Chapter Twenty-Five: Aftermath
Cyrus smiled triumphantly – or rather, Giratina used his body to do so. As the bright light subsided and the smoke cleared, there was nothing left of Latias.
But as it was about to turn to gloat at its remaining enemies, Giratina was taken aback when Latias seemed to suddenly float right in front of him. Only she looked nothing like before: she was back in her base form, with her healthy round body and big, bright yellow eyes, smiling just like she did before Team Galactic captured her. And she was somewhat translucent.
What was even stranger was that next to her, floated a similarly-translucent Latios, looking as he did before Team Galactic's agents ambushed and killed him. And next to him, floated the ghostly forms of everyone Latias had absorbed – Darkrai, Cresselia and Regigigas.
"No!" Giratina yelled. "You can't be here! I killed you!"
"Yup," Latias agreed cheerfully. "You killed me good!"
"And not just her, but all of us she had trapped inside her," Darkrai said. "Consumed by the power that you gave her, incidentally."
"And now it's time for us to go," Latios said, putting his wing around his sister and hugging her. "But before that, I think we should give a going-away present for our friends down there. What do you think, sis?"
"Sounds like a plan, bro," Latias said.
"Enough!" Giratina shouted and aimed the Red Chain at the ghostly Latias – but instead of firing a red beam of energy, the specter broke into pieces while the three red jewels crumbled into paste, causing Giratina to cry out.
"Oh, but I forgot to tell you, I gave it already," Latias taunted. "You know, when you killed me."
"You made that thing with gems forcibly ripped from Uxie, Mesprit and Azelf," Darkrai explained. "But as powerful as they are, they aren't a match for the mighty Giratina, right?"
"Meaning you don't seem to know your strength, big guy," Latios said. "Should have not bet your resurrection on a puny human, I guess."
~o~O~o~
Down below, everyone just stared as Cyrus/Giratina screamed at what seemed to be thin air. Only Mewtwo could see who Cyrus was ranting at, but couldn't do anything but stare in sheer shock.
Cyrus' rantings were interrupted as something suddenly struck the shadowy image of Giratina behind him – and it reacted as if it was solid. It was a Skarmory, with Steven Stone and Wallace riding on it. Wallace's Milotic and Steven's Metagross also fired at the Giratina from below, and both Giratina and Cyrus reacted by cringing in pain, dropping the remnants of the Red Chain into the abyss below.
And along with Steven and Wallace, everyone else followed: Morty, Eusine, Dawn, Lucas, Barry, Jupiter and Mars had arrived to the Spear Pillar, along with all their best Pokémon: Morty's Gengar, Eusine's Alakazam, Dawn's Empoleon, Lucas' Torterra, Barry's Infernape, Jupiter's Skuntank and Mars' Purugly all bombarded Giratina with their attacks, not giving it an opportunity to fight back.
Making sure Cyrus was distracted, Cynthia got up and pulled something from her pocket: an old-looking, decorative blue ocarina, prompting a confused look from Kris.
"Sorry, girls, but that thing Cyrus crushed was just a cheap knockoff I bought from Sinnoh," Cynthia explained. "The guy who sold it to me said it could turn time backwards but ehh… anyway, this is the real Azure Flute. You don't think I'd blurt out information like this where Cyrus could hear it, did you? I wanted him to think he had the upper hand. And now…."
And as soon as Cynthia started playing the flute, it began to play a melody on its own – a hollow, echoing melody that reverberated all over the Spear Pillar, causing the pillars and the stone floor to tremble.
As it played on, the fourteen plates Kris and Iris had stuck on the floor glowed in their respective colors. Only now did Kris and Iris see that all of the slots for the plates connected to the pedestal in the middle, which glowed as well. The three plates on the pedestal glowed in reddish brown, silver gray and baby blue, then combined into one, bright, golden light that fired a beam towards the sky.
When the beam passed by Dialga and Palkia, they stopped fighting. The crackling of electricity and the strong wind around the temple stopped, and the now-calmed dragons of time and space began once again disappearing back into their own dimension while a helpless Cyrus/Giratina looked on.
But the miracles didn't stop there. The sky above the Spear Pillar went from purple to bright golden yellow as something emitting the strongest light Kris had ever seen descended towards the Spear Pillar. Even when the light hurt Kris' eyes, she couldn't look away, wanting to catch a glimpse of what was coming down. It was almost impossible to tell with the brightness, but Kris could swear that for a brief time, she saw an outline of an equine-shaped Pokémon, reminding Kris of a mythical creature of some kind, like a Centaur or a Qilin.
