A/N: Next chapter! Woohoo! (I'll leave the rest of the notes for the bottom.)

Disclaimer: Pokemon and its characters and concepts do not belong to me.

Five Days of Midnight

Some Enchanted Evening

Chapter 14

"Battling for an official Pokemon League badge," James lamented after Misty's declaration. "It's all so…legal. And boring. Legally boring. Or would you say boringly legal?"

"You would say 'shut up, you're doing it anyway,'" Misty snipped with a roll of her eyes. She clutched the Pokeball tightly in her palm, and for once, holding a Pokemon in her hands felt like an enormous weight on her shoulders. She wondered if Sabrina had felt the same way before facing Lucinda, or if the feeling of dread only plagued Misty. After all, Sabrina had gone into the battle not knowing what power she was facing, nor the price she would have to pay for defeat. Misty, unfortunately, was all too aware of the fact that she was taking her life, as well as the lives of those around her, into play.

"I hate to interrupt your whining fest—actually, I enjoy it—but if there are people in the water I suggest we get a move on?" Meowth cut in, gesturing to the ocean that spread wide before them.

"Right," Ash squared his shoulders. He pulled his hat down further onto his head, but he didn't come over to reclaim his jacket from Misty. "Let's go, Pikachu."

The electric Pokemon looked reluctant to head anywhere with Team Rocket, much less into their dingy submarine back into the thrash of the storm, but his sense of duty to friends had always matched that of his trainer, and so he, much like Ash, visibly steeled himself and nodded. "Pika."

"Wait, Ash!" Misty exclaimed suddenly, and she hurried over to him, her hand plunging into her pocket. She pulled out the small golden cylinder that Samuel had placed into her protection, and, palm flat, she offered it out to her companion. "Here."

He recognized it—it looked just like the souvenir one that Samuel had given him. Only this one, he knew, was real. "That's the weapon?"

She looked mildly surprised. "Samuel told you about it?"

Ash sighed, somewhat frustrated. "Well, he told me that there was one. And that you had it. And hey, that he had some cheap souvenir ones that he could give me!" He sighed, staring forlornly at the small tube in Misty's hands. "I'd hoped that the real one was a little more impressive-looking, if you know what I mean."

Crestfallen, her shoulders slumped slightly. "So, you don't know how to use it?"

"No. Don't you?"

"No," she admitted somewhat reluctantly, and then she pressed it into his palm. "While you're out there in the submarine, try to figure it out. We're going to need this."

Their palms remained pressed together for a long moment, a clutch over the small tube that was somehow supposed to save them all. "We're…we're actually going to have to kill somebody, aren't we?" Ash asked tentatively.

"I prefer to not think of her as a person," she replied carefully. "After all, she's already…dead, right? She's some sort of evil spirit. So we can't really…kill her."

He swallowed noticeably. "Right," he said, but he seemed to have gone a few shades whiter than normal. "I just…you know. Hope spirits don't bleed."

Misty offered him a shaky smile. "Me too," she confided, and she glanced down at their hands, still linked.

"So I'll…uh…see you when I get back. When we get back. All of us." And there was a hint of pleading in this voice, as though he were begging her to make it through the other side, to beat the odds and hold out against Lucinda's fury and be there when he returned with the rest of the gym leaders.

"Right," Misty said, trying to sound brave and not worried at all. Not at all as though she thought that maybe, this might be the last time she saw Ash, so soon after finding him again, and she might never seen her sisters or Brock again, and she, Brock, and Ash, their trio, might never be whole again.

She wanted to warn him to be careful, but it seemed silly when she didn't even know which of the two of them really needed to be careful. Which of them was putting themselves in greater danger?

Ash snatched his hand back with Samuel's weapon so quickly it was as though Misty's palm had burned him, and when she saw the pained look in his eyes she wondered if it wasn't so. "Come on, Pikachu," he said quietly, almost avoiding Misty's eye.

"Well, both of you can follow us," Jessie huffed. "We're driving. Heaven only knows what would happen if you were left to steer the submarine." Dripping with self-importance, she breezed past them, Meowth following in her wake and attempting to mimick her higher-than-thou attitude.

