Well, after the heart-stopping ending for the
last chapter, I bring you the final chapter of the Hero mini-arc!
Read on and witness the final fate of Ash, Latias, and pretty much
everyone else!
Disclaimer: All characters in this chapter are
either parodies, gross transformations, or licensed to other
companies who are not me. Kudos to Alex Warlorn for the solution to
Charizard's problem and for his help editing.
…
High-pitched screams filled the chamber as the newest general gleefully dug his claws again and again into the human's flesh, tearing at muscle and viscera as he shredded apart the weakling's innards and gnawed on the intestinal tract, not minding the foul taste of the bowels emptying in his mouth.
He could sense the human's spark of life fading away. He could sense his victim's mind blacking out and shutting down as he sank into death. He found himself mildly annoyed that the fool was trying to escape so pathetically from his torture, and drove his tendrils; both physical and psychic, into the prisoner's flesh and soul, unleashing a wave of power which wracked the human's body in agony as he dragged the mortal's frail and pathetic spirit, kicking and screaming, back once again from the boundary of death and into the hell that was his life. "Not yet," he cackled, his tongue flicking at the air. "Not…YET!"
The bits and pieces of the prisoner's body, playfully ripped out by the general, floated into the air and reattached themselves to the shattered figure lying on the floor, painfully reconnecting ligaments, blood vessels, and nerve endings, causing the human to writhe about on the floor as he experienced a very painful, very careless, and very cruel form of healing that would leave him with bones arranged in the wrong manner, blood flooding his lungs and brain, a twisted spine, crossed nerves and pressure points, and a whole mess of other things which his captors would get around to fixing eventually…if only so they could take him apart again. The broken, barely human thing lay there, mewling piteously.
"Done having fun?" the master asked from his throne.
"Yessss," the general hissed, licking James' blood from his lips. "But he's so…WEAK…it is so easy to break him again and again. I require someone stronger…someone who won't fall apart the instant my mind brushes theirs!"
"And you will get that someone quite soon," the master promised.
"But how can I? How can I, if-" the general started.
The master laughed. "You don't really think something like that will keep her out of the picture? She will come back. I have foreseen this. And then, you may play with her to your black heart's content."
The general bowed graciously as his evil heart soared at the prospect of all the deliciously painful things he had in mind which would shatter her again and again. "Thank you, my master."
The master nodded. "In the mean time, we must focus on our latest comrade: the Alpha Ranger."
"Why IS he a Ranger, anyway?" Meowth wondered. "Instead of a horrible monster like the rest of us?"
"Because I…or should I say, the crystal piece of HERO, found this form more amusing," the master said with a chuckle. "It is a part of me, after all, no matter how much it has become corrupted due to the Mother's influence in our final battle. That is the only reason that the humans who go into HERO display any heroic tendencies at all and retain humanlike characteristics, before their hearts turn. However, this shard has managed to turn its corruption to its own advantage, by ensuring that no matter how 'good' its heroes start out as, eventually all will fall into my clutches. And each time they go through HERO again, they are that much closer. As for why they appear as heroes as pitiful and cliché as they are…the crystal recalls the foes who opposed me in many of my past lives. It finds it ironic and amusing to create mockeries of those foes, all of whom shall someday serve me or be destroyed at my whim. I must say, I am rather pleased by how this piece has managed to use its own flaw, the Mother's benevolent energy infecting it, to its advantage. I will put that energy to great usage, once it is mine."
"But why does it turn all the Pokemon who pass through it into monsters like us instead of mockeries, then?" Cerberus asked.
The master shrugged. "Partly to keep the humans confused and perplexed, partly because it feels like it. As I said…it is a part of me. It enjoys manipulating the weak and causing chaos and suffering to all."
"And it's done a good job of it too…I can't wait to see the looks on their faces when his friends see what you've done to their precious Ash, master! Heeheeheeheehee!" Mewgle giggled insanely.
Shalor looked pensive as he stared at the imposing image of the white Ranger in the fortress' crystal viewer. "But I wonder…master, I know Alpha Ranger is strong, but…what if they manage to defeat him?"
The master shrugged. "If they defeat him, he will be that much more willing to join us to get his revenge. If he defeats them…not only will those members of the Chosen no longer be a threat, but it will be even easier to convince him to join us by offering him the power to destroy every vestige of his past. Either way…I win."
…
At the hotel…
Max had fallen asleep, still bound and gagged to his chair. He was drooling in his slumber, causing his gag to get soaked with saliva and start smelling funny. The television was still on, albeit muted, and showing some stupid movie about a Meowth who went around on roller skates killing blocky alien robots.
On the bed, next to a limp length of rope was a note:
Deer Mai, Ash, Brok, Mistee, Peekachoo, Togetik, Lateeas, and evrywun els,
Mew and Selebee shoed up and said thei needed mee too cum with them so wee can saiv the world frum the bad gi. Bak toomoroe.
Luv yoo lots, Jirachi and Absol
They could have at least untied me before they left, Max thought unconsciously as the ropes digging into his sides manifested as the coils of an Arbok in his dreams.
…
"Latias."
She opened her eyes. She had stopped falling. Someone had caught her. "Where am I?"
"Between life and death."
She had the nagging feeling she'd been here before. "And who are you? Your voice sounds familiar."
"You once knew me, even if it was only for a moment. We have passed that moment…and now I know you much more intimately than before, for I am no longer who I once was."
A figure appeared from the grayish and shifting void around her. Latias blinked in surprise, her visitor looking quite a bit familiar. "Molly?"
…
"We've done nothing wrong!" protested one of the guards as he was led away in handcuffs. "You can't do this to us!"
"I can, and I have!" Officer Jenny said smartly, hands on her hips. "By protecting a madman, you are not only aiding and abetting his insane plans, but you are also obstructing justice by preventing the proper authorities from handling this situation! As such, you and all your colleagues are under arrest…or at the very least, will be held in police custody for questioning until we can tell just how much you know about what's going on!"
The guard grumbled as he was dragged away by the cop, along with all the other Pokemon and security guards Ford had hired to keep everyone out of the Tower.
The plaza in front of Battle Tower was lit up by floodlights set up by Ever Grande police in the wake of the frenzied battle which had occurred when the cops, summoned by Brandon, had descended on the plaza to aid the other Frontier Brains and Elite trainers in their fight against the surprisingly large horde of guards Ford had in his employ. The perimeter of the plaza was now heavily secured to keep any other lingering guard reinforcements or the numerous frightened pedestrians from getting anywhere near the tower, and allowed the police to continue their so far unsuccessful efforts to penetrate the building's unbreakable defenses. The Brains and Elite trainers would have stuck around, but their Pokemon were exhausted from the grueling battle, so had gone to the Pokemon Center to heal them and promised to be back as soon as they could.
"Report. How are our efforts going so far?" Jenny asked one of her lieutenants.
The lieutenant saluted. "Ma'am! Still no success. The tower still repels all efforts to gain entry. We still have helicopters and flyers patrolling the roof and upper levels to look for any openings and weak spots, and welders are attempting to cut through the metal over the windows, but still nothing seems to be working. Diggers encountered several extremely solid layers of metal not too far beneath the surface, which cancels out any of our burrowing plans."
"How about hackers? Have we managed to get any headway through the building's electronics?" Jenny asked.
The lieutenant shook his head. "No ma'am. All phone and computer lines into the building are unresponsive. We've tried cutting power, but the facility has its own generators. We sent a crack team of Porygon2 and Porygon into the systems, and all of them came out with their data on the brink of derazzing."
Jenny sighed. "Great…where are the Poke Rangers or Soldier Scouts when you need them?" Not that they'd be of any help, considering how they seem to be part of all this, she thought bitterly, still trying to cope with the unbelievably hard blow to her morale and every belief she had in Ford Industries, the HERO project (which, as a high-ranking police officer, she was peripherally aware of, but not to the full extent which had just been thrust upon her, thus clearing her of any attachment to the guilty parties (or that's what she believed anyway, she'd have to check with the legal department to be certain)) and a good many other things in her life that she had received when she had found out, via the somewhat unreliable Brandon and the much more trustworthy elite trainers after him, just what was going on here.
"Well, keep at it," she heard herself telling the lieutenant. "No fortress is truly impervious. There must be some way to get in…interrogate the guards we've captured, maybe they have keycards or a password or something that'll work…it's drawing at straws, but it's all we've got."
"Yes ma'am."
Jenny walked away, feeling somewhat useless and unsettled, as she often did in situations where she felt that she was superfluous and had little to no control over the situation. The thought of the kids whom had fought alongside her in the battle against Neo Team Snagem trapped somewhere up in that tower, while their friend was being held hostage and forced through Lord-knew-what kind of torture, sickened her. It was, she thought ironically, like history from only a few days ago being repeated, only this time she wasn't up there with them, sharing the fight and standing alongside people she had swiftly realized were friends she could trust to protect her back. She didn't have many of those on the force.
She sighed, taking a seat on the rim of the currently inactive fountain in the middle of the plaza. "What's the point of me being around when I can't handle when push comes to shove?" she thought miserably.
"Officer Jenny!"
The cop looked up in surprise, the somewhat familiar voice catching her attention. "That voice…is that…?"
She was not completely surprised when she saw Wes and Rui, the former wearing his stylish blue coat over somewhat uncomfortable-looking formal wear, along with the dashingly handsome masked figure of Zoro running over to her. "What the…how did you three get in here?"
As they stopped before her, the caped Zoro laughed and twirled one of the fine ends of his moustache between his fingers. "Ah senora, a little dash of the Encanto de Zoro and the guard on duty let us right in."
"That and we greased their palms a little," Wes said with a smirk.
Jenny sighed and put her face in her hands. "Great, I thought we'd gotten rid of all the bribe-takers during the last mass layoffs."
"Bribes? All we did was give them some coffee and donuts," said Rui, frowning at her two companions. "And said we were bringing some for you, Officer Jenny. But, ah, we had to give up some for every cop who stopped us, so…" Rui shrugged weakly. "Now we're all out."
"Oh." Guess I don't have to fire anyone after all, she thought. Though I could have used some coffee and donuts. "And what're you three doing here?"
Wes shrugged. "For the same reason the people you were with came last time…because they're our friends."
Zoro nodded. "Si. This is true. Senor Ketchum and his comrades are mi amigos…and I cannot stand by and allow mi amigos to go alone into danger! Es dishonorable!"
Jenny blinked. "How do you even know Ketchum and his friends are involved?"
Wes smirked. "Who else would it be? That, and there's all these rumors going about with the people outside saying that Ash has been captured by Ford, who's actually a mad scientist who's trying to make him into the world's most powerful monster. We weren't sure how much of that was true, so we thought we'd ask you."
"And see how we could help," Zoro added.
Jenny sighed, reminding herself to find out which of her officers was feeding all these leaks to the media and the public and have him or her demoted back to meter maid. Or man. Or person, to be absolutely politically correct. "That's only half-true, but it's still enough for us to be called in. I don't know how much you three can help, but…" She paused, then smiled. "I thought the same thing of those friends of yours, and they managed to help out a great deal. I don't suppose you have any ideas on how we can break into the invincible Battle Tower over there?"
"Actually," Rui said with a grin, glancing at Wes. "We did have an idea or two…"
…
Ford's fingers flew at the controls. The electrified cage surrounding the arena quivered and retracted back into the walls, while the lava filling the field drained away. The platforms retracted back into the ground as the arena floor slammed shut over the lava drain, leaving the field looking as good as new, almost as if it had never been covered in molten rock just a few moments ago.
Two figures stood resolute, one figure lay curled up in pain on the floor. The two were Ford's weary Blaziken and the newly born Alpha Ranger, and the one was the utterly defeated figure of Charizard, his wings torn off and his dreams shattered.
"How does it feel, son?" Ford asked the Ranger, his face sweaty with anticipation and triumph.
"It feels…" Alpha Ranger said, his voice a distorted and somewhat older form of Ash's. He glanced down at his hands, clenching his fists. "Powerful."
Blaziken raised an eyebrow at the Ranger's tone, but said nothing. Ford didn't seem to notice.
"I told you!" the businessman said gleefully. "I told you! Wasn't it worth it, Ash--er, Alpha? Wasn't it?"
"Yes," Alpha said slowly, his arms lowering to his sides. "Yes, it was."
Ford glanced at Charizard, feeling a twinge of guilt. "A shame this realization had to come at such a price…"
"There will always be those who do not understand," Alpha said calmly. "If they won't understand and won't get out of the way…then they must be pushed."
Ford frowned, some of his ecstasy at the success he had been working for years for ebbing away a little. "Not sure that's the right attitude…then again, the example I've set does give good reason to believe that…" he murmured to himself. "In any case," he said, his enthusiasm bubbling back up. "You are here at last, and underneath your standard will lead the forces of Earth to victory against the evils which plague it!"
"…Heh," Alpha smirked, looking amused by Ford's comment. The confused businessman did not have time to ask why that was though, because just then the sealed door behind the super Ranger in the arena opened up.
Harrison, his Blaziken, Steven, Metagross, Lucy, Seviper, Misty, Togetic, Corsola, Brock, Crobat, May, and Combusken all tumbled through the door. "Ash! Ash we're here-" Misty stopped dead in her tracks, seeing the Alpha Ranger, who was now impassively staring at them all through his jagged visor. They all gasped, both at the sight of the spandexed figure that had once been their friend as well as the broken orange dragon behind him. "Oh no."
"Curses! We're too late!" Steven lamented.
"Dad, Brother Charizard, are you all right?" Togetic cried in concern. The dragon whimpered but said nothing, while the Ranger chuckled softly.
"Ash, speak to us!" Brock pleaded.
Alpha chuckled. "Heheheh. Ash isn't here anymore."
Lucy frowned. "That don't sound good…"
"Father, how could you!" Harrison cried.
Ford sighed. "I did what I had to, son. And the world is a better place for it."
"The world's a better place because you transmogrified a kid against his will and mutilated a Charizard for life!" Lucy asked incredulously.
Ford sweatdropped. "Th-That was Blaziken's fault," Ford said quickly, receiving a glare from his Pokemon. "I told him to punish the Charizard for forcing Ash to suffer dehydration from the lava by prolonging the battle, but I never said he should go that far!"
"And that exempts you from taking responsibility for his actions as his trainer!" Brock asked furiously.
Steven nodded in agreement. "For that alone,
you could and WILL be sent to prison, the other crimes you've
committed (kidnapping, forced and illegal experimentation, reckless
endangerment, etc.) notwithstanding! As League Master of the Hoenn
region, I'm placing you under arrest!"
"Wh-what!" Ford
cried, startled. "But…but I…I was just…"
"There's no excuse for this!" May snapped. "There's no way you can possibly justify this!" Combusken squawked in agreement, both enraged that a fellow Fire Pokemon had been forced to suffer as Charizard had, and also feeling ashamed and depressed that the oh-so-hot Blaziken would do such a horrible thing.
"I…I was just…I was just trying to do the right thing!" Ford snapped. "I'm trying to save the world here! You have to make a few sacrifices for that!"
"I believe Team Aqua, Magma, and sad to say now Lance, all used that same logic," Steven said coldly. "And used it as reason for all the crimes, atrocities, and deaths or near-deaths their actions have caused."
Lucy nodded. "I know better than anyone that you need to break a few eggs to make an omelet…but in the real world, it's not just which eggs, but how you break them, that matters! If you're trying to make a 'save the planet' omelet, then you're going about it with completely the wrong recipe and ingredients!" She sweatdropped. "Er, that sounded kind of stupid, now that I said it…"
Seviper hissed hungrily next to her trainer. "Mmm, this fool surely deserves to spend a month being dissolved by my stomach acids…"
"Wh-who are you to judge me and what I do!" Ford asked, getting frustrated.
"As an official League representative, I believe I can actually," said Steven, raising an eyebrow. "And what you have been doing here is so far outside the rules that I doubt any lawyer you hire will be able to get you out of this if you go to court."
"When my heroes save the day, the people will love me and forgive me!" Ford protested. "They'll never let me go to court! And if I did, no jury will be able to prove that we would all have been saved if I hadn't changed Ash into a superhero! What I've done may not be right in the high-and-mighty eyes of the law, but I still know it's the right thing!"
"I don't know about that…" Corsola muttered to herself. "Isn't there some human saying about how the ends don't justify the means?"
"Actually, that depends on the context of the ends and means," Metagross said intelligently. "But in this instance, I believe that logic holds true."
Alpha, who had been looking in boredom at the shocked Misty for most of this argument, whirled around to face Ford, who was continuing his spiel on why what he did was all right. "Oh, shut up you fuckhole." He whipped out his laser gun and fired it at the businessman.
…
"Mie," the girl corrected. She looked so much like the human Latias had met once before…she had the same blue eyes, only her entire body seemed to have turned to crystal and her human features looked…unfinished somehow, or as if they were in the process of turning into something else.
"Not Molly?"
"No. Mie."
"Oh," Latias said apologetically. "You just look like Molly. Sort of."
"I was Molly, once," said Mie. "But not anymore."
"Ah." Latias nodded. "So…I'm dead, then? I distinctly remember getting a broken sword driven into my chest, then falling to the ground and bleeding out in despair."
"You did."
"Yeah, that's what I thought."
"You are between life and death," Mie repeated. "Your spirit flees its body, which is as we speak on its last moments of life. That is just enough time to return to it, if you wish."
"Return to what?" Latias asked, sullenly. "To a corpse with a missing wing and a sword driven through it? I don't want to be a zombie."
"Not a zombie," Mie corrected. "Something more. Something different. Something…that is more like you than ever before."
Latias considered it for a moment. "…What good would it do? I've already let my friends down. And it's too late for Ash, isn't it?"
"Your friends are still alive," Mie told her, to which Latias' eyes widened in surprise. "All of them."
"R-really?" Latias asked, shocked and hopeful. "All of them!"
Mie nodded. "Yes. Pikachu, Sadic, and Crawdaunt fought and fought until there was nothing left to fight, and are lying exhausted in the corridor amidst the blood of the beasts they've killed. Charla managed to overload the mechanisms pushing down on her with her stubborn refusal to give in, and the ceiling press stopped, but she and Phanphy are still trapped, as is Annabel in the pit. Bayleef and Gardevoir are still in the Red Ranger's capture cards, but other than that and the Poke-B-Gone in their veins they're fine.
"As for Ash…he has transformed, yes. He has fallen into the clutches of the enemy. But there is still a chance you can save him. Or perhaps…someone close to you. Someone who has the power and experience at saving lost souls?"
"Mewtwo," Latias understood at once, automatically reaching for the Dragon Flute. Of course, since she was a spirit, it wasn't there. It was still where she left it, with her body. "I'll call him the instant I get back. Can't believe I was stupid enough not to think of him in the first place…"
"We all make mistakes," Mie said with a smile. "That's how I got here, too."
"Is it?" Latias asked, surprised. "I'd like to hear more about that, but seeing as how you said my body's only got a few moments of life left I don't think I have time."
"Actually, you have all the time you need or desire," Mie corrected. "We're a little less than halfway between life and death, time and not-time. So what you would perceive as time only passes if you believe it does."
"…That's weird," Latias said, raising an eyebrow.
"From our perspective on this side of what you would call reality, time--and a lot of other things--are really quite subjective," Mie told her with a shrug.
"Okay, so that means I'm not running low on time. Nevertheless, how do I get back? I have to help my friends!" And see the King, she thought to herself, kicking herself for nearly forgetting about him in her urgency.
"You can get back the way you did last time," Mie told the dragon girl.
Latias stared blankly. "Last time?"
"Yes, the last time you died."
She sweatdropped. "…I think I'd remember dieing more than once."
"You do remember," Mie told her. "You just don't know you do. It's a consequence of forced and premature reentry into the time stream before completely leaving it."
"Is it?" Latias asked dubiously.
"Oh yes, happens to pretty much everyone who reincarnates."
"Rein-" Latias paused. "Registeel said something about that…"
"About your soul being that of the first Latias'? He was telling the truth. You and your ancestor share the same spirit, if not the exact same body. You died after defeating Missingno, couldn't stand to go into Eternity without your King, so reentered Time to be with him again," Mie told her.
Latias raised an eyebrow, skeptical despite the fact that everything Mie was saying resonated oddly true with her. "And I couldn't have chosen to be reborn sooner, instead of several thousand years after he…I don't know, died or something…and became King of the Ghosts, who then destroyed Alto Mare because I didn't recognize him or whatever?"
"Of course you could have," Mie told her. "And then the King would have lusted for his own granddaughter. Wouldn't that have been fun?"
Latias' eyes bulged. "Ugh…I really didn't need that mental image." Mie giggled. "Okay, I see your point. And I suppose avoiding a dilemma like that was part of the reason she…I came back so late, incidentally condemning the King to several thousand years of loneliness?"
The once-human girl shrugged. "Better that than besmirching his honor, reputation, and legacy with incest and producing some truly twisted offspring who would have ruined the peace the two of you had wrought together."
"…Yeah, I can see how that would work," Latias said, feeling more disgusted. "Okay, so I just need to find my way back to the time stream like I did before in that time I can't remember, right?"
Mie nodded. "It'll be easy because you still have a warm body with blood flowing through its veins for at least a few more moments, time-wise. You can home in on that feeling now that I've stopped your freefall to death and reenter the world of Life and Time just about where you left it."
"I'll still be stuck in a really badly wounded body though," Latias pointed out.
You will not, said the crystalline Unown, appearing around her. We, and you yourself, shall see to that.
"I will?" Latias asked in surprise.
You remember who you were. You remember what you were. You just do not remember you remember. The crystalline alphabetic entities spun about and rearranged themselves into a long, glistening chain which stretched off into the void, towards a somewhat darker region off in the infinite nothingess. Or at least, that's what it looked like to Latias, whose extradimensional senses were groggy from her 'death' and rather untrained for the most part. Perhaps that was for the best, because as she was now, her mind would be unable to comprehend the sheer complexity and impossibility of the region she was in, between time and not-time, between life and death.
You are Latias, friend of Ash Ketchum and others, brother of Latios, adopted aunt of Phanphy and Togetic, child of Ho-Oh and an elder Latias, surrogate daughter of both Vincentio and Mewtwo, future Queen of Dragons, and destined mate of Rayquaza, they told her. You are Latias the First, founder of your line, brother of Latios the first, former Queen of Dragons, survivor of the Evil One's last coming, and mate of Rayquaza.
Both lives, both memories, are from different times, separate instances where you swam in the river of time. Both are viable. Both are real.
Accept both, so that you may live one last time and fulfill what you are meant to do. What you are Chosen to do. Grab onto this chain, and we shall guide you back to where you belong. Do not become so startled by what may happen, though, that you let go, they warned her. If you do, you will fall out of time for good, and there is nothing we can do to return you to life then.
Latias had expected to feel apprehensive from this explanation, from how she would 'remember' this other life she had led, how it might change her into someone alien and different. Oddly enough, she felt excited. As if this was what she, when she had passed back through this shadowy place to reenter the time stream once before, had envisioned would someday come to pass. She realized that these memories, even if they had belonged to a different 'incarnation' so to speak, would still be hers, would still have been MADE by her. This ancestor, this first Latias whom she had once been, was no different than she. There was no precise line between when she had stopped living one life and started another, they were both the same life, just extended somewhat and transmuted past its end.
And now it would be extended and transmuted once more. Eagerly, she grasped the end of the chain, her skin (if she had any, seeing as how she was a spirit) tingling as her mind, or whatever passed for one in her spiritual form, had a sudden flash of memory, one that she recognized instantly although part of her could not remember ever having it before:
It was dark, and warm, and cozy.
But too small! She wanted out!
She thrashed and flailed at the walls of her prison, struggling to break free, and then…
Light. It hurt the…the things she used to…see things…which had never been used before. She squeezed the things shut; squealing (was that what she sounded like? Interesting.) in pain.
She felt a wave of…not-hurt…when something big moved over her, blocking out the light and heat. Squeezing open her…things that she saw with…she saw the vague, blurry figure of a big reptilian object which had a color like…like…well, she'd never seen colors before, but she decided it was called tan, just for the heck of it.
She knew instinctively this was her mother, and squealed with joy.