But it only lasted a second, and then Kris and everyone else had to avert their eyes as the being that descended glowed even brighter, sending showers of golden light down on the Spear Pillar. As the light hit the temple, unconscious people and Pokémon all around them started getting up. Croc, Iris' Haxorus, Red and his Charizard, Lance and his Dragonite and Aerodactyl, Cynthia's Garchomp and Togekiss… even Mewtwo was restored to full strength as it glowed briefly and transformed back into its smaller, lither Mega Evolved form.
And just a few yards from Kris and Iris, a muffled cry for help was heard under a pillar. Realizing who it was, Kris and Iris whistled at their Pokémon and rushed over to it. With help from Croc and Haxorus, Kris and Iris were able to lift the pillar, and from a hole in the ground that just barely left him enough air to survive, crawled a bruised, battered but clearly relieved Wes. Kris and Iris rushed to hug him, but were forced to stop as he winced in pain.
"I'm okay," Wes muttered at them. "Just… don't touch my ribs right now. What is… whoa!"
Wes, like everyone else, turned to stare at the thing that bathed the temple in a golden light. Cyrus and the shadowy form of Giratina behind it also glared up at it, Cyrus grabbing something from his pocket: a large purple and white Poké Ball with two pink circles on either side and a white letter 'M' between them.
"You," Cyrus/Giratina hissed at the light. "You think you've won?! You know you cannot intervene! I'm in the body of a human! You know, a part of that disgusting bacteria that's currently crawling all over your precious world?! My precious world! But you know what they say, if you can't beat them… join 'em!"
Cyrus chucked the Master Ball at the light as hard as he could – but it was unceremoniously shot down by a Shadow Ball from Mewtwo, who had floated on top of another pillar.
"It's over, Giratina," it said. "You've failed."
As Cyrus/Giratina turned to glare at Mewtwo, the golden light started to ascend back towards the sky, slowly and surely disappearing into the clouds until there wasn't a trace of it left. But everyone's Pokémon were now ready to fight – and Giratina stood alone.
"Attack!" Cynthia yelled, and nobody though twice.
Cynthia hopped on her Togekiss and flew towards Giratina, blinding it with a Dazzling Gleam attack while Garchomp slammed into it with a Dragon Rush attack, both Cyrus and Giratina roaring in pain as the attacks hit. Lance didn't hesitate to follow, his Dragonite and Aerodactyl both blasting at Giratina with a simultaneous Hyper Beam.
But it was nothing compared to the barrage of attacks Giratina was about to suffer. As it tried to swipe at Cynthia and Lance with its claws, Steven's Metagross's Meteor Mash and Wallace's Milotic's Ice Beam stopped it. This gave everyone else to gather their attacks: Croc's Hydro Cannon, Scorch's Blast Burn, Shrew's Rock Slide, Haxorus' Draco Meteor, Charizard's Fire Blast, Gengar's and Purugly's Shadow Balls, Skuntank's and Infernape's Flamethrower, Alakazam's Psychic, Empoleon's Flash Cannon and Torterra's Solarbeam all hit it simultaneously, breaking even the powerful barrier Giratina/Cyrus had put around it.
The shadowy form of Giratina disappeared, as did the red aura around Cyrus. The force of the explosion sent plummeting down the same cliff he tried to throw Kris and Iris off, hurtling towards the last remaining portal opened by his thoughtlessness. But to make sure Cyrus would never return again, Mewtwo floated higher, and with precision aiming, launched a Shadow Ball attack down at Cyrus, causing another explosion that closed the last portal for good.
As the barrier between the worlds returned to its normal state, so did the world around them. The weather turned calm again and the sky above Sinnoh returned to its usual color. Aside from the massive destruction around the Spear Pillar, there were no signs that anything unusual had happened at all.
In other words, peace had returned.
~o~O~o~
"This is Kinsey from Jubilife TV, reporting live from the base of Mt. Coronet. The unusual weather phenomena plaguing the Sinnoh region have come to an end. Having lasted for several weeks, people nationwide reported erratic weather, bizarre electrical storms and unusual lights at the sky, the Mt. Coronet area of Sinnoh having suffered the worst of it. Having stymied even the veteran researchers of Hoenn's Mossdeep Space Center and Weather Institute, these strange events have finally been explained. An expert endorsed by Sinnoh's Champion, Cynthia, has confirmed these events to be a temporary disruption in the Earth's magnetosphere, which has caused no damage to the planet's ecology or its inhabitants, this rare event being only, we quote, 'a minor annoyance'."
