AN: Good guess to those who said I've been writing on my hiatus, but no. I've just been busy getting married and stuff.
That said, to everyone who guessed that we're nearing the end of The Sun Soul, good guess and yes. I know I've said that before but this time I really really mean it! I promise!
But there are still stories to tell. I said waaaay back in Chapter 1 (good god that feels like it was so long ago) that Pokemon as a series has a lot of untapped potential. I still hold to that and I think that it should be fun to write something of a Legendarium. To that end I've recently finalized the outlines for three books and a lengthy appendix to complete this series. I have absolutely no idea how long it will take to write, but we'll see how it goes. They should all be considerably shorter than The Sun Soul.
I know my posting schedule has been something of a rollercoaster and the quality of the chapters has been hit and miss, but I appreciate everyone who stuck with me and hope you'll consider this my genuine thanks for your time and hope that you enjoyed the story.
Peace!
Chapter 37 - Synthesis
May's jaw dropped. "What do you mean, you think you were dead?" she blurted. "You're standing right here." the girl reached out and poked Ash with her finger.
Straightening up, Ash looked between May and Mewtwo, the latter of which remained standing silently in the corner. His focus visibly sharpening, the young trainer took May by the hand. "We understand now, we understand it all," he said quietly but confidently. "May, there's work we have to do, now."
"Ash, what are you-" May stopped, realizing that, in addition to hearing Ash audibly speak the words, she'd heard them from inside her mind, in Mewtwo's voice. She jerked her hand free of Ash's and backed away from both the trainer and the Pokémon. "Ash, what the hell is going on?!" she shouted, stabbing a finger towards Mewtwo. "Why... How is that thing inside my head?"
Holding out his hand, Ash took a step forward. "May," said the savant and the psychic in tandem, "this was the only solution. Anything less or different would have resulted in utter defeat. There was no other way."
"Defeat for who?" May demanded. "What are you talking about?"
"A way to end the fighting between Mewtwo and humanity with no further bloodshed or destruction." Ash said, his words echoed by the psychic. "There was only one way, because humans have evolved to a point never reached by any form of life in history: a state of Universal Apical Predation. There was no chance for permanent coexistence with another species of their caliber. We stand by our belief that no two apex predators can share an environment, that one would destroy the other and possibly itself in pursuit of limited resources. Humans have reached a state of being universally apical, they are the ultimate predators of any environment they choose to inhabit. They could not coexist with anything as powerful as themselves. We see that now.
"Synthesis," the pair still spoke in unison but it was Mewtwo's voice that grew louder. "The only solution."
May swallowed the lump in her throat. "We?" she asked.
"We," Ash and Mewtwo answered in unison as May listened, her face growing pale. "May," he went on, Mewtwo's voice fading into the background of the dark room as Ash spoke up, "there was no other solution. Humans overcame nature by sacrificing some individuality to form societies that were far stronger than the sum of the humans inside them. Nature necessitates conflict over limited resources, so when Mewtwo arrived, being apical itself, there were only three possibilities."
Her whole body tense as she listened, May clenched her hands into fists. "Which were what?" she growled.
Ash cleared his throat. "The first and most likely was violent conflict between two parties, both with the power to lay waste to anything on earth, resulting in the utter destruction of one party and incalculable collateral damage. A second, less likely outcome would have been one party losing or surrendering its status as apical."
"Which wasn't going to happen?" May crossed her arms in front of her chest as she scoffed.
"Exactly," Ash went on. "The only other option was a synthesis, a combining of the two into a single entity. More complex and powerful than the sum of the precursors, only a new entity could completely reconcile the previous differences."
All the color finished draining from May's features. "Ash," she said in something of a choked whisper. "Are you saying? What you're telling me is that you and Mewtwo? You're both..."
The savant and the psychic nodded. "Yes. We are both."
May's face snapped. "Enough with the 'we' shit!" she screamed, clenching her eyes shut and pressing her fists to her temples. "This is so wrong!"
Ash stepped forward, gently grabbed May by the wrists and brought her hands down to her sides as she opened her eyes and looked at him. "It's me," he said with a smile. I'm still just as much Ash Ketchum as I ever was. I'm just..." he shrugged. "I'm just Mewtwo too now. I'm still me."
Mewtwo stepped forward, speaking independently of Ash this time. "One entity," it said, "two bodies, fully Mewtwo and fully Ash. That was the Sun Soul's definition of victory."
May blinked. "What?" she probed.
Ash grinned again. "My wish from the Sun Soul," he said. "I wished for victory. This is the result," he stepped back and held his arms out to his side. "If the Sun Soul had simply destroyed Mewtwo then his armies and his human allies would have continued on their rampage and the losses would have been tremendous. If it had destroyed Mewtwo and its armies then the events set in motion by Mewtwo's attack would have resulted in a world-wide war with much the same result as Mewtwo's planned genocide. Synthesis was the only option. Perspectives had to change."
May shook her head. "I still... How do I know it's still you?" she said. "How do I know you're not just Mewtwo pretending to be Ash?"
A smirk spreading across his face, Ash laughed once, darkly. "If I was, why would I be humoring you? Mewtwo was more efficient than that." Ash held out his hand before May could answer, his face and tone again growing more serious. "May, trust me and I'll show you. Every second we delay, people are dying."
Hesitating, May looked between Ash and Mewtwo, then taking a deep breath she looked into Ash's dimly glowing eyes, reached out, and took his hand. Instantly the world around her warped and turned completely black for a split second before coming back into focus. The young girl gasped and looked around. Finding herself back in Mewtwo's sanctum before the viewing pool, her knees shaking, she felt Ash at her flank holding her steady.
