I have nothing to say to you people today.
Flame stared at Lucky and Perry, unable to breathe. Perry looked almost relieved while Lucky looked grim. But Lucky's words echoed and bounced around in Flame's mind, consuming his thoughts like a swarm of carvahnas.
They're...from the future. They came to the past with the same goal as Grovyle. Right. Okay. That's easy to grasp. Yep.
In a way, it made some sense, but Flame simply couldn't believe it. It seemed too convenient, too coincidental. There had to be some mistake.
"Is that so?" Grovyle asked, frowning. "Do you have any proof?"
Perry glanced at his brother, then said, "We were booted from the planetary council. They destroyed all information about us. Something...about being too young, or unfit, or the like."
"So you know about the council," Grovyle growled. "Impressive. Then I take it you know where we're going?"
"Yes. You're going to go through the Passage of Time beyond Dusk Forest."
None of what Perry said made any sense to Flame, but it must have to Grovyle. Slowly, to prevent himself from hitting his head on the slanted wall, Grovyle stood up and folded his arms. He was a towering presence now that they were near him. Flame had never met another grovyle, but from what he knew about them, they were a stage one Pokémon, having evolved once. One of Flame's sisters was a quilava, another stage one Pokémon, and she was a good deal shorter. To be taller than he was supposed to be...did that mean he was much older than them?
"I've never heard about either of you, not even from Celebi, but for you to have this much information..." Grovyle closed his eyes. "The validity of your story will be for Celebi to judge. The two of you are going to lead the way so I can make sure there's no funny business. Understood?"
Lucky nodded sombrely. His gaze locked onto Flame and he looked at him with an apologetic expression. Flame stared back at him for a moment, then blinked and nodded. As bizarre as it all was, and as annoying as Lucky could be, Flame couldn't bring himself to hate him for it, or even think less of him. The two boys were just kids.
Although I have the weirdest sense of deja vu...
"Good," Grovyle growled. "Then go on. We don't have much time if the sableye have been chasing us non-stop. We need to get to Celebi as soon as possible." He glanced back at Flame and Julia, who were walking out of the crevasse, the latter rubbing her head from hitting it earlier.
"Um, Grovyle," Flame began, "who's Celebi? And what's the planetary – "
"Didn't I just say we're short on time?" Grovyle shot him a glare that was almost accusatory and Flame ducked his head, mumbling a quiet 'sorry.'
Perry gave a sad smile to Lucky, who didn't return it and instead took off down the path running. The spearow sighed and followed, after whom Grovyle ran.
Oh, no, we're doing this again? The last time Flame and Julia had followed Lucky's ridiculous pace, he got cramps in every imaginable part of his body. It made the mad dash out of the stockade seem like a walk through town. Regardless, Flame rolled his eyes and hurried after them.
The side of the path that had been open to the seemingly endless black abyss became a rocky hillside, as did the other side. Ahead of them appeared a forest of sorts, but in the night, it looked dark and grey instead of lush and green. The trees appeared to be evergreens, and there were little strands of grass poking out between them, though, like everything else, they were frozen in time and did not move. Lucky and Perry stopped by the entrance to let the others take a break. But while they and Grovyle just stood and panted, Flame and Julia flopped onto the ground like limp magikarps and wheezed.
"Frickin'...hahh...hahh...slow...down...hahh..." Flame gasped out. Lucky grinned at him and stuck out his tongue.
"I had to slow down, like, five times!" he giggled. "And you guys were trailing about a whole kilometre behind!"
"Lies...hahh...we...were...right...hahh...behind you...gah..."
"Rest up quickly," Grovyle snapped at Flame and Julia, his eyes narrowing at the brothers. "The two of you are slowing us down quite a bit."
"Stop...rushing us..." Julia panted, sunk against the hard-packed dirt below like it was their soft straw bed at the guild. Flame wished it was. Better yet, he wished he was at the guild, safe in the bed with Julia, snuggling and toasty warm...
Shaking his head to clear the thought from his mind, he reluctantly pushed himself from the ground and stumbled over to Julia.