"Hey, if you guys can do it, it can't be that hard," he shot back, and while their argument might be petty, Misty was simply relieved to see Ash asking more like his usual self, and less gloomy.

He hesitated in the doorway, Pikachu by his side, and Misty couldn't make out his expression in the darkness. His body seemed to be on point, tense and ready for battle, but whether he was ready to run and join Jessie and Meowth or run back to Misty was uncertain.

"Go," she said quietly. "And you'd better figure out that weapon, Mr. Pokemon Master!" She tried vainly to sound as bossy and demanding as she usually did, which normally came so easily to her, but when she thought that this might be the last time she saw Ash…well, it was a little harder than normal to scold him. But she knew that while most times her orders would annoy him, today they would be comforting.

Ash, however, did not seem very comforted. He gave her a ghost of a smile for her effort, and then, as though acting before he could change his mind, he tore off towards the submarine, leaving Pikachu to scamper after him in his wake.

And Misty, for her part, had to will herself to keep her feet firmly planted on the ground and not take after him in a run. She wished that the sun would come out for just a moment, because if this was the last time she would ever see Ash, she wished that she could actually see him go, rather than just hear the retreat of his footsteps.

With a deep breath, she tucked the Cascade badge, James's promised prize that he couldn't care less for, into the pocket of Ash's jacket. She turned to face her opponent, unable to keep a small, ironic smile off her face. She was no stranger at battling either member of Team Rocket, and yet this battle was the most important one of all—and it was one where they were battling for the same thing.

"Ready?" she asked, and James nodded. Even he seemed to have finally grasped the seriousness of the situation, perhaps due to the fact that he and Misty were the only two left in the tower, and he had no one to distract him from the truth.

He nodded, and withdrew a Pokeball from his belt, as Misty had seen him do so many times before. "Ready," he confirmed.

Misty enlarged Squirtle's Pokeball. "Then let's go."

"You guys do this everywhere?" Ash panted as he pumped his legs viciously in the Magikarp submarine. "I figured you had a motor or something."

"Do you have any idea what a motor would cost?" Jessie responded testily, looking much less tired than Ash did, having had many excursions in the submarine under her belt by this point. "Do you think we're rolling in cash?"

"Maybe if you spent some of your time actually working instead of trying…" Ash paused to catch his breath, moving his hands from the handle bars to his thighs to try and give them extra support, "…trying to steal Pikachu all the time, maybe you'd be able to afford a motor!"

"But this allows me to stay in excellent shape," Jessie primped, and Ash was glad that he was seated behind her and therefore could easily roll his eyes without being seen.

He could feel the gold cylinder that Misty had placed into his hand pressing against his palm from his pocket, and he remembered her command that he figure out how to work it. Why she had entrusted him with this, well, that escaped him. He suspected it was because she hadn't been able figure it out for herself and needed someone else to try in order to confirm that it wasn't really the weapon that Samuel had promised would save them all, but rather a worthless piece of junk.

Making sure to keep pedaling, as to be sure to not earn Jessie's wrath, Ash pulled it out and turned it over a few times, carefully examining it for some sort of button or lever among the symbols and inscriptions that he did not understand. He held it up, trying to peer through it like a telescope, but there was no visible opening.

"What do you think?" he asked Pikachu. "What, am I supposed to just conk Lucinda over the head with this?"

"Pikapi," and though Ash sometimes had trouble deciphering exact meaning from his Pokemon, it was obvious from his tone that Pikachu doubted this idea.

"Yeah, I didn't think so, either," he sighed. He smacked it roughly against one of his gloved hands. "Well, I hope it isn't some sort of an explosive," he pondered out loud as he continued to smack it against his palm, hoping to set off a spring of some sort.

Jessie's ears perked up at this. "What? Explosive?" she shrieked, trying to crane her neck back while still pedaling in order to see what mischief Ash was creating in her submarine. "You'd better not have any such thing in here, twerp! You'll be sorry if you do!"

Still holding the cylinder, he held up his hands defensively. "I don't, okay?" He sighed, and pocketed the weapon again, not looking forward to having to tell Misty that his attempts to figure out how to work it were as futile as hers had been. "Just a worthless piece of junk."