"We are pleased to report that the region was never in any harm and the people of Sinnoh can safely roam the streets once again."
~o~O~o~
A few days after the events on Mt. Coronet, everything returned to its usual state. Only members of the Legendary Pokémon Society knew the truth of what happened there, apart from Eusine. While the once Suicune-obsessed man wasn't told the whole truth and was sent on a bogus assignment afterward, he was still allowed to stay in the organization, having proven himself during the battle against Cyrus. Morty returned to his gym, Wallace returned to hosting Contests and other events while Steven Stone continued to wander the Hoenn region in search of rare stones, trying his best to ignore his father's attempts to make Steven work for the Devon Corporation.
As for Cynthia and Lance, they had their own assignment.
The two landed to their destination, far away from Sinnoh, next to a ruined temple. Called the Sinjoh Ruins, the temple was a place where two clans from Johto and Sinnoh met and built a temple to worship the deity Arceus. Though archeologists have had an interest in the ruins for a long time, the Legendary Pokémon Society had used all of its connections to keep people out of the area – which wasn't hard to do, considering its extremely remote location.
As Cynthia gazed upon the snow-covered arched entrance to the half-collapsed temple, she sighed mournfully. Lance immediately took notice of this.
"Something wrong?" he asked, concerned. "You cold?"
"No, just thinking," Cynthia murmured. "It feels bad we deceived those kids like this."
"They're practically almost adults, anyway," Lance pointed out. "Besides, what were we supposed to do? We tell them, and the next thing we know, half of the world realizes just how close they were to ending up as Giratina's food."
Cynthia smiled a bit – not everyone appreciated Lance's dark sense of humor (and the matter-of-fact way he expressed it) but she was used to it by now.
"But that Kris really wanted to be one of us," she said sadly. "And unlike some of the people in our group, she earned it."
"I'm not going to argue that," Lance said, "but she's still green. If anything, I think we're doing her a favor. I doubt she'll bug us about joining for a while. Far as she knows, she played her part and helped us prevent a dangerous madman from killing a bunch of people. To her, it's done."
"Too bad it isn't, huh?" Cynthia asked.
"Yeah," Lance said quietly. "Not by a long shot. I wonder what we're going to find here."
He turned towards Cynthia. "Ladies first," he smirked and gestured at the temple.
"Great, let me get fall in the spiky pit of doom first," Cynthia joked, but stepped in nonetheless, Lance following suit.
~o~O~o~
Indeed, as far as Kris and the gang knew, they helped the Legendary Pokémon Society stop Cyrus before she activated some kind of superweapon on Mt. Coronet, with the Giratina-related stuff being just some crazy junk Cyrus believed in. Memory modification was just one of the many things the LPS had to do that they weren't proud of, but they all agreed it had to be done.
The incident between Kanto and Fiore had indeed been a diversion by Cyrus, with the dimensional disturbance there being easily closed by Bill. As they promised, May and Brendan returned to Hoenn. Lunick, on the other hand, had vanished well before the LPS got to tamper with his memory, though they doubted he'd try to go public with what he knew.
As for the gang on Mt. Coronet, Jupiter and Mars quickly split from the group after the memory operation and went underground somewhere in Sinnoh – literally, that is, as Jupiter still wanted that treasure. Even if Kris had guaranteed them protection from the law, they decided not to take any chances.
Mewtwo had also vanished after the incident. Kris had called Blaine after everything to tell about how Mewtwo had another Mega Evolution and how it had saved the day again, also asking him what he thought Mewtwo would do next. Blaine was quiet a bit before answering:
"That depends on what it wants to do," he simply said. "Now it gets to really experience a part of life it has never tried before."
"What's that?" Kris asked.
"It gets to choose."
Dawn, Lucas and Barry had left for their next destination, the Fiore region. While there was still animosity, the trio agreed to travel together for now, and it seemed like even Barry had cut down on his snark.
Kris, Iris, Lyra and Wes accompanied Dawn, Lucas and Barry to the Jubilife City Airport and saw them off as they hopped on the plane to Fiore. After the Sinnoh trio was gone, however, the four gathered together in an awkward "where do we go from here" -moment.
"Well..." Wes said, being the first to speak up after the Sinnoh trio had boarded the plane. "Some adventure, huh?"
"Yeah, and you actually made a meaningful contribution," Kris deadpanned. "I didn't think I'd live to see the day."
Wes chuckled joylessly, then winced and held onto his ribs, prompting a concerned look from Iris.
"You sure you're okay?" she asked. "You should have stayed in that hospital a bit longer."
