Alchemist Spirit Knight Lucina
Chapter Twenty Three- Metal
Ike woke up in the middle of a field he didn't recognize. It wasn't in any time or place he'd ever known. The air was different, somehow, and while he could see black smoke polluting the darkening sky, he also heard the distant cry of a chicken in the distance. Sitting up, he looked around a bit. Two of the other Alchemist Knights were sprawled near him, but his head hurt a bit too much to attempt to look to see if Marth was among them. A hand reached to pull him to his feet, covered by a black, fingerless glove.
"Spitfire, does this happen a lot?" asked Red in his typical smug manner.
"If you mean waking up in the middle of nowhere, no, not often," Ike replied, his head throbbing from the change in position. "But was it just me, or did Marth's Lodestar weird out?"
A quiet voice that made his heart skip a beat out of both fright and happiness rang out behind him. "I believe it did," Marth stated rather apologetically. "I-I have no clue what it was I did, but I am sincerely sorry. If our friends are lost, it is my fault." Ike breathed a sigh of relief. If Marth had been separated from him, he knew he'd have panicked. It was bad enough knowing what would happen to him eventually, but not being able to protect him would have surely shot arrows of guilt into his heart.
Turning around to face the prince, Ike gave a reassuring grin. "It's fine! Whatever that was, it's not your fault, and I'm sure Lucina and the others just got off at the wrong time. We'll find them, if they don't find us first," he assured. "Anyways, I'm glad you're alright."
"Thank you," Marth muttered, his cheeks turning an embarrassed crimson. Ike felt his own burning, as they too often did in his presence. "I fear we've stranded ourselves here, wherever this is. Wait," he looked as if an idea had suddenly occurred to him. "Might anyone happen to have something belonging to one of the others?"
Red looked at Ike expectantly. "Sorry, don't think so," he apologized.
Another voice came from the side, scoffing. "Whatever happened, you brought it upon yourself!" Lucas exclaimed. "Dragging me here, tricking me like you did, I'd say you deserved it if you hadn't dragged me along too."
"Whoa, Espurr, calm down!" exclaimed Red with a small chuckle. "It's not li-"
"Excuse me, what did you call me?" interrupted the extremely creepy boy, who Ike was infinitely grateful didn't have his core activated. Being possessed wasn't an experience he wanted to relive in the slightest.
Red gave another small chuckle. "'Espurr'; it's a kind of Pokémon that looks completely innocent, but it can destroy anything around it with its Psychic powers. So, pretty much exactly like you, right?"
The Knight of Love gave a groan. "Innocent? I only just recently turned fifteen, but I've seen enough horror to last a lifetime. I believe innocence left me-"
It was Red's turn to interrupt with a loud round of laughing. "Ha, you, fifteen? You look, what, ten?"
Though he wouldn't look at the boy to check, Ike was sure Lucas was blushing furiously. "I'm telling the truth! And at least I don't look ten years older than I act and kidnap people to make them fight their dead brother!" he yelled back.
Grimacing at the harsh yells thrown between the two, Ike quickly gave Marth a desperate glance. "We need to break them up," he exclaimed, but the prince stared blankly ahead.
"I hardly think I'm the person to ask about this," Marth softly admitted. "I hardly have any idea what I'm doing without Lucina or the journal, so why should they listen to me?"
The defeated look on Marth's face made Ike desperately want to launch into some grand, encouraging speech to bring back his smile. He would have gone through with that idea, no matter how poorly it would have turned out had it not been for his eyes being drawn to the silver glow in his hand. "What does knowing what you're doing have to do with breaking up a fight? It's not like any of us know what we're doing any more than you," Ike quickly encouraged. "But hey, we're not completely hopeless: the Metal core is still glowing."
Marth opened his clenched fist and looked at the silver glow in astonishment. "Perhaps it didn't falter," he remarked with a slight smile. "That doesn't quite explain why the others were separated from us, but at least we have a task."
Turning to the still fighting Knights of Blood and Love, Marth bravely pulled Lucas back by the dangling hood of his cloak. "I apologize for deceiving you, but we didn't have much of a choice," explained the prince. "If we had allowed you to return home, the Star Eaters surely would have pursued you and captured, or even killed you."
"I'd have been willing to take that risk if it meant not having to fight Claus's corpse," Lucas muttered under his breath."