"There!" Meowth exclaimed from his position at the periscope. "We're right near them, head for the surface!"

"Oh, great, uphill," Ash muttered, and now it was Pikachu's turn to make an exasperated face.

"We'll surface and open the top hatch," Jessie explained, taking charge as was her nature. "And you can go up and save all your little friends."

He glanced around the small submarine. "This is going to be cramped," he sighed, but he found it easier to obey, and so he reached for the wheel of the hatch once Meowth had given him the sign that the top of their vehicle was above water. And he only gave himself a moment to think that the gym leaders thrashing in the waves around them must think that their luck had gotten even worse and that they were about to be attacked by a giant Magikarp, but he gave himself that moment, however brief, to think it.

He pulled hard, throwing his entire body weight behind spinning the wheel, and then he climbed the small ladder and pushed open the top, blinking as his face was suddenly pelted by the still falling rain.

"Brock?" he formed his hands around his mouth like a megaphone, peering into the vast, dark waters. "Hey, Brock!"

He thought he heard a voice call his name in return, but he couldn't be sure until a flash of lightning lit up the surrounding area. But when the flash came, he was able to see several figures treading water, not as viciously as Misty had been when he had plucked her from the water, but enough to keep their heads bobbing just above the surface, the tread of the very tired.

"Brock!" he yelped, unable to distinguish which one was his friend, but it didn't really matter as long as one of them was Brock. "Hey, everyone! Over here!"

Ash swung his legs over the edge of the Magikarp submarine, balancing precariously on the side, feeling his sneakers skid slightly along the slick surface. In the darkness, he couldn't tell if anyone was swimming towards him or not, if they knew that he was the one who was calling to them, or if they had even heard him at all.

Tensing his muscles in order to keep his balance, he cautiously waved his hands in the air and waved them frantically, hoping that they would at least be able to see his outline. "Guys, over here!" Briefly he thought that waving his arms in this manner was practically making himself a target mark for Lucinda, and he hoped feverantly that Misty's plan to distract her with a gym battle worked.

With the next lightning flash, it seemed that some of the figures had moved closer, and Ash leaned back so that he could call back into the open top of the submarine. "Move forward! We need to meet them halfway!"

"When did you become captain?" Jessie grumbled, but she listened. Ash wobbled violently on the side of the sub when it began to slowly move forward, and he leaned back to grasp onto the lip of the opening he had come out from and brace himself against the side of the submarine.

Suddenly, something reached out and snatched at the end of Ash's jeans, making him yelp in surprise. His thoughts immediately leapt to Lucinda, and whatever new creature she had brought to destroy them. He instinctively started shaking his leg, trying to free it from whatever had it in such a grip, until a voice interrupted him.

"Geez, Ash, if you're going to help us, help!"

A smile broke across his face. "Brock!" Relieved to hear his friend, even if he could not yet see him, Ash reached down, grasping onto Brock's arms to help him climb up the edge of the submarine. Rather than head down to the inside chamber where Jessie, Meowth, and Pikachu waited, Brock braced himself much in the manner that Ash was, getting ready to help the rest of the gym leaders climb in.

"You okay?" Ash called over the lapping waves.

"Been better." But Brock couldn't conceal his grin, self-satisfied at his survival, and he clapped Ash on the back familiarly. "Good to see you in one piece, Ash."

"Yeah, well, almost didn't happen!" Ash admitted, and then he reached down when he heard the light smack of hands against the submarine, grasping through the dim night as his hand clamped around a wrist. Brock assumed a similar position on his other side, and together the two hoisted Blaine up the side of the submarine.

He grinned at them, his teeth flashing white against a darkened face. "Nothing like crawling out of the freezing water and into a huge fish!" And his tone was completely serious, and Ash had to chalk it up to yet another one of Blaine's nonsensical sayings.

"You all right?" he asked as Blaine swung his legs over the edge of the opening, getting ready to lower himself into the submarine.

"Water isn't really my thing," he admitted, "so really I wish you had brought a plane instead of a submarine."