One hand firmly beneath May's shoulder to hold her up, Ash looked down at his partner and smiled. "Sorry," he said. "Teleporting is the fastest way to travel but if you're not used to it..." he trailed off.
Taking another steadying breath, May continued looking down at the ground for a moment before turning to face Ash. "Trippy," she smiled, looking up to see Mewtwo wave a hand over the viewing pool.
A smooth sheet of water rose and split into a number of perfectly formed squares a few feet across. The screens flashed to life showing, to Ash's eyes, dozens of different perspectives across a panoramic view of the events unfolding at Mt. Moon and throughout Saffron. Ash stepped up beside Mewtwo as the psychic began silently directing events, pointing to one screen, flicking his fingers, and shifting to a new view of some other event.
Folding his arms before his chest, Ash only watched for a second before turning back to May. "Care to have a look?" he stepped to the side and motioned for May to move forward.
Nodding, May took a step closer and began looking between the screens of water. "What's going on?" she asked, "it's all so fast."
Ash flinched. "Oh," he said quickly, turning back to the view screens and snapping his fingers. Immediately the pace of the events displayed slowed to a comparative crawl, shifting from an almost indecipherable blur of colors to a more understandable series of videos. "Sorry about that. Still getting used to the new..." he paused and looked for a word.
May smiled without looking away from the screens. "Perspective," she finished for him.
"Exactly," Ash answered. "It's difficult to explain exactly how I'm processing things now. There aren't really words to... oh," the savant stopped and looked away before turning back to May. "Excuse me for a second."
As May stepped back, Ash closed his eyes for only a second longer than it took to blink, vanishing from Mewtwo's control room. Opening his eyes again he stood in the hallway to the Sun Soul's vault, before the burned remnants of Giovanni. Kneeling down he reached out and pressed a finger against the man's chest and a spark of bright blue light leapt between them. Extending and reshaping itself, the spark grew and cocooned Giovanni in an envelope of blue light crisscrossed with veins of silver energy. Giovanni's burns melted away, replaced by fresh new skin and a full head of thick black hair. All at once the light faded and Giovanni gasped in a breath of air, his eyes popping open.
Sitting for a second as Ash stood up and stepped back, Giovanni looked around and up at the young savant. "Ash?" he took several more deep breaths. "What happened?"
The young trainer smiled and clasped his hands behind his back. "We won," he answered confidently.
Closing his eyes and leaning his head back against the wall. "I thought we were all dead," he muttered.
"May was fine, just a bump on the head," Ash answered. "I was very briefly dead, and you were on the cusp yourself. I thought you were gone... Another second or two and you might have been."
The older man sighed. "Well thanks for getting to me when you..." he paused and opened his eyes, looking up at Ash's face. Silence followed for a moment. "Son," he said slowly as if he had spoken before completely finishing a thought. "The last thing I remember is Mewtwo holding me out by the neck and setting me on fire." Giovanni held his hands, unburned and strong, up before his face, proceeding to run his fingers over his lips and across his cheeks. "What's going on here?"
Ash leaned down and offered Giovanni a hand up, which the elder savant gladly accepted. "Walk with me," Ash said. "I think I've got some explaining to do."
SC
Giovanni stood with his face hard but his eyes fully alert as Ash concluded his explanation. Waiting patiently, both he and May watched Ash as the young savant stood, his back to Mewtwo and the view screens, lining out exactly what had to happen next.
"It's not a perfect solution," Ash concluded. "It's going to require some secrecy on our part about my new nature, but it's the best option available."
Giovanni nodded. "Of course," he said as May voiced her agreement to the plan. "Mewtwo will remain here and direct your armies as necessary while you'll return to Kanto as if you simply defeated Mewtwo and used the Sun Soul to take all his abilities for yourself. Simple."
May folded her arms behind her back. "It's not too far from the truth," she said. "I'm in."
"Good," Ash said, looking between the two other savants. "That should give us all the time and cover we need to set things right."
May shivered as she looked at Mewtwo. "And you're alright with this?" she asked. "You didn't seem content to just hide before this..." she weighed the word cautiously, "synthesis."
Mewtwo turned from the viewing screens and faced her, his tail swaying casually from one side to the other. "It's impossible to fully explain, given that we share no frame of reference for my new perspective," said the psychic. "However I won't be hiding down here, not really. I'll be out exploring the world through Ash's eyes, exploring the stars, walking across the surface of the sun... dividing my attention much as before. This new state is... far more flexible, mentally, than I ever was before."
Ash cleared his throat. "Besides," he said, more to May than Giovanni as he gestured between himself and Mewtwo, "our, or my, or his, or its, however you want to look at it, perspective is different than before."
Shaking her head, May stepped back. "Whatever works," she said.
Ash looked between the two other savants. "Now," he went on, "there's work to do and I could use your help."
"Whatever I can do," Giovanni answered.
"Good," Ash smiled. "I'm sending you each out, you'll go to Mount Moon," Ash said to the elder man. "May, you're going to Saffron. I'll teleport you both in pretty much right next to Brock and Sabrina. You need to tell them not to pursue my armies as they retreat. They're not a threat anymore so just let them go and focus on rebuilding. Make sure they understand what's happened here and that I'll be along shortly to help how I can."
May nodded. "Got it. What are you going to do though?"
Looking back to the view screens, Ash focused on one in particular. "I'm going to have a meeting with Lance, Field Marshal Barshebeth, and the Orange Council."
May and Giovanni exchanged quick glances, but said nothing as Ash stepped forward and held out his hands to both of them as if to form a human triangle. The two other savants took his hands and instantly all three disappeared.
