"I need to go take care of some things." That seemed to be Mismagius's motto or something.
It had already been a week since the two of them had come to the dark, depressing world where Mismagius and Lucario both came from. Lucario had been captured by the shadow, who was causing disappearances in both their world and the one they were in now. They thought they would at least be seeing Mismagius a lot, but she always seemed busy with who knows what. Every now and then one of her council members would come to see the two of them. Other than that they were pretty much alone except for their new friend, Daisy the Banette, who became their first team member in this new world.
All three of them wished they could go outside, but Mismagius was afraid that the shadow might come after them or that the townspeople wouldn't trust them since they came from another world. Aamira spent a lot of time just looking out of the window, which took up most of the east wall. The window was supposed to be a special kind that you could see out of, but not in, so it was alright for her to stay next to the window all of the time.
It had rained almost the whole time they were there. But the clouds never moved, and the sun or moon never came out. Aamira had always liked it at night, but she hated there not even being a moon or the stars in the sky.
Daisy could always cheer the two of them up though. Since Daisy was once a doll, that was just what she did best. Even if she was now a ghost type pokemon.
This night was different though. Aamira had felt it before she had even fallen asleep.
Thunder clapped outside and Aamira woke up instantly and sat up in her bed. Daisy noticed and started playing the music box, which had helped Aamira get to sleep the past few nights, but Aamira hated storms like this. It had been raining for some time, but there had never actually been thunder and lightning up until now.
Aamira got up and sat down in the chair by the window again. Daisy closed the music box and sat on the windowsill. The city below them looked like it was in a fog because of how hard it was raining. It was hard to even see the forest in the distance, which usually showed up clearly against the horizon.
Aamira looked over at Quill. How could he be sleeping through this? He looked perfectly relaxed, all curled up asleep on his bed.
Daisy tugged on Aamira's arm. Aamira turned around and saw Daisy staring out the window at the streets below. Aamira didn't think anyone would be out in this weather, but down in the street, a lone pokemon stood. Aamira backed away from the window a little, thinking it was staring up at her, but then remembered it couldn't be since no one could see through the window from the outside. Besides that, it was wearing a cloak, so it was hard to tell what it was looking at, especially in the rain.
Aamira yawned. She was tired, so she decided to go back to sleep.
The next morning it was still drizzling.
Mismagius came in with Daisy following her. "I don't mind an extra pokemon hanging around, but could you make sure she doesn't get into any trouble? Just a while ago one of the council members caught her running around in the garden. She sure was doing a good job of scaring people."
Daisy ran and hid behind Aamira. She never really cared much for other ghost type pokemon, which they noticed as soon as she met Mismagius the first time.
"Daisy's like a little kid, you know that." Aamira said. "And kids can't just be locked in a room all day. We're all starting to get a little claustrophobic being stuck in the castle all the time."
"I know, but you just can't go outside. Not now. More criminals are starting to show their faces, so to speak. Somehow word got out that the shadow is nearly undefeatable now, so more descendants of its followers are showing up. Including someone who's thought to be a descendant of Shade."
"Who was Shade?" Quill asked.
"I keep forgetting how little you two know about this. Shade was second in command. He wore a cloak so no one ever found out what kind of pokemon he was."
'It couldn't have been that pokemon I saw last night…' Aamira thought.
"Apparently, when the shadow was sealed inside the magic staff, all of his followers went into hiding and started to blend in with the rest of the pokemon. But Shade wouldn't stand for the defeat. He knew that if the royal line came to an end, the shadow could come back and would be unstoppable. He alone was the one responsible for the disappearance of so many Lucario and Riolu back then. But when he was finally caught, he disappeared before anyone could even find out what kind of pokemon he was. The day after he disappeared, a note appeared in the castle. It said that one day the shadow would return and his descendant will become Shade and take his place. Looks like it's finally happened…"
"So there's someone almost as dangerous as that shadow that's going around also causing the disappearances?" Quill asked. "We could still help out, you know? If we're in danger and this shadow can slip in and out of places so easily, it would be better if we at least put up a fight and go out that way!"
"Quill!" Mismagius was obviously shocked by Quill's uncharacteristic behavior.
"Well what do you expect?" Aamira said. "We've been stuck here for a week and we haven't done a thing but lay around. That sounds like something I would normally say, but I'm not exaggerating when I say I've had to do everything I can to convince myself not to sneak out and just run off to who knows where!"
Daisy jumped around angrily, but couldn't say anything.
Mismagius looked at all of them shocked. "Weren't you listening to a thing I just said? It's too dangerous!"
"And what's life without a little danger?" Quill asked.
"Boring." Aamira replied.
"I can't believe you would want to risk your lives by going outside just to relieve boredom!"