"Well, I'm just happy to see anything at all," a new voice grumbled, and Ash and Brock leaned over to help Sabrina up. Seeing that he would have to move on, Blaine disappeared down into the huge Magikarp as Sabrina gracefully scaled the rest of the submarine.

She waited before descending, however. "We're one short," and though her voice was quiet, it was serious enough that they could hear her over the rain, wind, and waves. "Koga. He…"

"I know," Ash interrupted, wanting to spare her from having to retell the story. "Misty told me."

"Misty?" Brock craned his neck, trying to remain balanced on the side while peering down into the submarine. "Is she already here?"

"She's at the island," he replied, and he gestured towards the land that rose so high that it was visible even in the dark night. "I was able to get to her before the rain."

"What's she doing there?" Brock asked, a bit bewildered that she hadn't accompanied Ash in the submarine to pull out the rest of the gym leaders.

"Oh, probably getting herself killed," he replied darkly as the two trainers reached down and pulled up one of the Cerulean sisters other than the one they were currently talking about. "Getting in over her head. You know how good she is at stuff like that. Nothing new."

"Wait, what?" Daisy interrupted, shaking her foot free from Lily's grip both so that she could move into the submarine and so that Ash and Brock could pull her sister up the side. "What's Misty doing?"

Immediately Ash felt guilty for letting it slip that Misty was doing something dangerous. He couldn't help but be angry about her decision—he didn't care that she was right, and that it was their best chance and probably their only hope. It didn't matter that he would probably do the same thing if he had been put into her situation. He hated the situation, and he hated the choice she had made, and God, Misty just made him so angry sometimes.

Because he hadn't been lying when he had said to Brock that she always got in over her head. That loud mouth of hers had gotten her into trouble more than once—had gotten them all into trouble a couple of times.

…then again, so had his.

Which was probably the reason that despite how much they fought, they remained best friends. Misty made him so angry because he understood why she did the stupid, infuriating things she did, and he couldn't just be blindly furious at her and then brush it off as 'just Misty'. He always had to be angry while understanding, and that, in turn, just made him even more angry.

"It's nothing," he said guiltily, trying to offer both Daisy and Lily a reassuring smile. "You know how Misty is. Nothing could ever get the best of her."

"God, she has to like, stop getting herself into trouble," Lily grumbled, and Ash couldn't help but silently agree. Their lives would be a lot simpler if Misty could stop getting into trouble…and yet, if that happened, she wouldn't be Misty.

Maybe trouble wasn't that bad.

And besides, if Misty were here, she would certainly be quick to point out that she was far from the only one to find herself in troubling situations. And she had a good 'legend' to point to from their last encounter with a different maniac on a mission.

Erika was the last that they pulled into the submarine, and next to him, Ash could almost feel Brock visibly relax as their hands gripped tight and they pulled the slight girl up out of the icy ocean and onto their vessel. As soon as his hand was free from the grass trainer's grip, Ash, too, slumped exhausted against the side of the Magikarp, his arms aching from the effort of pulling body after body up from the waters.

Now free from the most pressing matter of helping those still caught in the waves, Brock raised an eyebrow at his friend. "Team Rocket, Ash?"

He shrugged. "Well, when you're desperate. Plus, they have a submarine."

Now Brock grinned, relief at having been saved causing him to be in good humor. "One that's probably packed as tightly as a sardine can by now."

Ash laughed, pulling his legs up from the water where the waves, now subdued, lapped at his ankles. He wanted to laugh at Lucinda, laugh right at her, ,that they had beaten her at her own game. That she may be powerful, but she couldn't bring down the whole of the Pokemon league in one swoop, not when they were fighting for a cause so dear to them. For the first time since the sun had slipped behind the moon, Ash felt as though they might have a chance, and as the waves ebbed away from the submarine, so did his despair. It was as if he had scooped up hope when he had scooped up his friends, and he clung to it.

He grinned back at Brock, broadly, freely, as he swung his legs back over the open top of the Magikarp. "Wouldn't have it any other way, right?"

Brock shook his head as he braced himself up on his knees, preparing to follow Ash. "Not a chance."