Blinking into existence, by himself and garbed in a set of glistening black armor nearly identical to the one he'd worn only seconds before, Ash stood on the craggy stone path circling the mouth of a gaping volcano. He looked over his shoulder and down the precarious slope at the towers and buildings carved into the face of Mt. Cinnabar and reflected for only a moment on how recently he'd been down in those fields, fighting for his life against Professor Elm, having just met May and witnessed Oak's death. His chest grew tighter and he turned away from the fields, which still bore the scars of Johto's war with Cinnabar, and looked ahead.
At his feet the incline angled sharply down to a path that followed the enormous crater towards the heart of the earth. So far below that normal human eyes couldn't perceive it, Ash saw the dim glow of molten rock. His nostrils filled with the burning odor of brimstone. He felt a stir in the air, not quite a change in the wind, but a darkening of the atmosphere.
"You know I'm here," he said quietly, looking down into the crater. "Come out."
A moment passed and Ash winced as the smell of sulfur grew far more intense, clotting the air. Smoke began to rise from the pit and churn into the atmosphere, so thick and dark it blotted out everything inside its borders.
"Come out," Ash called a little louder looking down into the mouth of the chasm, itself almost a mile across. "We need to retrieve your sister."
The earth shook and all at once the volume of smoke billowing up thickened, flecks of hot ash and belches of magma flying upwards like jets of hot water caught in an updraft. As Ash stood motionless on the edge, tongues of flame and pillars of fire shot out of the cloud, a lake of glowing and molten stone gurgled up to the edge of the cliff and spilled over like water from a pitcher. The lava trickled downwards, striking an invisible barrier around Ash's feet and splitting like water before a rock and continuing to flow. Ash rose a foot off the ground, hovered there, and looked into the cloud of darkness.
"Come out!" this time he shouted.
The ground beginning to shake and roll like waves at sea, a ball of fire more intense to behold than the sun exploded in the heart of the cloud. Rocketing out in all directions, blinding any onlooker and burning away the ash in the air in an instant, the fireball washed over Ash and the lip of the volcano. In an instant it was gone, leaving Ash unharmed in where he'd hovered a moment before.
Before him, hanging suspended in the air over the chasm, a tremendous shape, most similar to a bird or a dragon but far larger than any seen by anyone now alive, Moltres waited. Many gigantic wings, each no less than a hundred feet long, radiated out from the creature's body and turned as if on an axle like the spokes of a giant wheel. Crowning a long neck, Moltres's head craned towards Ash, looking at him with many eyes, a wickedly hooked beak tightly shut. From every inch of the monster's body, waves of heat and dazzling rays of light seared in all directions, contorting and bending the air all around and making it utterly impossible to get a good look at the creature. Standing before the creature, even Ash couldn't tell whether he saw eight wings or twelve, four eyes or eight, nor could he tell whether the shapes flitting across Moltres's body were rustling feathers or flowing tongues of fire.
Bending its neck back, the monster loosed a screech that split the air like thunder, shaking the ground and cracking the rocks at Ash's feet. Snapping forward, Moltres opened its beak and flared out all of its wings, exploding in a radiance that shamed the sun and blackened the ground, disappearing in the sphere of blinding light and heat. A jet of fire some twenty feet wide shot from the sphere at Ash like a missile and slammed into the shield surrounding the savant. Ash vanished within the roaring inferno as the skies all around grew dark with smoke and floating clouds of ash.
The fire bent away from Ash then, the young savant standing several feet above the ground surrounded in a blue corona, his eyes glowing dimly the same color. He gestured at Moltres and snapped his fingers. A bolt of lightning the color of blood shot from his outstretched hand and tore into the sphere of light like a spear through a wall of paper. The same shriek as before filled the air and Moltres's shield fell, through the concealing heat waves and tongues of light remained. The ancient creature flapped its wings once, the air all around for hundreds of feet filling with little whips of fire as Moltres moved, and bolted like an arrow from a bow at Ash.
"Oh," Ash's eyes went wide as he felt the heat.
Stretching its neck down, beak wide to bite, four or maybe six legs ending in feet that bore wicked talons craned towards Ash as the young savant raised his arms to defend himself. A blue sphere of energy sprung to life around him and Moltres's attacks rebounded from the barrier. Throwing his hands out to his sides, Ash roared a challenge and the barrier exploded outwards. The expanding blue sphere struck Moltres like the gale of a hurricane and sent the titanic creature staggering backwards through the air.
"Now," Ash stretched his hands towards the creature, his skin reddening from the heat despite his considerable psychic shielding, "You. Will. Obey." He clenched his fingers into fists as if around a neck and immediately Moltres began to visibly struggle. "You. Will. Obey!" Ash demanded, the muscles in his neck straining. A moment later the fiery creature ceased struggling.
Ash released his grip and let his arms drop to his sides as Moltres hovered in the air a hundred feet before him. "Two for three," he said, taking a deep breath. "Not bad," Ash blinked, disappeared, and reappeared, seated on Moltres's back in the crevice where her neck met her back. The savant's hair tossed this way and that as currents of searing hot air pushed him around in his seat but, unburned by the monster's heat, he clapped his hands. As a few sluggish seconds rolled by, the lava flowing down the side of the mountain towards Blaine's Gym cooled, hardening into a black crust. Satisfied that he'd protected the structure's occupants, Ash turned to the east and, in a puff of wind disappeared along with Moltres.
An instant later the sound of thunder and howling gales clawed at Ash's ears. He opened his eyes and looked around from his seat on Moltres's back. Beneath him the ocean stretched out as far as he could see in every direction. Above clouds as black as coal swirled and swam like currents of oil, split in a hundred places at any given moment by dazzlingly bright bolts of lightning that danced out in all directions. Ash took a deep breath as he looked straight down at the surface of the water, seeing the many hundreds of steel ships, most wrecked and sinking, broken hulls illuminated in the fires fed by spilt oil and fuel.