"Risk our lives…" Quill repeated. "Even if we went outside, everything's basically over, right?"
"There wouldn't be a problem with you two going outside if we only knew who was who! But the problem is, we don't. The enemy is everywhere!"
"Exactly!" Aamira said. "You say that word just 'somehow' got out that the shadow is pretty much unstoppable now because Lucario disappeared. Just face it; inside or outside the castle, nowhere is safe!"
"Then maybe it would be safer if you two were just locked in this one room all the time." Behind Mismagius, the door slammed shut and there was the sound of the lock clicking. "I had the feeling I would have to resort to this, though I really didn't want to. So while I figure out a way to get you two back to your world, and Daisy too I suppose, there will always be a guard outside of here for your own protection." Mismagius went through the door and disappeared.
"Maybe we did go a little too far…" Quill said. "But I can't take much more of this. We're not even really supposed to be here."
Aamira laid down on her bed and looked up at the ceiling. "Well, now you know how I felt at first."
"What do you mean?" Quill asked.
"You found me that day by Shroud Lake. I couldn't remember anything about where I came from or even who I really was. True, I was given a place to stay right away, but of course I never belonged in your world. But I didn't have any choice in staying because I had nowhere else to go."
"I… I never knew…" Quill gave her an apologetic look. "And I guess I wasn't really making it easy for you…"
"But what does it really matter anyway?" Aamira asked. "People are always destined to live in one world their whole lives. I guess I was sort of given a good opportunity when I was able to come to your world. Technically I was able to live in two worlds even if I couldn't remember the first one. And now we're both in this one."
"Yea, even if we're stuck here for now, we still have a place to go back to. And wherever it is that you come from, I'm sure you have a good place to go back to also."
"But unless I can get my memory back, I'm not sure if I want to go back to my world." Aamira yawned. "I hate this though. It's always so dark here so I'm always tired."
Daisy seemed to be a little anxious for some reason. Unlike the two of them, she wasn't really locked in. She looked back at Aamira and Quill for a second, then went through the door.
Aamira slept for the rest of the day, or whatever time it really was. That night it stormed again and not even that could wake her up.
Quill looked out the window. Where was Daisy? She still hadn't come back. What if something happened to her? Down in the street he noticed a lone pokemon in a cloak. It wouldn't have surprised him if it was Shade.
"Why don't you come and fight us instead of just lurking in the shadows all the time?" Quill said under his breath.
The cloaked pokemon turned and started walking out towards the forest. Lightning flashed somewhere past the forest and by the time the light had faded, the cloaked pokemon was gone.
Quill woke up the next morning from the light of the torches in the town below. That was the only real indication on when it was day or night, but it wasn't a good one since the rain could easily put the fire out. And even though the rain had stopped, the clouds were still in the same position they always were.
Aamira was still asleep, which was weird since she usually woke up before him. After a few hours, Quill started to get worried and decided to wake her up.
Aamira stared up at Quill for a moment. Her eyes were a strange color, but not too different from their regular color, so Quill figure that must be what they looked like when a Riolu's eyes were bloodshot.
Aamira yawned. "Do we have any missions today…?"
"We haven't been on a mission in a while. We're still in Mismagius's world, remember?" Quill said.
Aamira looked at him confused for a second then closed her eyes again. "Right, now I remember…" She yawned and rolled over. "Just let me sleep for a little longer… I'm really tired."
Quill walked over to the door and started knocking on it, hoping that the guard outside would open it. Luckily he did.
The guard at the time was a Gligar, who still looked pretty young. "What is it?" He asked. "You getting hungry or something?"
"No, Aamira's been asleep all day. I tried to wake her up, but she fell back to sleep right away." He said.
"Really?" Gligar walked over towards Aamira's bed and looked at her. "When exactly did she fall asleep?"
"I don't know, it's so hard to tell here. Around noon yesterday, I suppose." Quill said nervously. "This morning when I actually woke up before her, I thought she must be acting as a revolt or something, but when I woke her up her eyes were really bloodshot."
"Alright, I'll try to find Mismagius. But don't leave this room or you're bound to be in big trouble then."
A few minutes later, Mismagius came into the room followed by Gligar. "Still asleep, huh?" She said in a worried voice.
Quill put his paw to her forehead for about the fifth time since Gligar left. "I don't think she had a fever or anything, but she's never been asleep for this long before…"
"Why didn't I think of this?" Mismagius said. "Sometimes when pokemon are taken out of the environment they're used to, they can get really sick and no one will notice for a while. But what can we do? We still have no idea of when you can return to your world and there's nowhere like Vine City in this world."
"There must be something you can do." Quill looked up at her hopefully.
