cygnus used his telekinesis to collect the ashes and gather them into a small golden jar. The jar had been a gift from Kalana, emblazoned with the symbol of the Hylian Royal Family and embossed with a blessing in Hylian script. He sealed the ashes in the jar and led his family across the yard, away from the pyre and toward the rock face west of where the house had stood. They traveled parallel to the cliffs, passing bare trees, until they found what appeared to be an old cave that had been sealed by a lava flow that had cooled and hardened. To the right of the old cave entrance was the memorial that Tanis had built for his father, Mewtwo. It was a single marble pillar with a golden placard on top that read "In dedication to Mewtwo. Father, Mentor, Hero."

Tanis had never told his sons where he wanted to be buried, so they had chosen for him. Somewhere in the depths of this sealed cave laid the sarcophagus where Mewtwo had laid himself to rest. Cygnus handed to jar with Tanis' ashes to Opulous, who was scanning the inside of the cave with his cybernetic eye. After a few moments, Opulous found a satisfactory open area in the cave near Mewtwo's resting place and teleported the jar there. It vanished out of his hands with a tiny blink of blue light, and it finally sunk in for Cygnus that his father was truly gone. He cried again, harder than ever before.

Opulous teleported over a slab of marble from the remains of their old house with another blink of light. He held it in the air in front of them and psychically carved it into a handsome pillar. He firmly anchored the pillar to the ground right beside Mewtwo's memorial as well, and then teleported a chunk of metal over from the ruins as well. They didn't have any sheets of gold to use in Tanis' memorial, so he used a piece of polished steel instead. He psychically affixed it to the top of the pillar and embossed the words "Here lies Tanis. Mentor and guide, liberator and champion. Only ever equaled in greatness by his father."

The group stood silently for several more minutes, each paying their own silent respects. The sanctity of their mourning was interrupted however, by a distant whooshing noise that signaled the approach of a ship. Suddenly panic-stricken, Cygnus turned to scan the skies, and raindrops spattered his face and splashed into his eyes. He couldn't see very much though, with the cliff face filling his vision on one side and the trees on the other.

"Can't you leave us to mourn in peace?" Venius bellowed, now consumed in fresh rage. "Why don't you just leave us alone?!"

The ship finally appeared above them, but it wasn't a military ship of any sort. It was a small unmanned drone, silvery in color and about the size of an albatross. It turned a sharp corner to avoid striking the cliff face and made a few clicking noises before zooming around and vanishing back over the treetops.

"What in the world was that?" said Satoria, her voice tinged with fear.

"It was a spotter drone." Opulous said coldly. "Something has been looking for us, and obviously it just found us."

The seven of them exchanged nervous looks, and Cygnus nodded knowingly. He ran back towards the house and the rest of them followed, adrenaline coursing through all their veins. When they passed the tree line and the ruins of the house came into view, a terrifying sight met their eyes. There were four huge robots digging through the rubble of the bunkers on the other side of the yard, searching for something.

None of them had ever seen anything like the hunter-seekers; they hadn't had any experience with them like Shakara had at the Protectorate Administration Complex. They froze in place and all stared slack-jawed as the hunter-seekers turned to look at them. A moment later, that same little surveillance drone appeared and flew over to the farthest hunter-seeker, whose back opened up to admit it inside. All four of the robots turned to face them now, pointing the barrels of their plasma cannons at them and charging them.

Cygnus suddenly felt sick to his stomach and immediately recognized why; the robots had activated their own psionic disruptors.

"Run for it!" Cygnus yelled at the top of his lungs and dove into the trees.

Cygnus saw the others following around him in his peripheral vision and heard a terrible electric hum as the plasma cannons on the arms of the robots fired. The plasma splashed over the dry tree trunks and immediately ignited them; causing flames to sprout up everywhere they touched like orange flowers. The sizzling of the plasma as it hit the earth was much louder than the popping of the flames though, and the smell of smoke assaulted Cygnus' nose as he ran. He sprinted blindly through the trees, not caring where he ended up as long as it was as far away from those robots as possible.

"This way!" Venius' voice boomed through the trees to Cygnus' left. He immediately changed course to follow.

Cygnus was the first to reach Venius, and the two of them ran together through the bare, whip like branches.

"We've got to get around those 'bots and reach the Sol Blade!" Venius yelled. "I left it inside the bunker!"

"Shakara always kept some energy rifles stored in there too!" Cygnus added.

Together they ran until Venius signaled that they had come around to the proper position. Nolus, Satoria and Opulous caught up with them swiftly and Venius gave the signal for utter silence.

Venius peeked out of the trees and Cygnus followed. They saw that the hunter-seekers were stumping across the lawn towards the trees where they had last been seen, leaving an open path to the bunker. Once the hunter-seekers had vanished into the foliage, the four of them made a break for the bunker.

They made it three-quarters of the way to the bunker entrance before one of the hunter seekers re-emerged from the trees, having sensed their haphazard dash. It fired a cluster of plasma bolts at them, forcing them to leap down the stairwell for cover. Cygnus felt the concrete floor scrape the skin of his elbows and knees violently, and huge bruises appeared in many other places. He scrambled to his feet and dashed across the room towards the little steel cabinet where Shakara always stored spare weapons. The combination of the digital lock slipped his mind as he frantically tapped the buttons. It beeped harshly at him and refused to open.