"Chances are you'd end up fighting alongside him," Ike added. "I mean, with all of your power, they'd want to weaponize it and use it to hurt people."
The rather frightening blond took the pink core in his hand. "Then destroy this so they'll have no use for me," he suggested.
"Destroying that would be more dangerous than keeping it," Marth countered. "Considering the great deal of power stored within it, letting all of that out would cause such a great magical explosion it could potentially rip a hole in the universe!"
"I don't remember that from the book," Ike remarked, raising an eyebrow. "Are you sure you didn't just make that up?"
For a brief moment, Marth looked confused, but he quickly gave an explanation. "He talks about it right after the explanation of the Light core's powers, I believe."
He gave a nod, not wanting to admit he still wasn't sure what he was talking about.
Lucas opened his mouth, as if to say something more, but Red interrupted him with a confused "I thought you said Pokémon were only in my time."
"We didn't say that," Ike corrected. "But yeah, I'm pretty sure that's right."
"Then what is this white bird Pokémon?" Red countered, pointing at the chicken Ike had heard earlier, who was much closer now. The black-haired boy bent down to look at it closer, only eliciting a confused stare from the chicken. "It sort of looks like a Pidove or a Starly, but why is it so white? It is Shiny?"
The other three Alchemist Knights stared at him in disbelief. "I'm pretty sure that's just a regular chicken," Lucas deadpanned. "And not a Poké- whatever."
"'Chicken', is that at all like a Torchic?" asked Red. Ike tried very hard not to laugh and keep in mind he probably hadn't ever heard of animals without superpowers, which was actually pretty hard considering the situation they were in. Lucas and Marth simply stared blankly and uncomprehendingly at Red, who took a red and white ball like the ones his Pokémon came out of and tossed it at the chicken. "I'll catch you, 'Chicken'!" he cried.
As it hit the bird with a thud, it let out a series of angered squawks. "Great, now you've hurt it," Lucas berated.
An odd rumbling could be heard from off in the distance. "Hey, what is that?" Ike wondered aloud as he looked in the general direction of the sound. He gasped a bit when he saw a cloud of white storming towards them, echoing the cries of the chicken Red had hurt. With an exasperated laugh, Ike cried "Angry Chicken Brigade at five-o'clock, run for it!"
Marth looked at the storming cloud of poultry and shook his head. "That, I- I'm at a loss for words."
As they neared, Red threw out one of his Pokémon, a blue-green quadrupled creature with a pink flower bulb on its back. "Ivysaur, use Vine Whip to hold those things back!" he cried. The Pokémon sent out a pair of vines from the flower and wrapped a few of the chickens in them, throwing them back. They simply charged back into the hoard, as agitated as ever.
With a distressed moan, Red sent out the orange dragon he'd also used back at Silph. "C-charizard, Flamethrower, now!"
It shot flames from its mouth, but not one of them seemed to be phased by them. "Holy Tauros, what are those things, Rock-types?" he exclaimed. "But Ivysaur didn't work either, so, what, Dragon?"
"We're up against Dragon chickens," Lucas sighed as one charged for him, its talons cutting part of his sleeve and leaving a red gash. "This is not at all how I wanted to die!" he cried, suddenly sounding like a small child.
Ike hurriedly ran between the hoard and Marth, hoping to shield him from the worst of the attack. One of them reached him, pecking at his shin and leaving a small gash. He winced in pain, prompting Marth to try to run out in front of him. He caught the prince's wrist. "No, I'll be fine," he insisted. "Try to run if you can. I'll distract them."
"What kind of leader am I if I can't even stop my friend from getting attacked by monstrous chickens?" Marth countered, trying to jump in front of Ike and run his rapier through one of the chickens.
Red screamed in pain as two of them ganged up on him. "Someone," he begged. "Stop these little Zubats!"
Suddenly, as if Red's plea had been heard, the chickens all came to a halt. Marth looked at the one he'd skewered and muttered. "This, it doesn't look organic."
The chicken fell off of the rapier and onto the ground. The small hole running through it revealed a collection of circuitry and metallic wires. "A chimera…" Lucas muttered as he inspected it.
"Not quite," a female voice responded from somewhere in the distance. A woman in a white lab coat approached them, followed by a young man with blond hair and a floppy green hat. "They are my latest creation, the Cucc-0 Revenge Squad, commissioned by Lon Lon Ranch as a method to stop people from killing their chickens," explained the woman. "I thank you for helping me assure they work."