"I suppose it wouldn't do any more damage if you two went into the garden for a while." She said. "Like all of the other plants, the ones in the garden have been dead for quite some time, but it's the best I think we can do."
Quill tried to wake Aamira up again. She yawned and buried her head in the pillow.
"Come on!" Quill said. "You have to get up!"
Aamira sat up and put her hand on her head.
"Are you alright?" Mismagius asked.
"Yea, just a little dizzy…" Aamira replied.
"Well come on!" Quill jumped off of the bed. "Mismagius said that we could go into the garden for a little while. Don't you think it would be nice to get outside for a while?"
"Sure… I guess…" Aamira got out of bed and yawned.
"Wow, her eyes really do look bloodshot…" Gligar said absentmindedly.
Mismagius led the two of them out into the garden. It didn't look like much, the ground was dry and cracked in spite of all the rain, all of the plants were dead, and there was an old broken fountain in the center that was half filled with rain water, but it was pretty big. After a while, Aamira was wide awake again. What was supposed to be "a little while" turned into the whole day. They couldn't do as many things as they wanted, but it was nice just to be out in the fresh air again. Near the end of the day when the two of them had run out of things to do, they sat on a bench on the far side of the garden just to talk for a while.
"I hope we can get back home soon." Aamira said absentmindedly. "I didn't notice when we first came here, but this world's a lot different."
"What do you mean?" Quill asked. "Just look around. Of course it's different. Anyone could tell the difference."
"It's not just that. Even the invisible here is different. I can feel it. Or rather, I can't feel it at all…"
"I still don't get what you mean…"
Aamira yawned and sat back on the bench and fell asleep again.
"Aamira! You have to stay awake!" Quill tried to wake her up again, but she just wouldn't.
Later that night, Quill was sitting in a chair that he had pulled over by Aamira's bed. He wasn't tired in the slightest because he was so scared for Aamira.
"I don't care what happens after this, just please be okay!" He said to her, even though she was still asleep.
The door creaked open. Quill sprang to his feet, but sighed out of relief when it was just Daisy.
Daisy walked across the room and jumped onto Aamira's bed. She looked at her worried for a second, then went back to the door. Then, to Quill's horror, a pokemon wearing a cloak came through the door. He was about to shout, but Daisy covered his mouth before he had the chance.
The pokemon in the cloak looked down at Aamira, then it looked over at Quill. For some reason, Quill didn't feel scared of it anymore.
The pokemon in the cloak walked closer to Aamira, the whole time keeping its head down. It raised one of Aamira's eyelids. She shook it off and rolled over, but still didn't wake up. Then it picked Aamira up and started walking towards the door. Daisy took her hand away from Quill's mouth and beckoned for him to follow.
'What am I getting myself into?' He wondered, and followed after them.
Quill couldn't tell exactly where they were going. He tried to memorize everything they had passed and the direction they had gone so they could go back, but this world was so unfamiliar to him that he just couldn't. Soon the top of the castle disappeared below the horizon and Quill had no idea where they were. He only wished that someone would say something and break the dreadful quiet, even if it meant that it would have to be the pokemon in the cloak because he was too scared to say anything and Daisy couldn't talk.
Finally they reached a cave. The pokemon in the cloak carried Aamira inside, and Quill hesitantly followed. Daisy stayed outside and pushed a boulder over the caves entrance and came through the rock to join everyone else. The cave seemed to go deeper and was lit by a light that came from somewhere further down.
The cloaked pokemon laid Aamira down on the floor of the cave.
"Is she okay…?" Quill asked.
"She will be." He said in a whispered voice. Quill guessed it was so he wouldn't hear his real voice, but it still scared Quill a lot.
The pokemon put his hand over Aamira's forehead. The sleeves on the cloak were so long that Quill couldn't even see what his hands looked like. A flash of light came from its hand and went into Aamira's head. Aamira's eyes opened almost immediately. She yelled at the sight of the pokemon and quickly got up and backed up against the cave wall. Aamira stared at him for a moment, but then she started coughing.
"Are you okay?" Quill asked.
Aamira couldn't answer. Instead, she coughed something up that looked like a piece of glass. Aamira put her hands to her throat. "Ow… How could I have swallowed that?"
"That must have been what was making you sick." Quill said happily. "So you're going to be okay now!"
"You're only half right…" The pokemon in the cloak whispered.
"You don't have to whisper like that!" Aamira snapped at him. "You really think that after you gave me some of your aura so I would wake up that I wouldn't know who you were? Lucario?"
The cloaked pokemon hesitated for a moment before he pulled down the hood on his cloak. "I knew I wouldn't be able to hide my identity from you. And there's not much of a point in it either. Mismagius knows that I betrayed her, but I have to make her think for as long as I can that Shade and I are two different people."