Latias did not let go of the chain out of surprise from that abrupt memory of her first birth. In another time, or if she were another person, she might have. But these memories were hers. She knew that. She recognized them. And she knew there was nothing to fear from them. In a sense, as she was now, she was incomplete, only remembering half (if that, even) of her total existence, the lifetime she had lived in this present. By regaining the memories of that other time, of that past life, she would become truly complete…she would be more Latias than she had ever been before. And she found herself eagerly looking forward to that prospect.
She glanced over her shoulder (assuming she had a shoulder) and smiled at Mie. "Thank you for giving me a second chance, Mie. I'm sorry we couldn't help you when your town was destroyed."
"It is of no concern," said Mie with a simple shrug. "What is in the past is past. I have moved on to where I belong. But I, and my teachers, did not think you should die before you fulfilled your own part in the future they have foreseen." Her face turned serious. "But be warned. This is the only time we can do this. If you die again, there is nothing more we can do."
"So this is my last chance." Latias nodded in understanding. "Got it. Some could say I've had two too many as it is."
"Some could say that," Mie agreed. "Others could say that your love of life (or your King) was so great that not even dying twice could conquer it."
Latias chuckled. "That's a nice way of putting it." She reached up with a claw and grabbed the next link in the crystal chain. Her eyes went glassy for a fraction of a second (if they had seconds in this place, or eyes for that matter) as she absorbed another memory, then continued, slowly ascending the path laid out for her.
"Good luck, Latias," Mie said as she faded away. "You will certainly need it in the trials to come."
…
"FATHER!" Harrison cried in horror.
Ford gaped at the Alpha Ranger, gripping unconsciously at the cauterized, blood-rimmed hole in his shoulder where the Ranger's laser pistol had struck and passed right through. "Wh-what? Why…why did you…"
Alpha laughed and put his gun back in its holster. "What made you think I was interested in playing the part of your little hero stooge, dumbass? I've had enough of being part of a big group trying to save the world. This hero is going solo!" He chuckled at Ford's look of disbelief. "Guess you were wrong after all. It's not the fault of the individual that they become corrupt, at least not completely…it's the HERO itself, and the force behind it that's the problem. And I owe it big for finally giving me the freedom and power I deserve! Now I'm free to be the best…and NOBODY'S holding me back or standing in my way!"
Ford gasped in pain, his knees betraying him. He collapsed onto the control panel, blood splattering out onto it. "B-Blaziken," he rasped. "Get…get him…"
The tired, beaten, and purple-eyed Blaziken stared up into the eyes of his trainer for a moment. Then he grunted, and grinned. "Hmmph. He got you before I did. Oh well." He turned and limped away, ignoring Ford's cry of betrayal and Harrison's screams of rage. "Have fun," he said to Alpha.
"Heh. I will," Alpha said, turning back to the shocked group. "All right, which of you losers is next?"
"Why did you do that!" Harrison demanded, enraged. "What did my father do to deserve that!" True, they had just given Ford a big talking-down only moments ago, but Ford was still Harrison's father.
"Hey, that transformation fucking hurt, okay?" Alpha yelled angrily. "That, and I was so sick of hearing him TALK and TALK about how I was going to do this and be the greatest hero that and I just wanted him to shut up. So I made him!"
"I can't believe this!" May cried in disbelief. "What's happened to you Ash, to make you like this?"
"He's not Ash."
"Huh?" All looked at Misty, who had spoken up quietly.
"He's not Ash," she said, continuing to stare at the white and gold Ranger. "He can't be. Because Ash would never behave like this."
"Ha! Right and wrong, bitch!" Alpha said proudly. "The wimpy boyfriend you're used to wouldn't have acted like that…but that pathetic ignoramus ain't here no more! Now all that's left is the TRUE Ash Ketchum…one who isn't held back by petty things like friendship, love, kindness, compassion, morals, or any of that Tauroscrap! Now that all that's gone, I can do whatever I please, everything I've always wanted to do but couldn't because something was holding me back! I WANNA DO ALL THE STUFF I'VE SEEN IN MOVIES!" He threw his head back, laughing insanely. "As the Alpha Ranger, I'm going to be the number one, greatest of them all, just what Ash should have done before he got all these stupid ideas that were actually making him consider QUITTING Pokemon training for a while!"
"What?" Brock asked in surprise. "Ash was going to do that?"
Alpha chuckled. "Yeah, guess you don't know your friend Ashy-boy as well as you thought if none of you saw this coming! Further proof you guys have only been a waste of time, which makes the thought of dumping you all the sweeter!"
"Hey, that's no way to talk to people you've traveled with for quite a while, now is it?" Lucy asked, glaring at the Ranger in place of Ash's friends stunned silence.
"Why not? I can speak however I want!" Alpha retorted. "Who needs these guys, anyway? A horny, overly hormonal freak who walks around with his eyes closed yet still manages to home in on any pretty lady in sight, bugging the hell out of everyone, and is currently so crazy over someone who's DEAD he's going around wearing her clothes?" Looking uncomfortable, Brock tugged on his skirt while Crobat sweatdropped at his trainer. "Or a wimpy, annoying, whiny, weak-willed, self-conscious gym leader's daughter who thinks she has any skill at making Pokemon dance about and look pretty, uses her dad's influence to buy her way into a major tournament just to impress a guy she likes who's not even remotely interested, can't keep her idiot brother from making dumb wishes that makes everyone's lives more difficult, is currently having the hots for a freak in tights and a stupid mask, and has so many other things wrong with her self-esteem that it would take hours to list them. Oh, and did I mention she reeks as a trainer?" May was stunned speechless by the cruel words. It was only Lucy's hand on her shoulder which kept her from breaking down in tears then and there. "And then, of course, there's YOU," Alpha said, turning on Misty.
She tilted her head. "And what do you have to say about me?" she asked, while Togetic looked frightened of what her father had become.
Alpha laughed cruelly. "Oh, where to begin? Let's see, you're scrawny, have an inferiority complex due to tormenting by your airhead sisters (who are, by the way, much prettier than you), you have an unhealthy obsession with water and everything related to it, you baby that whiny brat of yours too much-" Togetic gasped at this, and Misty rubbed her back reassuringly. "-Speaking of whom, was nowhere NEAR worth all the effort it took to hatch the damn thing and keep it from killing itself in all the stupid situations it got itself into-you bitch and moan when things don't go the way you want, your blatant attempts to conceal your feelings for me were obvious to anyone with half a brain cell (which, admittedly, I didn't even have until just now), your extreme possessiveness of me is nothing short of insane, as is the way you're always trying to boss me around, you constantly criticize my skills as a trainer, and if that's not enough, whenever I do something you don't like you whack me on the head with a fucking hammer. There's a lot more I'd like to say too, but there aren't words in any language I know vile enough to express just how much I loathe you."
"First of all, it's a mallet, not a hammer," Misty pointed out calmly.
"You think I give a damn?" he snarled.
"No, not really." She smiled. "And second of all, everything you just said would be a lot more hurtful if I actually believed Ash felt that way."
Alpha was startled, while her companions looked confused by that statement. "What? What're you talking about? Of course that's how I feel you idiot!"
"Yes, but you're not Ash," she pointed out. "At least, not the one we know and have traveled with for the last few years. I know Ash probably has entertained thoughts like the ones you've just ranted to us about…but I don't for a second believe he held onto those thoughts, otherwise he wouldn't have stayed with us all this time…or put up with everything that I personally may have put him through. It's called love, and it's something you, you shadowy thing, can never understand!"
"…" Alpha looked dumbstruck for a moment. Then, to their surprise, he started laughing. "Hahahahaha! You actually believe that, don't you? What, you think my memories of what we had together are going to stop me from strangling you with my bare-er, gloved-hands? I understand love perfectly…and I'm sick of it! But hey, if you think it's gonna help you, go ahead. Come on!" He beckoned the group with one hand. "Let's do this! Take me on with all your Pokemon, if you dare! Let's see if your friendship and love can stand up to these fists of mine, that useless sod over there," he said, gesturing with his head towards Charizard. "Already proved just how worthless trust and faith really are when he tried to keep me from receiving this glorious power! SHOW ME WHAT YOU GOT!"
Harrison growled. "You may have once been my friend, but not anymore! You've hurt my father, who didn't deserve it, even if he did do something awful to you! Blaziken-"
"Stop!" Steven said, holding his arm out in front of the enraged teen. "You can't participate in this fight, Harrison."
"What! Why!" he screamed.
"Because your judgment is clouded by anger," the Steel trainer told him. "In a battle with Alpha, you'll be too blinded by rage at him to command your Pokemon effectively!" Harrison bristled at this but relented, realizing it was the truth. "Go tend to your father. He could use some assistance right now, I think."
"Here," said Lucy, tossing him a Super Potion. "This should work."
Harrison blinked as he caught it. "But…this is Pokemon medicine. It won't work on humans, will it?"
She shrugged. "To be perfectly honest, I don't really care." Harrison grunted, rolled his eyes, and headed for the door. Blaziken shrugged and followed him.
"Heh, I like that attitude!" whooped Alpha. "How'd you like to go on a date sometime?"
"Sorry, as I've already told your cross-dressing friend here," Lucy said, grabbing Brock by the collar of his dress and choking him. "I don't date scumbags. Or perverts," she added before Brock could protest that he wasn't a scumbag, which was true.
"Eh, your loss." He beckoned towards the group again. "So come on! Let's do this!"
"All right, you asked for it! Full Metal Attack!" Steven tossed out five extra Pokeballs, releasing his Aggron, Skarmory, Claydol, Cradily, and Armaldo to stand beside his Metagross.
"Seviper, change of plans. Instead of Ford, how'd you like a taste of this guy?" Lucy asked, tossing out her Shuckle, Gyarados, Milotic, and Steelix to battle alongside her Fangsnake. "And maybe the others'd like a piece too!"
"Ash…I don't know what's going on with you, but maybe fighting you will bring you back to your senses! Go, everyone!" Brock cried.
"Uh, Brock, I'm all you have," Crobat pointed out. "Everyone else is with the band, remember?"
At this, Brock curled up in a corner under a cloud of gloom. "Why must I be so uncool?" He lamented.
"Ash, or whoever you are, I'll prove to you that I'm not as weak as you say I am!" May cried, throwing out her Pokeballs. Delcatty, Ivysaur, Munchlax, and Beautifly all appeared before her. "Full Cast performance! Let's show him how much we've improved!"
"Yellow?" a confused Delcatty said, looking around and failing to find her beloved.
"I'm hungry," complained Munchlax, taking a bite out of Ivysaur's leaf.
She yelped and jumped away from him. "Hey, watch it!" she snapped, lashing out at him with a vine.
The garbage scavenger bit into it, catching it with his mouth. "Mmm," he mumbled, salivating all over it.
"Ew, get off!" Ivysaur shrieked, flinging her vine back and forth, trying and failing to shake the kitty off.
May's eyes twitched. Her Pokemon were NOT doing a very good job of proving how bad a trainer she wasn't. "FRONT AND CENTER!" she yelled, channeling Lucy for a moment while stamping her foot in frustration. Her Pokemon stared at her blankly. May groaned and put her face in her hands, while Lucy and Combusken patted her shoulders sympathetically.
"Togetic, go heal Charizard," Misty told her daughter. "He needs help more than anyone at the moment."
"But mom, what about you?" asked the concerned Happiness Pokemon.
"I'll be fine," Misty reassured her. "Your father and I simply need to have a heart-to-heart involving me bashing his head in until he goes back to normal. Get going!" The little angel nodded and flew off. "Okay, you impostor, here goes! Misty calls everyone!" She called out Politoed, Kasurin, and Golduck. Corsola hopped away from Misty's side, joining her friends and teammates.
"Yellow!" Delcatty squealed joyfully, pouncing on the duck.
"Finally, air! I haven't seen the light of day or had any lines for countless chapters now!" Kasurin cried, tearing up in joy.
Politoed shrugged and just clapped his hands like always.
Alpha sneered. "Wow, impressive lineup Misty. These are some of the guys who've been helping you maintain the gym while your idiot sisters are off screwing around?"
Misty smirked. "You've only fought Gyarados recently…or Ash has, anyway. You'd be surprised at what they can do after almost a year of getting whaled on by rookie trainers trying to get a badge!"
"Whatever you say." Alpha Ranger surveyed the two dozen or so Pokemon facing him. He chuckled and cracked his knuckles. "This shouldn't take very long…"
…
She remembered so many things.
She remembered playing with her siblings in the grotto they called home.
She remembered swimming in the ocean for the first time.
She remembered meeting her future mate, then a Bagon, for the first time as he splashed down in the grotto after yet another failed attempt at flight.
She remembered meeting the divine trio and their priestly entourage for the first time, and was moved by how deeply they seemed to care about her little problems and issues, which seemed so trivial compared to the rest of the world. When they had left, she understood why most could not help but love them.
She remembered the skies darkening as the evil one rose in power, and the nightmares which gripped her in her slumber and would only flee when she was beside her twin or Bagon.
She remembered the evil one arriving in their grotto, killing her parents, and infesting them so they would devour their own children.
She remembered the evil one leaving her and her brother to die, only managing to escape when Bagon, who had just escaped from his own zombified parents, plummeted from the sky again and knocked them out long enough for them to get away.
She remembered watching in terror with her friends as the godlike figures of the Mother and the Evil One clashed in the heavens, causing the Earth to suffer and die from the resulting storm of power.
She remembered crying as both omnipotent beings exploded, releasing a force which almost destroyed everything, yet somehow spared her, her brother, and Bagon.
She remembered her tears lighting upon the strange jewel fragments which fell from the sky, and how the air shimmered with magic and then…and then everything was back to the way it should have been.
She remembered the exhilarating, indescribable feeling of fusing with the jewel piece, and evolving into Latias.
She remembered being…elected, in a sense, as
Queen of the Dragons, alongside the newly evolved Rayquaza.
She
remembered the wedding, and what followed after. If these memories
hadn't been her own, and had Latias not been who she was, she might
have blushed at the very, very erotic images in these visions.
She remembered what felt like an eternity (though in actuality it was just a couple of centuries or so) of wonderful peace.
She remembered the unrest among the people.
She
remembered the machinations of Missingno.
She remembered sacrificing her life to seal the demon away.
She remembered waking up, in a sense, between life and death, and realizing her other half was not there.
She remembered panicking for a moment, then diving right back into the time stream to find him.
And then…birth, a second time. And the events of her new life began.
She continued climbing up the chain, reliving another memory for each link of the chain. She saw friends, many long gone, but she felt no sorrow at their loss, for she knew they were somewhere safe now. She similarly felt no sadness (well, maybe a little) when she saw Bianca die again, but was nonetheless reassured that she was fine. She knew the girl, her surrogate sister, was happy and well outside of time, just as her brother was. Someday, she would see her, and Latios, and all her other old friends again.
But today was not that day, for she still had business to finish and a life to live.
As she relived memories of the tournament, she knew she was almost at the end. She knew this for certain when she saw a familiar light at the very end of the chain, just a few 'meters' (if physical measurements counted for anything here) up the line.
Latias knew that light most intimately. It had been at her heart of hearts whenever she meditated, and she understood now what it represented: not just her connection to her beloved King, the tie which linked their souls; but also the very essence of the memories, power, and experience she had repressed from her first life, as well as the original crystal piece she had absorbed as a despondent Dratini which allowed her to evolve into Latias in the first place. That was why it was hidden so deep in her mind, underneath layers of primal memories and undiscovered abilities. It had not followed her when she had died, and remained in her family line; passed down among other Latias' until the day she was born again and reunited with it.
That was what had stopped her from completely fearing and hating the Ghost King the first time she met him, no matter how often she denied it. Because that part of her self remembered him dearly, and longed to be with him again. It was also the source of her heightened skill and power whenever she had managed to get truly angry, as she dipped deeper into the strength that was her right and heritage when she grew truly desperate. When she had absorbed the crystal from Mariah, adding it to the light along with the piece Latios had transferred to her in death, the memories and feelings and power contained in the light had started to seep out at a higher rate, which was why she had been changing so quickly over the last twenty-four hours.
And now, now that the self of her present and the self of her past were truly and acknowledgedly one, that light would no longer need to remain repressed. It would flow through her, infusing her spirit and allowing her to attain her true potential, for the sake of her friends and the world.
She reached the last link, pausing as she saw the Red Ranger plunge his broken sword into her chest once more. She glanced up at the warm, welcoming light, and smirked.
"Red Ranger, everyone, here I come…" She plunged her claw into the light and closed her eyes as her entire body (or spirit, whichever you prefer) was engulfed by its brilliance.
…
He felt strangely calmed. His sudden feeling of panic, horror, and loss, faded away, leaving a soothing sense of balance and peace in his soul. "Rayquaza?"
He glanced at Kyogre, who was looking at him in concern. "Hmm? What?"
"Er…are you all right? Just a second ago you were screaming about something."
He blinked. "Oh…so I was. Don't worry, it's nothing to worry about…sort of a false alarm, to speak."
She raised an eyebrow. "You sure?"
He nodded. "Yes, yes, I'm fine. I feel as if all is right with the universe again…or as right as it ever gets around here, anyway."
"Hey guys, look what the islanders gave me!" Groudon said loudly, stomping over energetically.
They stared at him. "Groudon, are those pants?" Rayquaza asked, disturbed.
"Yep!" Groudon said happily, tugging on the waist of his new article of clothing. "I finally got what I've longed for for so many years: a pair of comfortable pants which actually fit me!"
His companions sweatdropped. "Er, right…" Kyogre said slowly.
"I always envied the humans, with their ability to fit snugly into pants," Groudon continued. "Which is why I made pants illegal and forced everyone to walk around in skirts!"
"You mean kilts," Rayquaza corrected.
Groudon rolled his eyes. "Same thing."
"That was rather cruel of you," Kyogre said.
Groudon frowned. "This from the whale who used to eat a dozen human babies every day for breakfast?"
"So did you," she pointed out.
He had no response for that. "Uhhh…well, I have pants and you don't, so there…yeah!" He stuck his tongue out at her.
Rayquaza shook his head in despair and moaned. "And here I thought those two might have actually matured from being stuck in my head for a hundred thousand years…"
…
"Cradily, Confuse Ray! Aggron, Earthquake! Metagross, Meteor Mash! Armaldo, Skarmory, Aerial Ace! Claydol, Reflect!" Steven shouted out in rapid succession.
His Pokemon attacked Alpha Ranger in the order they were named. Cradily's Confuse Ray would daze the Ranger, while the Earthquake knocked him to the ground. Then, the Meteor Mash, followed by the double Aerial Ace attack, would damage him severely. Claydol's high-powered Reflect attack would guard the team from retaliation from the Ranger's laser pistol.
Of course, things did not go according to plan. The instant the green fossilized plant Pokemon fired a ray from its orifice, Alpha grabbed the throttle on his wrist-mounted device and squeezed it a few times. "Shield Mode!" He moved his arm in a circle in front of him, creating a blue shield which absorbed the Confuse Ray and kept it from hitting him.
Aggron started pounding the ground then, going into his Earthquake attack despite Alpha's senses still being intact. However, the Ranger avoided the attack by leaping into the air to keep from losing his footing, causing everyone else to flail about as the earth shook.
Metagross' eyes glowed, and several flaming rocks started falling from out of nowhere towards the airborne Ranger. He whipped out his laser gun and started firing at the meteors, blasting them to bits one by one as he soared through the air.
Of course, this left him completely open for Skarmory and Armaldo's Aerial Ace as they suddenly appeared behind him…at least, that's what they thought, for right before they could strike the Ranger Alpha backflipped over their shoulders, kicking them in the backs and sending them crashing right into the last meteor, which he had left intact for this purpose. The space rock exploded on impact, knocking the bird and fossil out of the fight.
Alpha twisted in the air and started hurtling down towards the remaining four Pokemon. Claydol's many eyes glowed, activating Reflect shields around him and his teammates. Alpha, however, seemed unfazed.
He squeezed his throttle a few times. "Power mode!" His right hand curled into a fist and started to glow. He thrust it down at the Claydol as he reached the doll Pokemon's shield, shattering the Reflect with a single punch and continuing his drive further, sending his fist right through one of Claydol's eyes and out the other side of the Pokemon's head. Claydol gasped, quivered, hardened, and crumbled into little bits of clay and dust, the spirit animating the clay vanishing.
Steven (and everyone else) was shocked. Even Misty, who had remained confident so far, was startled by what Alpha had just done. "He…he just killed…" May stammered in horror.
Togetic had glanced up when she heard the sound of shattering pottery and was as stunned as everyone else. "D-dad?" she whispered in disbelief.
Alpha chuckled and stood up, cracking his knuckles. "Don't think he'll be the last one to die." With that, he dashed suddenly towards Metagross.
Frightened of the figure in white and blue who had just killed one of his friends, Metagross panicked and hardened his body with Iron Defense. Alpha was undeterred as he squeezed his throttle. "Speed Mode!"
The Ranger became a blur as his speed boosted exponentially. He began pummeling the Iron Leg Pokemon's hard face with supersonic punches, moving so fast and hitting so hard the friction caused the air molecules surrounding him to ignite, setting him ablaze and adding a flaming element to his fists. And seeing as how Metagross was a Steel Pokemon, this was naturally a Bad Thing.
The metal Pokemon screamed in agony as his face melted from the red-hot punches of the Alpha Ranger. He collapsed to the floor in pain, liquid metal dripping over his eyes as the Ranger cackled gleefully and stepped back to enjoy his handiwork. "Heheh, Mom always did think I could have been an artist if I had applied myself harder."
He abruptly whirled around and punched Aggron, who had been charging towards him in rage, right in the stomach, smashing through the metal beast's chest armor and rupturing the Pokemon's gut. Aggron gasped from the sensation of his life slowly draining out of him. Alpha chuckled as organic juices started squirting out in vast quantities from the hole he had made, grabbed the monster by its horn, and flung it at the terrified Lileep, who had been paralyzed with fright ever since the Ranger had mercilessly killed her friend Claydol. As such, the fossil Pokemon couldn't move in time and got flattened when the extremely heavy Aggron landed on her.
Alpha casually wiped his hands and glanced at Steven, who had fallen to his knees in shock at the sight of his beloved team defeated, mutilated, and in Claydol and Aggron's case slain, so swiftly. "Hey Steven! I beat you; does this make me Hoenn League Champion?" he asked mockingly.
There was a pause. Then Lucy snapped, "GET HIM!"
In unison, all the Pokemon charged Alpha Ranger. May, who had been scared shitless by what the Ranger had done to Steven's Pokemon, tried to get hers to stop, but they were too infuriated by Alpha's cruelty to back down. Including Munchlax, who, being a garbage eater, had decided Alpha was garbage.
The psychotic antihero was unfazed. "Oh wow, throwing all your Pokemon at me at once just so they'll all die. What great trainers and friends you are." He squeezed his throttle. "Split Mode!" The gadget on his wrist glowed, and suddenly the Alpha Ranger multiplied from one to over a dozen, much like Yellow Ranger had several floors back. "Let's do this!" all the clones cried in unison, charging at the Pokemon.
"Seviper, Flamethrower! Gyarados, Thunderbolt! Milotic, Hyper Beam! Shuckle, Sludge Bomb! Steelix, Iron Tail!" Lucy commanded. The poisonous serpent spat a tongue of flame, Gyarados launched an electric strike from its crest, Milotic shot a golden laser from her mouth, Shuckle spat a barrage of poisonous globs, and Steelix swung his glowing tail at the oncoming Rangers.
"Crobat, Ultrasonic!" added Brock. Crobat started shrieking, sending out ultrasonic waves which would hopefully affect Alpha like they had the Blue Ranger.
"Politoed, Kasurin, Ice Beam! Corsola, Spike Cannon! Golduck, Hyper Beam!" Misty ordered. The Discfish and frog spat beams of pure cold, Corsola fired blasts from her spikes, and Golduck fired a gold laser from his forehead gem (after staring stupidly at Misty for several seconds, causing her to yell at him until he finally got with it).
"Oh…all right!" May relented. "Combusken, Blaze Kick! Ivysaur, Solar Beam! Delcatty, Blizzard! Beautifly, Silver Wind! Munchlax…um…I dunno, Bite his foot or something!" The Young Fowl launched at one of the Rangers with a flaming kick, Ivysaur charged up and fired a white blast from her flower, Delcatty breathed out a gust of snow and ice, Beautifly flapped her wings to launch silver vacuum blades, and Munchlax, well…just…stood there.