The inside was, as Brock had predicted, incredibly cramped. Everywhere people struggled to find sitting room, leaving them practically on top of one another (though, Ash noticed, they had so very thoughtfully left his spot on the bench empty so that he could ferry them back to shore.) Jessie, in her seat, looked annoyed at the invasion of her personal space as well as, surprisingly, vaguely worried as her eyes took in the crowded sub.

"Hurry up and sit down," she snipped at Ash. "This submarine isn't designed to hold so many people. Time to get a move on."

Brock pressed against the wall so that Ash could slip by and take a seat, his legs already throbbing in protest of the workout ahead of them.

"The storm's calming," Erika remarked quietly as Brock slid down to sit down next to her, his legs pressed tight up against his chest in order to make himself as compact as possible. "Do you think it's over?"

Ash's body tensed, because Erika was right, and he had noticed the same thing earlier. And if they were right, and the storm had calmed and the seas were not quite as rough, that must mean that Misty's gamble was paying off—that Lucinda had left the gym leaders in the water for dead and gone after the one that had slipped away and restarted her gym in rebellion.

And if Misty had been right, she was also in a lot of danger.

"Come on," Ash ground out through gritted teeth, pumping his legs vigorously. "Can't this thing go any faster?"

Jessie craned her neck to stare at him incredulously. "Only if you get out and push," she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "In case you haven't noticed, we're traveling back a bit heavier than we came out."

"Well, we have to beat Lucinda back to the island!" he exclaimed. "She might already be there!" He increased his pace with concentrated effort, his grip knuckle-white on the handle bars. He felt as though he were pedaling against the clock, and not only to get back to the island before Lucinda put her end to Misty's personal rebellion. No, on top of that there was the looming of the bigger clock, the five day deadline that Ash knew, intuitively, without the use of the sun to gauge time with, must be drawing to a close.

And at the end of those five days? He could still recall Samuel's words, branded across his mind. 'Five days she will relive a lifetime, five days will she be mortal, five days of darkness across the land in which she will reclaim her empire. Five days before she comes back into her full power. And if in those five days she is not defeated the sun again would never shine and she would live forever.'

He only had this one chance, and he only had these five days.

And Misty…

"If you don't get there before the end of the five days? They'll be killed."

Somehow Ash was certain that after Misty had escaped and had started battling to give away badged again, Lucinda wouldn't be quite so generous as to give her until the end of the five days.

He pressed harder, his breathing labored as a trickle of sweat made its way from his hairline down the back of his black shirt, running down his skin. "Come on," he urged on Jessie and Meowth, who were keeping up much of their same pace. "We don't have much time!"

"Like, what's going on, Ash?" Daisy asked, a sharp note of worry to her voice. "Is Misty in trouble?"

"Yeah, where is she? What's happened to her?" Violet chimed in, propping her hands on her hips.

"And you better not tell us 'nothing' again or whatever," Lily threatened, her pretty face screwed up in a scowl.

Sometimes, Ash forgot that these were Misty's sisters—she complained about them (and with good reason), and they made fun of her and roped her into doing things to get them out of the messes they made, but they were her sisters. They were her family, and despite the teasing and the fighting and the complaining, they loved her, and he knew that she loved them, too. Sometimes it was hard to remember, having grown up with only his mother as his family.

Although, he reasoned, it was much the same when he fought with Misty, wasn't it? They fought and called each other names, and she was, through it all, his best friend (best human friend, he added silently, his eyes sliding over to Pikachu). His best friend in a different way than Brock was…they were three sides of the triangle, three pieces that made up a puzzle and yet it wasn't all even and equals, and sometimes he just got muddled up when he tried to equate what he felt for Misty with what he felt for anyone else. Because no matter how he tried to rationalize, it always just came down to…that Misty was different.

And he wasn't going to let anything happen to her.

"She's…um…she's battling," he finished lamely, and the three Cerulean sisters stared at him blankly.

"Battling what?" Lily asked, honestly clueless.

"James!" Meowth piped up helpfully, and Daisy frowned deeply.

"Like, what do you mean, battling?"