Zapdos, her form veiled a roiling and crackling ball of lightning bolts, streaked through the air, shrieking deafeningly. Ash tracked her movement for only a second and spotted the figure at which she charged. Lance, sitting on the back of a tremendous Dragonite, perched on the hull of a massive ship that had turned up almost ninety degrees as it sank. The Dragonite roared a challenge and opened its jaws. The ball of energy shining from between its teeth further illuminated the corpses of two other Dragonites floating, eviscerated and burned, in the water below.
Lance bellowed an order and his mount loosed a bolt of energy, no less than five feet across and shimmering like liquid gold, that streaked for Zapdos. The Hyper Beam smashed into Zapdos's protective corona, bending away for a second before punching through and shearing away some of the sphere of light. The breach and subsequent strike by the Hyper Beam turned Zapdos away from Lance and she banked to the side and upwards, back towards the sky. The Elite Four's leader then looked up towards the new arrival, and even from where he sat, Ash could see the resignation on Lance's face give way to despair. Hearing his thought's, Ash winced as Lance quickly planned out how to do as much damage as possible and allow as many of the wounded as he could to escape before he died. Suddenly Ash's chest grew tight and he kicked himself for every second he'd delayed coming here to help.
Ash projected his thoughts at Lance, making sure the trainer heard them. Lance, he heard his thoughts echo inside his target's mind, you've done enough. Help everyone else escape. I'll handle the battle from here. Sensing Lance hesitate and seeing Zapdos look up at him, Ash shouted at Lance's mind. Go! I'll take it from here.
Without responding, but trying to suppress his confusion, Lance turned his Dragonite away and, his mount leaping into the air, angled towards a quickly sinking frigate with a dozen men still standing on the deck. Without watching but still aware as Lance began heaving the ship out of the water to relieve its crew, Ash jumped from Moltres's back as the fiery creature, without so much flapping its wings as simply tucking them behind its back, shot through the air like a laser and collided with Zapdos.
For an instant the world seemed to go silent as both legendary monsters disappeared in the resulting supernova. Even Ash had to look away and shield his face from the blast. Even with all his new power the young savant taxed his concentration reaching out and psychicly shielding the thousands of men still floundering in the water from the phenomenal release of energy. As Zapdos and Moltres fell beneath the surface of the water, throwing the sea for as far as the eye could see into a swirling maelstrom of tossing spray and geysers of steam, Ash teleported above the storm.
SC
Lance, his armor tattered where it wasn't broken, his last remaining Dragonite towering behind him stood silently, hands at his side, as Ash spoke. From a distance it could be seen that the shoreline of the island on which they stood sat crowded with the survivors of Orange's battle with Cinnabar. Thousands of people divided into camps by their nationality sat or stood beneath the smoke-choked sky as Ash, Lance, Cinnabar's Barshabeth, and four of the men on the Orange Islands' Council laid out the rough terms of peace between the nations. Anchored just a ways off the coast, some hundred ships waited to gather up the survivors and ferry them home. Despite the number of people, silence hung over the camps.
Ash, looked between the leaders. "Basically nobody gets a choice here," he said calmly, but adding a deadly chill to his voice. "Three quarters of the ships will take the Islanders home. The remaining third will return the Cinnabareans home. Orange will dissolve its alliance with Johto, and cease all hostilities against Kanto and Cinnabar. In return, Cinnabar will cede all the islands in the eastern chain to Orange, and declare the contested islands in the eastern chain the territory of Johto." He went on, laying out a few other terms that balanced out the equation somewhat. "Fair enough?"
The faces around him all soured, but each nodded in turn.
Barshabeth spoke first. "Deal," he agreed without any effort to mask the bitter flavor of his words. "I'll have peace on those terms."
Lance stepped forward. "Agreed," he said.
The councillors from the Orange Islands all looked amongst each other. "What happens if we say no deal?" one of them asked, instantly drawing perturbed glares from the other three.
"Then," Ash focused his full attention on the man, "Zapdos, Moltres, and Articuno, the former two of which you've already seen in action, will pay your islands a visit. And they won't leave until you agree to those terms."
The councillor, a nondescript man in his forties with brown hair and matching eyes levelled a defiant eye on Ash. "Do as you say, or you'll destroy us?" he sneered. "Tyrant. You give us nothing but the illusion of choice."
Ash met his glare and visibly stiffened. "No," he answered. "No, I'm giving you a chance to choose. I'm giving you the chance to go home and peacefully live out your lives while allowing your neighbors the chance to do the same." He looked between the four councillors, Barshabeth, and Lance. "The paradigm has changed, gentlemen," he said. "As I warned you before, Mewtwo aimed to exterminate all mankind, and he had the power to do so. That power is now mine and unless any of you," he continued looking amongst the faces present, "wish to draw it down on yourselves, you will maintain the peace we are here establishing."
The councillor who spoke before leaned forward. "You, you're a tyrant," he growled.
Ash shrugged. "You can think of me that way if you choose," he said calmly. "But if I am a tyrant, I'm a fair tyrant. If any of you antagonize your neighbor, I will intervene on behalf of the defending party. Clear?"
The conversation wound down quickly after Ash's demand for peace cemented itself in the terms of everyone's returning home unharmed. Ash informed those present that in lieu of military action, any party that felt they had suffered an injustice could plead their case before himself. No one challenged him and when that concluded, Barshabeth walked away with a sour expression towards his subordinates while the Orange Councillors returned to their silent soldiers.
As the smoke overhead billowed, fed still by the burning wrecks at sea, Ash turned to the towering trainer at his side. "You feeling alright?" he asked, no shortage of sympathy in his voice as he felt the grating pain of loss simmer beneath Lance's calm features.