"We gotta go," he mumbled, extending a paw to her. She didn't take it. In fact, she showed no sign of even hearing him. "Hey! Are you awake? Get up!"
Julia turned her head away.
"We'll leave ya here!" Lucky warned teasingly. "Do you want to be left for the sableye? Mmm, tasty pikachu meat..."
Groaning, Julia lifted her head a little and took Flame's proffered paw. Either he or Julia used too much strength, because she was on her paws too suddenly and she fell over into Flame, knocking him over again. They stared at each other for a moment, then giggled and stood up together. It felt almost as if they really were at the guild and they were just goofing off on a mission or the like. If that Celebi person could help them, they soon would be back, and life would return to normal.
Flame glanced sheepishly at Perry and Lucky and found that both were looking at them with sullen expressions. He gave them a questioning glare and Lucky quickly waved a paw.
"Sorry!" he woofed. "I just don't like romance very much. It's gross."
"Are we going to stand around all day, waiting?" Grovyle snapped, crossing his arms. "I'm not here to babysit, you know."
"Oh, right," Julia said, laughing uneasily. "Let's go." She wore an odd expression on her face and she looked around at the forest before shaking her head and following Grovyle and the brothers in.
The forest, known as Dusk Forest because of the perpetual fog covering it, as Grovyle had explained, was almost devoid of life. Here and there, Flame would spot a mothim or mismagius, but these Pokémon seemed to fight amongst themselves rather than with the newcomers.
"So, Grovyle," Flame began, hoping his question wouldn't get brushed off this time, "who is Celebi?"
"She is an old and dear friend of mine," Grovyle replied. "She can lead us to the Passage of Time, which will take us back to the past. Because she had done so to take me to the past in the first place, she, too, is a threat in Dialga's eyes. However, she constantly reminds me about how she can never be caught." He paused for a moment. "She is a tad...odd. Quirky, you might say. But she is friendly enough. I doubt she will mind leading the four of you to it as well...or two, depending on how well-behaved Perry and Lucky are."
Lucky put on an expression of mock hurt and traced a hoop over his head then, after a moment's consideration, Perry's, too.
"Once we return to the past, though," Julia said, "are you going to steal the Time Gears again?"
Grovyle didn't hesitate in his reply. "Yes. I am."
"But I don't know if I trust you yet," said Flame warily. "I mean, even though what you said sounds plausible..."
"Three of us are telling you that that's what needs to be done," Perry chirped at him. "And even if you don't trust us, it's the truth. We have to alter the course of history. You don't want this everlasting darkness to be in your future, right?"
"Yeah, of course, but doesn't time stop when you remove a Time Gear?"
"Those effects are temporary," Grovyle said with an edge of frustration in his voice. "Once all five are placed in the Temporal Tower, time will flow smoothly across the planet."
"But if that's the case," Julia murmured, looking contemplative, "why are they all scattered across the place rather than just being in the tower?"
"That's..." Grovyle trailed off and frowned at her. "That's a good question. It's a question that has been asked before at the council, but we couldn't figure it out. Perhaps it's because of the guardians who protect them. The Treeshroud Forest Gear, admittedly, was not guarded, but the Limestone Cave one was by a ditto and the other three by the lake guardians, until Azelf died."
By now, the trees had thickened and it appeared that they were approaching the centre of the forest. The Pokémon were even scarcer, which Flame thought was both unsettling and a relief.
"We're getting close," Grovyle said, looking from side to side at the trees. "Celebi should be nearby."
"Grovyle...did you kill Azelf?"
Flame recoiled from the sharp look that Grovyle gave him, but the question had been eating away at him for too long. He thought that he knew exactly what Grovyle was going to say, but the answer surprised him.
"I don't know."
"How can you not know?!"
"During the battle," Grovyle began, "I was attacking quite frantically. I don't remember ever drawing blood from any of them, but it could have happened."
Lucky glanced over at Flame and shrugged. "It's been written into the history books that Grovyle killed him, but there was a skeptic who had another theory. They wrote that they saw Grovyle without blood on his claws before he was shoved into the dimensional hole, and thus, he couldn't have killed him. It's a big mystery."
