PDM: Life in Flames

Chapter 20: Aura, Revisited

Elisa and Rio's journey up Mt. Corona continued.

Their concerns rose when there was a tremor. Looking around, they were the only pokemon in the area, so no one else could have triggered any sort of quake.

"That must have been the mountain then…" Elisa said, a slight amount of dread arising in her mind. She knew she had nothing to worry about for herself (she was fire-proof, after all), however she hadn't forgotten she was originally human and stemming from that was a certain terror on the prospect of witnessing a volcanic eruption.

The main source of her dread though, was from concern for Alex, Eve, and Rio. All three might be killed by the eruption if they didn't find some way to either stop it or get them away from the volcano.

There was little chance of any of them getting away from an eruption at this point. The tremor indicated the mountain was only getting closer to the time of eruption.

"C'mon then, let's hurry up." Rio said briskly and they broke into a run. They were already tired and exhausted from the trip but Elisa pushed herself to keep up and Rio, though winded, ran for all he was worth.

It wasn't long before they came to a cave; an entrance directly into the volcano. Surprisingly, there actually wasn't that much heat coming from the cave.

"Maybe it's not that close to eruption then?" Rio suggested hopefully.

"Well, let's get in there. There hasn't really been another path since we started up Mt. Corona so Team Long Ears must have gone in here." Elisa said and charged on in, Rio following.

Elisa stopped when they found the cave to be rather dark deeper in.

"I can't see anything…" Rio said, then he recalled something,

"Hey, Elisa why don't you do what you were doing the other night in the forest? With your tails?"

Elisa had forgotten about that and it took her a moment to figure out what he was talking about but then she remembered and glanced back at where her tails would be. She focused her thoughts on light and thought about having a torch of any sort.

Soon, her tails were glowing with a gentle firelight.

"Man… that's so cool…" Rio mumbled as his eyes adjusted to the light. He reached out and touched one of her tails, feeling the fur. An unwise action as it turned out.

"Ouch, hot!" he yelped and swiftly withdrew the paw, waving it about. The slight smell of burnt skin was tangible.

"Whoops! Sorry!" Elisa said quickly.

"No… it's my fault…" Rio said, looking at his paw, "I guess there's fire in your fur generating that light or something. At any rate, they're burning hot." His paw was slightly burnt but otherwise fine. It wasn't so severe that he needed a berry for it.

They proceeded forward, Elisa's tails shedding light as they proceeded.

After a minute of navigating the darkened cave, they emerged into a cave full of magma. The chamber was lit by the glowing, molten rock. There was solid rock ground, with what seemed like a lake of magma below, waiting to incinerate any non-fire-type that fell off the path.

"Whoa…" Rio gasped, looking around.

Elisa stepped out into the open space and looked around. She immediately felt the massive shift in temperature upon stepping into the cave. The magma was super-heating the room, the air rippling with heat.

"Rio… stay back… I think you'd best stay there until I can spot a quick way through here." Elisa said, unwilling to risk Rio's life again in extreme temperatures unless she had to. She couldn't be sure how far he'd have to go through the heat and if he collapsed partway, she had no guarantee that she would be able to drag him to cooler safety. Passing out in this heat would be fatal to him, so he would have to hurry from one cool area to the next.

Rio took a seat on the rock floor and gestured for her to go ahead.

Elisa stepped forward and looked around at she went deeper into the cavern. Looking up, she saw a crack in the ceiling that likely went outside, which explained why the passage they had entered through wasn't just as hot. The heat in the room escaped out that way (though apparently not fast enough to make things cool).

A Magmar (a humanoid pokemon that looked like it was made of fire) stepped out and confronted her. A natural instinct seemed to tell Elisa that it was competing for territory with her. It thought she was another volcano resident and wanted to claim the area for itself.

I wonder how much more I'm going to start feeling like a Vulpix... or a pokemon at any rate? Elisa privately wondered and charged at the Magmar, smacking it.

It countered with a flame-covered punch but this only fueled Elisa's own fire-reserves (the punch itself was virtually harmless) and she retaliated with a fierce blast of flames. Again, the fire was not any bigger than normal for her; in fact, it might've been smaller. Nonetheless, the Magmar experienced some mild pain from the attack, as it evidently didn't have the flame-absorbing ability Elisa did.

It quickly started to realize its disadvantage (as it knew little else but fire-type moves) and it backed down. Elisa smirked and yelled "Scram!" prompting the hapless Magmar to retreat.

Her opponent cowed and gone, she glanced around some more. She looked at where Rio was waiting and then looked to the right and saw another passage. She walked over that way and felt the air cool as she got away from the lava.