"Yeah, well, I'll make do with these delicious painkillers they gave me," Wes said and shook a bottle of pills in his pocket. "Besides, I need to get back to Orre to see my mom and sis. I'm not too worried about what Cheren said, but I'd still like to check in, just in case."
Kris frowned at Wes for talking about it so openly. "So you told-"
"Every word, to both of them, while you were talking to Blaine," Wes said quietly.
"We understood it," Iris said.
"I called him a scumbag!" Lyra piped in.
"But we're still good," Wes confirmed.
Kris smiled. "Here's something I never thought I'd say when we first met, but… it was good meeting you. You leaving now?"
"'Fraid so," Wes said and pointed at the large screen showing the departing and arriving flights. "Got my ticket ready as well. You guys feel free to come to Orre at any time, though. It's great if you like, uh… sand."
Kris gave him a brief hug while Iris almost choked him with her hug.
"We'll meet again, I'm sure," he said and patted Iris on the back.
When Iris was finally done a few minutes later and trying her best to look like she wasn't crying, Wes went in for a hug with Lyra, but when Lyra didn't seem to get it, he settled for an awkward handshake before he left for his terminal.
"Guess I'll be going too," Lyra said and showed Kris and Iris a brochure she picked up.
It was about the Unova region and the Pokémon League they had there. There were plenty of Pokémon there that couldn't be found anywhere else, a tempting idea for sure.
"I can't exactly afford a flight, but I think I figured out a way to get there cheap," Lyra said proudly. "I'll make my way on trains and boats and hitchhiking, earning my way by battling and doing work, I don't care if I have to scrub a deck or serve seafood to obnoxious rich tourists, I'm ready for anything. Whaddyathink, Kris, bet you haven't thought of that, huh?"
Kris and Iris glanced at each other, trying to keep a straight face.
"Gotta say, never crossed my mind," Kris said. "Great idea, Lyra. You sure about Unova, though?"
"Absolutely, I've always wanted to go!" Lyra said cheerfully, then turned to Iris. "You sure not coming along? You're going to be taking over a gym soon, right?"
"I am," Iris said, "but not just yet. There's still stuff to do here. Some loose ends. I'm sure you understand."
"Eh, not really, but it's your life," Lyra said with a shrug. She then turned to look at Kris, though her face turned a little redder and she couldn't quite look her in the eye. "So, uh, Kris, this is gonna sound a bit weird, but… you and me… we're good, right?"
"Lyra, trust me, we're good," Kris said firmly. "We'll keep in touch, I promise! You can tell me all about Unova then."
"Great!" Lyra squealed. "Uh, I mean… well, bye then!"
With a nervous wave, Lyra turned around and left the airport, though Kris noticed an unusual amount of pep in her step. Iris raised an eyebrow at Kris.
"Did you really mean that?" she asked.
"Oh, Arceus, no!" Kris sighed. "But she did save my life, and it would be kinda selfish of me to hold on a grudge after that, so… working on it."
Iris nodded, then turned to look at a young man on a bench. Sitting between an old woman holding a Glameow in her lap and a man reading a newspaper, the young man wore a thick brown trench coat, sunglasses, a scarf covering his face and a wide-rimmed hat obscuring parts of his head. This was a big city, so no one really questioned it. When Iris nodded at him, the young man stood up and walked over to them. When he was close enough, he finally dared to remove his sunglasses, hat and scarf, revealing his reddish brown eyes and black, spiky hair.
"Sorry for the hassle," Red whispered to Kris and Iris. "I'm still not ready to come out of hiding just yet. But trust me, I will meet up with Yellow as soon as I'm able."
"It's fine," Kris assured. "So what did you want to talk about?"
Making sure no one was listening, Red leaned closer to Kris and Iris and muttered: "I may have a lead on this prophecy thing. There's an icebreaker called S.S. Spiral in Snowpoint City. A friend of mine I'm sure you both know is going to meet you there. But Kris, this prophecy, to decipher it would require traveling all over the world just to get the different pieces, and then you'd need someone to be able to translate it… it's kind of a hassle."
"Hassle is better than boring," Kris said with a shrug. "Trust me, we're okay with traveling. I feel like this is what I'm meant to do, you know?"
"And I'll keep her company as long as I can," Iris said. "There's still a lot that I want to see and learn before I take over the gym."
Smiling at them, Red put his hat, sunglasses and scarf back on again. Giving them a thumbs up, Red left and soon disappeared into the crowd. Chattering excitedly, Kris and Iris left the airport to prepare for their trip towards Snowpoint, wondering where their journey would take them next.