Julia jolted to a halt. "Wait. Who wrote that?"
"Um, lemme think..." Lucky thought about it for a moment. "I think it was a villager who had seen Grovyle in the past. He was a corphish."
Could it be...?!
"How is that even possible?!" Julia exclaimed. "Before that happened, I told him that I saw that! Corphish is one of our friends! And you're saying he wrote that theory?!"
"When stuff happens in the past, it alters the future," Perry explained with a shrug. "So even though for you, it only happened a little while ago, we read that book before even coming to the past."
That's weird! Flame thought, sharing Julia's surprise. So Corphish went on to write that theory? Man, this is even more confusing than the fact that Perry and Lucky are from this time!
All of a sudden, a green ball of energy shot out from nowhere and exploded on the ground beside Lucky. Lucky yelped in shock and leaped away from another energy ball.
"Hey! Watch it! You nearly hit me!" he yelled into the trees. Whatever was shooting at him shot again but hit Perry this time, sending the little bird flying backwards into a rock.
"Perry!" Julia called out as she and Flame ran over to him. Lucky beat them to him and cradled Perry in his arms with his head down to protect his brother. Flame stood in front of both and, as a result, was also shot by an attack. It hardly damaged him, however.
"It's a grass type move!" he called out to Grovyle. Grovyle's eyes widened and he walked over to stand in front of the four others.
"Celebi, is that you?"
The rhythm of the attacks halted, and, in a flash of light, a small, pink Pokémon appeared in the air, beating her wings quickly. Her black-ringed eyes were full of fury and she readied another Energy Ball.
"You two!" she yelled at Julia and Flame. "Get out of the way! I don't want to hit either of you!"
"Celebi, what are you doing?!" Grovyle demanded, taking a step back to shield them better. Perry mumbled an 'I'm fine' to his brother and the two stood up, warily taking defensive stances.
"My dear Grovyle," Celebi said through gritted teeth, "you haven't fallen for their lies, have you?"
"Lies?" Grovyle echoed, narrowing his eyes.
"We just want to go through the Passage of Time, Celebi!" Lucky called out. His voice cracked. "Please!"
Celebi glared at them and shot a barrage of leaves at them, making Lucky cry out.
"Stop it! Please!" Julia yelled fiercely. "What have they done to you?!"
The pixie-like Pokémon closed her eyes, then replied in a shaking voice, "Their goal is to go back into the past and destroy all the Time Gears!"
What?! Destroy the Time Gears?! That's ludicrous! What is she talking about?
"But you tried to kill us!" Lucky spurted out, stepping backwards and looking from Celebi to Grovyle to Julia to Flame. There was a pleading look in his eyes, but the fact that Lucky hadn't denied to wishing to destroy the Time Gears hit Flame like an Ancientpower attack. Perry was just silent, his eyes averted.
"Perry, Lucky..." Flame began. "You wouldn't...you're not...trying to destroy the Time Gears...are you?"
Lucky avoided his stare and looked at Celebi again. "Please, you have to let us through! Or we'll have to do it all again!"
"Do what all again?" Celebi spat. "Perhaps murder one of the members of the planetary council, hurt another, and lead the sableye to our location?!" She psychically raised all of the stones in the area and shot them at the brothers. Flame quickly leapt to the side to avoid getting hit and saw that Julia had done so, too. A chirp of pain could be heard and when Flame looked over, he could see Perry trembling on the ground, blood staining the dull grass beneath him red.
Celebi slowly approached them, readying another Magical Leaf attack. "I should've done this a long time ago instead of foolishly trusting the two of you." Lucky had picked up Perry again and took a step back, causing him to trip over one of the stones and fall over.
She's going to kill them?! Flame realized in shock. But...I knew them! Sure, they were annoying, but they don't deserve this!
He quickly ran in front of them again, and Julia followed suit. "Don't do it, Celebi!" he cried out. "They're just kids!"