This simultaneous attack turned out to be the wrong thing to do, however, for these clones were not like the ones Yellow Ranger had used. The instant the projectile attacks hit them, the clones exploded in an incredible blast of heat and light which shook the arena. Steelix, who had hit one with his tail, and Blaziken, who had nailed one in the chest with her kick, were both startled as the conflagration consumed them.
May gasped. "Combusken!" Lucy was similarly startled by the blast, but gritted her teeth, having faith in Steelix's durability.
The true Alpha Ranger, along with the remaining clones, leaped out of the explosion, arcing high into the air. Simultaneously, the Rangers pulled out their guns and started shooting lasers at the group of Pokemon.
"Politoed, Kasurin, use Ice Beam to make a shield!" Misty cried out.
"Help them out, Delcatty!" May commanded her cat.
The three Pokemon fired blasts of ice at the air, causing it to solidify into a frozen wall which stopped the laser shots, although it melted slightly when the bolts impacted. However, the wall was no protection against the clones themselves, for when they hit it they all exploded, shattering the shield and pelting all with very sharp fragments of ice. The true Alpha Ranger had kicked off the top of the wall, leaping over it just before it exploded, and was now descending rapidly towards the defending Pokemon. He squeezed his throttle a few times and shouted, "Electro Mode!" just before he hit the ground, punching it and releasing an electric shockwave on par with Pikachu's regular voltage output which rippled across the floor, electrocuting all the Pokemon surrounding him with powerful lightning bolts which tore out of the ground and delivered painful shocks right into their bodies.
They writhed, twitched, and screamed in anguish (save Munchlax, who was greedily swallowing the electricity with Stockpile) before finally passing out, their bodies burnt and blackened by the electric wave while their trainers gaped speechlessly.
Alpha got out of the crouch he had used to generate the electric attack and stretched his back, chuckling. He felt a sudden pressure on his leg, and looked down to see Munchlax, still hungry, gnawing at his boot.
May gasped and pulled out her Pokeball. "Munchlax, retur-"
Alpha whipped his gun out of its holster and shot Munchlax right between the eyes, killing him. The garbage-eater fell on his back and disgorged the electricity he had stockpiled from the Ranger's high-voltage attack, sending it arcing into the air where it split and came right down onto Golduck and Kasurin, as well as Steven's remaining Pokemon, killing them gruesomely. "Too late."
The now-useless Pokeball fell from May's trembling fingers. She dropped to her knees, her voice fleeing her, staring wordlessly at the corpse of her garbage disposal Pokemon. Misty had the same reaction, realizing to her horror that her nerve-stricken Luvdisc and adorably stupid Golduck were now utterly and irreversibly dead.
Alpha calmly put his gun back in his holster. "Who's next?"
Up on the arena's edge, Harrison gaped at the gory spectacle below, the handkerchief he was using to wipe his father's sweaty brow dropping from his hand. "I can't believe this…" His Blaziken turned away, shaking his head despondently.
Ford stared dully at Alpha; the burnt hole through his shoulder long since healed over by the Potion, and said nothing.
And the purple-eyed Blaziken, sitting higher up on the stands, contemplated whether or not he felt up to killing all three of them.
…
Red Ranger grunted, tugging on the hilt with all his might. With a cry, he tore his broken sword out of Latias' chest, causing a fresh wave of blood to spurt out for a moment. "I suppose this could be counted as desecration of the dead, but I'm rather attached to this sword, even if it's broken," the Ranger told the corpse. "I'm sure I can get it fixed, though." He turned and walked a short distance away, bending down to pick up the severed wing. "And I think I'll take this as a souvenir, since you aren't using it. Wonder if I can get it remade into a sword…it does have a rather powerful edge, after all. Heh."
Latias could not respond to him, of course, because she was dead. And the Ranger knew that and was fine with it.
Except for one small, insignificant detail. That being that Latias was not quite dead yet, as Red was about to learn.
The dragon's body was motionless, and to all appearances was still and dead. And yet…
And yet, even as the blood kept flowing, albeit at a much more reduced rate than before, there was a heartbeat. A faint one, starting at nothing, but slowly growing faster and faster.
Latias' yellow eyes began to glow a pure white, and her body followed, without warning growing to an incredible brilliance the likes of which the Red Ranger had never seen before. Startled, he dropped the dismembered wing. "Ahh! G-ghost!" he cried in fright.
But the light was not a ghost. Rather, it was the power of evolution.
The light faded. Latias hovered above the ground, her wounds healed, her wing restored. But that was not all that had changed with her.
The red coloring which covered most of her body had diminished, leaving a majority of soft white down in its place. There were still red stripes crisscrossing over her skin, forming intricate swirls and curlicues, with a large red splotch over her chest that had a hollow blue triangle in the middle. Her short, skinny arms had lengthened and thickened, made up of a white forearm and a hard, armored lower arm with three longer, jointed claws than what had previously passed for fingers, with a flattened palm. One of the claws was further apart from the others, making it a 'thumb' of sorts. Her wings, which were also down in her thicker lower region, had transformed from long triangular fins into white angelic wings with red tips on the very end of the longest feathers. Her legs, which had previously looked sort of like duck feet with very little muscle attached to the lower end of her body, had changed into smaller wings like the ones growing from her back. (Although one could consider the loss of legs a great tragedy, Latias had never really used them much to begin with, so it didn't make much of a difference.) The little 'nub' on her rear had grown out into a true, slightly stubby tail with mottled red and white down.
Her head was for the most part unchanged, except
the ear tufts on the back had grown out a little and were smoother
and more streamlined. The red coloration on her face was the same as
before, except there was now a little dot in the small white
triangular space on her forehead. Her yellow eyes, which had remained
the same, blinked a couple of times, adjusting to the light. She
turned to gaze at Red Ranger, who shuddered as he felt her piercing
eyes peering at him, seeing past his uniform and seeing the person
within. Trembling, he dropped the bloody wing he had cut off, which
dissolved in a flurry of white feathers the instant it touched the
ground. "Th-this can't be. You're dead! DEAD! Monsters I kill
don't come back from the dead unless they're transformed into
giants, resurrected by some bad guy, or are some kind of doppelganger
or mimic! You can't be alive!"
"And yet here I am," Latias
pointed out.
The dragon girl had felt different for a moment upon her transformation, but the feeling had passed after her spirit got settled into her new body. She was different from how she had been before, and at the same time, not different. She was who she was supposed to be: Latias.
Her eyesight was more powerful than it had been before. It was no longer forced to simply see things of the material world, but was now sensitive to psychic patterns and imprints. She could 'see' the psychic trail or fingerprint a person left wherever it went, and more than that, could see inside them, down to their very souls. She had unwittingly used this same power when Lance had told his lies to the Elite trainers, peering into his heart and seeing the falsehoods he had spun and how his soul had been hollowed by his pride and fanaticism. It was basically an advanced form of aura reading, something she had dabbled with during her trainer with Mewtwo before dying and remembering how to do it properly.
The Red Ranger's heart was distorted as well, not just from pride and foolishness, but from a foul cancer that had infested his body; the product of HERO, used so many times on the Ranger, to the point where it was present in some shape or form throughout nearly his entire spirit. She recognized it as the power of the evil one, and shuddered inwardly, thinking sadly how his influence could still poison the world so many years after his defeat.
Except he was back, wasn't he, and behind this latest threat to the world? Somehow she had always known it was him, but only now that she was whole in memory and spirit did she truly realize this. But that was a matter for another time; right now she needed to focus on her original mission: save Ash and her friends. Now that her senses were heightened, she could tell that Ash had already gone through HERO…and something truly terrible was going on at that instant.
She looked sadly at the Red Ranger, feeling pity for him in place of her previous anger. Yes, he had killed her, trapped her friends, and was truly corrupt…but she now saw that he was a victim himself of Ford's depraved ideals, much like how she had been a victim of Lance's. She could easily defeat him, now that he was weakened and scared…but perhaps there was another way.
She floated towards him. Frightened, Red took a step back. "St-stay back!" he said, prepping his lasers. "I-I'm still armed!"
Latias was not worried. She could tell even without reading his mind that his guns had become overheated, the way he trembled, the quiver in his voice, and smoke carrying the scent of melted circuitry trailing from the cannon's exhaust vents all told her this. "Don't worry," she told him as her claws started glowing. "This won't hurt." With that, she drove her arms into the Ranger's chest.
He gasped, expecting to feel a pain not unlike the one the dragon must have felt when he drove his sword through her chest…and was surprised when he saw that not only did he feel nothing, but that her claws had appeared to…pass through his skin, and were causing a strange tingling sensation as they rooted through his body painlessly. "Wh-what are you-"
"Quiet," she told him. "I'm trying to heal you." She then tuned out any confused replies he might have to that, and focused completely on her task. After all, groping about someone else's soul was a very delicate business.
Her face rankled slightly as her claws trailed through the parts of the Red Ranger's spirit which had been tainted by the evil one's power. To say it was like sticking your arm in a mountain of fresh dung was an understatement, it felt absolutely vile…and somewhat corrosive. She was glad her claws were 'ghostly' for this; otherwise it would be hurting her physically instead of psychically.
She cringed inwardly as she found what she was looking for, the spot where the HERO's power had entered Red Ranger in the first place, and the point from which it flowed to the rest of his being. Steadying herself, she gritted her mental teeth, and tugged hard.
Red gasped, and Latias herself nearly let go as
the sheer foulness and malice of the power she was striving to grip
washed through her, threatening to consume her and turn her into
something like the Ranger. Or at least, that's what it wanted
her to think.
Latias refused to let go. She had suffered far worse
than this thing could do to her…well, okay, not that much, but…hey,
it was still pretty bad.
Gathering all her now-very formidable mental strength, she dug her claws in deeper to the metaphorical mass and pulled with all her might.
It didn't want to let go. It was rooted in very deeply to the Red Ranger. But the evil thing was no match for Latias as she was now, and slowly, inexorably, but still inevitably, the monstrous thing was forced to let go.
Latias reeled back as she tore the parasitic power out of Red Ranger, watching with satisfaction as the red spandex suit and armor were torn off the human's skin with it, disintegrating and congealing into a visible red mass around the psychic material she had gathered in her claws. The thing tried to seek refuge in her soul, but she gave it no entry, those doors were locked and barred to things of this nature, and it had not the power to force them open. Without a host, it quickly dissipated, the energies it had contained released to the winds. Latias smiled triumphantly, the warm sense of having done a good deed welling up in her. She felt a mild pressure on her side and looked down to see Red Ranger, who was no longer Red Ranger, pounding his fists angrily and hopelessly against her chest. "Nooo! Give it back! Give it back!"
She looked down sympathetically at him. "I can't, and even if I could, I wouldn't," she told him.
"But I need it!" the ex-Ranger protested. "Please, give it back!"
"And what would you do with it if you had it?" Latias asked with a frown. "Abuse it some more? Trap more innocents in cards and kill people for fun?"
"I would do whatever I want! I deserve it!" he snapped.
She slapped him hard, leaving gashes in his cheek. "What you need is a reality check," she told him sternly. "Power is meant to be used responsibly, not to do as you please. You knew that once, but have forgotten, Richie Getem."
The red-haired boy who looked surprisingly like Ash blinked in confusion. "Wha…how did you know my name!"
"I learned it when I was inside you, pulling out that cancerous power," she told him. "You have fallen far from whom you once were, Richie. What happened to the kind and caring boy who was friends with his Pokemon and gave them all cute nicknames to show that they were his teammates and not pets?"
"He grew up," he told her. "And got rid of his Pokemon once he realized how useless they were."
She shook her head. "As I feared. You have had the power too long. Your mind has been twisted as well."
"What's that supposed to mean!" Richie snapped.
"It means that you have become addicted to it, like a junkie to their drugs, in spite of evidence that it's bad for you…although in your case, the poison is subtler and not so obvious to the one who is poisoned." She shook her head. "You can recover from this, Richie, but it is a path you will have to walk down on your own. I have other things to attend to…and another soul I must save before it is poisoned as badly as yours."
"What? But you can't just leave me here!" Richie protested.
"You're right, I can't," Latias agreed. Her eyes flashed, and the door she had entered the room through was blasted open. "There is your way out. Leave. Since you've been here so many times training, I'm sure you know the way out." Richie didn't move. He glared at her furiously. She cocked her head, not surprised. "You can leave freely, or I'll make you. Which would you prefer?"
He clenched his fists. "Don't think this is over!" he cried, stomping past her in rage and out the door. "You'll pay for this!"
"Somehow, I doubt that," she murmured, her eyes glowing again as she telekinetically lifted the two capture cards which contained her friends off the ground, where they had fallen after Richie lost his powers and dropped them. Her eyes flashed as she sent a little psychokinetic force into the cards, causing them to shatter and release Bayleef and Gardevoir in a flash of light. Both were still out cold from the Poke-B-Gone Red Ranger had hit them with, but Latias intended to change that.
Latias placed her new palms onto Bayleef and Gardevoir's foreheads and concentrated, marveling as she did so at how much 'cleaner' their spirits felt than the one she had just visited, since they were lacking the corrupting power which Red Ranger had possessed. Gardevoir's spirit seemed especially pure, and it saddened Latias that the Embrace Pokemon could not see it for herself and realize that she truly was beautiful, no matter what her face looked like.
Her eyes glowed as she exerted her will on the white blood cells inside Bayleef and Gardevoir's bodies, supercharging them and making them strong enough to destroy every particle of Poke-B-Gone in their systems, neutralizing the toxin. Within seconds, the task was done, and the venom was gone.
Bayleef and Gardevoir shuddered for a moment, then were still. Latias nodded to herself, satisfied that they were healthy and fine. Their bodies would just need a little time to adjust to the overabundance of white blood cells Latias had provided, and they should be back up in no time. In any case, she knew what she had to do now.
Regretting for a moment that she had not done this sooner, but quickly dispelling such thoughts because she knew they amounted to nothing, she removed the Dragon Flute from where it (still) hung around her neck and blew into it.
She closed her eyes and relaxed as she played, the soothing melody of the flute echoing throughout the room and deep to her core. With her heightened senses, she could feel the resonance from the infinitesimal part of her mind that was connected to Mewtwo as the magic flute sent a signal up through that connection. A moment later, she heard an echo, the 'sound' of her signal being received and acknowledged. Satisfied, she stopped playing and turned around to the point where she felt the inbound psychic wavelength of a Teleport just as Mewtwo appeared in the center of the room. The flute disintegrated in her hands, its power expended, but that was of minimal importance to Latias at the moment.
The Psychic blinked, startled by the white and red dragon's new appearance. "Latias?"
She nodded. "Yes."
"You have changed."
She cocked her head. "Have I?"
He paused, studying her. "Yes…and no. You are more yourself than you were before…interesting." He looked past her. His eyes widened when he saw the masked feminine Pokemon. "Gardevoir!" He glided over to her, knelt, and cradled her in his arms. "What has happened? Why did you summon me?"
"This is why," she told him, sending him a telepathic 'packet' of information containing the details of everything that had happened since Lance and Charla had crashed into the Pavilion.
It took the Genetic Pokemon less than half a second to process and diseminate the information. "Interesting," he said, his eyes narrowing. "You let Richie go?"
She shrugged. "Would it have made you feel better if I had killed him?"
Mewtwo frowned. "A little…but I suppose you're right, I'd feel sorry about it later. You made the right decision, it would be best to let him have his own chance for redemption." He carefully stood up, still carrying the unconscious Gardevoir. "So you summoned me for aid?"
Latias nodded. "Yes. Can't you feel it? Something terrible has happened…a powerful emanation, coming down towards us from the top of the tower, screaming from torment and anguish. It reeks of his work."
"So it does," Mewtwo agreed. "Which means it might be too late for Ash. And I too detect pain, suffering, despair…and something more…you are wrong Latias, something terrible has not happened, it is still going on. We must stop this at once."
Latias nodded in agreement. "Yes. But first…" She paused. "Mewtwo…can you go save my other friends?"
Mewtwo frowned. "They aren't in any imminent danger."
"Yes, but we may need their help. I know where they are, but you're faster than me because you can Teleport. You can find them from the memories I gave you, then teleport everyone to the top of the tower to help out against whatever's going on," she told him. "Plus, I don't think they'd be pleased if they missed out on this."
"That is true, but sometimes it's a good thing to 'miss out' if going could mean your death," Mewtwo pointed out. "And I suppose you were planning to go up by yourself while I was gathering your friends and face this threat yourself?"
"…Sort of," she admitted, feeling somewhat embarrassed and stupid for the thought.
He pursed his lips. "Very well."
She blinked. "Huh? You're letting me go?"
He nodded. "I can see that you are still feeling guilty for letting down Ash by not getting there in time…if you believe you can do him any good by charging up there yourself, go right ahead. I am not certain it is the best thing to do, but sometimes the only way to learn from a mistake is to make it in the first place."
Latias sweatdropped. "…That's not exactly reassuring."
"Just a little nugget of wisdom," he said with a shrug. "Although to be honest, I'm letting you go because I'm rather curious to see what you can do. Your memories of how you saved Richie are intriguing, and a somewhat different method from how I perform purification. Admittedly, it's not exactly the most selfless thing to do, but…"
"But as a teacher, and surrogate father," she told him, causing his white cheeks to darken slightly. "You would like to see what your daughter and student has learned, even though at the same time you are feeling apprehensive about letting her go into danger."
"…Yes, that's it exactly," Mewtwo said, impressed.
Latias chuckled. "I'll bring Bayleef if it'll make you feel better."
He smirked and rolled his eyes. "Ah yes, your best friend will surely make a good chaperone…very well, then. I'll gather your friends and meet you at the top shortly. If you find yourself unable to handle things, call me through your link—you know by now how to use it properly, I think—and I'll be there right away."
Latias nodded. "I understand." She paused. "Oh…and before you get going, could you do something about the people still trapped in here?"
Mewtwo nodded. "Of course. And I'll let the police gathered outside the building in as well. I seriously doubt they will be of any use, but they should probably be on hand to deal with the freed employees and remaining Rangers…and arrest Ford, of course."
"Rather than letting us pummel him a bit?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.
Mewtwo smirked. "Now I didn't say that…if the police find him roughed up a bit when they show up, we can always lay the blame on that Lucy girl, she'll surely take pleasure in being given credit for it. Although they'll have a hard time explaining why his mind was completely shattered…" He chuckled darkly. "In any case, we should both get going. I sense the violence upstairs decreasing…but whether that is a good or bad thing, I cannot be certain. Rising levels of fear and panic seem to indicate the latter."
"Then I must be swift," Latias said, telekinetically lifting Bayleef and clutching her friend in her claws.
"I'll teleport you," Mewtwo told her. "But you should wake up Bayleef first, she won't be a good chaperone asleep and nothing but deadweight if you teleport right into the middle of a battle, where it would be problematic to wake her."
Latias nodded. "Right." She looked down at
Bayleef, her eyes glowing.
The vegetative Pokemon's eyes
fluttered open. "Wh…what? Wha's going on?" she asked
drowsily.
"You're recovering from the aftereffects of the removal of Poke-B-Gone in your body," Latias informed her. "How are you feeling?"
She grunted. "Mmm, fine, fine-" She stopped, suddenly noticing how different Latias looked all of a sudden. "Latias?"
The dragon smiled. "Yes?"
Bayleef blinked a few times in disbelief. "Did you…evolve, or something?"
"Or something, yes," Latias said in amusement.
"You look…wow. I mean, you look really pretty," the amazed Bayleef said. "What're you called now?"
"Thank you," Latias said genuinely. "And my name is still Latias, as far as I can tell. But we don't have time to talk, we need to go. Ash and the others are in grave danger, and we've had more than enough delays as it is." She nodded to Mewtwo. "We're ready."
"We are?" Bayleef asked, confused.
"We'd better be."
Mewtwo smirked, and, with a thought, demolecularized the two Pokemon, transporting them up to the top floor of the tower. "There. That's one thing out of the way." He glanced down at Gardevoir. "Now for you…" His eyes flashed.
Gardevoir groaned and stirred in his arms. Her eye blinked open. "Mmm…" The orb opened fully when it saw the white, semi-feline face of her beloved. "M-Mewtwo?"
"Yes," he said, leaning his head down to kiss her gently. "I have returned."
"…I missed you," she said after a long moment of staring into his warm purple eyes. She wrapped her arms around him and leaned on his shoulder, holding back tears. "Don't leave me again."
"Shh," he said, rubbing her on the back while nuzzling her cheek. "I have no intention of going anywhere, my love."
"Oh, Mewtwo…" she sighed.
"But now is not the time for romance," he said seriously. "We have other things to deal with."
"Oh?" Gardevoir asked, disappointed that she wouldn't get the 'together' time she needed so very much with her love.
Mewtwo nodded. "Yes. Your trapped friends, for one thing. And the people still stuck in this building, for another. Speaking of which…" His eyes glowed.
…
"Sacred Fire!" Wes commanded from Ho-Oh's back.
Ho-Oh took a deep breath and exhaled rich gold and crimson flames at the metal shutters coating the outside of the Battle Tower's Grand Aerie. The fire washed over the metal, causing it to glow a dull red for a moment.
"Now, El Toro, use Ice Beam before it cools!" Zoro commanded, also on Ho-Oh's back.
The masked bull, who was standing between the two trainers, inhaled and spat out a white beam of cold energy, which struck the spot Ho-Oh had hit and froze it.
"Now, Sacred Fire again!" Wes commanded.
Ho-Oh sighed. "Again? Fine." He breathed fire out at the frozen metal shutter again, heating it up once more.
They had been alternating between ice and fire attacks repeatedly on the metal in an attempt to cause it to expand and contract enough to the point where it cracked open, but they had been trying for several minutes now and it wasn't working. The same thing could be said of all the other police fire and ice Pokemon attacking the tower's shutters; the metal simply wouldn't break.
Rui sighed unhappily down on the ground. "And it seemed like such a good idea, too…"
Jenny laughed bitterly. "Well, once again, the Ever Grande police force in unable to do anything but clean up. We're never going to get into that tower."
The moment she said this, all the shutters on the tower retracted at once, causing the area to brighten suddenly as light from all the free windows poured out.
The police stared, dumbfounded, not quite believing that just like that, the tower was open. "Perhaps I spoke too soon…" said an amazed Jenny as with a flash of light, the frightened and confused employees who had been trapped inside the Tower appeared in the middle of the square, where they were quickly set upon by paramedics and paparazzi who had managed to force their way into the police enclave.
The shutters in the aerie had retracted as well, revealing the gruesome spectacle going on inside. "Whoa!" Wes gaped.
"Dios mio!" agreed Zoro, crossing himself.
"We must stop this!" lowed El Toro.
Ho-Oh nodded in agreement. "Right, I'm not fond of females but they don't deserve to be treated like that! Let's go!" He started flying towards the now shutterless and easily breakable glass windows…
And the crystal inside HERO flared and fired a bolt of electricity through the window Charizard and Charla had smashed through, arcing around to strike Ho-Oh and everyone on board. "Gaahhhhh!" Wes cried, convulsing as the shocks poured into him.
Ho-Oh screeched in pain and tumbled from the sky, smashing into the side of the tower as he fell, causing the skyscraper to shake and also tossing off his passengers. Together, they all started falling towards the ground, to the horror of all the people gathered below. And Rui, of course.
Quickly recovering, Wes pulled out a Pokeball. "Ho-Oh, return!" A red beam shot out and struck the phoenix, causing him to dematerialize back into the sphere. Wes pulled out another Pokeball and threw it out, releasing his shiny Aerodactyl. "Aerodactyl, help us out!"
The Fossil Pokemon squawked in acknowledgment and swooped down, catching Wes on his back and grabbing Zoro in his talons.
"What about meeeeee?" El Toro cried as he continued to fall.
"El Toro, return!" Zoro said, recalling his Pokemon. "Well, that did not go well."
"You're telling me." Wes glanced back up at the Aerie, and saw that it was now enshrouded in a glowing spherical purple force field, as was the top five floors of the building beneath it. "Great…something really fucked up is going on, and there's nothing we can do about it. By the time we get there, it'll probably be too late."