But as they left, the man on the bench reading a newspaper stared on, stroking his finely groomed black mustache.
"Soon, my friends," Missile mused to himself. "Soon."
~o~O~o~
Somewhere in Johto…
Elder Li, the old leader of the Legendary Pokémon Society, was on his knees in a large, empty temple hidden in the wilderness of Johto. Mumbling to himself, Li didn't initially notice a man sneaking towards him. But when he finally caught on, he chuckled to himself.
"You're quite good," he laughed. "No one has managed to sneak up on me in fifty years."
Li got up and turned around lazily to look at the intruder. It was Silver, accompanied by his Sneasel.
"So, you're his son," Li mused as he stared at Silver. "I have to say, when we first met in the Sprout Tower, I wasn't expecting this. I hope you at least took my advice into consideration."
"I did," Silver told him.
Li's eyes turned to the large, sharp dagger in Silver's hand. "You sure about that?" he asked with an amused tone.
"I have to find out if what my father said was true," Silver said simply and threw the dagger at Li as hard as he could.
Li didn't even flinch, simply flicked the knife away with his fingers, but with enough impact to send the dagger flying to the opposite side of the room, hitting a wall and sinking deep enough to stick in it. Silver scoffed.
"You're not human," he said.
"Surely your father didn't say that?" Li laughed. "I was born a human, you know. I simply took some measures of… self-improvement."
"Would that include making a deal with Giratina?" a threatening voice asked from the shadows.
Giovanni emerged from the dark corner of the temple and walked to Silver's side, the large man towering over his medium-sized son.
"See that symbol, Silver?" Giovanni asked. "Take a close look."
Silver looked at the floor beneath them. Painted on the floor was a symbol, a large, dark purple circle with six spikes protruding in every direction from it. The same symbol was also painted on every wall and in the ceiling as well – six in total.
"Circle of the Torn World," Giovanni mused. "A group of Giratina-worshipers."
Silver shook his head. "I don't understand!" he snapped at Li. "You helped my friends stop Giratina!"
Li just smiled and shook his head. "We don't need to go through all this. I'm sure your father has told you everything. Suffice to say, I wasn't going to let someone like Cyrus determine what our brave new world is going to be like. He was just about destruction. I'm all about creating something. And to do that, Lord Giratina must return in our terms!"
"Do it," Giovanni told Silver. "He practically admitted it. It's okay to do it!"
Silver didn't budge. His Sneasel looked at him in concern. There was another dagger in his pocket, but all Silver saw in front of him was a frail old man who partly inspired Silver to become who he was now – a better person. Or so he wanted to believe anyway.
"You know I can't do it myself!" Giovanni pressured Silver. "Do it now!"
"Perhaps your boy needs more motivation," Li said.
Without warning, the old man lunged at Silver, but Silver's reflexes were as sharp as ever. At his command, Silver's Sneasel stopped Li's advance with a barrage of Ice Shards, allowing Silver to pull out his dagger and hit Li square in the chest.
And Silver's suspicions were confirmed, when, instead of dropping to the ground and bleeding like a normal person, Li disappeared into a dark cloud, as if dragged into darkness, leaving only his colorful robes behind. Panting heavily, Silver collapsed on the floor, staring at Li's robes, crumpled right in the middle of the ominous symbol.
"You did the right thing," Giovanni assumed. "But I must still ask you to make sure. Are you ready for the next stage of our plan?"
Silver bit his lip. "Yes… father."
-THANKS FOR READING!-
A/N: Whew, well, that's season 2 done. It took quite a while, and this needlessly epic story is only 40% done! Three seasons of adventures with Kris and the others still to come, with hopefully MUCH better schedules. But first, some trivia:
- I'm not a 100% happy with these last chapters, since there's so many times when our heroes are saved from doom in the nick of time. So expect less of that in the future.
- HUGE thanks to Ardtornismyname, DoctorWhale, UnbiasedBias, An7 and all of my other readers, reviewers, followers and favoriters for support, ideas and encouragement. Seriously, even if you just glanced at this story and went "Well this sucked!", then thank you for reading, at least.
- My favorite chapters would probably be the Clash of the Elements two-parter and Nightmare On Canalave Streets, though there were many individual scenes I really liked. Notably, anytime there was banter between Jupiter and Mars and everytime Kris and Lyra interacted. I love how Lyra turned out as a character, and I'm pretty proud of Kris' characterization. She reminds me a bit of myself... but I hope I'm not as obnoxious as she can be sometimes :D
KRIS WILL RETURN IN SEASON 3, "UNDER THE SAME SKY", COMING SOON... STAY TUNED!