"You know," Ash offered weakly. "Pokemon battling. For a Cascade badge."

"Pokemon battling?" Lt. Surge barged in on the conversation. "With what Pokemon? Did she find out where that little demon lady took 'em? Did she get them back?"

"No, no," he replied hastily, making sure to still pedal with all his might while he answered the questions. "She borrowed one of mine."

"Why would she do that?" Erika inquired from her position on the floor, her arms wrapped around her legs. Her forehead wrinkled with confusion.

"Yes, you think we'd have more important things to deal with right now than someone wanting, like, a badge!" Violet exclaimed, bewildered.

"She's…kind of acting as…bait for Lucinda," Ash finished, and he cringed as he said it out loud—it sounded so much more foolish, and so much more dangerous, when spoken. "Ow!" he added, clutching the back of his head and craning his neck to stare at Daisy, who had been the one to whack him hard on the back of the head. "What was that for?"

"And why did you let her act as bait?" she demanded angrily, so much the older sister in that moment. And Ash, poor Ash, was the outlet for her frustration.

"It was her idea!" he protested.

"And you let her?" she screeched again, her fists balled up at her sides.

"Oh, right," Ash grumbled sarcastically. "I should have told her not to do it. That would have worked. I mean, you grew up with her, you know how Misty totally always does what other people suggest, especially if they disagree with what she wants to do. Oh, yeah, that so would have worked."

"So you just, like, gave up," Lily accused, pointing her finger threateningly at Ash, and for some reason this cut him to the heart.

"I didn't give up," he snapped, twisting in his seat as far as he could while still pedaling away. "Haven't you noticed how I'm pedaling as fast as I can so that we get back there before anything bad happens? I would.…I'd never give up on her."

"Oh, please, spare me the poetry," Jessie grumbled, leaning heavily on her gloved hands that rested on the handle bars in front of her. And although he hated that it was a member of Team Rocket that embarrassed him, Ash felt his face heat up with a furious blush, and so he lowered his head to try and hide it and redoubled his efforts.

Because he was determined to prove to them all, now, that he didn't—and wouldn't—give up.

And so he made sure that he was the first one ashore when they finally reached the island, using his position on the bench and therefore at a spot higher than the rest of the gym leaders to his advantage. He hopped up onto the seat, pushing open the top of the submarine and reaching up to hoist himself out of it.

"Don't bother with a 'thank you'," Jessie grumbled, watching as Ash wiggled out of the submarine, waiting impatiently for her own turn to exit.

His feet hit the solid, snowy ground once more, and he took off on a run. "Misty?" he yelped, racing into the ice tower. His heart pounded up near his throat, his pulse racing as his eyes frantically searched for his friend, hoping, praying that he would not find her fallen. "Misty!"

"Ash!" he heard her call back, and he turned the corner and there she was, sitting there almost glumly, James at her side, the battle clearly finished.

He skidded to a stop, struggling to catch his breath. "You're…you're all right?" he confirmed through slightly labored breathing as his heart rate returned to normal.

"I'm all right," she confirmed, standing back up. "But I've been so worried about you! When it didn't work, and she didn't show up, I thought…"

Ash eyed her in confusion, not bothering to turn as he heard the footsteps of his friends following behind him, entering the ice cavern for the first time. "It didn't work?" he asked her, baffled. "But the sea got so calm…I thought that she had to be here."

Misty, wide-eyed, shook her head. "No. Nothing. We had the battle, and that was the end of it." She offered him a weak smile, pulling back the flap of his coat to reveal eight badges, all in neat rows of two. "I won, so you don't even have to wait for me to replace the badge."

"Now I'll never become a Pokemon master!" James lamented, obviously having forgotten about his earlier disdain at the very idea of battling for a gym badge.

"James, you never wanted to be a Pokemon master," Jessie reminded him impatiently as she made her appearance. Behind her followed the rest who had crammed into the submarine, and Misty brightened to see all her friends and family, her fellow gym leaders, safe and seemingly no worse for wear.

"You're all right!" she blurted out, clasping her hands in relief.

"Yeah, thanks to your guys doing some quick thinking," Brock said generously, and Misty couldn't help but smile.