Lance shook his head. "No," he answered. "No I'm really not."
"Can I help?" Ash asked.
A steady sigh escaped the leader of the Elite Four, but again Ash felt Lance's heartache. "Not unless you can put things back the way they were before," he responded.
The younger trainer cleared his throat. "Sorry," Ash said. "The politics are different now. They have to be." He looked over at the taller man. "But don't worry. You'll retain your position as the de facto king of Kanto. You'll probably lose some influence in Johto though."
"I don't give a damn about the power or the influence," Lance turned on Ash, though he kept his voice down. "This whole problem could have been avoided if I'd been a better leader. I had the power, the responsibility to keep Kanto and Johto safe..." he went silent for what felt like hours. "My policies caused this. My lack of leadership caused this. Ketchum, do you know why they call me the Champion of the Elite Four?"
Again Ash shrugged. "Because you're the most powerful member," he answered.
"Hah," Lance shook his head. "A good guess, but wrong."
"Enlighten me then," Ash answered.
"A Champion is more than a strong fighter," Lance looked away and up at the sky. "A Champion is a leader, and not just in battle. A champion is someone to be followed, to be emulated, a paragon that stands as an example of how everyone else should act... I called myself a Champion of the Elite Four and by extension a Champion for the world to trust and follow... and I let all this happen."
"So help me fix it," Ash began. "Help-"
Lance raised a hand and cut Ash off, reaching up to pull his fiery hair away from his face as the wind picked up. "Spare me the motivational speech," said the titanic trainer. "I'm not wallowing in my self-pity for failing my people. I'm warning you of what you have to look forward to."
"What do you mean?" Ash raised an eyebrow.
Lance held his arms out to his sides. "This is your peace," he said. "Your rules are the rules holding things together now. For as long as there are good times, you'll get the credit... but when the peace fails, whether it's in a year or a century, the blame will fall in your lap. You just established yourself as the world's new authority and with the monsters you have at your command, I'm not about to challenge you. Hell, I'm going to be telling everyone I can that you're in charge now if that's what it takes to keep those monsters of yours away. I just hope you're up to running the show."
Taking a deep breath, Ash turned away. "You're still Champion," he said. "It's still your job to keep Kanto running. Just focus on that. I'll handle the rest."
Lance scoffed, a sound halfway between laughing and sneering. "Confident aren't you?"
"I started this journey more than a year ago," the savant said, looking more through Lance than towards him. "I set out from Pallet with Misty and my Pikachu with the single-minded goal of stopping Team Rocket and making the world a safer place. I thought I could do it, and I was a fool." He waited a moment then, as if to let Lance think on the statement. "Throughout the journey I made mistakes, I wavered in my conviction, and ultimately I lost sight of my goal completely. I stopped focusing on making the world a better place and instead fixated on first dismantling Team Rocket and later stopping Mewtwo.
"And why not?" the younger trainer went on as Lance listened patiently. "Saving the world was too much; no matter how much I tried to help one person it invariably hurt someone else. Team Rocket though, I didn't have to do anything but fight and kill them. They were a problem to be solved by simple destruction. Destruction is so much easier than protection."
Lance smirked. "Your point?" he asked.
"I lacked the power to create anything," Ash grew more serious. "I could only destroy... but that changed when the Sun Soul changed me. I don't lack the power anymore. I really can build something beautiful now."
The elder trainer shook his head and folded his arms in front of his chest. "Listen, Ash," he said as the Dragonite behind him began to growl and shift about, "you're getting a bit ahead of yourself here. Take it from me... controlling a country, much less an empire like you're proposing, is nightmarishly stressful at best, assuming you're trying to look out for your underlings. I inherited a stable region to rule and the pressure still kept me up at night. You've just torn that structure down, destabilized most of this hemisphere, and proclaimed yourself king. You've got a hell of a road ahead if peace is your aim.
"You seem to think that everyone is just going to fall in behind you because you're the most powerful trainer, or whatever you are, in the world. Now that might be for the Cinnabareans, seeing as how you showed up riding on the back of their god," Lance pointed up towards the sky where, even through the smoke and haze the glow of Moltres' fire shone for all to see, "but there will be dissidents. People will fight you, and if you want to maintain control, you'll have to fight them too."
"Maybe," Ash said. "I can't see the future, clearly that is, but I can tell you that big changes are coming. The paradigm has changed, and Kanto has a new destiny now."
Lance shrugged. "For better or worse, this is on you now," he said.
Smiling now, but unsure if he should be, Ash put his hands on his hips. "Cheer up," he said. "Don't you think this is exciting? It's like a whole new day is dawning for the entire world."
"I'll keep the peace," Lance acknowledged. "But really, you might as well be Champion now."
Ash thought for a second. "I've never been much for titles," he said, "though I do like that. Ash Ketchum: Champion of the Elite Four... eh, it still fits you better. But seriously, Lance, this will work. Trust me. It might be artificial at first; people only cooperating because they have to, but who knows... after a while I'll bet the cooperation becomes completely natural."
Lance shrugged, signalling his acknowledgement without agreeing, as Ash turned to leave. "I hope you're right kid," he watched as Ash and the smouldering lights from Moltres overhead winked out of existence. "You're insane, but I hope you're right."
SC
Humming to himself, the technician in the white lab coat paced about the sterile white room, checking off boxes on the paper stuck to his clipboard. The tank full of silvery fluid and the girl suspended therein sat silently while countless little instruments and readouts beeped around the room. The technician kept on as if deaf when Ash appeared silently behind him in the room. Watching with no small measure of amusement, Ash folded his arms as the technician, a shorter man with rudy hair and green eyes finished his inspection.