"That does not mean we cannot try, amigo," Zoro pointed out. "Look over there!" He pointed to a window a floor or two beneath the force field, which had been opened by a tired manager trying to get some fresh air after hours of working late just before the building had been locked down. "We can get in through there and get to the Aerie using the stairs!"
"Will we make it in time?" Wes asked doubtfully.
Zoro shrugged, nearly slipping out of Aerodactyl's grip by accident as he did so. "Maybe, maybe not. But we have to try, si?"
"Yeah, I guess we do…" Wes agreed. "Okay then…Aerodactyl, take us in!" The pterodactyl squawked and did just that.
Down on the ground, the confused and dazed ex-hostages were being taken away to be checked up and debriefed, while Jenny was organizing a force to go inside the Tower. "Okay people, I know that big glowing thing looks a little scary, but it's nothing to be afraid of! It's up to us to get in there and put a stop to whatever bad mojo's going down!"
"But Officer, why can't the Poke Rangers or the city's other heroes handle it?" whined one of the recruits, who was scared despite Jenny's reassurances.
Jenny hesitated. The classified information about just what those 'heroes' were had not been distributed to the lower-ranked cops to keep them from becoming demoralized. "The Rangers are…indisposed," she said, which wasn't completely a lie, vowing to tell them more inside, if it were necessary. "Tuxedo Masquerain is already inside, but may need assistance. As for the Soldier Scouts, they are MIA. But that's not much of a surprise, since Tuxedo Masquerain seems to be the only one who ever knows where to find them, so perhaps he will be able to shed light on this. In any event…we're the Ever Grande city police force! It's our job to fight crime and handle situations that are dangerous to the people we're sworn to protect! In the absence of other heroes, we are the only ones who can handle something like this!" She pointed to the open Tower doors. "So let's get in there and put things right!"
"Yes ma'am!" the cops chorused, saluting and heading inside, looking quite formidable in full combat armor.
"I hope Wes will be all right," Rui said anxiously, looking up at the window where her boyfriend and Zoro had disappeared into.
"Don't worry," Jenny said, putting a hand on the girl's shoulder. "If he managed to deal with all those Snagem thugs just a few days ago, I know he'll be okay now." She paused. "And if he's in trouble…we'll make sure he, and everyone else, gets out all right, okay?"
Rui nodded, smiling weakly. "Okay, officer. You go get them."
"I will," Jenny said, sliding down the visor on her riot armor helmet. "I will." Calling out her Arcanine, she followed her troops into the tower, leaving the anxious Rui behind.
"Be careful…" the red-head whispered.
…
"Charizard, get up, please!" Togetic whispered desperately, shaking her big brother. She didn't understand, she had healed all his wounds, the hideous stumps which had once been his wings were scabbed over, his bones were reset, and yet he still wouldn't move. "We need you!" She hadn't looked up from her task of healing in the last few minutes, too frightened by the blood-curdling screams from Alpha's victims to risk seeing what had caused them and make the terrifying visions her imagination conjured up all too real.
"You don't need me," he whimpered, eyes clenched tightly shut. "Nobody needs me."
"We do! I do! Charla does!" Togetic protested. "Who will help save everyone if not you? Who will be your child's father if not you? You're needed, Charizard! You have to get up!"
"Don't bother trying," the warped voice of her father sneered just before Alpha grabbed her neck, cutting the Happiness Pokemon's pleas off in a strangled gasp. "He's not worth it. He failed when his trainer needed him most. He lost his wings. He has no point in living…which is why I'll let him keep living." He laughed and kicked Charizard in the side, causing him to roll over, whimpering. "Hahaha! See how pathetic he truly is? Once a brave, flaming dragon…and without his wings, this is all he is. Not a father, not a hero, not even a Pokemon, but a worthless wyrm. Heh, I made a pun."
"You leave him alone!" Misty yelled.
Alpha snorted and turned around to face the red-head. "What? You still up? Oh that's right, I saved you for last, didn't I?"
"Please…Ash…stop this," Misty begged, looking weary, her mind reeling from what Alpha had done to her friends and still distraught from the sudden deaths of Kasurin and Golduck. "This is enough. Whatever point you're trying to make, you've made it. Just…just stop!"
Alpha snickered, tightening his grip on Togetic's neck. "Stop? Why should I stop? I'm just getting started!" He darted forward.
Misty swung her mallet at him. The Alpha Ranger caught its blunt end in his free hand, wrenched it out of the girl's grasp, threw it on the ground, and crushed it with his heel. "Sorry, was that supposed to hurt?" He punched her square in the face, breaking her nose and knocking her to the ground.
Harrison, who had been transfixed with the atrocities by some perverse fascination, finally snapped out of it. "We can't let this go on any further…we have to stop this!" He glanced at his father. "Dad, stay here, we'll be back soon, okay?" Ford said nothing. He was as catatonic as he had been ever since getting shot. "I'll take that as a yes. Blaziken! Get in there!" Blaziken nodded and ran down the steps to reach the edge of the arena…
Only for the older, more muscular purple-eyed Blaziken to drop down in his path, blocking his path. "No." The insane chicken landed a haymaker in his younger counterpart's face, sending him slamming back into the seats.
"Blaziken!" Harrison cried, running to his side. He helped his dazed Pokemon get back to his feet, then glared at his father's former best friend. "What are you doing! Why are you fighting us? Haven't you done enough?"
"No." The older Blaziken thrust his fist forward, launching a Phoenix Punch at the duo.
The younger Blaziken quickly shoved his trainer out of the way, taking the flaming blast head on. He cried in pain and fell to his knees, his chest smoking.
Harrison slid down the nearby stairs, bumping his head on the steps from where Blaziken had thrown him. "Ow! Dammit, that-" His vision was blotted out by a tall, aquiline figure as the older Blaziken appeared over him, fist drawn back to smash his head in. The human's eye bulged. "Oh fu-"
Harrison's Blaziken tackled the elder from behind, knocking him off Harrison and allowing the teen to crawl away to safety. He cursed himself, wishing that he hadn't dropped his other Pokemon off at the Center before that night's party at the Pavilion, and so could neither help his Blaziken out in any way nor do anything to stop the Alpha Ranger. He stared as the two fire chickens started grappling and rolling about on the floor, trading blows, then at the arena floor, where the Alpha Ranger had slammed Misty into one of the walls and had pinned her there with his free hand, the other still constricting Togetic. Tears in his eyes, he furiously glared at his catatonic father. "Dammit, dad!" he cried angrily. "Look what all your precious dreams of heroism have done!"
Ford said nothing. He continued to stare into the arena, not at the Alpha Ranger, the cringing Charizard, the unconscious or dead Pokemon, and what Alpha had done to the humans, but at a point that only he seemed to see.
"So here we are, Miss Waterflower, just you and me," Alpha said, enjoying watching Misty squirm under his grip. "Were these any other circumstances, someone could construe this as almost romantic…heheheheh."
"Please…stop," she rasped.
Alpha threw back his head and laughed. "Hahahaha! I can't believe you ever cowed or intimidate me! I mean, look at you! Without your Pokemon, without your stupid mallet, you're nothing! Nothing but another hypocritical tomboy trying to assert her own version of femininity, but still enjoys wearing dresses and being a lady whenever she feels like it while bossing around the people around her…bitch. I don't know what I ever saw in you."
"If you're trying to hurt my feelings…it's not working," she gasped. "Because I still know that you aren't really Ash…and no matter what you say, I know that's not how he feels about me."
Alpha shrugged. "That may be true, I may not be Ash…not the one you know and love, anyway. But that doesn't really mean anything to me because that's still how I feel about you. And as for Ash…he can't do a thing to help you. He's somewhere so awful that when he comes back, he'll be me. And then I really will be Ash Ketchum…not that I wish to be. I'm perfectly happy as the Alpha Ranger. Heheheheh."
"I don't believe you!" she protested. "When his friends are in danger, Ash always manages to come to their rescue!"
"Oh, and you think he'll come to yours? When he didn't come to save the others?" Alpha laughed. "Let me guess; you think that because you and he love each other or something, if I start to really hurt you he'll break free and take his body back or something, right? Idiot." The silver faceplate parted along an invisible seam, revealing his mouth. The familiar mouth of Ash Ketchum. "Here, you know what? I'll give you a free shot. Kiss me. If anything'll break him free, that will. Let's see just how powerful love is, shall we?"
Misty was struck speechless. "Wh-what? You want me to kiss you?"
"Sure, why not? You've kissed this mouth so many times before, what does one more matter?"
"It's not the mouth so much as the person behind it!" Misty protested. "I kissed Ash all those times, and you're not him!"
"But I am Ash, even if it's not the part of him you care for," Alpha pointed out. "And he's inside me, somewhere, so you'll be kissing him. And maybe it'll be enough to bring him back to the forefront." He smirked. "So, what'll it be? Gonna risk it all on a kiss? Because it's the last chance you've got." Misty said nothing. Togetic blinked and looked from her mother to her captor and back in apprehension. Alpha shook his head and loosened his grip. "Figures. Knew you didn't have the guts to-"
Misty lunged at him. She kissed him with all her pent-up frustration and passion and all the emotion reserved for Ash, longing for him with all her heart and praying, hoping, believing that this would free him.
After a full minute, Misty finally pulled away, gasping for air. The Alpha Ranger stood stiff, his muscles tense, his mouth frozen in a small 'O'. "Ash?" Misty asked hopefully.
"Mmm…nope, sorry," the Alpha Ranger said, his faceplate closing back up. "The number you called does not exist, please hang up and try again." Cackling, he lunged forward, slamming the shocked Misty back up against the wall. "Sorry little girl, I guess love doesn't conquer all after all. Just another bit of propaganda shoved down our throats like everything else in life, much like how I'm going to shove this Togetic here," he said, holding up the choking Happiness Pokemon. "Down yours!"
He wound up his arm, intending to do just that…when, with a flash of blue light, Latias and Bayleef appeared in the center of the arena.
They would have showed up sooner, but since the crystal's barrier had gone up while they were halfway between being teleported and arriving, their rematerialization was delayed by several seconds due to the interference caused by the malevolent gemstone's energy.
Latias dropped Bayleef on the ground, her now-rather impressive mind quickly taking account of every sickening detail of what was going on around her.
First, every inch of the place practically screamed with violence and evil, the familiar essence of the evil one's power staining the entire arena along with remnants of old battles fought here long ago, during past Hoenn League Championships. There were several spots where the concentration was greatest, of course, just as Red Ranger had contained a high dosage of it. The first one was obvious, the crystal itself, contained in a cage-like structure hanging from the ceiling, beneath a large entertainment system. The crystal flared as her mind 'brushed' against it, displeased with her presence. She didn't want to be around it either, so quickly pulled her awareness from the stone before she could get sucked in and thrown into the nightmarish mindscape which was its master's psyche.
The second highest concentration of evil was in the blue and white spandex-clad figure across the arena from them, holding Misty against the wall and rearing his arm back to smash Togetic into her face…or through it. She nearly flinched at the malice he radiated, far worse than that which the Red Ranger had possessed. Although the concentration wasn't quite as intense as that of the crystal itself, it seemed…more venomous, somehow. As if something far worse than the shard's power itself had filled the human's body. And, buried deeply somewhere in that seething mass of hatred and lust and chaotic desires was the barest, faintest ghost of something different. And Latias instantly knew that the figure was Ash, twisted by the power of HERO. But since she could still sense a tiny trace of Ash somewhere in there, Latias knew there was still a chance that he could be saved.
Two more concentrations, far, far less potent than the ones in the crystal or in Ash, almost went unnoticed by Latias' psychic senses at first, so overshadowed were they by the aura radiated by Ash and the jewel. When she did notice them, she recognized their carriers as Mr. Ford and his Blaziken. Although neither of them had ever gone through HERO themselves, they had clearly been exposed to it long enough by sheer proximity, as well as absorbing some of the radiation given off in the hero creation process, that their minds had been twisted almost beyond repair, which probably explained a lot of their behavior, and why said Blaziken not only had purple eyes but was currently trying to kill Harrison, the young man's own Blaziken, and Mr. Ford himself, switching between his targets with no discernible pattern, the younger Blaziken the only thing that had stopped him from murdering the two humans by then.
Of course, these concentrations of evil energy were not the only things in the room which invoked strong feelings. There was also a great deal of suffering and despair, and it almost broke the dragon's heart to see what was radiating such pain.
There was the Metagross with the melted face. The ten or so Pokemon lying unconscious on the floor, blackened by electricity. There was the shattered Claydol, the Munchlax with the gaping head wound, and others whom Alpha had randomly decided to kill…none of which, thankfully, were Chosen…although Golduck and Kasurin were among the deceased, along with Lucy's Seviper and Gyarados, whose jaws had been split open, and Crobat, who's shrieking had gotten on Alpha's nerves so he had ripped the mammal's wings off, and the sudden shock, pain, and grief were so great that he had bit his own tongue off and bled to death.
There were the humans whom Latias and her group had been separated from. Steven was dead, the words I AM TEH CHAMPION carved into his face by Alpha's dagger. Brock had been stripped of his Venus dress (which had been put on Lucy) revealing him in the nude, which would have been bad enough as it was if Alpha hadn't also decided to cut off his male organ and stuff it in his mouth, causing blood to pool out on the floor around him. He and the dressed Lucy were tied up in a small intestine which had been removed from the dead Munchlax, and both seemed to have gone catatonic from shock. Or maybe it was the numerous bruises and gashes covering their skin.
As for May…absolutely nothing had been done to her. Nothing at all. Which, of course, was one of the cruelest things Alpha could do. By ignoring her, he had effectively told her she wasn't worth his time, both when he had been the caring boy they had all known and loved, and as the evil monster he was now. Latias barely had to probe far to tell that the girl was overwrought with grief, despair, guilt, and was drowning on her own self-loathing…much as Latias herself had been when she was dying from Red Ranger's sword, but seeing as how May's self-confidence had been so fragile to begin with, this blow had been too much for her to bear. She sat in the dirt, staring blankly at everything around her. She made no move to help her friend Brock or her semi-mentor, Lucy. She made no move to recall her Pokemon or to help Misty. She was simply…dead, in a sense, on the inside. Or broken.
But even worse than that was the raw, gaping despair which consumed Charizard. Latias instantly felt a sympathetic connection to the fire dragon, seeing that both his wings were torn off, just as one of hers had been severed not too long ago. He was curled up in a ball on the floor, his body stabbed repeatedly with barbs of self-hatred, accusing himself over and over of being a child killer, a weakling, an unworthy mate and father, a disgrace, and most prevalent of all, a failure. He felt that he had failed his trainer, his friends, his mate, his unborn child, and himself. After all, what good was a Charizard without wings? Among his kind, those who found themselves permanently unable to fly almost always killed themselves in response to the gaping loss of freedom denied them due to inability to fly, often jumping off a cliff to take an honorable 'last flight' to their deaths. Charizard was, at the moment, not in the right frame of mind to do something like that (thank goodness) so was simply going to lie on the floor hating himself until death got bored of his sniveling and claimed him.
Latias would have done everything she could to help him, having found herself in a position not unlike his own (though much less severe) just a few minutes ago, if it weren't for the fact that the Alpha Ranger was about to do something horrible to Misty and Togetic. Her friends were unwell but for the moment safe, the dueling Blaziken seemed to be well out of the way of the two Fords, so saving her niece and human 'sister' from Alpha was at the moment her highest priority.
While Bayleef, who was dumbstruck by the brutal scene which greeted them, started to express her horror at what they had been too late to prevent, Latias dashed forwards at speeds close to that of sound, slamming into the Alpha Ranger's side, causing him to let go of Misty and Togetic as he was sent hurtling across the pit and slammed into a far wall. "Gaaaaahhh!"
Misty fell to her knees, gasping. "Wh-what?" She looked up at Latias, eyes wide in disbelief.
"Aunt Latias?" Togetic whispered in amazement.
"Yes," she said, her eyes focused on the dust cloud that had formed from smashing Alpha into a wall.
"What-"
"I died, came back, and evolved. Sort of. No time. Bayleef?"
"Here," the Grass Pokemon said, bounding over.
"Get ready. Misty, Togetic, attend to our friends, I believe they could use it."
Misty nodded nervously. "I…don't know what we'll do for Brock, though-"
"Simply reattach it, when Togetic heals it it should return to full functionality. If not, I'll fix it myself," Latias said.
Togetic's eyes bulged. "I don't wanna touch that!"
Latias shrugged. "Then Uncle Brock will remain a eunuch for the rest of his life."
"The thought is tempting…" Misty murmured. "But Latias is right. Come on, Togetic."
"O-okay, mom," the Happiness Pokemon said, following her mother away from the coming battle.
"Latias, who is that guy anyway?" Bayleef asked right as Alpha burst out of the dust cloud, firing lasers at them.
Latias' eyes glowed, and the air around them warped and hardened, causing the laser shots to reflect away from them. "Ash."
Bayleef blinked. "Ash?"
"Yes. And we need to fight him to save him."
"Ah. Okay." Bayleef quickly gathered light from around her (with all the spotlights in the arena, it wasn't difficult) and fired a Solar Beam at her transmogrified trainer.
Alpha squeezed his throttle. "Shield Mode!"
A blue force screen appeared in front of him…which shattered instantly as Latias struck it with a spear of psychic will, causing the Solar Beam to lance in right behind it and strike Alpha in the chest, pushing him backwards as he cried in pain.
"Wh-what?" he said in disbelief, holding a hand to his smoking chest. "You…you actually hurt me?"
"We're gonna do more than that," Bayleef quipped, swishing her leaf and flinging a cloud of Sweet Scent at the Ranger, following that up with a Solar Beam to set the cloud aglow with seizure-inducing lights.
"Ha! That won't work on me, my visor filters out all harmful light effects," Alpha boasted, pointing his gun at Bayleef.
"It wasn't supposed to work on you," Latias said, appearing behind him and slamming into him with Aerial Ace. "It was only meant to distract you."
The Ranger hit the ground, rolled, and sprang back up, fuming. "Split Mode!" He immediately separated into half a dozen clones.
Latias' eyes flashed, and a wave of psychic force struck the Rangers, causing five of them to explode instantly and hurtling the true Ranger back through the air. Bayleef followed up that strike by flinging Razor Leaves at the stunned Alpha, cutting up his suit and doing some minor damage. "Ugh!"
Alpha flipped, landed on his feet, and started charging towards them. "Speed mode!"
As he accelerated rapidly, Latias glanced at her friend. "Bayleef?"
The plant smirked. "You take him high, I'll take him low."
Just before Alpha could reach them and slash them with his nastily pointy dagger, both Bayleef and Latias move to the side. Latias held a claw out at the Ranger's head level, while Bayleef extended a vine at ankle level. The Ranger, startled by this, tried to stop, but of course he was moving too fast. He tripped over Bayleef's vine and flew face-first into Latias' clenched fist at incredible speed, cracking his visor and causing a slight pain to go up Latias' arm from the impact. "Ohh…" He collapsed to the ground, groaning.
"Is he all right?" Bayleef asked in concern. Yes, he was trying to kill them, but he was their trainer after all, and she didn't want to hurt him too badly.
Alpha instantly leapt up, somersaulted through the air and landed on Bayleef's back. The Plant Pokemon gasped as the Ranger brought his dagger down on her head…before it was wrenched from his grip by Latias' telekinesis, crumpled into a metal ball, and flung back at Alpha's head, cracking his visor again and flinging him off her friend. "Thanks," Bayleef said in relief, kicking the stunned Ranger with her hind legs, and sending him rolling away.
Alpha sprung back up again, panting slightly. "You…fucking little…" He paused, then laughed. "How ironic…just when I get strong enough to not need you losers anymore, you actually get powerful enough to be worthy of my time. Figures."
"Losers!" Bayleef asked angrily. "Is that all you have to say of us after all the months and years we've known each other? After all we've been through together! All the fights we've had!"
"Yes," Alpha said flatly. "That, and I find it amusing that a stupid animal like you actually had a crush on me once. You idiot."
Bayleef growled, but Latias put a hand on her friend's shoulder. "Calm down, Bayleef. He wants you angry."
"How can he say all that stuff!" Bayleef asked, still furious.
"Because he's not truly Ash, and that's not truly how he feels about you," Latias told her. "What we are facing is, in a sense, Ash's dark side…his pent-up anger, bitterness, and negative feelings about his friends amplified by HERO and the evil one's power. The real Ash is still in there somewhere, but buried deep beneath layers of negativity and hatred."
"How do we help him?" Bayleef asked, startled.
"By removing the power from him before it can corrupt Ash's soul and really make him the Alpha Ranger," Latias told her friend. "I was able to do it to Red Ranger, but the human that remained had had the power so long he knew nothing else, and was still a heartless power-hungry jerk. We must do the same for Ash before it's too late."
"I'd like to see you try!" Alpha said, squeezing his throttle. "Electro Mode!" He slammed his fist into the ground, sending an electric shockwave rippling out towards them.
Latias' eyes glowed, and Bayleef levitated off the ground, causing the shockwave to pass underneath her. When lightning bolts shot out of the floor to strike at them, they were diverted by the dragon's will and sent shooting right back into Alpha Ranger, causing him to stagger back and cry in pain as he was electrocuted by his own power.
"Ugh…you'd think after all the times I've been zapped by that fucking Pikachu, I'd be used to that," he growled, panting.
"That's no way to speak about your partner and best friend!" Bayleef said in alarm.
"Remember Bayleef, he can't help it," Latias reminded her. "He's made up of Ash's negative thoughts and feelings, like annoyance and frustration for all the times Pikachu's shocked him for no reason, so it's only natural that he can feel nothing but hatred. It's rather sad, actually…I find myself pitying him."
"What! I don't need your pity!" Alpha said angrily. "I'm better than I've ever been! Without all those stupid things like friendship or morals holding me back, I'm free to do whatever I want!"
Latias shook her head. "Those 'stupid things', as you call them, are part of what makes life worth living," she told him. "Without friendship, without love, one is terribly alone in the universe. Without the ties that bind us to others, we are all nothing against the void. In a way, you, or the true Ash knew this, for why else would he have made so many friends or acquaintances throughout his journey?"
"Oh, shut up!" Alpha snapped. "I don't want to hear any moral lectures! I've heard enough of them from my so-called friends before I quieted them myself!"
Latias shrugged. "Very well…I didn't think I'd convince you of anything, anyway."
"Then why'd you say it?" Bayleef frowned.
"Because I felt it needed to be said," Latias told her. "So without further adieu, let's finish this, shall we?"
"I agree," Alpha growled. "Split Mode!" He instantly split into numerous clones. However, instead of charging at the duo like before, the clones floated into the air, frozen in Ash's trademark 'V for victory pose', and started orbiting the two Pokemon.
"What are they doing?" Bayleef asked in confusion, taking a step back. To her surprise, the clones shifted their orbit to stay equidistant from her. "Huh?"
"Hmm…" Latias lashed out at one clone with her claw, but its orbit was well outside her reach. When she floated closer to try to hit it, the clones both moved away and followed her, once more keeping themselves equidistant from her. "I see. We can't touch them. Well, not physically anyway."
"So?" Bayleef asked. "Let's not touch them, then." She swished her leaf, flinging Razor leaves at some of the clones floating past her, just as they stopped orbiting and started shooting towards her. The clones exploded on impact, but now the remaining clones were closing in on her. Latias' eyes flashed, and they all exploded, leaving the duo untouched.
"What was the point of that?" Bayleef wondered.
"To let you forget about me!" the real Alpha cried, dropping down from the HERO and plummeting towards them. "POWER MODE!" He thrust his fist downwards as he fell, intending to smash Latias' head in.
She held out her claw, catching the fist easily in her palm and stopping the Ranger's momentum dead in its tracks. "What-"
Latias' eyes flashed, and Alpha was flung across the room with a blast of psychic force, slamming him into the wall. "I believe this has gone on long enough," said the dragon, flying towards her transformed trainer.
Bayleef nodded as she followed. "I agree." She shot her vines out, slamming them into the moaning Alpha Ranger's wrists and wrapping them around them, pinning him to the wall.
"Argh…let me go!" Alpha cried angrily, struggling against the vines. Unable to reach the gadget on his left wrist, he was all but helpless.