"Come on, Brock, 'you guys'? You know that was all me. Ash isn't capable of quick thinking!" she teased, but Ash only looked solemn, and her smile faded away.

"I don't understand," he said quietly, confused. "Why would she just give up and leave us alone? Let us save everyone from the water and let you have a battle here?"

"Does it matter?" Lt. Surge blurted out. "Maybe she realized that she was outnumbered, especially since we have some Pokemon we could use now!"

Ash shook his hand, Samuel's story replaying in his head. "She might be outnumbered, but she would never think she was overpowered."

"And either way, if she doesn't find us we need to find her. We need to get our Pokemon back!" Brock said urgently.

"At this this way she won't have the element of surprise," Erika offered.

And on the word 'surprise', there was a loud crack, and the group collectively jumped, spooked. Silence hung in the air for a long moment, and then there was a loud groaning sound and the ice pillar above Misty's head swayed, like a pin stuck by a bowling ball, and then it started careening down towards the group.

"Look out!" Ash yelped, and he grabbed Misty's arm as she was the closest to the falling pillar. The group scattered, clearing a large path for the ice beam to fall, and Ash kept his hand instinctively tight around Misty's wrist.

The ice beam struck the ground with a loud crash, and it shattered upon impact. Ash threw up his arm to block any shards that might fly their way, and next to him, Misty squeezed her eyes tightly shut. The ice splayed against the walls, and some of it headed for the trainers, coolly scraping arms like sharp fingernails.

And as easily and unexpectedly as it had fallen, the world was silent once more.

"Is everyone all right?" Ash asked, breaking the quiet. He lowered his arm and looked around—everyone seemed fine, if a bit shaken by the sudden falling of the pillar.

"And this is why you should never have a home made out of natural materials!" Jessie scoffed, brushing a few stray shards of ice off of her arms, shivering a bit as it melted against her skin, leaving her damp in the cold air.

"Something's not right…" he murmured, slowly releasing Misty's wrist. "That wasn't an accident."

"I think that may be the first perceptive thing I've heard you say," a lilting, taunting voice said, filling the air around them. It was familiar, unhappily so, and Ash turned in a dizzy circle to try and find the source of the sound. He tried to locate exactly, where in this maze of ice, Lucinda was.

Misty's eyes widened; always a bit faster on the uptake than Ash was, and she clamped a hand in horror over her mouth. "Of course," she breathed. "Of course she would wait until you got back, not attack while you were gone. Now she has us all in one place!"

Anger, like a hot knife, flashed through his body. He was just so tired of this demon lady with her surprises and her tricks, and her refusal to leave them alone. And his trepidation at defeating her with the weapon that Samuel had given them—if they could ever figure out how to use it—flew out the window, because, as Samuel and Misty had both tried to impress upon him, she wasn't a human. She was a spirit, an evil spirit, and one that Ash had had more than enough of.

And who did she think she was, closing the gyms and stealing Pokemon? His Pokemon were his friends, not tools to be used and then carelessly discarded until they were needed again. And they were his, and he wasn't about to let anyone take them away from him. And he certainly wasn't about to let this…creature, let Lucinda hurt his friends, as she seemed so determined to do.

Ash set his jaw, his mouth pressed into a grim line and his fists balled together. "So, now she has us all in one place!" he yelled, addressing the entire room since he did not know where he could find Lucinda. "Then she needs to come out and face us!"

"Ash…" Misty's voice was hushed and uncertain, but Ash, his eyes blazing, shook his head.

"We're going to end this. No more being afraid."

As you may be able to tell, we're entering the big climax of the story!

This fic, it seems, will end up being 18 chapters, which means only four left! I'm going abroad for my spring semester to Ireland, so my plan is to have the entire fic finished by the time I leave in mid January, which I think is very doable.

Thank you to everyone who reviewed last chapter! I'm so glad you all enjoyed it, and I hope you'll continue to review for the rest of the story! Also, thank you to everyone who has added this story as a favorite—41 people!—and those who had added it to a C2 community! It's very flattering!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and again, please take the time to leave a review! :-D