"How is she?" Ash asked, waiting politely as the lab tech screamed and threw his clipboard in the air. "I'm sorry," he asked as the middle-aged man slumped against the wall, clutching his chest, "did I frighten you?"
"Of course you," the man gasped and swallowed the air, "didn't. Who are-" he hiccupped and covered his mouth. "Who are you?" he hiccupped again.
"Ash Ketchum," came the response as Ash took a few steps forward. "And could you give me some time alone with your patient, please?"
"Sorry," said the technician. "Orders are to keep everyone out- wait. You're the one working with Blaine, right? Then the subject is your..." he trailed off as Ash nodded. "Well... ok. Sure, but I can only give you a minute. Is that quite alright?"
Ash waited until the technician left the room. "Thank you," he said after the white door had closed, leaving him alone with the tank and the buzzing lights overhead. "I won't need that long though."
Calmly, Ash strode forward and put his hand on the lid of the tank. As if the hatch weighed nothing he scooted it aside until the heavy lid fell to the ground with a crash. Smiling, some of the few positive memories from before he'd merged with Mewtwo flooding into the new Ash's mind, he reached into the silver solution and found his mark. Taking Janine by the elbow he lifted her, a blue light shot through with silver veins spreading from his hand to envelop her skin. The needles and tubes fell from Janine's body without so much as leaving punctures or track marks. Drawing then on Mewtwo's pre-synthesis memories of its own experience with Huntington's, Ash focused more of his attention on the girl, leaning down and taking her up in his arms like a new bride.
Vaguely aware of each cell's metamorphosis, Ash let Mewtwo's knowledge guide the wave of energy pulsing through Janine's frame as the psychic's power wrote the disease out of the girl's very genes. When the blue light died away, Janine took a breath under her own power, asleep in her partner's arms. Smiling, Ash closed his eyes and both he and Janine vanished from the room. When he opened them again he stood in the Cinnabar Gym's rookery, looking out over the better part of the entire island as a warm evening breeze blew in, ruffling the violet folds of Janine's newly generated hoodie and jeans.
Looking down as Janine stirred in his arms, Ash smiled. "I told you I'd be here when you woke up," he said when Janine's glittering purple eyes opened and fixed on him. "See," the savant smiled wider, "no time at all."
Her smile spreading across her entire face, Janine reached up and put one arm around Ash's neck. "It still felt like too long." She arched her back and stretched with a groan. "Speaking of feeling," she held her hands in front of her face. "Did the treatment take?"
Ash smirked. "See for yourself," he said, leaning down and setting her on her feet.
Without hesitating, Janine leaned back and threw a hard kick through the air, missing Ash's chin by mere centimeters and using the momentum of the kick to spin lower to the ground and unleash a flurry of punches at an imagined opponent. A second later she rose up on the balls of one foot and raised her other leg high over her head.
Making a point to look as if he were trying, and failing, to maintain eye contact, Ash cleared his throat. "Well," he focused, more happy memories from before his fusion with Mewtwo springing without invitation to his mind. "There's a stretch if I've ever-" he stopped short as Janine jumped and spun in the air, landing on one hand, leaning forward and catching her weight on her other hand, and standing erected there for a moment without any shakiness in her limbs.
"Ash," she said, joy plain her voice as she rolled to the ground and sat cross-legged. "It worked. The treatment really worked! I've never felt this good. It's wonderful!" She sprang up, jumped at her partner, and threw her arms around his neck. "Thank you," she said, voice steady and soft. "Thank you so much."
Ash returned the embrace. "Well, before you go getting too excited," they separated only enough to look each other in the eye, "I think you might want to know something."
"What?" Janine asked, apparently puzzled. "Ash, what?"
Ash stepped back and lifted one hand. "Try not to freak out," he smiled weakly, feeling for the first time since the fusion a tug of anxiety in his chest. A silvery blue light coalescing in his palm, an identical flame beginning to burn in his pupils, Ash waited for a reaction from Janine that never came. "Remember how I was riding off to beat Mewtwo and stop him from destroying the world?"
Janine nodded. "Vaguely," she answered, tone even.
"Well," Ash went on, "I didn't so much 'beat' Mewtwo as I... basically merged with him to stop the ." Again he waited for Janine to react, and again the lack of an outburst surprised him.
Janine reached her fingers towards the flame in Ash's palm, hesitating when she felt the heat. "Ok," she looked Ash in the eye. "You've got my attention."
Beginning with the Elite Four's summit in Saffron, Ash detailed the events that had lead up to his fight against Mewtwo. Janine listened without interruption, remaining still as a statue even as the color drained from her features. Her eyes narrowed and her lips pursed as Ash explained the transformation inflicted on him by the Sun Soul, but Janine remained silent and alert.
Taking a deep breath, Ash paused to gauge Janine's reaction. "And that's about it," he said at last. "I'm still me. 'Me' just happens to include more than Ash Ketchum alone."
"You're Ash," Janine stated flatly, "and Mewtwo. Ash and Mewtwo in the same body?"
"Ash and Mewtwo in both bodies simultaneously," the savant added.
Puzzlement flashed across Janine's face. "How?" she asked. "How are you in both places at once?"
"It's a psychic thing," Ash answered. "As I understand it, the bond functions like telepathy between perfect clones to keep us in perfect sync. For all practical purposes, we're one person."
"That is..." Janine trailed off.
"Creepy?" Ash offered.
The girl in the purple hoodie smirked. "Kinda cool. Spooky and weird sure, but I'm not a psychic."