"Move aside!" Grovyle growled at them, walking over to stand beside Celebi. "If they are so deranged that they believe destroying the very things that keep time flowing will do any good at all, and if they truly betrayed the planetary council, they're too dangerous to keep alive."
Not Grovyle, too, now!
Lucky had stood up again wearily. Tears began to pool in his eyes but he blinked hard and wiped his face with the paw that wasn't holding his brother.
"Get out of here," Flame whispered. "Run!"
Lucky didn't hesitate to obey. He turned tail and hurriedly limped off into the forest. Celebi opened her mouth, then closed it after a moment. Even in the gloom of the woods, Flame could see the blood that was pooled on the ground where the brothers had been and the thin trail leading away. Julia must have been thinking the same thing.
"They're not going to...to bleed out and...die...are they?"
Celebi sighed heavily. "It is for the better," she spoke. "Had they befriended you two?"
Flame nodded slowly. It was too difficult to even try to process everything.
"I apologize. My attack must have seemed unfounded." She stared after the brothers for a few minutes longer, then turned and beckoned with an arm. "Come. We have delayed enough. That you are here again, Grovyle, tells me that you must have failed in your mission, yes? Then we must go to the Passage of Time at once."
"How far is it from here?" Grovyle asked.
Celebi replied, "Not far. Just up this way, on the plateau." She flew on ahead, Grovyle running after her.
"I...I don't believe this," Julia murmured to Flame. Neither she nor Flame had moved to follow Grovyle and Celebi yet. "They wouldn't have wanted to destroy the Gears. Not if they came from the future. And now they're going to..." She trailed off and clenched her fists. Flame glanced off into the woods where the brothers had vanished and felt a sharp pang of guilt.
"But if they did all that Celebi said they did...maybe this is for the better?"
Disbelief and shock flashed in Julia's eyes and her ears drooped in hurt. Before Flame could take it back, he heard Grovyle shout from up the path, "Hey! Are you two coming?"
Flame nudged Julia's shoulder. "We'd better get going. We need to get back to the past." After a moment's hesitation, Julia slowly nodded, then, with a final glance back, followed Flame towards the two grass type Pokémon.
The feeling Julia had gotten at the entrance to Dusk Forest had faded almost entirely, but how jarring it had been stuck in her head. Right before they entered, she had gotten the feeling that she had been there before. After thinking about it for a while, she managed to remember that she had gotten that same feeling at Foggy Forest, in the past.
But I assumed it was part of the Dimensional Scream, she realized. Is there a Time Gear here, too? However, she hadn't gotten the Dimensional Scream earlier when she touched the frozen water. Did her ability work differently here?
Grovyle had been explaining their situation with the sableye to Celebi that whole time. Julia felt herself getting frustrated. How could Celebi just ignore them after brutally attacking their friends and leaving them to die?!
"Hey, Celebi," she called out, and Celebi glanced back. "Could you tell us more about – "
"Of course," she interrupted quickly, lowering her eyes. "I owe that much to you. I do not want to be thought of as an evildoer to the two of you. As difficult as it may be to grasp, the so-called 'brothers' always had the deluded goal of destroying the Time Gears, nearly from the moment they joined the planetary council, which is a secret council at which we discuss and research the paralysis of the planet, and how to reverse it. They were violent, killing one of our members who disagreed with their ideals." She paused to take in a deep, shuddering breath. "Shortly after we released them from the council, Dusknoir's henchmen found our secret meeting place and ruthlessly murdered and captured many of the members. This was after decades of keeping the meeting place a well-kept secret."
Julia kept silent, staring at the ground. Beside her, Flame asked, "So, how'd they manage to go back in time before?"
"A few moons ago, the brothers found me and they claimed they had changed their thinking and wanted to assist in the stealing of the Time Gears. They had entirely fooled me." She smiled bitterly. "Once I realized this, I sent two of the other members of the planetary council after them. They were two pelippers."
The...?! Are they the same two that...?! The gears clicked into place in Julia's mind and she couldn't help but gasp. Now I get it! The pelippers...they actually were on our side this whole time! And they were after Lucky and Perry!