Latias used her psychokinesis to freeze his body in place and stop his thrashing. "We will," She told him, hovering before the Ranger's chest. "After we free Ash and make sure you no longer exist!" She drove her claws into Alpha's chest, projecting her will through them and into the Ranger's soul.
That turned out to be the biggest mistake of her new life.
Whatever she had expected to find in this black pit was infinitely worse. Her mind was instantly bombarded with images so vile they made her want to cry and flee to some tiny corner and hide there until the world made sense again.
Thousands of babies, cradled in massive claws, lifted to a flaming maw…
Oceans comprised of blind, bleeding bodies, scrambling over and on top of and through each other, all screaming in pain and reaching up for a nonexistent light while ships made of bone scythed through them, drinking their blood to polish their decks…
Worlds where the air was fire and those who were cursed to live there burning both inside and outside, their lungs turning black and shriveled with every screaming breath they took while their bodies crumbled into ashes…
Crystalline trees from which people hung impaled on the branches, roots and spines growing inside them and bursting out of their skin while they still lived, their life blood greedily drunken up by the evil plants as they feasted upon their food's pain…
Drowning in despair, tears of acid falling forever from the sky, dissolving the body so it would evaporate, rise into the atmosphere, reform, and be dissolved all over again in an eternal cycle of suffering…
Universes where life was frozen into programming and perfect order without freedom or individuality, and universes of absolute chaos, where nothing was solid or uniform and all of reality endlessly shifted, throwing its inhabitants into total madness…
Worlds that were cold and dead and empty of life, their soil screaming with all the blood and pain and endless, endless death that had been shed…souls frozen in jagged ice wailing in despair as beautiful, radiant angels passed them indifferently, not caring in the least for the suffering…worlds where pure darkness was solid and all suffocated in it, and worlds of light so bright that all were burned to cinders by it again and again.
And all these screams, all these cries of agony and despair, together blended into a dissonant, toneless voice, singing with beatific and eloquent joy at the thought of annihilation and war and destruction and pointless suffering, how beautiful and perfect worlds which had been cleansed of all forms of life by violent and excruciating genocide were, how wonderful it would be if all the myriad fragile realities were to shatter like so much glass and all the souls therein were to fall into its waiting arms, so they could flail about in the void forever, their lonely voices crying out in a despair sweeter than the freshest honey, so those who loved such things could drink and drink and be content forevermore.
Her mind was nothing but a miniscule speck, smaller than a germ, compared to this conglomeration, this entity of pain and malevolence so vast that all of reality could easily fit in its mouth. This thing which listened to the screams of those who were burning and buried alive for relaxation, and bathed in rivers of sour tears and babies blood. And that thing stared at her with three eyes, each the size of a large universe, and intoned, "HE IS MINE."
Bayleef stared in alarm as Latias was violently cast off of Alpha, thrown away by a blast of purple and red and black electricity which convulsed through the Ranger's body, causing him to howl in pain before falling limp against the wall. The crystal above them pulsed steadily, its brilliant glow looking rather pleased and satisfied with itself. "Latias?" Bayleef asked, her voice full of concern. "Wh-what just-"
"I can't," Latias whispered, her form trembling. Her mind was still reeling from what she had just seen; the sheer complexity of cruelty, the vast and endless detailed and horrific torture of those trapped in it nearly enough to drive her mad. She had just gotten a glimpse into the mind of purest evil, a brief and fleeting look into Hell, and it had almost destroyed her. "I can't. I can't save him. He's directly involved himself in Ash's transformation. I…" Her head hung low. "There's nothing I can do."
…
Zoro sighed as Wes tried, yet again, to break through the force field. "Amigo, I don't think that crowbar is going to work."
His prediction was proved correct as the ex-thief smacked the shield with his crowbar (where did he get it, I wonder?) and staggered backwards, the resulting vibration running up his arm and shaking his body. "Dammit…"
He threw the now bent-out-of-shape crowbar away in frustration, almost hitting the head of his Umbreon. "Hey, watch it!" the Moonlight Pokemon said angrily.
"So, got any other ideas?" Wes asked Zoro.
The masked swordsman shrugged. "I really don't know. We've tried El Toro's wrestling moves, El Rosa's dancing techniques, both El Lobo and El Caballo's charging attacks, and El Gato and my own espada skills. Needless to say, none of them worked." He looked sadly at the bent mess that had once been his sword.
Wes sighed and ran a hand back through his head. "And I've tried Espeon and Umbreon's powers and teleportation, Plusle and Minun's combined electric attacks, Aerodactyl's Hyper Beam, and if Ho-Oh fit in here I'd try him out too. Nothing works. Lousy force field." Grumbling, he punched it, yelping and convulsing as it electrocuted him. His Pokemon snickered, which earned them a one-way return to their Pokeballs.
As you may recall, Zoro and Wes had climbed into the Tower through an open window with the idea of getting to the Aerie through the stairs or elevator, seeing as how the outside was now blocked off by that weird force field. Unfortunately, said field extended inside the building as well, blocking off the stairs and keeping the elevators from going past a specific floor. All of this meant that the Aerie was still off-limits, and Ash and his friends were still in trouble. And it seemed as if there was nothing Zoro or Wes could do about it.
They heard a 'ding' behind them and turned to see the elevator banks in the hallway just outside the stairwell they were in all open up at once, allowing Officer Jenny, her troopers, Sidney, Phoebe, and Tuxedo Masquerain to spill out onto the floor. "All right people, come on! There must be some other way to the hundredth floor from here!" Jenny barked.
"'Fraid not," Wes said, coming out of the stairwell. "We've tried. Force field is in here too. Blocks everything above us off."
Jenny blinked. "That can't be! You mean to say there's no way up?"
Zoro sighed regretfully. "I am afraid not, Madame Policia. We have looked everywhere, and tried every attempt to break through the barrier. The elevators won't go any further, the stairs are all blocked off, and the force field even passes through the ventilation ducts and servicio passageways which go to the higher floors."
"I should know," El Gato grumbled, licking his fur to clean off the dust and dirt. "They made me go in to check."
Sidney sighed in annoyance. "Great, so we've spent the last half hour or so fighting that stupid Yellow Ranger, and now we can't even get to the damn top of the tower."
"Perhaps I should give it a whirl," Tuxedo Masquerain said, stepping forward. "I haven't met a barrier yet than can stand up to the likes of me!"
Five seconds later…
"Wow, that was pathetic," Wes said flatly. "I mean really, who uses a rose to break a force field?"
"Shut up!" Tuxedo Masquerain snapped, wincing as he plucked another thorn from his face. "I'd like to see you do better!"
"I tried whacking the thing with a crowbar," Wes said. "And it jarred like hell, but at least I didn't throw a flower at it which exploded and pelted my face with charred plant debris."
Zoro put a hand on the miserable Tuxedo Masquerain's shoulder. "I'm afraid I must concur, chico. A rose is all well and good when you are trying to be elegante, but you should never use one as an actual weapon in a fight."
"But you have that Roselia," Tuxedo Masquerain pointed out. "Just like I do."
"Si," Zoro agreed. "But they are not weapons, they are Pokemon. And they have many other attacks other than simple roses."
Tuxedo Masquerain sighed, and winced as he plucked out another thorn. "Yeah, I suppose you're right."
Jenny sighed as she watched her officers and their Pokemon try and fail to penetrate the barrier. "Great. Just great. We've come all this way, and we still can't do a damn thing."
"Perhaps I may be off assistance?" offered an unfamiliar voice which echoed through their minds.
Jenny turned around as the group of officers standing guard in the hallway parted in fright, allowing a tall, white, vaguely feline Pokemon with purple eyes to glide into the stairwell, followed by a masked Gardevoir, a Pikachu with a cape, mask and sword much like Zoro's, a Manyula, a Crawdaunt, a Phanphy, a large female Charizard, and Annabel.
"Hey, you guys made it!" Tuxedo Masquerain said in surprise, pulling out the last thorn. "Er…but weren't there a couple other Pokemon with you? And who's the big guy?"
"I am Mewtwo," the Genetic Pokemon said. "You may or may not have heard of me. It matters little. I was summoned to assist in this endeavor, and that is what I intend to do."
Jenny looked dubious, but Annabel quickly reassured her. "Don't worry officer, he's on our side. I can vouch for him. He was able to get me and everyone else out of the traps we were in, and would have teleported us right to the tower's top if it weren't for this weird force field here," she said, pointing to the rippling barrier blocking their progress up the stairs.
"It is the power of the crystal fragment, put into action by its master, the evil one," Mewtwo said, glaring at the wall as if it were the enemy himself. "A truly formidable opponent. But I believe I can dispel the barrier, now that I am before it, so we can continue to the tower's top and stop whatever madness is going on."
Jenny still looked apprehensive, but then Zoro pitched in. "I recognize some of those Pokemon, they belong to the boy we are trying to save, Ash Ketchum. If they trust him, I believe we can as well."
Wes grunted and shrugged. "Eh, if he can get us to the top, he's good enough for me."
"Hmmm…" Jenny frowned. "All right then…but I'd like explanations later as to just who exactly you are!"
"Very well. But let's get past this obstacle, shall we?" Mewtwo started up the stairs towards the force field; the cops who had been trying to break it open in the meantime after Tuxedo Masquerain's failure pushing themselves to the sides away from him.
"You might want to stand back," Crawdaunt commented to Wes' Espeon and Umbreon. "The last time he broke down a force field, the backlash was wicked."
Mewtwo placed his palms against the force field, which rippled as he touched it. He closed his eyes, gathering his power, for he would most certainly need it to get through a barrier of this caliber.
…
Alpha had fallen unconscious after Latias' attempt to purify him, which was good since the dragon didn't really know what to do with him. She figured she'd wait for Mewtwo to show up to deal with him; in the meantime he was tied up in Bayleef's vines and currently not a threat to anyone.
Latias had assisted Togetic in healing all the wounded (and fixing Misty's nose), returning the Pokemon that could to their Pokeballs, and fixing Brock's maleness when Togetic repeatedly refused to touch it. One quick sojourn into their minds to erase the memories of the horrible things Alpha had done later, and their mental state was quite a bit more stable. Even May seemed a bit better, although she still felt very guilty and inadequate due to Munchlax's death, and there wasn't much more Latias believed she could do about that….or about those who were now dead.
There was, however, something she could do about the crazy Blaziken. One psychic blast to the chicken's brain, and he was out cold, and Harrison and Mr. Ford were safe. She refused Harrison's request to go into Mr. Ford's mind and see what was wrong with him on the grounds that she wasn't sure exactly what she could do for him or for his insane Blaziken. Both of their minds had been saturated by radiation from the crystal for so long that she wasn't sure what would happen if she were to remove the power, it might causes their psyches to collapse or something, which was why she elected to wait for Mewtwo to arrive to see for himself what they could do.
So, while Harrison attempted to get some reaction out of his father, Brock made himself comfortable in the new set of clothes Latias had fashioned for him out of air particles so nobody would have to look at his nakedness (and Lucy wouldn't be motivated to chop his maleness off again), May was attempting to pull herself back together with Lucy's help, and Misty and Togetic were trying to recover from what had almost happened to them as well as Golduck and Kasurin's death, seeing as how Latias thought it might be for the best for at least a couple of other people to remember fully what happened here this night, the dragon turned her attention to Charizard. The fire dragon was still badly in need of some aid, and she believed that she could do something about that.
"Do you really think you can fix him?" Bayleef said doubtfully.
Latias nodded. "Yes, it's just the way to go about it that troubles me. I can give him new wings, ones that are superior to the old ones, and I could go inside him and talk him out of his problems…but that wouldn't make them go away. He's been suffering from self-doubt for a while now; even if he doesn't show it much, and it's clear that it's eaten him up inside, no matter what we, Charla, or he has told himself. Even if I bring him out of this funk, he'll still blame himself for failing Ash, and feel guilt for indirectly causing all of Alpha's evil. So…what he needs is a fresh start."
"You're going to erase his memories?" Bayleef asked, looking alarmed. "Latias, that may be an okay thing for a spot-job like what you did for the others, but…if this has been bothering him this long, you'd have to take out a big chunk of his memory! That can't be healthy, can it? And I can't imagine it would be easy for the rest of us, or Charla."
Latias shook her head. "No, it's not…which is why I'm not going to do it. So instead…" She glanced at her friend. "Bayleef, do I seem different to you?"
Bayleef blinked. "How do you mean?"
"Well, now that I've 'died', regained memories from a past life, and come back like…well, this," she said, gesturing to her body. "Do I seem like a different person to you?"
Bayleef thought about that. "Well…not that much, no. Other than the new body. And the powers. And those memories, like you said. But…" She frowned. "I mean, you haven't acted like you were a different person. That is, you still behave like the Latias I remember from before we came into the tower."
"That's because I am the Latias you remember," the dragon told her. "And at the same time, not. The Latias you know, the Latias I was thousands of years ago, and the Latias I am now are all the exact same person…and at the same time, they are different. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The Latias I was thousands of years ago behaved for the most part like I do now but lacked some of the…mannerisms I have in the present, as well as the benefits of being raised by humans. Those I got from my current, or most recent, life. What I am now is, in short, a fusion of the two…the 'true' Latias, in a sense. One who has a better perspective of both my lives, and to whom many of the issues and problems of my previous lifetimes seems less pressing or tragic. Simply put, a transformation can put a lot of things in life into a different perspective."
Bayleef tried to cogitate that. "So…you're going to transform him?" Latias nodded. Bayleef looked disturbed. "Into what? A different Pokemon? A human? Some freakish mixture of the two…what do they call it, a Pokemorph or something?"
Latias chuckled. "No, I wouldn't have the first clue how to do something like that. There is, however, something I can do. I've done it before actually…to another friend who was suffering…but the details of that time aren't important. Charizard is who we must focus on now." She plucked two white feathers from her body and placed one on each of Charizard's scabbed-over wing stumps.
Bayleef's eyes widened in amazement as the feathers glowed and sank into Charizard's skin, causing him to shudder for a moment. "What was that?"
"His new wings."
Bayleef blinked. "Those feathers are wings?"
"They will be," Latias told her. She pressed her claws against Charizard's side and closed her eyes, spreading her wings as she did so. Slowly, gently, her wings flapped. With each flap, a cascade of loose white feathers showered down, more feathers than there appeared to be on her wings, and still more appeared with everyone that fell off. Bayleef stared in wonder as the feathers drifted down onto Charizard's limp, quivering form, until he was covered in the soft down, much like a hillock buried beneath a fresh snowfall. Even the dragon's tail flame was covered up by the feathers, and amazingly enough it neither suffocated nor set the feathers on fire.
After a moment, Latias stopped flapping her wings. All her feathers were still on them, as if none of them had fallen off, and yet Charizard's form was still covered in down. The feathers glowed softly and suddenly began to contract, collapsing upon themselves and melding together into a single, small form of light which resolved itself into a small orange Pokemon egg. There was no sign of Charizard.
Bayleef blinked. "Where did-" Latias pointed to the egg. Bayleef's jaw hung open. "No way."
"Way," Latias said with a smirk.
"You…you…what's the word?" Bayleef asked, her mind failing to provide her with an appropriate label.
"Age regression?"
"Yes, age regressed him! How?"
Latias shrugged. "To be perfectly honest…I don't know how either. But I can. I don't use it often, though…even if it does only last a little while, forcing a different viewpoint on other people isn't always a good thing." She paused. "Actually, it rarely is unless absolutely necessary, but you know what I mean."
"Yeah…so, how is this going to help him?" Bayleef asked, nodding at the egg.
"When the egg hatches, he'll be a Charmander again, with all his memories from his life before," Latias explained. "Through the simpler mind of a Charmander, all his problems, issues, and self-doubts will seem silly or pointless, since all they do is make him feel bad and don't fill his stomach or make him happy. He'll rapidly mature into a Charmeleon soon after, giving him another, more mature perspective on his issues. By this point, they won't seem quite as silly, but he will have realized that the majority of his problems are not only untrue, but self-inflicted, and will logically enough let them go. When he finally becomes a Charizard again, with the new wings I've given him, he'll be purified of all the nagging doubts, self-loathing, and guilt which would have led him to kill himself if I hadn't age regressed him to begin with."
Bayleef blinked. "Huh. That'll actually work?"
Latias shrugged. "It did the last time I tried
it. What I'm unsure of is how Charla will react to it."
She
glanced up, sensing a fluctuation in the energy flowing from the
crystal which maintained the shield that had kept them stuck in here
after their arrival by teleport. "Ah, speaking of Charla, she
should be arriving with Mewtwo and the others any minute now."
This prediction was proven accurate as the crystal flashed glaringly, vibrated, and abruptly dimmed as there was a rumble beneath them and the faint sound of the force field around them shattering. A moment later, there was a great flash of blue light, and Mewtwo, along with Gardevoir, Wes, Zoro, Tuxedo Masquerain, Sidney, Phoebe, Jenny, Annabel, the other missing members of Latias and Bayleef's original group, and the rest of the police appeared in the middle of the room, drawing the attention of all the conscious people in the Aerie, most of whom had been wrestling with their own worries which had resulted from Alpha's assault and Latias' subsequent little memory erasure.
"Officer Jenny! Phoebe! Annabel! Thank goodness you're here!" Brock gushed, running over and startling the three ladies. "I'm so glad you weren't here to see all the awful, awful things which happened here (most of which I can't recall due to someone tampering with my head) but you're fine now, and that's all that matters! Now, do you think any of you ladies could spare a date with me, because even if I can't remember what happened I know it was awful and need some help recovering from it…"
Bayleef blinked. "I thought Brock was too caught up in Venus to be attracted to other women. Unless…" She frowned and glanced at Latias, who was whistling innocently. "Latias…"
The dragon shrugged. "Well, I figured as long as I was messing around in his head, I might as well do something constructive…"
"Then why didn't you just remove his girl problem in the first place!"
Latias looked at her friend in disbelief. "Because then he wouldn't be Brock, of course!" Bayleef facefaulted.
Brock was dissuaded from hitting on Jenny, Annabel, and Phoebe when an amused Mewtwo levitated him upside-down off the ground and hung him in the air for a few moments. The amusement didn't last long, for it was then that he, and everyone else, noticed the corpses Alpha had left behind. "What happened here!" Annabel asked in alarm.
"Damn! We were too late after all…" Wes said with a grimace.
Phoebe gasped when she saw Steven. "Steven! No!"
Sidney swore. "Damn! We came up here to help out, and look what happened…one of us dies! And his Pokemon too, to look at it," he said miserably, staring at some of the corpses. "Blimey…what a loss."
Jenny sagged. "No…I was too late to stop it…what's the point?"
"It may be true that you were late," Mewtwo told her, putting a hand on her shoulder (and earning him a glare from Gardevoir, which he ignored.) "But now that you're here, you can make sure that none of this will ever happen again."
She nodded slowly. "Yes…I suppose I can…who is responsible for all this?" Jenny asked loudly of the human survivors who approached her.
"It was him," May said faintly, pointing to Alpha Ranger as Bayleef dragged him over. "He did it. He killed…he killed all of them." While it was true she couldn't remember seeing her poor Munchlax get shot, that didn't stop her from imagining it happening over and over again.
"But that's a Poke Ranger! Isn't it?" asked one of the confused cops.
"Not one I've ever seen before…" muttered one of his companions.
Jenny sighed, knowing it would take a while to explain all of this. "Even if he is a Ranger, he's clearly broken quite a few laws, such as murder and slaughtering trained Pokemon. We'll have to take him downtown."
"Wait," Misty protested. "That's…yes, he did those things, but he didn't mean to! That's Ash!"
"That's Ash!" Wes cried in disbelief.
"Madre de dios! Say it isn't so!" Zoro protested.
"It is," Mewtwo said, with a glance at Alpha. "He went through HERO. It twisted him…very badly, it appears."
"If that's the case, then I suppose he wasn't totally responsible for his actions…" Jenny considered. "Since from what I know already, he would have been forced through that thing…" She glanced upward at the infernal machine and grimaced, not liking the look of it. "In which case, the person who forced him to undergo this transformation shares a good deal of the blame. Where is Mr. Ford?"
"Up there," Lucy said, pointing to the seats surrounding the arena. The businessman was as lifeless as ever, his sullen and despondent son sitting next to him, knowing this had to be done, no matter how much it saddened him.
Jenny sighed and nodded. "All right. We'd better go get him, then. You lot! Come with me!" she said to a group of her cops. "You five, start taking pictures for forensics and make sure those bodies stay undisturbed. Everyone else, guard the perimeter and call for backup and paramedics, we don't need the press barging in here…assuming they can get past the guards outside, that is…move!"
The police quickly broke up, leaving everyone else who had come up to assimilate what had happened.
"May, are you all right?" asked a concerned Tuxedo Masquerain.
"I…yes, I'm fine, but…" She stopped, sniffled, and finally hugged him, startling the masked coordinator. "Oh Drew! My Munchlax is dead!"
"I…oh no. That's horrible!" Drew said, feeling somewhat awkward yet sympathetic all at once. He had never quite been in a position like this before.
May sobbed. "He…he never tried to hurt anyone, and now he's dead! I never got the chance to really bond with him before, and now I never will!"
"Er…" Drew sweatdropped, having no idea what to say. He quickly glanced at Zoro, who was lip-synching lines for him. "Ah…it is terrible to lose a loved one, but even more terrible to lose a friend before we get to know them," Drew told her robotically. "But that is the way of the world. People die every day, some of them people we cherish, but if we spend every memento…er, I mean moment," he said quickly, correcting his misreading. "Every moment thinking of what was and what might have been, then we have no foot-er, future, to look forward to." May gazed into his eyes, blinking back tears, but Tuxedo Masquerain was too busy glancing at Zoro to notice. "And…ah…we must find the strength to move on, in spite of this sorrow, for those who have deport-departed, departed!-us would not want us to suffer so, would they?"
She sniffed and nodded. "I guess…"
"Good, good!" he said encouragingly, glancing at Zoro again. "And…ah…you must learn to treasure the memen-moments you still have with those who are still around you. Your friends. Your family. Those whom you might wish to be more than friends. Kiss the girl."
"What?" May asked, confused. Tuxedo Masquerain was equally confused, wondering why Zoro had said that and why the masked swordsman was now slapping his forehead in frustration. Was he supposed to do that too?
Just as he was about to do just that, Wes, annoyed, shoved Tuxedo Masquerain in the back of his head, pushing his face into May's. However, instead of kissing, they ended up smashing their noses into each other, causing May to recoil in pain. "Ow! Why'd you do that?"
"I-I don't know! I didn't mean to!" Tuxedo Masquerain said frantically, glancing at Zoro for help, who just threw up his hands in defeat and stalked off. "Er…oh, forget it."
"What?" May asked, still confused.
"Uh, nothing. Why don't you…ah…tell me about Munchlax…"
Crawdaunt shook his head sadly as he scuttled about the dead bodies, peering through the gaps between the photographing police officers' legs to take a better look. "Didn't think Ash had it in him to do this…"
"It wasn't Ash," Pikachu said firmly, joining the lobster. "It may have been his body…but Ash would never do this."
"Regardless," said Sadic, shaking her head in disgust. "Whoever did this killed because he felt like it, just because it amused him, not because he was hungry or felt honestly threatened. Were he a Sneasel or Manyula, he would have been cast out or killed by the pack for such a shameful abuse of hunting skills."
Crawdaunt grunted. "Yeah, that fucker-" he paused, noticing a hint of pink among the charred, blackened bodies. He paled. "No." He shoved the officers out of the way, scurrying onto the bodies.
"Crawdaunt, what are you-" Pikachu started in confusion. He gasped as he saw what Crawdaunt had unearthed from beneath the other bodies.
The hard-shelled lobster stared, lip quivering, eyes brimming with tears, into the still, lifeless face of Kasurin. "My son…" he whispered. His legs lost the strength to support him, and he collapsed onto his belly. "That…that's my son…and now…" Words failing him, he simply clutched the dead form of his estranged child to his chest, weeping.
Pikachu and Sadic looked on sadly. The photographing officers, uncertain what to do now that the crime scene had already been contaminated, just backed away and decided to move on to the next group of bodies, knowing that forensics was going to be pissed at them for this. "Crawdaunt…I…" Pikachu started.