"The cool part," Ash added with a note of excitement, "is that when the Sun Soul fuzed us together it went a step beyond just giving each of us the other's memories. I gained total access to Mewtwo's psychic power but Mewtwo became a savant and all of the abilities that confers were added to Mewtwo's skill... he became an even more effective psychic. Before the synthesis he could barely control Zapdos alone but now we can exercise direct influence over all three, Zapdos, Moltres, and Articuno simultaneously."
Janine's face fell some. "What are those?" she asked.
Ash's eyes widened some. "Oh, I forgot you've never seen them," he said. "This way." Ash lead her to the edge of the rookery's platform. "Up there," he pointed out towards the sun.
"What's that?" Janine asked, squinting as a star seemed to rise out of the sun, spreading and growing as it neared and arced higher in the sky. Seconds later the point of fire hung in the air some hundreds of yards above the ground and shining like a second sun and lighting the landscape as such. "Is that a Pokemon?" she asked, the shape descending and gradually taking on form.
Ash rocked his head from side to side in indecision. "Yes... in the same sense that the ocean is a puddle. Moltres doesn't neatly fit into human taxonomy. She's a sentient fire spirit: not fire guided by a spirit, but a spirit of fire."
Looking on with her mouth hanging open a little, Janine flinched with realization. "Moltres is the name the Cinnabareans gave their old god."
"Yep," Ash confirmed.
She pointed at Moltres. "That's the god they worship?"
"Yep," the savant repeated.
"You're controlling a god?" Janine gasped.
"The word 'god' is... flexible."
"Wow," Janine looked back at the flames hanging in the air. "Is it true she eats fire?"
Ash shook his head. "She doesn't eat anything. Moltres and her sisters don't actually need fuel sources to exist."
Janine flinched a second time. "Wait, what? No fuel? No food or anything?"
Smiling the young savant shrugged. "It's a false vacuum metastability thing," he said, "except without the finite lifespan. Moltres burns without fuel in the same way the universe sort-of came from nothing."
"Really?"
"No," Ash put his arm around her shoulder, "but that's the easiest way to think about it that mostly sums up the idea."
"Whatever," Janine shook her head before letting slip a few giggles. "I'm dating a physical god," she grinned.
"Eck," Ash cringed. "I'm not god," he said.
"Tell that to anyone who sees you riding that," Janine pointed at Moltres. "But alright. I won't call you a god, your holiness." She nudged him.
The savant rolled his eyes. "Whatever," he sighed. "Hey, I'll be happy to fill you in as we work, but right now there's a whole lot of cleanup to do. Mewtwo wrecked Indigo Plateau, Saffron, and most everything in between and I'd like to get things rebuilt as soon as possible. Mind if we hop to it?"
Janine shook her head. "Not at all," she said. "After you."
SC
Some Months Later
Giovanni, his hands folded behind his back while the wind tugged at his meticulously pressed suit, looked between May and Ash before his gaze settled on the former. "I'm not going to recommend that," he said, gaze calm and cold beneath the brim of his fedora. "No need to make things hard on yourself."
Shifting and setting her hand on her hip, May licked her lips. "It's my decision," she said, the sun glinting off the silver etching and sparkling polish of her white armor. "And it's final."
Ash, May, Giovanni, and Janine all stood on a wooden pier, one of a dozen such structures that stretched from the golden beach into the cerulean waters. All around them men and women in black uniforms lined with red labored to carry crates and barrels from the shore onto the ships at the end of the piers. Behind the four trainers stretched a ruined city, while before them the ocean stretched to the horizon.
Ash cleared his throat. "Actually," he said, "it's my call. Team Rocket is mine," he gestured to the soldiers, trainers, and support crew so busily seeing to their duties. "Those are my ships," he pointed to the vessels the Rockets were equipping. "I'm the one financing this journey and I think I have every right to come along and see that you succeed. Frankly I don't see why you don't just have me teleport you to Hoenn and help you reclaim it."
"Ash, please," May pressed her hands together, almost pleading. "Hoenn is my home. The people are my people. I'm the closest thing it has to a rightful queen. If you come along and just hand it to me like a, like a," she hesitated and her tone changed. "I have to retake Hoenn by myself, conventionally, or it won't mean anything. Otherwise I'll only be queen because you made me queen, not because I earned it."
Looking over his shoulder to Janine, Ash paused as the woman in purple nodded slightly. He heard her thoughts and agreed with her that May had a point. "You realize," Ash turned back to May, "that without me being there you don't have any guarantee of success? People will die and you could be killed. I could make it easy."
May nodded. "I know. I know," she said. "But it wouldn't mean anything. I need to do this my way. To me, it's worth the risk. It's worth any price."
Ash sighed and turned to Giovanni. The older trainer shifted his weight and faced May. "You don't even have any Pokemon," the tall man said, "not of your own at least."
"I know," May's face fell. "But I can find and train another team."
Stepping forward, Janine put herself between May and the other trainers. "You realize," she said with an icy calm, "that you'll be half a world away from us. If you need any support, you won't be able to get any. You'll be on your own."
"I'm prepared for that," May answered. "I'll accept that risk."
"But you're not just risking your life," Janine went on. "You're risking the life of every person accompanying you. It's your decision that's putting them in harm's way. You'll be the one responsible for every one of them killed. And you're willing to accept that?"
May nodded without hesitation. "Hoenn is my birthright," she said. "No one can give it to me. I have to take it. Even if you weren't sending me with ships and men," May faced Ash, "I'd still go. I'd go alone if I had to. I'd swim all the way there if that's what it took." The fervor in her voice brought a smile to Ash's face.
The young savant shrugged and looked between May, Janine, and Giovanni. "I did ask for volunteers on this one," he said. "No one boarding those ships chose anything different. I even warned them I might not be going."
May flinched. "You did?"