"We met those guys!" Flame exclaimed, looking at Julia excitedly. "They helped us out a lot! That's why they were so concerned about the rumour of Azelf's Time Gear being sealed away!"
Celebi nodded back at them, then locked eyes with Julia. She stared at her, scrutinizing. Julia felt a little taken aback and she folded her ears back.
"Oh, do excuse me," Celebi said, giggling. "I thought I might have recognized you, but I must have been mistaken!"
"This is the first time I've visited the future," Julia joked uneasily. Celebi smiled at her and turned back to Grovyle. Now that Celebi had explained herself – with, admittedly, a strong and unsettling argument – she seemed much more cheerful. Radically different from the Pokémon who tried to kill Perry and Lucky.
This is too much to take in at once! First, Perry and Lucky are from the future, and now they're the bad guys?! I'm not sure what I believe anymore!
"So, Grovyle, this might possibly be the last time I see you," Celebi told him, holding her arms behind her back. Grovyle shrugged indifferently.
"We're slowing down," he commented. "Remember, if the sableye catch us, I'll see you last tied up next to me on a pillar."
"Your sense of humour is tactless as always, I see."
Julia felt bad for listening in to their conversation, but it seemed interesting. Besides, the fact that Flame had said nothing to her yet meant that he was also listening to them.
"Oh, don't be like that," Celebi was saying, lightly punching Grovyle's arm. "You always act all depressing, but I know you're happy to see me again."
"Of course. You have been my closest friend."
Celebi sighed and nodded. "Yep. Friend." She looked up, moving a bit closer to him. "You're always in such a rush. Why can't you slow things down, once in a while?"
"You know perfectly well why. It would put our life's mission at stake." Celebi made a face and opened and closed her hand at his last sentence in imitation of a blabbing mouth. Julia covered her mouth discreetly with a paw to keep herself from laughing despite herself.
The trees had thinned by now and the four were nearing a flat, rocky area. It was surrounded by stone hills that seemed to stretch out for kilometres on all sides. Their sheer height made Julia feel very small and insignificant and, without realizing it, she reached out and grasped Flame's paw in her own. Not fifty metres from them was a glowing blue hole with yellow rings of energy forming a sort of pathway right in front of it.
"There it is," Celebi murmured. "Beautiful, isn't it? There used to be more spread across the continent, but they have been destroyed. This may very well be the last accessible one."
"Then let's go," Grovyle urged, taking a step forwards.
"Always the impatient one, aren't you?"
The deep voice echoed and bounced off the tall stone walls, and Grovyle whipped his head around, searching for the source. The owner of the voice floated up through the ground in front of them, and six sableye skittered out from behind scattered boulders to surround Grovyle, Celebi, and Flame and Julia.
"Dusknoir!" Flame exclaimed, taking a step back. Dusknoir laughed.
"It has been a while since I saw you all last," he said darkly. "I realized how much you all must have been missing me, so I dropped over to meet you all again. I do hope you don't mind."
Grovyle growled, deep in his throat. "So you were keeping an eye on us after all." His voice became quiet and Julia could faintly hear him murmur the names of the brothers.
They can't be on Dusknoir's side! Even if they wanted to end the world, they wouldn't side with that villain!
Grovyle continued, "You let the the four of us come here so you could catch Celebi as well, didn't you?"
"Honestly, Grovyle!" Celebi huffed, though not with as much playfulness as she had had before. "Do you not yet know that I cannot be caught? Dusknoir, if this was the best plan you had, I would expect your master to be ashamed of you!"
"We're going to power through them, got it?" Grovyle hissed back at Flame and Julia. "Run and don't stop until we reach – "
An earsplitting roar drowned him out and everyone looked up at the stone wall right above the Passage of Time. Two red eyes glowed in the gloom of the black, then yellow lines began to pulse. A dark blue, four-legged creature with an elongated neck and metallic accents gazed down upon the four with an expression of indescribable hatred. Then it tipped its head towards the sky and let out another roar.
"P-Primal Dialga..." Grovyle murmured, taking a small step back. "It...cannot be..."