"Go away," Crawdaunt whispered. "Just…go." Corsola, who had long since been healed, trotted up next to Crawdaunt, equally sad, for Kasurin had been her friend too. She rubbed her horns against the lobster's shell, letting him know that she was here for him, and he was not alone in his sadness. Politoed joined them, though didn't get quite as close, since he was not as intimate with the two Pokemon as they were with each other. His hands hung at his sides, his usual happy clapping noticeably absent.
They were not the only Pokemon to suffer from loss. Nearby, May's Delcatty yowled mournfully, and violently attacked anyone who approached her dear dead Golduck. The remainder of May's Pokemon held a silent vigil of their own over poor Munchlax, with May and an uncomfortable Tuxedo Masquerain watching on.
Lucy, along with her Shuckle, Steelix, and Milotic, mourned for their dead friends Gyarados and Seviper in their own manner, Shuckle emitting bitter pheromones, Steelix making a long, sad grinding noise, and Milotic singing, her usually beautiful voice deep with sorrow. After rubbing Gyarados' side with a sad smile, Lucy knelt next to her Pokemon, and brushed her fingers against the poisonous snake's scales gently. "Heh…I never thought it would end like this," she confessed softly. "I always thought it would just be you and me in the end, whatever end that might be…but then, I suppose you rarely can choose when you die, can you girl?" She didn't cry. She had long since outgrown tears…but that didn't mean hard-as-nails Lucy couldn't still feel sad like every other human in the world. She stood up, sighed, and closed her eyes. "Goodbye, old friend."
Annabel, who was disgusted and ashamed that her tower had been used so carelessly as a slaughterhouse, watched from afar, feeling a deep sense of guilt that she hadn't known about HERO in advance and put a stop to this madness before it could really take off. Brock had been hitting on her a moment ago, remembered his Crobat was dead, got sad, and went off to mourn. He'd probably be back in a few minutes; his hormones were a very powerful force after all.
Pikachu shook his head. He had seen death, of course, even helped hunt down live game for food to help feed his friends, as well as killing lots of RPGenerator monsters and the Scyther mutants in the lower corridors of Battle Tower, but that did not make this scene seem any less horrible to him. It did not help that he had known a couple of those who were gone fairly well, either. "Jeez…just…jeez," he said finally, shaking his head unhappily. "And to think, we might have been able to prevent this, if…if…"
"Don't think that," Sadic snapped, cuffing him on the back of his head. "What's past is past. If you constantly fill your head with thoughts of what might have been, you'll have no future and will never be able to move on."
He smirked slightly. "More of that Sneasel philosophy?"
"That, and some common sense," she said, messing with his hair affectionately. "The loss of a loved one is something to be sad about, for a time…but time passes, and you must move on. I was pretty sad when my ma died, too. Didn't know how I'd go on without her for a while…but I managed. Most people do, in their own way. For me, though, it helps that all my life I've been taught that death is nothing to be feared. Avoided, yes, painful, occasionally, but feared? Never."
"Why is that?" he asked curiously. "You said the same thing before."
"Are you afraid of being born?" she asked him.
He frowned in confusion. "Um…not particularly."
Sadic smirked. "Then you shouldn't be scared of death, because it's the same thing as birth. Birth and death are the two things that every single one of us has in common. Death is an end no more than life is a beginning, they're both just transitions."
Pikachu blinked. "Transitions? From what?"
She chuckled. "Death is obvious. You lose your physical form and go to…well, my kind call it the Celestial Hunting Grounds. Your kind probably have their own name for it, just as the humans and most species do as well. Whatever it is, it's the next stage. We drift there, formless and free from things like pain or hunger or sadness…and then, if we crave materialism again for whatever reason, we come back, clothing ourselves in flesh and emerging from a fresh egg to begin life anew. It's an eternal cycle."
Pikachu blinked. "So…what, you think some of these guys," he said, gesturing to the dead. "Like Kasurin or Golduck will come back someday?"
Sadic shrugged. "If they choose to. Records of my tribe's past have documented such occurrences. They are few and far apart, but they have happened. I myself occasionally have dreams, memories of hunting prey underneath a different sky, where the northern lights don't shine and the air isn't as crisp and cold, which leads me to believe I myself may have returned from the Hunting Grounds. Or I might just have really weird dreams. It matters little in the long run. If I did come back, I'm glad for it, because I was able to meet you."
Pikachu blushed severely as she messed with his hair some more. "Er, do you suppose they'd let me into that hunting ground of yours when I pass on?"
"I don't see why not," she said after a moment's thought. "How fast can you run under duress? If you're going to be prey, it's not fun to chase someone who's slow and is an easy catch." Pikachu sweatdropped heavily at this.
"Latias?" Charla asked, coming over anxiously to the evolved dragon. "I've looked everywhere, but I can't find Charizard. What's happened to him?"
Bayleef grimaced. "Oh boy, here we go…"
Latias held out the new egg to Charla. "Here he is."
She stared blankly. "Latias, I wanted to know where Charizard is. I don't see what an egg has to do with anything."
"He's in the egg," she said calmly.
Charla blinked. "…He's inside the egg?"
"Yes."
Charla's eye twitched. "And…why, exactly, is he inside an egg?"
"Because if he weren't," Latias said with a smile. "He'd be dead."
Charla started. "…What?"
"When we found him, he was in pretty bad shape," Bayleef told her. "Ford's Blaziken tore off his wings."
Charla's eyes widened. "Sweet heavens!" Now it all made sense to her. Who wouldn't want to die if they suffered as grievous a fate as that? To never fly again…nearly all winged Pokemon agreed that killing themselves was far better than living like that.
"It was more than that, though," Latias elaborated. "He lost his fight to Blaziken, and in doing so failed Ash…or so he believes. The guilt, doubt, and self-hatred were tearing him up inside. Simply growing him new wings would not have made them go away, so the only way to make him better was to give him a new perspective…and this was the only way to do that."
"By turning him back into an egg?" Charla asked doubtfully.
"With the simpler mind of a child, his problems will seem less complicated and overwhelming…allowing him to shed them as he evolves, becoming the 'true' Charizard, free of his nagging guilt and doubts. But to do that…he needs you."
Charla blinked. "Me?"
Latias nodded. "You are pivotal to Charizard, Charla. So many of his thoughts revolve around you. To him, you are practically a goddess, a divine personification of all that is perfect in a female Charizard. He finds himself at once both unworthy of you and honored beyond belief that you continue to choose him as your mate. He only desires to prove himself to you and to be a good father to the child the two of you has conceived. He does not already see that he is all these things already, and has no need to prove himself.
"This is his second chance to see that. On his own, however, he may not be able to do it. Your love will allow him to take the next step…to become the Charizard he is meant to be." She held the egg out to Charla again.
The female dragon hesitated for a moment…then gently took the egg from the dragon's claws. She gasped as it started to glow. "It's hatching!"
"Wow, that was fast," said an amazed Bayleef.
"Like I said before, "Latias said with a smile. "His evolution will be faster than usual. His body naturally wants to return to its original age, so will mature very quickly. How fast it goes depends on how well he adapts and rejects his old hindrances…I believe Charla's presence will help with that a great deal."
The glowing egg, now a mass of light, changed shape, swelling from an ovoid object into a larger reptilian form. The light faded, revealing a small orange bipedal lizard with a yellow belly, a burning flame on the tail, and a pair of blue eyes that Charla immediately recognized, no matter how young he had gotten, as being her Charizard's.
The Charmander blinked, unused to the light. His eyes came into focus, sighting on Charla. "Charla!" he squealed happily, hugging her on the chest.
Her eyes widened. Her heartbeat sped up as she felt a strange, warm feeling inside her. It was partly her usual, familiar love for her mate, but there was something else too…
This child, he felt so…so small, and weak. She felt a surging desire to hold him in her arms, to keep him safe from the bad things in the world. Her maternal instincts brimming, the female Charizard wrapped her arms around the little one and held him tightly to her chest, closing her eyes and breathing softly as she felt the Charmander, her Charizard's, heartbeat against her skin.
Latias felt pleased and certain that she had done the right thing. Bayleef, however… "You sure this won't give him an Oedipus complex?"
Latias blinked. "A what?"
"Oedipus complex. Heard Pikachu talking about it one time. It means you have a sexual desire for your mom."
Latias frowned. "Oh…huh. Never thought of that." Bayleef facefaulted. "Oh well, I'm sure it's nothing to worry about. It worked out the other time I did it…"
"If you say so…" Bayleef said doubtfully.
Mewtwo examined Alpha, who had been laid out on the ground before him. "Well?" Misty asked nervously. "Can you fix him?"
"I believe I can…" said the clone, not looking up. "It will be difficult…our enemy has a very strong grip on him…but yes, I believe I can."
"Yay!" Phanphy squealed, hopping up and down happily. "I knew you could do it, Great-Uncle Mewtwo!"
Mewtwo blinked and stared at Phanphy in confusion, as did Misty, Togetic, and Gardevoir. "What?"
"You're Latias' daddy, and Latias is my aunt, so you're my great-uncle!" Phanphy clarified.
Misty sweatdropped. "That actually kind of makes sense…oddly enough."
Amused, Mewtwo glanced at Gardevoir. "I suppose that would make you a Great-Aunt, wouldn't it?" She blushed under her mask, flattered and at the same time overjoyed to be welcomed into their somewhat odd and unorthodox family. "In any event, Ash is not past saving yet…although we'll have to move quickly. I could use your help, Miss Waterflower…yes, and perhaps the children as well."
Misty blinked. "What do you need us for?"
"Your strong connections to young Ketchum will make it easier to locate him in the vast ethereal morass occupying his body and free him from the enemy's grasp. Phanphy and Togetic call him 'father', and you and he share a bond of your own. I'd ask Pikachu for help as well, but…" He glanced at Pikachu, who was trying to comfort Crawdaunt. "He seems to be a bit busy helping the grieving at the moment."
Misty bit her lip. "If I have a connection with Ash, it can't be that strong," she said bitterly. "I tried using it, or something like it, to snap him out of this…and it didn't work."
"Love is a powerful force," Mewtwo said gently. "But Ash's soul is, at the moment, in a very, very bad place. Almost the very worst of places, or near its edge. Somewhere so far from here that, no matter how strong a bond you share, he'd be lucky to feel anything at all from our side of reality. That does not make your connection any weaker, it simply means he's out of range. I seek to remedy that. The love you all have for him will serve as a beacon with which I will be able to find him, purify him, and grant him control over his body once more." Hopefully, he added to himself. Assuming I'll be able to convince our foe to let him go in the first place… He did not pursue that line of thought any further.
Misty took a deep breath and smiled. "So, what do we do?"
"Yeah, how do we help Daddy?" Phanphy chirped.
"Close your eyes and concentrate," Mewtwo told them. "Think of Ash. Think of all he means to you. Think of all he has done with you. Think of all you feel for him, and him for you." They obeyed. He could already sense their heartbeats increasing as memories of the trainer, father, and lover they all knew ran through their heads. He smiled. "Good. Now, picture that there is a…tunnel of sorts, going from your mind to my mind. Direct the flow of your thoughts of Ash through that tunnel, from your mind to mine." Gardevoir blinked in surprise, her psychic senses 'seeing' three twisting threads of light running from Misty, Togetic, and Phanphy's heads, and into Mewtwo's brow. Glowing beads moving faster than light ran down the threads and into the spot on Mewtwo's brow, causing it to flash slightly each time a bead connected. (Note that the 'light' was psychic in nature, and was invisible to those using their eyes only.)
"Good, good…these are strong feelings. They will serve well. Now, continue thinking of Ash. Let yourself relax and immerse yourself in the flow, ignoring all external disturbances which would seek to disrupt your contemplation. If you hear a sound, it is nothing. If you feel a touch, it is nothing. Do not lose control of the thread, for if you do we may lose him forever. You may want to sit down, Miss Waterflower, this might take a while," he recommended.
Misty did as she was told, sitting on the ground. Togetic fluttered her wings and landed on her shoulder, while Phanphy sat on his hindquarters. The threads and beads were unimpeded by this change in latitude, and continued to feed into Mewtwo's mind. "Good. Now…one more thing…" His eyes rolled upwards, towards the sinister HERO above them. With a flick of a finger, a Shadow Blade sliced through the supports holding the device to the ceiling, causing it to plummet to the floor. Before it could crash and crush the startled, terrified people below, it stopped in midair and was surrounded by a faint blue glow as Mewtwo held it up using telekinesis. The crystal flashed angrily, but could do nothing. "There. That should keep any unwelcome surprises from interfering. I'd deal with it permanently, but the longer I dally the less chance Ash has of recovering. So Gardevoir, I need you to tell the others to be on guard in case anything happens. Nothing must disturb my trance. Understand?" She nodded fervently. She understood the importance of what Mewtwo was doing, and would make sure nothing stopped it. "Good. Now…" He took a deep breath. "Let us begin." With that, he closed his eyes, pressed his palms onto Alpha's forehead, and plunged himself into pure evil.
…
"I'm sorry dad," Harrison said sadly, stepping back to let Officer Jenny and her subordinates through. "But this is for your own good."
Ford, unsurprisingly, did not respond. He was lost in his own mind, confused and dumbfounded, trying to understand what had happened.
Where did I go wrong? He wondered as Jenny read him his rights, then handcuffed him. What did I do to cause all this pain, all this suffering, all this…evil…to occur? I was only trying to do the right thing. I was doing the right thing! He insisted to himself as his body was lifted to his feet and roughly shoved towards the aisle. With his consciousness not paying attention, his unconscious took over and automatically made his body start walking. I was making heroes, champions of right and justice, to protect the world. So why…why did they all, why did Ash, who showed every indication of being perfect for this, turn evil? He continued pondering this as he was led down the aisle. HERO isn't evil, no matter what they say. I have no doubt of that in my mind. Nothing so pure and beautiful could be evil. Which means there's something else wrong. Something…something in the subjects itself, perhaps? But what?
He froze suddenly at the top of the stairs leading down into the arena as a strange thought came to him. Perhaps…perhaps the real problem was that no matter how pure of heart they were, everyone has the potential to become evil…which means…that everyone is evil by nature…if so, then it's no wonder they turned out so wrong when they gained the power.
How can this be remedied? How can I fight evil if it's everywhere, in every person, even in myself? Why, the only way I could do that would be to…to… His eyes widened in realization, a brilliant epiphany hitting him. Yes…of course…that's PERFECT…
"Hey! Ford! Keep walking!" Jenny said, shoving the businessman in the back, frustrated that he had been standing stock-still for the past several seconds despite all their attempts to make him budge. Growling in frustration, she was about to let out her Arcanine…
When abruptly, every spotlight in the room swiveled and focused on Mr. Ford, leaving most of the room in darkness and covering the businessman and the police escort in blinding light. "Agh!" Jenny covered her eyes with an arm.
"What's happening?" an alarmed Bayleef cried.
Latias gasped, sensing a great deal of activity from the crystal. She glanced at the infernal machine and saw that, even though it was disconnected from the ceiling and hovering over the floor, it was powering up. "The HERO is activating on its own!"
"What! That's impossible!" Harrison screamed in disbelief.
"What do we do!" May shouted from the arena as she heard horrific screams from the police trapped in the patch of light, which was growing brighter and brighter in intensity, blazing like a small sun.
"Smash every light!" Harrison said, taking out Blaziken and charging up the stairs towards the spotlights. "The HERO transmits power through them!"
Tuxedo Masquerain nodded. "Yes, that should work!"
Brock reached for Crobat's Pokeball…only to remember Crobat was dead, leaving him completely useless. "Aw man…"
"You guys help us out!" Wes said, tossing out Plusle and Minun. "Use your electric attacks to overload the lights!"
"Okay!" the mice chirped at once.
"Ready Plusle?" asked Minun.
"Ready, Minun!" said Plusle.
They touched their cheeks to each other and let out a powerful Thunder attack, dancing through the air and striking several spotlights, causing them to overload and explode.
"El Gato!" Zoro commanded his partner in swordfighting. "Destroy those lights, pronto!"
"Mind if I join you?" Pikachu asked his rival, drawing his sword.
"And don't forget about me," Sadic added, flexing her claws.
The suave feline smirked. "I would be honored, my amigos." The three blade-masters rushed off to do their part.
Latias rose into the air. "Gardevoir, Bayleef!" she cried. "Let's attack that thing at once! Maybe if we stop the flow of evil at its source, we'll stop whatever transformation is occurring!" She could sense the crystal's energy flowing through HERO to the lights, and from the lights to Ford. It was filling the man to bursting within the light. There was no telling what would result of all that power converging in one human. If only Mewtwo weren't occupied saving Ash…no matter. She had watched as the evil one had destroyed her old world thousands of years ago, she would not let his power do the same again!
Bayleef nodded in understanding. "Just like when we were stuck in that force field, then."
Gardevoir's eye glowed and her dress billowed as she gathered her power. "We must stop this…attack!"
Bayleef drew light from all the spotlights and fired it from her mouth as a Solar Beam. Gardevoir pointed her green celery-stalk arm at the HERO and launched a powerful Psychic blast at it. Latias' body glowed as she focused her power, and launched a Psylance (one of her new techniques, a spear made from focused psychic energy) at the evil device. The three attacks collided against the HERO's built-in defense force field, which went up the instant it detected their attack. Undaunted, the trio poured on the power, causing the shield to warp and flicker as they slowly started to eat away at its defensive ability.
"Drew, what can we do?" May asked.
"Nothing. We'd only get in the way," Tuxedo Masquerain told her firmly. "The others have everything under control. Let's leave it to them, okay?"
"…Okay," she said smiling. "I hope this works…"
The other cops in the room, somewhat frightened, wisely decided to do as Tuxedo Masquerain said and stay out of the way, letting these others handle things. That, and they were too scared to actually do anything useful.
Rapidly, the dozens of spotlights went out, smashed, shattered, and overloaded by the swift Pokemon heroes. The room darkened as the beams of light were cut off, but the spotlights attached to the HERO itself were still firing at Ford. The screams from the police and Jenny had long stopped, and the remaining cops and those still on the arena floor could not help but fear for the worst.
"It's starting to fail," Latias announced as the shield flickered. "A little more, and we've got it!"
"Here, let us help you out!" said Pikachu, firing a Thunderbolt at the spot where the three ladies' attacks converged. Plusle and Minun joined in, combining their own electricity with Pikachu's to make a much stronger attack.
"Heh, don't forget little old me," Sadic joked, breathing out Icy Wind.
"Blaziken, let's help them out!" Harrison said. The Blaze Pokemon nodded and breathed a flamethrower at the shield. Down in the arena, Charla added her flames to the mix, creating a powerful stream of fire which washed over the HERO's shield along with all the other attacks.
The combined assault was too much for the machine to handle for more than a few seconds. The shields collapsed, and the awesome elemental energies converged on the evil device, causing it to explode spectacularly. A quick shield thrown up by Gardevoir and Latias kept the flames and debris from hitting anyone, forcing the ball of fiery death to collapse on itself and go out, leaving the furiously cracking crystal shard behind as the only remnant of the infernal machine. It fell to the ground, bouncing a few times before lying still, throbbing angrily.
"Yeah, we did it!" Bayleef cried, right as the room went completely dark due to their destroying every spotlight in the room. "Ooh. Dark."
Latias' body began to glow brightly, lighting up the arena floor. "That was great work, everyone!"
"Yeah, who knew you guys could do so much damage by teaming up?" asked an impressed Crawdaunt, carefully putting Kasurin's body back on the ground. "Kinda makes me wish I could have helped out too."
"Well, I'm sure you'll get another chance eventually," Corsola said, joining him. "I mean, we are going to have more fights in the future."
"True, true," Crawdaunt agreed with a nod.
"Great job, Blaziken!" Harrison said with a grin. His Pokemon smirked. "But…what about my dad? Is he all right?" They both turned to look down at the spot where the HERO's beams had been concentrated. "Dad? Are you okay?"
The spot was dark, for Latias' light did not reach it. However, a spark of golden light appeared. It grew and grew, until it outshined even the surprised dragon and lit up the whole room.
Standing where the HERO had given its power, surrounded by the ashes of the police escort and Officer Jenny, were two figures. One was monstrous, and somewhat of a mix of humanoid and avian in form. Its body was covered in fire, with blackened bones visible in the flames. Spikes grew from its arms and knees, and its feet ended in huge talons. A pair of long demonic wings sprouted from the back of its head, spreading three feet outward in both directions. Its head was a blackened skull wreathed in flame, crowned with a bony helmet with devil horns and spiky knobs growing from its forehead and eyebrows, with a cruel curved beak and glowing red orbs for eyes.
The other figure was a stark contrast to the monstrous bird-thing, and the source of the golden glow. His body was covered in black spandex with golden gauntlets and greaves. He wore golden bracers around his upper arms with zigzags carved into them, and a black and gold belt with A.S.S. engraved on the buckle. His upper body was clad in a vest of solid gold armor, with a torus-shaped band going over his shoulders and around his neck with intricate designs etched into it. A white cape with a red interior hung from the shoulders of this torus and hung to the ground. A white hexagonal crest was sunken into his chest, with the A.S.S. emblem on it, and the number 100 embossed on his chest underneath it. His black helmet had a pair of pointed fins on the top of the head which looked slightly like dog ears, and a pair of gold bull-like horns sticking out from the sides of the helmet, with red sirens for tips. The gold-rimmed black visor was angular and wrapped around a blank pentagonal golden faceplate, looking vaguely like the letter H without the upper arms. A katana hung from his belt on the left side, with a crosspiece looking like a Houndoom with its mouth chained shut.
The shining gold figure drew his sword and slashed at the air with it, stepping forward and leaning on one foot as he did so. "Kiyah! Your attempts to prevent my transformation were close to succeeding, evil ones, but not close enough! Although I am not as powerful as I should be, Shining Ranger and Phoenetrice are more than ready to defeat you!"
…
Mewtwo descended into the heart of the corrupt mass which plagued Ash's body and spirit, guided by the warm, glowing globules surrounding his body, representing the loving thoughts of Ash's friends. Somewhere in this hell they could sense Ash's spirit, and it was to that spirit Mewtwo would have to go.
To purify Ash, Mewtwo first needed to find the kernel of what made Ash Ketchum Ash Ketchum, the heart of his heart so to speak. Just as Latias had removed the evil from Richie by ripping out the central root from where it had been implanted in the boy in the first place, so would Mewtwo have to begin his purification where the power was most concentrated in Ash, where the evil one's own will was working on corrupting the boy's soul and turning him to full evil as the Alpha Ranger. Once that happened, Mewtwo did not think he would be strong enough to change him back.
He passed horrors that would drive the most courageous person insane from terror. He passed tortures so gruesome and inhuman most people would tear their eyes out after seeing such a sight. He saw cruelties so intricate and complex, that, along with going insane from the horror and complexity, one could not help but be impressed by how much thought and work had gone into crafting them. Mewtwo ignored all of them, as the Unown has taught him to, among other things, and wondered if they had anticipated this rescue mission. It wouldn't surprise him if they had.
He soon found what he was looking for, as the increased activity from the positive thoughts and memories indicated. After rounding a geometrical figure so multifaceted and impossible that Einstein would have torn his hair out and stabbed himself to death with a ballpoint pen from the attempt to comprehend it, was Ash's soul. It was so small and frail, a luminous figure pierced by millions of spines and tentacles from the pure, unadulterated feeling of evil surrounding him, the ends of said spines and tentacles anchored into the tiny object and spreading runners and roots in Ash's soul, growing inexorably as they infested him and fed him with feelings of anger, pain, anguish, despair, hatred, and the utter, utter meaninglessness of, well, everything. The chill which ran up Mewtwo's (imaginary) spine told him at once that this was the source of the corruption.
Some of the thoughts surrounding Mewtwo, overjoyed to see Ash, left orbit around the psychic and tried to make contact with the boy. The instant they approached the trapped spirit, more tendrils shot out from the heart of decay enshrouding Ash's soul and speared them, dragging the happy thoughts screaming into oblivion. The feeling of hatred and thirst for violence and destruction and loathing for all forms of life grew stronger, and the roots wormed themselves deeper into Ash.
Despite himself, Mewtwo shuddered. This was not going to be an easy task.