"Hey Venius, gimme the sword for a second!" Cygnus shouted.

Venius handed him the Sol Blade and he gripped it firmly and took a stout swing at the locking mechanism on the weapons cabinet. It smashed apart with a shower of sparks and several bulky grey energy rifles tumbled out. Cygnus returned the sword to Venius and picked one up. It was extremely heavy and cumbersome; Cygnus knew that it would tire his arms out if he had to lug it around for as long time. He flipped the power switch on and cranked the output knob to maximum, fully aware that it was probably an older model and more prone to overheats.

Venius yelled a string of panicked profanities and Cygnus spun around to see what had elicited them. One of the hunter-seekers was standing at the top of the stairs, blocking the only entrance to the bunker. Its plasma cannons were beginning to glow as it recharged them.

Cygnus did the first thing that came to mind; he pointed his energy rifle at it and fired. But the hunter-seeker's left arm popped open and emitted a beautiful blue dome shield that dispersed the beam easily.

"Come on you stupid sword! Call another meteor!" Venius growled and pointing the Sol Blade at the hunter-seeker, waggling it like a video game controller.

Cygnus saw a flash of movement behind the hunter-seeker and heard a loud crash. Its shield flickered sickly for a moment and its body shuddered, and Cygnus felt a miraculous feeling wash over him. The psionic disruptors had been deactivated or destroyed somehow! He tossed the useless energy rifle aside and teleported outside, behind the hunter-seeker. He created an orange energy sword and decapitated it with a single clean stroke. The neck stumps sizzled dangerously and it collapsed to the bunker floor with a terrible cacophony of clangs.

Cygnus scanned his surroundings and immediately saw what had destroyed the psionic disruptors on the back of the hunter seeker. It was a Pokemon, Absol to be specific, and Cygnus recognized it as one of the Pokemon that Asha owned. It had apparently sliced through the unprotected coils on the back of the hunter-seeker with the crescent shaped blade on its head. It gave him an affectionate, familiar smile.

Cygnus caught sight of the other hunter-seekers re-emerging from the forest, they were falling back under the assault of Asha's other Pokemon. Cygnus saw her Skarmory flying in circles and slashing at one hunter-seeker's shields, her Arcanine spewing jets of flame at another, and her Espeon teaming up with her mother's Vaporeon and Jolteon against the last one. The shields effortlessly held off their attacks until Melicia and Tamista teleported behind them and blew them to pieces with shadow balls.

Nolus, Opulous, and Satoria emerged from the trees; they had stayed behind when Cygnus and Venius made their dash toward the bunker. Asha appeared out of the trees farther to their right and ran straight towards them while shouting.

"Are you guys ok?" She bellowed.

Tamista and Melicia floated over to join the group, and Asha's Pokemon gathered around them protectively, keeping their eyes open in case more robots attacked.

"Asha, what in heaven's name are you doing here?" Nolus asked bewilderedly.

Asha came to a stop in front of Nolus and gave him a pouting look. "That's some way to treat the one who saved your life!"

Nolus sighed and gave her a look that seemed to scream "You could have died you crazy girl!" Then he smiled and put his arms around her warmly. "Thank you Asha, thank you.

"Now tell me what the hell happened here! What were those robotic versions of you doing attacking you? What demolished the house? Where are Tanis and Shakara?"

The seven siblings fell silent and looks of sadness returned to their faces. Asha stared at them each in turn, first confused and then horrified.

"Oh no!" Asha whispered in silent terror. "They're not…Even Shakara?"

"We're still holding out hope for my mom!" Satoria burst out, "She wasn't even here when the bombs fell!"

"That's right!" Tamista added, "She had left for her Protectorate Summit this week. She might have been in transit or safe in her Protectorate complex when the attack occurred!"

"She's probably in hiding right now, or trying to find a way to reach us without being discovered by the humans!" Melicia finished.

Asha had a terrible look of sadness on her face. Nolus immediately stepped gave her a second hug, this time not letting go right away.

A/N: I've gotten several comments lately from people who have wanted there to be some kind of revenge against humanity for what they did to Tanis and his family. I feel the need to remind everyone that it wasn't all of humanity in general who were responsible for this, but mainly the Psi-Slayers and their supporters. And while I DO plan on having a major revenge occur, I'm afraid you guys will have to wait awhile for a truly satisfying one to occur. Venius will have a try at it next chunk, but the true revenge won't happen until near the end of Book II.

Also, I would have gotten this chunk to you a little sooner, but I was struggling with the ending. I guess I'm still not satisfied with it, but I really wanted to get this one out sooner for you guys since the cliffhanger was especially painful. One guy (you know who you are!) actually said he would commission me to finish if he had the dough! I guess that level of flattery made me write a little faster, until I got stuck on the ending. But enough rambling, I'm gonna go get started on Chunk 10! Later!