"That thing is Primal Dialga?!" Julia gaped at it. The beast was massive, at least ten times as tall as she. It swung a tapered tail back and forth slowly, like a pendulum, or a ticking clock counting away the seconds to their doom.
Grovyle shut his eyes tightly. "Had it just been Dusknoir, we could have stood a chance. But now that he's here..." He opened them again and, letting out a deep sigh, stepped towards Dusknoir. "I surrender. Do with me...as you will..."
No way! This can't be the end!
Dusknoir chuckled and floated over towards Grovyle, folding his arms. "My, my, how unlike you, Grovyle. Surely you can't be giving up yet?"
Grovyle averted his eyes but did not reply to the ghost Pokémon. He wore an expression of shame and hopelessness. Celebi clenched her fists tightly, indignation in her eyes.
"Grovyle, you can't mean this! We cannot give in now!"
"We have no choice," Grovyle breathed. "We can't win. This is it for us." His voice took on a hard edge. "But you haven't won yet, Dusknoir."
"Is that so?" Dusknoir drew nearer to him, his one eye gazing sharply into both of Grovyle's. "Do tell me why not."
Grovyle flinched away from Dusknoir but remained firmly on his feet. Julia fought the urge to rush in and shove Dusknoir away. He was making her feel sick, though she couldn't discern why.
"You should know," Grovyle said, a smirk escaping his stoic face. "I did not come to the past on my own. I was with my partner."
"You had a partner?!" Flame blurted out. "Is he still in the past, then?"
"She," Grovyle corrected. "Yes. Though we may have been separated, due to some difficulty in the Passage of Time, she is still there, and she will complete our mission in my place."
Dusknoir broke into a smile, then burst into laughter. Grovyle stared at him, finally taking a step away.
"What? What are you giggling at now?"
"Would you care to tell me the name of your partner?" Dusknoir chuckled, folding his arms again.
"Why do you care? Don't you already know?"
"Can you not say it?"
Can you stop answering in questions?
Grovyle narrowed his eyes. "No, that's not it. Her name is Julia."
A burst of cold ran up and down Julia's spine. She was frozen with her eyes wide and her mouth half open.
There's no way... There's no conceivable way...
Flame stared at Julia, his expression almost matching hers.
Why didn't the subject of my name ever come up? When Flame was introducing us, Lucky interrupted him... Oh, no, he knew, didn't he?
It didn't make sense. It couldn't. If it did, then that would mean that Julia was a criminal – or trying to save the future. And she knew that she could never be either. It simply wasn't possible.
"G-Grovyle," Flame stammered, "you've gotta be kidding..."
Grovyle looked back in confusion. Flame's voice was filled with horror like a lakebed with water.
"Julia's...right here!" Flame grabbed Julia's paw and stared into her eyes. Grovyle frowned, looking doubtful.
"That can't be." He looked from Dusknoir to Julia. "No. The Julia I knew was a human."
The silence that followed was as empty as a void. Grovyle's eyes widened, realizing what the silence meant. He took a slow, careful step towards the pikachu, disbelieving.
"What...what happened to you...Julia?"
Julia couldn't look at him. It couldn't be true. She didn't know him. There was no evidence. Not enough pointed to this being the truth. Sure, she knew that he wasn't a bad Pokémon at Fogbound Lake, and sure, Lucky told Grovyle that he had something of his when they met, and sure, Julia knew from the bottom of her heart that she had been to Dusk Forest before, but...but...
But...
Dusknoir chuckled and floated over to Grovyle's side. "Strange, isn't it? I had no idea about her until I learned, in the past, that she possessed the Dimensional Scream ability. Then, she and Flame told me about how she had amnesia, knowing only her name and that she had once been a human."
He had smiled when I told him...but there must be a mistake...
"How convenient for me, eh, Grovyle? She couldn't remember me at all! And nor could she remember you!"
Grovyle stared at Julia, shaking his head. His eyes narrowed in fury and he whirled at Dusknoir, striking out with his claws. Dusknoir simply floated backwards out of reach while two sableye rushed to their master's side protectively.
"How could you?!" Grovyle spat. "You bastard..."