Carefully, he approached the tortured soul. The happy thoughts around him, repopulated by new ones generated by the minds of Misty, Phanphy and Togetic, stirred, but did not leave Mewtwo's presence, the horrific deaths of their siblings enough to teach them caution. Mewtwo kept all his senses on overdrive, constantly scanning the area for any sign of attack. None came, but that didn't mean there wasn't one in the works.
Cautiously, he extended an arm out to touch one of the slowly shrinking patches of spiritual essence which weren't covered in nastily sharp penetrating barbs…
And was buffeted back as a mind infinitely larger than his own became aware of him, and was angered by his presence. His astral form almost lost cohesion, and the happy thoughts, and connection to his friends outside, were nearly blown away by the enemy's fury.
Three eyes, each one the size of a large universe, appeared in a pyramid formation, with the tiny lost soul framed in the center. "HE IS MINE."
Mewtwo recovered quickly, although his mind reeled not just at the size of his foe's mental might, but at how much raw malice and disgust was present in that foe's voice. The enemy, the evil one, would like nothing more than to swallow all of existence and condemn every living soul throughout reality to an eternity of mind-bending and unimaginable suffering, to join all voices into one joyous song of misery, death, and despair. That same song was echoing, from all around him, and it took all the training the Unown had given him to keep Mewtwo from breaking down and retreating from fright. "He is not yours," Mewtwo said, steeling himself. "He belongs to his friends, his family, all those who have claimed a place in his heart."
"HOHOHOHO! IN THAT CASE, HE TRULY IS MINE. I HAVE ALREADY DUG INTO HIS SOUL. A PIECE OF ME IS INSIDE HIM NOW. A PIECE OF ME HAS ALWAYS BEEN INSIDE HIM, JUST LIKE ONE IS INSIDE OF YOU."
"That may be so, but you didn't earn it," Mewtwo agreed, forming a Shadow Ball. "More than just you is inside him. I represent the rest of Ash Ketchum's heart, the people he loves and cares for…and for them, I shall free him, no matter if hell bars the way!"
"HOHOHOHO! HELL DOES BAR THE WAY, FOOL…BUT VERY WELL. IF YOU INSIST. SAY THE MAGIC WORDS."
Mewtwo blinked, dissipating his Shadow Ball. "Wait, what?"
"SAY THE MAGIC WORDS," the evil one said innocently. (My, what an oxymoron) "AND I WILL LET HIM GO."
Mewtwo blinked in confusion. "Um…please?"
"OKAY." Instantly, all the roots and tendrils buried inside Ash's soul removed themselves, causing the spirit to cease its suffering and relax. "THAT WASN'T SO HARD, NOW WAS IT?"
"Er, no, I suppose not," said Mewtwo, still confused.
"WHILE I'M AT IT, I SUPPOSE I MIGHT AS WELL GET RID OF ALL THE EVIL AND CORRUPT POWER I'VE STUFFED IN HIM. CAN'T HAVE ANY OF THAT LINGERING AROUND, NOW CAN WE?"
"Er…no…" Mewtwo said, very, very confused.
"OKAY. HERE WE GO." Abruptly, all the pain and suffering and hatred and joyous destruction stripped itself from the mindscape, collecting itself in a tiny, crackling ball of malevolence, which floated over to Mewtwo. "HERE YOU GO. DISPOSE OF THIS SOMEWHERE, WILL YOU? CAN'T HAVE IT FLOATING ABOUT FREELY WHERE IT CAN CORRUPT SOMEONE ELSE, NOW CAN WE?"
"Ah, no," Mewtwo said, grabbing the evil orb and holding it away from him at arm's length, its very presence filling him with fear and disgust. "Um…thank you?"
"YOU'RE WELCOME," the evil one said sweetly. "SEE YOU TOMORROW AT THE FINAL BATTLE. HAVE FUN TILL THEN, YOU HEAR ME?"
"Uh…I shall try to," said Mewtwo, wondering if maybe he wasn't hallucinating all this and had in fact just gone insane from one of the many nightmarish impossibilities in this mindscape.
"OKEYDOKEY. TTFN, TATA FOR NOW!"
"Yes…" Mewtwo agreed slowly as the three eyes vanished. "Tata." Completely dumbfounded, he faded from the dreamscape, taking the evil ball with him. He left behind the good thoughts, severing his connection to Misty and the kids, allowing the thoughts to fly towards Ash's soul so they would revitalize it.
Once Mewtwo was completely and totally gone, the eyes reappeared as the happy thoughts were, with a surprised shout, utterly consumed. "HOHOHOHO. FOOL."
…
"Master, why did you-"
He laughed. "I have my reasons. Let us leave it at that, for now."
…
"Wait…you're calling us evil?" asked a confused cop. "But…I'm a police officer, see?" he said, thumbing his badge. "So, unless I were a dirty cop (which I'm not) that makes me a good guy!"
"Wrong!" Shining Ranger corrected, pointing his sword at the officer. "Every last one of you is evil!"
"And why is that, exactly?" Latias asked, narrowing her eyes.
"Because you are alive, of course!" the Ranger said, as if it were obvious.
They stared at him. "Huh?" said a confused May.
The Ranger gestured with his sword. "As long as a person is alive, they will be tempted to be evil! Their desire to live will cause them to do greedy and selfish things! So by removing the desire to live, there will be no more evil! Therefore, I will save everyone on Earth from evil by killing every last one of them!"
There was a long pause, as they stared at him incredulously. "…That is the absolute most fucked up reasoning I've ever heard," Lucy said flatly. "And I've heard a lot of stupid things in my life."
"Of course you'd say that, because you are alive!" Shining Ranger said patronizingly. "You'll thank me once you're dead!"
"…How can I thank you if I'm dead?" Lucy said in disbelief. "I'll be dead. I won't be able to thank anybody!"
"That's beside the point!" Shining Ranger said. "Even if it is a thankless job, I'll be satisfied knowing I have done the right thing!"
"How is killing everyone on earth just to stop them from maybe doing evil the right thing!" a disbelieving Sidney cried. "Most of those people are innocents who haven't done anything wrong!"
"Which is why they must be killed too," Shining Ranger said. "To prevent them from possibly causing evil in the future."
"That is so fucked up," Lucy repeated, shaking her head.
Crawdaunt nodded in agreement. "He's crazier than a sack of crazy Linoone who graduated from Crazy Linoone University during National Linoone Go Crazy Week." Corsola stared at him. "What?"
She sighed. "Nothing."
Latias' lip curled back in disgust. The aura she 'saw' for the Ranger was disgusting. It didn't reek of pure hatred and destructive desires like Alpha or Red Ranger's had, but of something almost worse: the foul odor of pride, of a mind so blinded by its own perceived brilliance that it could see nothing else but its own vision of reality. The 'Phoenetrice' (i.e. Mutant Blaziken), on the other hand, had the same feel as Alpha, (although a little less vile) which didn't surprise her much, and was only given a mere fraction of her attention as a result. She had seen all too many people like Ford in her days as Queen, among all the pompous politicians and leaders she had to deal with on a daily basis who were convinced that only they knew what was best for the people, instead of getting off their plush asses every now and then and actually asking the people what they needed so they could get a better idea of what was going on in a given situation and allow them make a truly fair decision. Ford was no different.
In fact, her distaste of Ford would have been enough to make her attack him, had Harrison not stumbled down the stairs and grabbed the armored Ranger's shoulder. "Dad, wait! Please, just stop this!"
Phoenetrice growled and flexed its burning arms, but both Harrison and the Shining Ranger ignored it. "Hmm? How do you mean?"
"Dad, this has gone on long enough! I'm tired of this superhero thing! I'm tired of your desire to save the world! All you're doing is making it worse!" Harrison said desperately.
The Ranger looked confused. "I…don't follow."
"Dad, all I'm asking is that you STOP this! Please, it's enough! More than enough people have died already! Just…just let it end, will you?" He started crying. "I just…I just want my father back!"
Time seemed to stop for a beat as Shining Ranger stared at his son, and everyone stared at Shining Ranger, wondering what the result of this sudden intervention would be. Latias' eyes narrowed at Ford, not trusting the man one bit, but willing to see if maybe, just maybe, his son's desperate pleas might be able to break through to the father beneath the armor.
All of a sudden, Shining Ranger chuckled and embraced Harrison. "I love you, son."
Everyone relaxed. Harrison sighed in relief and hugged his father back. Latias' eyes widened, sensing through the Ranger's aura what Ford was about to do. She lunged forward…
Just as the Shining Ranger drove his sword right through Harrison's stomach, yanking it upward and slicing through Harrison's chest and ripping his head off. It flew through the air and landed with a bloody thud on the arena floor below. "Which is why I killed you first," Shining Ranger said happily. "So you wouldn't be tempted to evil. Now you'll die pure and innocent, like you should be. Say hi to your mother for me when you get to the next world, will you?" He cheerfully pulled the headless body off his sword and tossed it over the side of the arena.
Latias' and Gardevoir's eyes flashed at the same time, and Harrison's descent slowed down in midair. The dragon, humanoid, and Togetic all rushed over to what was left of the teenager as he gently lowered to the ground. "Can you-" Togetic started.
"No," Latias said coldly. "No healer is that good." Gardevoir shook her head sadly.
Sadic growled. "Okay, now I'm getting seriously pissed off here! Not only did he just kill his son, which where I come from is strictly a no-no unless under specific circumstances, it was for no damn reason either!"
"Us killing him, however, would be for a good reason, right?" Crawdaunt asked, clacking his pincers, his grief at losing his own son aroused again. He was infuriated that anyone would ever think of killing their child so callously, after he had just lost his own so recently.
Charla agreed with Crawdaunt's sentiment, even though the child she had lost she had known for all of a few moments and had not been particularly attached to, it was the fact that she would never get to know that baby that hurt her. Her tail flame roared, growing bigger and hotter. She gently placed Charmander on the ground and kissed him on the forehead. "Dear," she said softly. "If you will excuse me, I must go kill that bad man up there."
Charmander nodded, understanding from his own memory that someone who intentionally killed their own child, rather than accidentally doing it as he had, was bad and needed to be punished. "Go."
Harrison's Blaziken, paralyzed with shock at the sudden death of his trainer, stared down at the headless, dead body of Harrison. With a roar of grief and rage, he leaped furiously at the Shining Ranger.
Phoenetrice grinned maniacally and thrust a talon forward, firing a ten-foot spear of flame at the enraged Blaziken. Before the fire could strike and incinerate him, a blue spherical shield formed abruptly around the Blaze Pokemon and protected him from the blast, as well as halting his suicidal lunge. Latias and Togetic, using their control over the Safeguard they had formed together, levitated the Blaziken away from the insane duo and set him down neatly on the arena floor.
Latias, eyes burning with white fire, glared at the Shining Ranger, as behind her the trainers and their remaining Pokemon prepared themselves for one last fight. Because of Ford, almost all of them had suffered this night, losing a friend or a family member due to the madman's machinations and insane dreams of heroism. "Enough people have died here today.
"But I don't think anyone would mind if two more inconsequential kills were added to that list."
"It is only EVIL that shall die this day!" Shining Ranger said proudly. "And to aid me…" He did a weird pose, slashing through the air with his sword before pointing it straight upward. "Shining Hero SUMMON!"
The sword ignited in a blaze of golden light at the same instant that Latias roared and unleashed a nova-hot stream of Dragonbreath at the false hero.
…
Mewtwo opened his eyes, removing his hands from Alpha and taking the ball of evil with him. "Well, that was a bit odd, but it went much better than I expected-" Mewtwo stopped, puzzled. Ash was still clad in the outfit of the Alpha Ranger.
He blinked in confusion. If he had just removed the power from him, why was Ash still Alpha? He looked down at the ball he had removed from the boy…and his face paled as he saw it to be a glowing iridescent ball of light instead of a pulsating, malevolent conglomeration of anger and hatred. "Oh no…"
"Nngh…" what's wrong?" Misty asked, rubbing some sleep out of her eyes as she woke up from her trance. "Did we save Ash?"
"No," the psychic said flatly. "I've been deceived. I haven't purified Ash, I've removed his soul!" He glanced down at Alpha, who was starting to stir. "Quickly, I must-"
"Shining Hero SUMMON!"
There was a flash of light, and Alpha was gone.
Togetic and Phanphy cried in alarm. "Ahh! Where'd he go?"
"Wherever it is, we must find him quickly!" Mewtwo said, furious at how easily he had been tricked. "Without Ash's soul in his body, Alpha, Ash's 'dark side', is all that remains! Whatever meager vestige of restraint Ash's soul may have had on him is now void!"
It was at this point they finally noticed how dark the room was, and how all the light seemed to be emanating from the golden figure standing on the edge of the arena wall, with the flaming monster behind him. There were several flashes of light, and the Pink, Yellow, Green, and Blue Poke Rangers appeared alongside the golden figure, along with Alpha, a confused Tuxedo Masquerain, and…Soldier Heart and Wisdom, who were naked and going at it like rabbits.
There were numerous yells of horror and arousal from the arena, and Brock fainted with a massive hemorrhaging nosebleed. Phanphy's eye twitched and more repressed memories started stirring. Thankfully, he passed out before he could remember any of them.
"Whoa," said an amazed Wes.
"Avert your eyes!" Zoro hissed, covering his own eyes as well as Wes'. "It is disrespectful!"
Latias gasped and quickly dissipated the Dragonbreath she had fired, not wanting to incinerate Tuxedo Masquerain or the Soldiers along with the evil Rangers. "DREW!" May cried.
"Huh? What am I doing up here?" asked the confused Tuxedo Masquerain. "And…GIRLS!" He got a nosebleed, just staring at the two ladies, who had yet to notice where they were.
"Hmmph, the evil in them has manifested as lust. I shall correct that!" Shining Ranger said, gesturing with his sword.
Abruptly, Soldier Heart and Wisdom were wearing their costumes. "Huh?" Heart said, feeling strange. "What just…" It was then she noticed that she and Wisdom were at the edge of an arena, with everyone staring at them, and only moments ago they had been having sex. "AHHH! Where are we!"
"I don't know," Wisdom said, pulling out her bubble gun. "But I want some answers!"
"Yeah, who are you, and where's Red? And who's that guy?" Yellow Ranger asked, pointing at Alpha.
"The Red Ranger is no longer with us…this is Alpha Ranger, his far more powerful replacement. I have summoned you all here to aid me in my quest to finally rid the world of evil forever!" Shining Ranger told them.
"Rid the world of evil? Is that possible?" wondered Green Ranger.
"I don't know…but if it is, I'm all for it!" said Pink Ranger.
"Don't listen to him!" Tuxedo Masquerain protested. "He's going to try to 'save the world' by killing everyone on it!"
"WHAT!" Heart and Wisdom cried in alarm.
"It's true, that's what I plan," Shining Ranger said without guilt or shame.
"Sounds good to me," said Yellow Ranger with a shrug. "If it'll rid the world of evil, I'm all for it!"
"I'm always for fighting evil!" Blue Ranger agreed.
"It'll make the world a better place if every evil person died!" Pink Ranger added.
"And we'll get to kill everyone on Earth. That's a definite bonus!" Alpha sneered.
The police gasped at the Rangers' unanimous condemnation of Earth. This was understandable, they had always thought of the Rangers as heroes, imagine how shocked they must feel to learn just what kind of people they really were.
"Then you'll have to do it without us!" Heart announced angrily. "There's no way we'll assist you in a plot to kill everyone!"
"That's right!" agreed Wisdom and Tuxedo Masuqerain. On the floor, the crystal glowed angrily at this.
"Hmmph. I'm disappointed in you three…Very well!" The chain on his sword shattered, and the Houndoom jaws opened wide, causing light to run down the length of his sword. "Shining Sabre!" He slashed out at the three renegades, creating a massive energy blade which would have sliced them in half…
Had not Mewtwo intervened and teleported them away at the last minute. "I think not," said the Psychic, as his body started burning with blue psychic flames. "This has gone on for long enough…we will not allow you to carry out your insane plans!" He was about to lash out with a mental strike which would utterly shatter the Shining Ranger…when the nearby crystal pulsed, and a spike of pain shot through his head, causing him to falter. "Wh-what?"
"Are you all right?" asked the alarmed Gardevoir.
He held his head, puzzled and a little sore. "Yes, I'm fine…but what…"
"Nothing will stop me in my glorious mission!" Shining Ranger declared, raising his sword in the air. "Rangers…attack!"
Five minutes of utter pwnage later…
The four regular Rangers were lying at various spots on the floor, moaning in pain. The Shining Ranger was slumped against a wall, his cape torn, his sword broken, and his shiny gold armor all but shattered after a joint assault from Latias, the recovered Mewtwo, Gardevoir, Pikachu, Sadic, Zoro, El Gato, Harrison's enraged Blaziken, and quite a few other people who were pissed off at him. He had put up a good fight, but with everyone teaming up on him he hadn't stood a chance. The room was much darker now as a result, but Latias' glow was able to illuminate the arena pretty well in Shining Ranger's place. Phoenetrice was currently beating the floor with his fists in pain as Charla held him in a leglock, and Charmander was gnawing on his head. Blaziken, who had helped subdue the fiend, growled then turned away.
As for Alpha...
"Ow, ow, ow!"
"That's for Kasurin…again!" Crawdaunt growled, pounding Alpha with a Crabhammer again.
"And Yellow!" Delcatty screeched, slashing at his chest with her claws.
"And Munchlax!" Combusken said angrily, hitting him in the side with a Blaze Kick.
"And my Seviper and Gyarados!" said Lucy, ramming her spiked boot into Alpha's groin.
"And Crobat!" Brock joined in, kicking Alpha's sides whenever there was an opening.
"And for being a complete and total asshole, along with everything else!" Misty agreed, pounding him with a spare mallet.
"Don't forget to leave some of him for us!" Sidney called, growling.
"We'd like a piece of him too for killing Steven!" Phoebe agreed.
"Do you think we should stop them?" Latias asked Mewtwo, looking away from the sight of virtually every Pokemon in the room beating up Alpha for all the friends he had hurt and killed. "I mean, if we let them keep doing this, Ash might not have a body to return to anymore."
"I'm not worried," said Mewtwo with a shrug, glancing at the quivering soul in his hand. "If worse comes to worse, I can always clone him a new body."
"Won't that clone develop a soul of its own, though?" Bayleef asked.
"Not if I grow the new body around Ash's," Mewtwo said. "I've done it a few times, actually. I'd like to think I'm rather experienced when it comes to cloning."
"Okay, I think that's enough of that," Wes said, pushing the enraged group away from the beaten Alpha. "Keep going, and you'll cross the line to where you're as bad as he is."
"I don't particularly care," Crawdaunt growled.
"But I do," said Corsola, firing one last spike at Alpha for good measure. "Even if he did kill two of my friends."
"…Fine," Crawdaunt grumbled, scurrying away, still feeling an empty spot in his heart where his son had once been.
"Are you all quite through?" said the ranking police officer, who was in charge now that Jenny was dead. "Good. In that case, I'm putting all of you," she said, referring to the Rangers and Phoenetrice. "Under arrest, for reckless endangerment, illegal experimentation, murder, and conspiring to wipe out all life on Earth." She shook her head in disgust. "And to think, we once looked up to you all…cuff 'em." She paused, glancing at Phoenetrice, who Charla and Charmander weren't letting go of any time soon. "Don't think we have anything for that guy, though, that won't melt from heat…"
"I believe I can handle that," Wes said with a smirk, raising his left arm to show the Snag Device on it, which he had been wearing under his sleeve all along and somehow went unnoticed by all. He popped a Pokeball out of his pocket, flipped it in the air, and caught it in his gauntleted hand. He clenched it, causing the ball to glow as his Snag Device poured energy into it. "Snag Ball, go!" He hurled the spherical capture device at the mutant Blaziken.
Charla and Charmander quickly scrambled off as the Pokeball struck Phoenetrice and snapped open, shooting out a big yellow energy hand which grabbed the Blaziken and dragged him, howling and screaming, into the Pokeball, which snapped shut instantly. It fell to the ground and started wobbling, the white button on its side flashing red as Phoenetrice fought to escape from the Pokeball. All watched with hushed breath, waiting as the button kept flashing…flashing…flashing…
With a satisfying tone of finality, the ball stopped wriggling and the red light went off. Phoenetrice had been snagged.
"Wow," said the impressed cop. "Never seen something like that before."
"Yeah, well," Wes said, bragging. "I'm just glad I found a use for the old thing. Hasn't seen much action since I used it to capture and subdue the toughest Pokemon of a high-ranking crime syndicate, leading to its downfall."
"Really?" said the interested officer. "Hmm…wonder if we could get some of those down at the station…"
"How could this happen?" Shining Ranger lamented as he was yanked to his feet, his arms pulled and handcuffed behind him. "My mission is right and just! How could I fail-"
He was broken off when Blaziken, still irate for his trainer's death, punched Shining in the gut, causing him to double over in pain. The Blaze Pokemon pulled back his fist for another punch, when Mewtwo intervened, paralyzing the Blaziken with his psychic hold. "That is enough," he told Blaziken. "You have already had your shot at him. You have already beaten him. You have had your vengeance."
"But he's still alive, and my trainer's still dead!" Blaziken protested.
"Yes, and will killing Shining bring him back?" Mewtwo pointed out. The Blaze Pokemon fell silent. "There has been enough death this night. Let it end here."
"…" Blaziken jerked as Mewtwo let go of him. He gave Shining Ranger a sullen look…then sighed and walked away.
"That goes for all of you as well," Mewtwo said, turning to the other Pokemon. "You have had your fair share of retribution for the deaths of your own comrades. But in the end, it means nothing, and deep down, you all know this. Hurting those responsible will not save those who are gone. Killing them will not bring your loved ones back. Revenge is, in the end, ultimately pointless. Whatever anger you still harbor, let it go. It will do you, and those you wish to avenge no good. I speak from experience" Lucy nodded sagely, agreeing perfectly with this.
They were silent as they mulled this over. "He has a point," Politoed announced suddenly. "They wouldn't want us to stay this angry and vengeful, would they?" Delcatty shook her head, thinking sadly how Golduck had not been clever enough to think of such a wish, and Crawdaunt thought to himself that Kasurin, being too much of a namby-pamby, would have wanted him to just let it go…and the crazy thing was, the boy might have a point. "There's still plenty of reasons to be happy, even if they're not with us anymore. The sun will rise again in the morning, like it always does," the frog continued. "Let's watch when it happens, okay?"
"Fuck…can't believe this is happening…" Alpha groaned as he was pushed, limping, towards the exit. "I'm going to fucking kill every last one of you, you know that?"
"Yeah, yeah, keep going," said the cop behind him, shoving him again.
"What are we gonna do about him?" Brock wondered. "He's still got Ash's body."
Misty glanced at the shining ball of light in her hands. Mewtwo had handed it to her before going to stop Blaziken, saying 'it felt better with her'. "Oh, I'm not worried. We'll think of something."
"Yeah," agreed Pikachu, hopping on her shoulder. "Don't worry Pikapi, we'll get you fixed up in no time!"
"So if you see some bright light, stay away from it!" Togetic recommended. "There's no reason for you to leave just yet, right?"
"We still need you, after all," Phanphy said cheerfully. "We love you, daddy!"
At this, the soul-ball stopped trembling a little, and brightened visibly.
"To think," Tuxedo Masquerain mused as the four Poke Rangers were led after Alpha. "Not too long ago, I was just like them. And I might be, again."
"No, you won't," May said confidently. "I'll make sure of it."
"And we will too," Heart said, putting a hand on his shoulder.
"Yes, you didn't forget we're in the same boat as you, did you?" Wisdom asked, taking his other shoulder. "Don't worry. We'll find a way to fix this."
Tuxedo Masquerain flushed. "…Thanks, girls."
Zoro, watching from nearby, chuckled. "Way to go, chico."
Sidney sighed, staring unhappily at Steven's body. "We're going to need a new champ."
"The new guy won't be the same as Steven, though," Phoebe said sadly.
Sidney shrugged. "We'll get used to him…or her…I'm sure. That's how it always is."
"I guess…" Phoebe said unhappily. "But I suppose…that's just the way life works, doesn't it?"
"Pretty much, yeah," Sidney agreed.