She headed back and looked around for other passages to consider. There was a hole in one wall where someone might've gone, however it looked as if any bridge across had since collapsed (due to the volcanic activity). Seeing no other paths, she headed back to Rio.

"Alright… I think I found a way. You're going to need to run, just to be safe."

Rio got up, took a moment to stretch, readying himself for the sprint ahead and, once he was ready, Elisa quickly led the way to the path onwards.

Rio arrived at the cooler area. The trip had been short and quick. The air was warm there, but tolerable for him.

The two of them proceeded deeper into the volcano in this fashion: Elisa scouted out the area ahead (occasionally driving off local pokemon) and she would spot a way forward (or two) and then return to Rio. If there was more than one path possible to traverse, they'd discuss briefly which way to go and then they'd make a quick sprint for the next "safe-zone" in the cave.

Rio stumbled partway during one sprint, as a tremor shook the entire volcano and he nearly fell down as the quake disrupted his balance. However, Elisa caught him and he quickly used her to push himself upright again and resume his run.

They ran into a Camerupt wandering the safe zone and they quickly realized it had been the cause of the tremor this time. Elisa had been just out of range from its earth-shaking attack.

Rio quickly slapped it with Force Palm and Elisa smacked it. One of the humps on the camel's back exploded, sending conflagrations of magma flying in all directions. This only heated Elisa up but Rio screamed as the hot wave washed over him.

"Leave us alone!" Elisa roared and spat a ball of fire at it. This was enough to take down the Camerupt and it fell over.

"You okay Rio?" Elisa said quickly turning her attention to him.

"I'm alright…" Rio groaned, nursing a blackened segment of skin across his belly.

"You are not alright." Elisa said through her teeth and pulled out another oran-rawst berry pair for him, "Stop trying to be such a hero, sheesh!"

"I… I just don't want you worrying so much about me…" Rio said, "That's part of the reason your aura was black, wasn't it…?"

Elisa couldn't deny that. She had been worried about Rio then… but for entirely different reasons.

"We're partners." She responded tersely, "That means we support each other. So even if I have to baby you, I'm going to do it." Elisa said, making herself sound as bull-headed as possible.

Rio laughed but accepted the berries from her and didn't argue any further.

"Hey Rio…" Elisa said after he had eaten the berries, "What color's my aura now? It's not black, right?" she said this somewhat shyly.

Rio paused and then rubbed the back of his head a little like he was embarassed.

"Actually… I haven't seen it since. Your aura isn't always visible. Not like my dad's. So, I really don't know." He admitted, "But I hope it's normal now. I think someone like you really doesn't deserve to have that sort of pain."

"Oh…"

She was a little disappointed to not know her color. However, it was nice to hear Rio's words of encouragement.

o0o

After perhaps an hour of travelling deeper into the volcano, they came across something.

Elisa thanked their luck that they saw the thing from a high-ledge, where they looked down at it.

It was evidently a pokemon… but nothing like any Elisa had ever seen.

The pokemon in question was clearly massive, walked on four legs, and most of it looked like it was actually made of lava or magma. If it had had twice as many feet, it might've resembled a spider. Its feet and head seemed be made of metal. Its head was rather skull-like and the pokemon seemed to radiate so much heat, Elisa might as well have been a candle in comparison.

"Wow…" Elisa gasped softly, "Who is that?"

"I've… I've never seen a pokemon like that… I don't know who or what that is…" Rio said, his voice quiet and awed. They both had no desire to be spotted by the pokemon below.

At present, the pokemon seemed to be in state of utter outrage as it was stomping about, roaring, and yelling obscenities throughout the cave. Its voice was too loud and too mangled (it half-sounded like it was gargling or something) for Elisa to place as male or female. It soon vanished from sight as it stomped off into another part of the volcano. The uproar it was making seemed to shake the whole volcano as it went.

They hadn't seen any sign of Team Long Ears on the way down but this was something they hadn't expected to see.

"We'd better find them quick and get out of here…"

Rio was still staring as if the pokemon was still there.

"What's wrong?" Elisa said, concerned.

"That thing… it's really mad…" Rio said, blinking… "I know a little about how aura works. It generally flares when the owner's angry… well, that thing was blazing in more ways than one."

"Whoa…" Elisa blinked, slightly stunned, "I wonder what's got its shorts in a knot?"

Rio raised an eyebrow at the figure of speech but Elisa ignored this and decided to shrug off the question.

"C'mon, before it comes back and notices us or something." She said and led him onwards.