"So you're Shade!" Quill said. "This whole time you were Shade! The shadow's second in command!"
"I WAS the shadow second in command. Or did Mismagius not tell you the truth behind that? Haven't you noticed how strangely she's been acting lately? She brings you to this world, and you have nothing to do so you're forced to stay in the castle all the time. Then when being stuck inside constantly practically drives you crazy, she panics and locks you in. And immediately after that Aamira just happens to get sick and hardly ever wakes up."
"Wait, what are you saying?" Quill asked.
"Isn't it obvious? Mismagius isn't trying to stop the shadow, she IS the shadow!"
Quill jumped, but for some reason, Aamira wasn't too surprised by that.
"She told us Shade was evil and was the shadows second in command so we wouldn't get curious and go looking for him." Aamira said. "We don't know anything about this world… Of course we would believe whatever she said."
"So let me tell you what really happened." Lucario said. "The first Shade was a Lucario that worked along side Mismagius all those years ago. He was her most trustworthy servant. But what she didn't know was that he was working on something that would trap her so she would never be able to cause any destruction to this world ever again. When she was nearly at the height of power, Shade showed her a staff with a magic crystal on it. He said that the crystal was like the ones legendary pokemon use to store their power and that if she stored her own energy in it, her energy would grow and she would become invincible. But using his own aura, he was able to seal Mismagius entirely in the crystal. Then Shade said, 'one day, you may get out of there and try to take over again, but when that happens, my descendant will become the new Shade and stop you once again.' And guess who his descendant is."
"But she couldn't have been telling us nothing but lies." Aamira said. "A lot of the story was like the ones that she told us. She said that someone sealed the shadow in a staff, and in a different story, she said that the Shade worked with the shadow and said that another Shade would appear when the shadow returned."
"Yea, but in that story, Shade was evil." Quill said.
"You're missing the point I'm trying to make here." Aamira said. "Remember the first story she told us? She said that it was the king who sealed the shadow into the staff. If she was telling the truth, and Shade was the king, and Lucario is Shade's descendant…"
"Then Lucario is the king!" Quill said.
"Exactly…" Lucario said. "But the kingdom isn't really mine; it's yours." He pointed at Aamira.
"What? You're joking, right?" Aamira said. "Mismagius said that kings usually have aura like mine, but… I can't be royalty!"
"Maybe not. There are two ways to become the king though. Either you inherit the title, or an Aura Reader becomes the king. But because of how fearful the people have become, it's always an Aura Reader that becomes the king unless one can't be found."
"Wait, you lost me." Quill said. "What's an Aura Reader?"
"You don't know. That's just perfect…" Lucario said flatly. "An Aura Reader is someone with a particular aura, like the kind Aamira has. And there are many effects that come from it, including four special abilities that only Aura Readers can learn."
"That explains a lot." Quill said. "You know, like whenever you touch something you have a thought that tells you about it."
"That hasn't worked for a while now." Aamira said. "I haven't even been able to use Aura Sphere as well as usual."
"Maybe because your aura isn't complete, like mine, which would mean that you still wouldn't be a perfect candidate to become a king. As you know, aura comes in many different colors to reflect the personality and fighting style of the pokemon. An Aura Reader's has two colors: gold and silver. It's really rare that they're equal though, so a lot of the time Aura Readers have trouble using their abilities the way they want."
"That really explains a lot." Quill said. "So what kind of abilities does Aamira have anyway?"
"There's the ability called Aura Reading, which obviously comes with being an Aura Reader. It lets you learn whatever you want just by touching what it is you want to learn about. Then there's Aura Seal which, like the name suggests, lets you seal aura. If you're wondering, that's what Mismagius did to you. The opposite of Aura Seal is Aura Release, which is what I did so save you just a moment ago. Then there's the third and hardest to do; Aura Restore."
"What does that do?" Aamira asked.
"Imagine if you could save someone inches from death, or even bring them back to life if you were strong enough. That's what it does. But not only is it the most difficult to do, but it's also the most dangerous. Many of the former kings have died trying to bring back their loved ones. Every now and then it would work, but in using up all of their aura, the kings would completely disappear only moments after."
"So it basically just returns aura back to the way it was before." Quill said. "Yea, Aamira did that once!"
"I did?" Aamira asked.
"Don't you remember? When we were in Divum, Suicune tried to escape from his treasure using your aura and he accidentally messed up mine. Then I got really sick because of it and you saved me. And fainted right after…"
"That sounds like it." Lucario said.
"I can't believe all of this." Aamira said. "I have so many questions now…"
"I guess we can ignore the rule that says you can't question the teacher for now." Lucario said. "Ask me whatever, but we have to get going."