"Of course," Ash chuckled. "Of course I didn't think you'd actually demand to go without my help, but I wanted everyone going with you to be aware of that possibility." He paused and examined the faces around him. Janine remained, as ever, unreadable to anyone who couldn't hear her mind. Giovanni grimaced and clearly projected his disdain for the situation, and May continued to hold out hope that she could be allowed to do things her way.
Looking a little deeper into her mind, Ash felt the deaths that May already expected to come weighing on her. He could tell that she already ached at the thought that people under her command would die at her command. The thought, Ash sensed, sat so deeply rooted that nothing would ever assuage the loss of even one of her men. Neither however, Ash sensed, would any loss or any setback dampen May's burning want to take back her homeland from the warlords holding it.
"Alright," Ash said resolutely. "May, this is your show. The ships and the men are yours to command and I'll let you do things your way."
"Really?" May's eyes widened.
Ash sighed. "But I'm not going to be keeping my eye on you twenty-four-seven either. I'll have my hands full on this side of the world. Everything on the other side of that horizon falls to you now."
May bolted forward and threw her arms around the other savant. "Thank you!" she blurted, either not noticing or not caring that Janine's eyes had caught fire. "I'll never forget this! As soon as I take Hoenn back, you're invited to the celebration and I'll show you all the things I've done."
Ash put his hands on May's shoulders and moved her to arm's length. "I look forward to it," he said, almost having forgotten that the girl before him had yet to reach sixteen years of age. "Just don't be reckless. You need to be a stabilizing influence, not a conquering maniac."
"Aw," May feigned dismay. "Why can't I be both?" She stopped when Ash glared at her. "Okay, okay," she said. "Stability it is. I promise."
Stepping back then, Ash and Janine watched from a distance as Giovanni begrudgingly went about trying to instruct May on what he thought to be the most effective means of commanding the men under her authority. The Rockets continued for the next hour to carry crates to the ships, make the vessels ready for the sea, and when time allowed, introduce themselves personally to their new commander.
One young man in particular, Ash sensed, a boy of seventeen and possessed of vivid green eyes and sandy hair passed by May more than a dozen times, each time taking a load almost too heavy to carry solely because it had been marked for the ship at the end of the pier on which May stood. On what would have been perhaps his final trip, the young Rocket stopped beside the savant and began trying to introduce himself, though he succeeded in little more than blabbering his name and rank several times without ever getting to a real introduction. Before he could complete his introduction, Giovanni barked at the young Rocket to get back to his duties.
"It's eleven thousand miles from here to Hoenn!" Giovanni barked, just as much at the surrounding Rockets as the one stumbling over himself in front of May, "and storms are coming!" He promptly walked up the pier and began ensuring that the ship was ready to sail.
Covertly reaching over, Janine slipped her hand into Ash's and inched closer to him. "He sure seems to like this," she said.
Ash smirked. "Dad likes everything." The young savant rolled his shoulders back. "But he means well. He just worries about his men."
"I still can't believe he turned Team Rocket over to you," Janine whispered, squeezing Ash's hand.
"In name only, really," Ash answered. "He's going to remain chief administrator. I'll just be the one suggesting projects for him to consider in the future. I'll be taking a hands off approach. That's all."
Janine shook her head. "I don't understand you, Ash Ketchum," she said.
He could already hear the answer in her mind, but Ash asked anyway. "What's that supposed to mean?" he asked.
"You have all this power," Janine looked up at him, amethyst eyes sparkling, "but you don't have the slightest inclination to use it. Lance all but names you Champion of the Elite Four, and you tell him to retain the position. Giovanni names you head of Team Rocket, and you keep him in charge. You even turned control of the Gym back over to Vermillion. I don't understand."
Ash let go of Janine's hand and turned back around. Walking into the ruined town for some way, Janine in tow, Ash stopped in front of a house that looked as though it had been hit by a bomb. Reaching down he picked up a slab of wood and began wiping away the grime until "Delia Ketchum," became visible on the placard. He rubbed a little more and "Ash Ketchum" appeared from under the grime below his mother's name.
Tossing the address placard aside, Ash turned back to Janine. "I don't want to be a king," he answered. "I want to make the world safe, not rule it."
"I don't understand," Janine stepped closer to him, looking away and into the ruins of another of Pallet Town's destroyed homes. "Why not?"
"Can you imagine the headache?" Ash laughed. "It's been a month since I fused with Mewtwo and started helping Kanto rebuild, and there are already people starting to form cults to worship me." He paused and took a breath. "I'm not a god," he went on. "I can't control the entire world. There are still going to be conflicts, murders, thefts... that will probably never change. But I can make the world's leaders so afraid of my taking any side but theirs that they'll do anything to keep the world as calm and neutral as possible. Lance is a good leader. So is Giovanni. Barshabeth too. I'll be the ultimate deterrent to any war and hopefully in the absence of such large scale conflict, things can get better on their own."
Janine shrugged, walked forward, and leaned against Ash's shoulder. "You're the walking god," she grinned as Ash cringed, "not me. It's your call." She smiled as Ash put an arm around her shoulder. "Kinda funny, don't you think?"
Ash grinned, "It is," he said, reading her mind. "Two years ago today, I was standing right here as a Red Gyarados demolished my hometown... The first chapter of my life ended right here. It seems fitting that this newest chapter start here too."
"What do you plan on doing?" Janine asked.
Looking down, Ash kissed the top of her head. "Hm," he muttered. "Well for starters, I was think you and I could settle down, have maybe... four or five kids, rebuild Pallet." He paused and grinned. "You know, live happily ever after."
Janine squeezed her arm around Ash's waist. "One condition," she said. "I want an Arcanine."
Ash laughed, turned her towards him and pulled her close "I'll get right on that."
The End