"It was not my doing, but it was quite fortunate that it happened. Now I have all of you..." He glanced past Celebi and Julia at Flame. "...as well as you, young Flame. What a shame that you did not realize that you were assisting a criminal."
"Julia's not a criminal!" Flame yelled, standing in front of her. "She's my – my mate, and I'm not going to let you hurt her!"
At any other time, the fact that Flame had finally said it, that they were mates, would have caused Julia to flush red. But now, now that they were looking death in the eye, it sounded like false comfort, a false promise.
After all, this was it.
"Sableye, seize them at once," Dusknoir commanded, a triumphant tone in his voice. "If they resist, kill them."
The two sableye by Dusknoir's side quickly charged Grovyle and grabbed him by either arm. After a split second, Grovyle began thrashing and trying to rid himself of the two, but he suddenly cried out and dropped to a knee. The scent of fresh blood hit Julia's nose and she saw, in horror, that the sableye had tore up his arms with their claws.
"Grovyle!" Celebi shrieked as a sableye dashed in and grabbed her by an arm as well. The other three did the same with Flame and Julia.
So much for Celebi being un-catchable.
But Celebi was far from finished. She looked Julia and Flame in the eyes and hissed, "I'm going to speed up time in a straight path from us to the Passage of Time. I can only do it for so long, and Primal Dialga can stop me at any second. I'll grab Grovyle; you two, run, got it?"
Flame and Julia nodded hurriedly. Celebi gave them a small, sad smile, then began to glow. The glow expanded and everything outside of a path leading right to the Passage of Time went grey. The sableye suddenly halted in their actions, allowing the three to wrench themselves from their grips, and Dusknoir became frozen in mid-shout. The only one who hadn't stopped moving was Primal Dialga, his tail thrashing furiously.
Flame and Julia ran.
The Passage of Time, like Primal Dialga, kept fluttering and moving slightly. Julia could hear the air rushing past her ears and finally felt the bite of cold on her fur. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Celebi grasp Grovyle by the arm and him stumbling after her.
Above them, Primal Dialga roared, glaring down. Several long, metallic fins on his back began radiating silvery light and spreading apart.
"He's about to use his Roar of Time attack!" Celebi cried out. "We don't have much longer!" The fur on Julia's neck rose and she tried to force her legs to move faster. The Passage was so close – !
Not more than ten metres away from it, the brief burst of quickened time was shattered with an earsplitting roar and Julia could suddenly hear Dusknoir yelling at them or the sableye, or Primal Dialga. Everything felt like a jumbled mess.
"Keep going!" Celebi yelled at them. Grovyle had snatched his arm away from Celebi's hold and he closed the gap between himself and the Passage. Before he went in, he glanced back and nodded to the pink Pokémon, who just smiled sadly again at him.
"But what about you?" Flame called out. Celebi stared, then broke into a grin.
"Haven't I told you I can't be caught? Now, get the hell out of here!"
The last thing Julia saw before Flame pulled her into the Passage was all six sableye lunging towards the spot where Celebi used to be.
"It's over."
Lucky shook his head at his brother with a grin. "Don't be such a pessississimist, Perry!" he scolded, continuing to wipe away the crusted blood from Perry's chest with a leaf. The spearow turned his head away.
"Don't be an idiot. We saw those sableye running through the woods. They're either all dead, or they made it to the past and closed the Passage behind them. Face it – we're not getting back to the past."
"We'll find a way." Lucky stood up and picked up Perry to set him on his shoulder. "Take it easy, 'kay? And don't start bleeding again. If you bleed all over me, it'll be gross."
"Grosser than romance?"
Sticking his tongue out, Lucky retorted, "I'm, like, a romance expert. Anyways..." He grinned determinedly. "I know where to find another Passage of Time. It's kinda far away, but it'll be worth it."
Perry frowned and sighed. "I think I know the one you're talking about. Arceus, I hate that one. Guess it can't be helped. Let's hope the porygons aren't in a cranky mood today."
Silently, Lucky dashed off into the dark undergrowth and disappeared into the shadows.