"They did their job," Ike muttered, a bit irritated to have been used as a test subject. "Maybe a bit too well."
The green-hatted boy looked at their wounds and frowned. "Zelda, you hurt them," he complained. "Maybe don't use them on people next time?"
The woman, Zelda, gave an apologetic bow, her brown braids flying up with the sudden motion. "Please forgive me for hurting you," she stated. "I haven't introduced myself, have I? I am Zelda Hylia, owner and proprietor of Hylia Robotics."
"And I'm Link," the green-hatted boy exclaimed. "Her assistant, or, well, more like friend. She talks to me a lot more than she lets me touch her equipment."
Ike started to introduce his group, but was cut off by Zelda suddenly walking away. "I will heal your wounds at my workplace. Please follow."
The Alchemist Knights followed the woman, Link walking beside them. "Sorry 'bout that," he apologized. "She's not really a people person. So, what's that glow-y thing you've got?"
Marth gave a surprised glance to the Metal core, which was glowing violently. He gave a small smile as he handed it to Link. "I believe this is meant for you."
He looked at it for a moment before smiling. "This is really cool, can I really keep it?" he asked.
"It's called the Metal Core," Ike explained. "It's one of the Alchemy Cores."
"Cool!" Link exclaimed. "Hey, Zel," he called. "Look at this!"
The white-coated woman slowed her steps to walk in line with her friend. "This is a magical object, correct?" she inquired.
"Yes," Marth told. "It glows as it does in the presence of its chosen wielder, who is meant to join the other chosen Alchemist Knights, in this case us, to save the universe from the Star Eaters, who are attempting to spread discord and entropy across the cosmos."
Both Zelda and Link hung on Marth's every word, as did Ike, but simply for the speaker's sake. "Is that so?" Zelda managed to get out. "And Link was chosen for such a task? What an honor. You must help, no matter what!"
Link nodded. "Of course!" he agreed. "Now, how do I use this?"
"Put it on and call out 'Metal'." Marth explained.
The green-hatted boy wrapped the chord around his wrist a few times. "Metal!" Link repeated . His green clothing was enveloped in silver, reemerging as a similar outfit dyed violet. As he looked at his new appearance, Link gave a laugh. "What's with the costume?" he asked, a question Ike had asked himself countless times.
"It doesn't matter," Zelda quickly dismissed. "Either way, I will help you with this in whatever way I am capable of."
"Thank you," Marth quickly followed. "Now, we became separated from the rest of the Alchemist Knights due to a mishap with the homing spell that brought us to Link, so we need to find a way to reu-"
The prince was cut off by a high-pitched giggle coming from the low-hanging shadows. The Alchemist Knights turned towards the laugh, as did Zelda, and a small, impish creature wearing a broken, rather elaborate stone mask. A shock of bright orange hair stuck out behind the mask. It would have looked almost human if it wasn't for its small stature, grey-black skin, and the fact it was levitating.
"I found you!" exclaimed the creature in a voice that was definitely feminine, though a bit accented. "You think you're clever, running off, thinking we'd left."
Ike had no idea what she meant, but after a muffled noise from Lucas, saw the memory of their previous fight against the Celestial Knights run through his head. "You're a Celestial Guardian, then?" Ike asked, knowing the answer and tightening his grip on his sword.
"That's right," she coldly chuckled. "I'm Midna, and I think it'd be nice to end this before the sun sets, so would you perhaps be quick with your struggle? I won't drag out your end too much if you don't waste my time."
AN- There, you got Midna. Are you happy? Okay, probably not what you expected when I asked if you wanted Midna, but you got her. And hey, Ike finally got his POV chapter. Also, thanks to Armin and Burning Light and Crystal (the "And Crystal" is part of the same name) for suggesting Cuccos being enemies in this way back in like, chapter six or so. See, I remembered. Plus, I updated the first few chapters to be a bit better and have significantly less semi-colons.
So, chapterly question: there is something very wrong in this chapter. Okay, there are actually a few, but one is a bit more immediate. And I mean intentionally wrong, not a silly oversight on my part. Can you figure it/them out?
So, thanks for reading and preemptive apology for next chapter! –Twilight Joltik