"So much bloodshed…so much violence…so much suffering…" Annabel said, shaking her head miserably at all the bloodstains and corpses on the arena floor.
"You couldn't have known about it," Lucy assured her. "It's not your fault."
Annabel nodded. "I know. But now…it's over. Maybe now, this Tower can truly be what I always thought it was…a place for trainers to test their skills, without the terrible secret looming over it." She smiled, her outlook on the future bright.
"How could this be?" Shining moaned as he was led ungracefully towards the exit with the other Rangers. "How can it end like this? Oh great HERO, please give me a sign!"
"Forget it, bub," said the officer who had him under custody. "That thing's kaput. The only thing it can do now is…" He stopped, stunned, as the crystal suddenly lit up and started to rise into the air. "Act…weird?"
Mewtwo gasped and clutched his head, feeling another stab of pain. "Wh-what the?"
All of them instantly felt a wave of mind-numbing fear as an unearthly chill ran down their spines. Latias' feathers ruffled, and she bared her teeth at the crystal. "It's him," she hissed, recognizing the aura around the jewel. No one else could possibly have one as vile or twisted. "He's here!"
And then, to most everyone's amazement, the small jewel fragment laughed. "That is correct," a voice emanated from the shard, its utter loathing of them and all life in general dripping from every syllable, a dissonant chorus of pain and misery audible in the background. "I thought it was about time I intervened."
"Who are you?" Shining Ranger asked in wonder. "That voice…so melodious, so perfect! What divine spirit are you?"
"I am one who seeks to cleanse the Earth of life, and render it barren and empty, so nothing may ever sprout here again," the voice of the evil one told him. "I gave you the power you now hold, and can grant you more if you will assist me in my quest. After all, if there was no more life, there is no more evil, correct?"
"Don't do it!" Latias yelled at Shining Ranger. "He's lying!"
"Yeah, weird floating crystals that talk are almost always pure evil on principle," Wes added.
"Of course I will join you!" Shining Ranger said, ignoring them. "I will do anything to rid the world of evil!"
"Open your eyes, Senor Ford!" Zoro cried. "This entity is clearly El Diablo himself!"
"Hmm, that's a name I haven't used for a while…" the voice mused. "But it is irrelevant. He is far too deep in madness to see the truth. And in the end, evil is only a matter of perception, anyway. You see me as evil because the majority of my values and pastimes involve annihilation, inflicting pain, destruction, torture, etc. I see that almost everything you mortals do could be interpreted as evil under the right context. Ford is too far gone to see how skewed his own definitions of evil, and how to get rid of it, is. Such is so common among those whom I take interest in…you were not very different from Ford yourself not so long ago, Mewtwo."
His head still throbbing with pain, the Psychic managed to respond. "Those days are long past, evil one."
"Are they? Hmm. We shall see. In the meantime…" The crystal turned its attention back to the Rangers. The cops, feeling so terrified they voided themselves as the entity's attention passed over them, quickly collapsed to the ground in fear. "Shining Ranger, will you serve me so that we shall eradicate this Earth?"
"To rid the world of all evil, I will do anything!" Shining Ranger said zealously.
"But-" May started.
"Oh, give it up, we tried that already," Tuxedo Masquerain snapped. "He's not listening."
"Alpha Ranger, will you serve me if it will allow you to destroy all you once held dear…and to repay the debt owed by creating you in the first place?"
"Hell yes!" Alpha said gleefully. "I've been waiting all my life for this!"
"Then come both of you, into my arms." Lightning bolts shot out of the crystal and struck Alpha and Shining Ranger, causing them to cry in pain and surprise before vanishing in a flash of light. A third lightning bolt shot out and struck the Snag Ball containing Phoenetrice, causing it to vanish as well.
"Are they dead?" Bayleef asked, startled.
"No," Latias corrected her friend. "Just transported somewhere." She growled at the crystal. "What are you up to!"
"To finish what I started all those years ago…you remember, do you not? You were there, I recognize the scent of your soul…heheheheh…I saw your mate in the flesh not too long ago…enjoy whatever happiness results from that reunion, for it will not last long." Enraged, Latias launched a burst of Dragonbreath at the crystal. The white flame formed itself into the shape of a roaring dragon, which lunged at the shard…and dissipated completely with a simple pulse from the crystal. "Temper, temper, Latias. That was an act unbefitting of a queen."
The crystal then turned its attention on the soul in Misty's arms. It screamed, a sound reminiscent of wind chimes jangling against each other, and promptly flew down her shirt, causing her eyes to bulge and would have sent everyone else laughing if they weren't scared stiff from being in the presence of pure evil. (That didn't stop Brock from feeling a hint of jealousy, though) "Do not think the freedom I have given you will last long, mortal. It is no more than a loan with quite a lot of interest behind it…when I come to collect; I seriously doubt you will be able to repay the debt."
"You'll have to go through us first!" Pikachu said, brandishing his sword at the crystal, and trying to hide how scared he truly was. It was all he could do to refrain from leaping down somebody's shirt as well, but that would make him look very foolish in front of Sadic, wouldn't it?
"That shouldn't take long then, approximately a thousandth of a second. Nine hundredths if you are more resilient, which I seriously doubt." Chuckling in amusement at Pikachu's shocked expression, the crystal floated towards the ceiling. "It's been entertaining terrorizing all of you, but if you'll excuse me I must be off."
"Wait!" Blue Ranger cried. "What about us?"
"What about you?" asked the evil one, somewhat annoyed.
"We want to destroy the world too!"
"Yeah, we can help!" Yellow Ranger said.
"If we weren't in handcuffs, that is," Green Ranger said. "I don't suppose you could take them off?"
"Hmm…" The crystal brightened, and from the way its aura writhed Latias knew something bad was about to happen. "I apologize. How could I possibly forget about you?" The jewel flashed, and the Poke Ranger's heads exploded, showering blood, plastic, metal, and bits of brains everywhere. "There. Now you're dead," the crystal said pleasantly, as everyone else gasped in horror. "And while I'm at it, I should probably deal with you three as well," it said, turning to Tuxedo Masquerain and the Soldier Scouts, whose eyes widened in terror.
"NO!" Latias quickly threw up a Safeguard around the trio, and the horrified May as well, as the crystal flashed. Mewtwo made to help her, only to feel another crippling stab of pain in his head which caused him to fall to his knees. Alarmed, Gardevoir helped him up, the world's most powerful Pokemon feeing surprisingly weak. Ugh…what is happening to me?
Latias' shield, sadly, was completely ineffective. Tuxedo Masquerain, Soldier Heart, and Soldier Wisdom's heads all exploded. May, who had been the closest to the green haired ex-coordinator when he spontaneously combusted, got the worst of the gore shower. She stood there, eyes wide, hyperventilating from the abrupt, violent, and messy death she had just been millimeters away from.
"There. That's everything. Now I must be going, and I would suggest you all leave as well, if you wish to face me and my minions tomorrow for the destined showdown foretold by the Unown. The missile I fired from orbit will be here in approximately thirty seconds, and when it hits this island and everything on it will be vaporized. Farewell." In a flash, the crystal vanished.
As the devil's last words sank in, mass panic spread in. May started screaming her head off, the cops voided themselves again and ran for the exit, Pokemon and humans started gibbering and running about, certain they were about to die, until Mewtwo, his head feeling remarkably clearer now that the crystal was gone, roared, "WE SHALL NOT DIE THIS DAY!" and slammed his hands onto the ground.
A wave of blue light shot out from his fists, encompassing the entire arena floor and turning it a bright cerulean hue. The wave spread out from the tower, covering the entirety of the island's surface, startling cop, partygoer, trainer, and Pokemon alike.
They felt a sudden moment of weightlessness, then a sharp tug from somewhere around their navel, and every living thing on Battle Frontier vanished without a trace. (Sad to say, those who were dead, or in Pokeballs attached to dead bodies, such as the ones belonging to Tuxedo Masquerain and the Soldier Scouts, were not picked up by the teleport and left behind to face their doom.)
A few seconds after that, a missile roared through the skies like a meteor and drove into Battle Tower, engulfing the entire island in an earth-shaking explosion.
…
The teleport, usually a rather smooth transition from one spot to another, felt rather prolonged and rough, probably because it had been a huge mass transit, snatching up a few thousand individuals at once and plopping them down about half a dozen kilometers away.
The instant they rematerialized, on the northern beach of Ever Grande City (scattering all the confused partygoers, trainers, Pokemon, and cops over a wide distribution and crushing quite a few sandcastles, interrupting a couple of weddings and beach parties in the process) Mewtwo gasped and fell to his knees panting. "Nothing to worry about," he quickly reassured Gardevoir. "Just used up a lot of energy…I'll be fine in a-"
It was then the missile struck Battle Tower. The explosion was tremendous, and everyone on the northern beach could not help but stop and stare at the huge mushroom cloud rising from what had once been one of their city's main attractions and sources of income. "Dude," said several particularly stoned drunks or druggies, "This year's fireworks are the best ever!"
They forgot about the brilliant explosion right away, not just because of the wave of heat and force which rippled from the blast over them, causing the earth to tremble, glass to shatter, and car alarms to go off, but also because the explosion had caused a tremendous water displacement in the form of a mile-high tsunami which was now roaring towards the city, drawing away water from Ever Grande's artificial shores and causing it to rise several feet above the receding waves for a moment (seeing as how it was a floating land mass attached to the seafloor by numerous pillars and supports) as the tsunami added all that water to its mass.
A few foolish surfers immediately jumped into the water and started paddling towards the wave which would completely annihilate their city, thinking of nothing but how sweet a ride it would be.
Gyarados' (who had appeared near his trainer when the teleport ended, even though he had been in the Battle Tower's plaza when it happened) eyes bulged. "Wow," he said simply. "That is one big f'ing wave."
"And it's coming right for us!" Brock screamed. "We've traded one death for another! Oh well…Annabel, will you have sex with me before the wave hits so I don't die a virgin?" This resulted in him getting pounded by Lucy, unsurprisingly.
Misty hugged Ash's trembling soul to her chest in fright, wondering if she was about to join him. "Mewtwo, can you-"
"Give me a second," he said, catching his breath. "I can-"
He was cut off when a white and red blur shot out to sea, kicking up sand and water in their faces as it rocketed towards the wave at subsonic speeds, very nearly creating a sonic boom in its wake.
Togetic gasped. "Aunt Latias!"
"She's going to take that thing on head-on!" Pikachu realized. "But it's much bigger than the one in Alto Mare, and she had her brother to help her then!"
"Mewtwo, you have to-" Bayleef started.
"Do nothing," the Psychic said, shakily standing up, leaning on Gardevoir a little for support as he regained his strength. "This is something she must do on her own. If she fails, I will do what I can to save this city…but I assure you that I am not doing another mass teleport like that last one any time soon, I'm not immortal after all."
"You're not?" asked a surprised Crawdaunt.
"No, my body's actually deteriorating at a fairly slow rate due to an error in the cloning process used to create me as well as the vast amount of power my body is forced to house, limiting my lifespan to a few decades (if that) unless I either stop using my powers all together (which slightly speeds up the rate of deterioration which each use) or I find a way to permanently stabilize my DNA." He looked around, surprised by everyone except Gardevoir's (who just seemed sad) look of shock. "What, I never mentioned that before?"
…
She had come full circle.
This was her fifth time doing this. Two times in her last life, two times in this life, and right now.
The first two times had been to break up tidal disturbances engineered by Kyogre in attempts to destroy her and Rayquaza's kingdom. Latios had been by her side then.
The third time was when Anny and Oakley had destroyed their uncle's Soul Dew. She and her brother Latios had flown out to stop the wave. But she had not been who she was supposed to be yet, so failed to gather the required energies, forcing Latios to sacrifice himself.
The fourth time she had been alone, but was still not the Latias she was supposed to be. Because of that, even though she had her brother's crystal fragment transferred to her when Latios had died, she was unable to use it to stop the wave, and Alto Mare was destroyed.
The fifth time, she was who she was supposed to be. She was Latias, wholly and completely. She was both Queen of dragons and child of man, just as her brother had been both Prince of dragons and child of man.
She knew now that just as she had returned to the time stream to find her King, Latios had followed her when he had inevitably died, to protect his sister. He was gone now, fully crossed over to outside of time, but he was still here. He was still inside her, a part of her through the memories she had of him in both lives and the power he had given her. Latios had never left her, not even when she had failed on that awful night which had started her journey, because just as she had not known the Ghost King for who he was, so did she not know herself or her brother for who they were. Had she been able to do so, the city of Alto Mare might still stand this day.
But if it had, would she be here now? If it had, would she have met all her wonderful friends and evolved into the person she was now? Second-guessing history was not for those confined to the timeline, she decided. Only the Unown, or others outside of time, would know for sure.
What was past was past. She had failed to save one city, and now would save another. This time, she would not fail. She was and was not the person she had been a few months ago. She was and was not the person she had been a hundred thousand years ago. She was, simply put, Latias. That was who she was.
She could sense them all around her. The Latias' and Latios' from the time between then and now, her children and her ancestors at once. There was her brother, flying alongside her, his red eyes filled only with love and the desire he had always had to protect her. There were Bianca, Lorenzo, Marcella, Vincentio, and the rest of her human family, flying on invisible wings to keep up with the rest of the pack. There was her King, at once somewhere else in this world and by her side, a golden-eyed memory, one as close to her as her own shadow.
They were here, had been there, would always be there. They were inside her and alongside her. They were her family, her memories, her dreams. They were Latias. She was Latias.
Her journey had come full circle, and yet it was not over. As Sadic had told Pikachu, and Vincentio himself had once told her, there were no endings or beginnings, only transitions. Existence was a journey with no start and no conclusion, an eternity of travel through worlds both physical, metaphysical, and spiritual, constantly learning more about one self, about the world, about reality. But, for the moment, she had reached the end in a sense, this was the transition point between one journey and the next. One that would be harder and more challenging than anything she had faced in the past.
And she was ready for it. This knowledge suffused her with a warm calm, a calm that spread throughout her body and radiated outwards as the ghosts of her memories faded, leaving Latias alone—no, she had never been alone—as her body turned into a sphere of glorious light. The light shot forwards, towards the crushing wave of destruction which raced towards the shoreline and her friends. The light crashed into the raging wall of water, burying itself deep within the heart of the tidal surge.
And then, when the moment was right, Latias released her power in a colossal blast of psychic power.
"LUSTERRRRRR…PURGE!"
…
Cacturne's eyes widened as she stared out the window. "Well, that's not something you see everyday…"
Wobbuffet did not respond to her comment, or to what was going on outside. She had not expected him to. Even so, she wished that he would do something other than stare at that crystal in his hand all day…
…
The people gathered on the shoreline, standing on the rooftops, staring from their windows and balconies, watched in awe as the colossal wave split right down the middle where the magical glowing ball had flown into it, a beam of light shining up into the heavens as the wave collapsed upon itself, its rage ceasing as abruptly as it had started. The waters still rushed towards the fragile island, but as a gentle surge rather than a force of pure destruction. All Mewtwo needed do to keep the sea from washing over them and flowing into the city streets was to form a force field around the island's northern edge, deflecting the tide and allowing the waters to flow back into the hole which had been formed by Battle Frontier's destruction, creating a large whirlpool off in the distance which sucked up the shattered remains of the monorail system, which had been totally devastated by the massive tsunami.
The island was tugged slightly by the whirlpool's current, but its supports were strong, and the city stayed fast. Mewtwo soon lowered the shield, and the much-reduced tide came back in, lapping at their feet as it rose onto the beach. Charla held Charmander above the water in distaste, and made sure to keep her flaming tail well above the nasty wetness. Out to sea, the beam of light died down, leaving them staring out at the empty stretch of ocean where Battle Frontier had once been. Richie, staring out to sea in disgust, turned and ran into the city streets, cursing the dragon furiously and weeping bitter tears for the power he had lost.
"That was…" Togetic started, awed.
"Incredible," Misty finished.
Bayleef nodded, astounded. Yes, she had seen Latias change a suffering, wingless Charizard into an egg with minimal effort, and whup the Alpha Ranger's rear, but that somehow felt a heck of a lot different than watching her single-handedly cripple a mile-high tsunami which would have shattered Ever Grande to pieces.
"Wow," said Brock, simply. May would have said something too, were she not still traumatized and covered in gore from the boy she had been crushing on.
"Dios mio…what power…" said Zoro, shaking his head in amazement. El Gato took his hat off and wiped some sweat from his brow.
"Was that…my daughter?" Ho-Oh, who had been released by Wes in case Latias failed to stop the wave.(Wes was the kind of guy who always had a plan B). "That was…beautiful…" Once more, the phoenix felt a deep sorrow for what he had missed out on by not being a part of the life of his child.
"Where's Latias?" Pikachu asked suddenly. "Did she-" He broke off, recalling painfully how Latios had died the last time there was a big tidal wave defeated by a ball of light.
"Nah, she's okay," Sadic said, shaking her head. "A girl can tell these things. She's all right."
"She is indeed," agreed Mewtwo. "And yet, we should retrieve her. She is tired after an effort such as the one she just performed, and needs to rest somewhere where she doesn't run the risk of drowning or getting eaten by an oceanic predator. I would fetch her myself," he admitted. "But…" He flinched and leaned more heavily against a surprised Gardevoir. "I am tired as well. I am not used to being on the material plane for so long after spending so much time with the Unown. That, and the fact that in the last hour I've performed several mass teleports, broken down a very powerful force field, and delved into Hell itself to retrieve a soul, has taken its toll on me."
"Then we'll go get her," Misty announced. "Gyarados and I can go out and get her back within half an hour, right Gyarados?"
"Yeah, I can easily do that," the sea serpent said, lowering his head. "Hop on." Misty, still carrying Ash's soul, climbed onto her Pokemon's head. Togetic, as always, fluttered after her, alighting on her shoulder.
"I'm coming too," Bayleef said, vaulting herself up with her vine whips. "I missed the last ride because there were too many other passengers, and had to fly Air Charizard again. Plus, Latias is my friend, and I want to be there to help her out, just like she's helped me out twice now tonight."
The redhead nodded and turned to her other friends on the beach. "We'll be back soon," Misty told them. "Head back to the hotel and rest up, this has been…" She winced, recalling yet again seeing Golduck and Kasurin's painful deaths by electroshock. "This has been a long night." Gyarados started levitating out over the ocean.
"W-wait!" Ho-Oh cried suddenly. "I…" He grimaced and swallowed. "…I'd like to come too."
Wes' eyebrows raised. "Well, Ho-Oh!" he said in mock amazement. "What's this I'm hearing? Actual concern for a female's well-being?"
"Shut up!" Ho-Oh snarled, smacking Wes with a wing. "Misognyism be damned, she's still my daughter, and as a father it's my responsibility to care for her!"
Mewtwo nodded. "In that case, go. I think she'll be pleased to see you."
Ho-Oh grunted and kicked off, intentionally blowing sand in Wes' face, who flinched but still smirked, as he flapped his wings and glided out to Gyarados, Togetic and Misty. The small group then proceeded together out to sea, in the direction of where Battle Frontier had once been.
"This is going to be one hell of a report when I get back to the station," the leading police officer said, shaking her head. "Oy. I'd better go round up the others and head back…it's been a long night."
"We'll go with you," Sidney said, as Glacia emerged from the still rather confused crowd of teleportees to join them. "We'll need to make a report as well at League headquarters…they'll need to know that Steven's…" He clammed up, unable to say anymore, while Glacia looked at him in confusion and a hint of worry.
The officer nodded. "Your help finding the others—and breaking up and controlling this crowd, I suppose--would be greatly appreciated." They headed off.
Annabel, Lucy, and the rest of the Frontier
Brains stared out to sea. "And just like that…it's gone,"
Tucker said in wonder. "Our job. Our home. Battle Frontier is
gone."
"And so is Mr. Ford," Annabel added.
"Good riddance," said Lucy with a shrug. "The bastard used us to promote his stupid hero factory…no offense, Noland."
"None taken," said the former factory leader with a shrug.
Brandon shook his head and started taking off his priestly robes. "That does it, screw Ra. I'm not worshipping a god who blows up my pyramid just because my magic rod got broken. I think I'll become the High Priest of Bahamut or Odin instead, I hear the babes in Valhalla are to die for, literally." His comrades sweatdropped.
Greta sighed miserably. "Great…there goes my pavilion…and all the credit I had run up at the gambling lounge…"
"Attachment to material possessions leads only to strife and misery," Spenser said sagely. "Although I am somewhat miffed that my palace is gone, my favorite staff was still in there…" Everyone facefaulted.
"Well, now that they're off to get Latias…" Mewtwo abruptly stood up, not looking in the slightest bit weary or tired.
"Hey!" Brock realized. "You're not-"
"Tired? No, I just pretended to be to convince Ho-Oh to do something nice for his daughter, if I had to watch one family be destroyed tonight, I could at least try to heal another," Mewtwo said with a smirk. "That, and because it would allow me to have some private time with Gardevoir." The humanoid Pokemon beside him giggled at this, blushing under her mask. "We'll see you back at the hotel."
Brock blinked, and then shook his head ruefully. "You horny bastard…"
Well," Mewtwo said innocently. "At least I have a mate." Brock's eye twitched, while the others snickered. "Come along now, dearest," Mewtwo said, leading Gardevoir away. "We have much catching up to do."
"Hmm…that reminds me…" Crawdaunt said, scuttling over to Corsola. "Wanna continue what we were doing in the bathroom at the party?" Phanphy, who happened to be nearby when this was said, twitched violently as another repressed memory struggled to rear its ugly head, before thankfully going back to sleep.
Corsola stared at him in disbelief. "Crawdaunt, your son's been dead for less than half an hour and already you want to have sex!"
Crawdaunt shrugged. "It's how I deal with grief, other than beating the crap out of someone. Did the same thing when my dad got caught by that lobster trap." He shook his head sadly. "Poor dad…I told him the Pokedoll Luvdisc they baited the trap with was too cute to be the real thing, but he wouldn't listen. Next thing he knew, he was being served up for dinner at the local seaside restaurant…poor dad. They didn't even care that he was allergic to butter, too."
Corsola sighed. "Oh, all right. Maybe it'll make me feel better too."
"Kay. Hey, Delcatty?" The sullen pink cat looked up. "Me and Corsola are gonna have sex, wanna join us?"
"…" Delcatty meowed piteously, and then slowly walked over to them, feeling like she had no other choice. Without her Yellow, her life seemed so meaningless. What else could she do now that he was gone?
"Great, I knew you'd want to!" Crawdaunt said cheerfully. "Okay girls, let's go back to the hotel, the pool there is heated."
"We're not using another bathroom?" Corsola asked as they walked away.
"Nah, one bathroom a night is enough for me," he replied before they were gone.
"Hey Pikachu, race you back to the hotel!" Sadic said energetically.
He sweatdropped. "By 'race', do you mean you hunt me through the streets, toying with me and causing my adrenaline to rush, before finally cornering me and eating and/or mating with me?"
"Yes."
"Do I have a choice?"
"No, not really."
Pikachu grunted. "Eh, fine. Can I at least have a head start?"
"You have ten seconds," she told him. He immediately took off. Ten seconds later, the Manyula was in hot pursuit, purring happily.
"Have fun playing Hide and Seek!" Phanphy said naively, waving his trunk goodbye.
"Ah, love…" Politoed said with a happy sigh. "I hope that one day I shall be similarly blessed. Oh well." With nothing better to do, he started clapping like he usually did.
"We should get going too, Charmander," Charla said, nuzzling her age regressed lover happily. "It's probably way past your bed time."
"Charlaaaaa!" Charmander whined. "Just because my body's regressed doesn't mean my mind—ooh, a Butterfree!" Phanphy, also seeing the Butterfree, squealed and began to chase it, resulting in him running right into a lamppost and knocking himself out. "So pretty…Charla? Why are you laughing?"
Brock blinked, looked around, and suddenly realized that he was almost completely alone. "Guys?" He turned around, looking about the beach, which amazingly enough didn't look nearly as crowded as it had been a few minutes ago. "Wes?" Wes had been grabbed by a sobbing and heartsick Rui, and had taken her back to the hotel, leaving Espeon behind so Ho-Oh would know where he'd gone. "Zoro?" Zoro had gone off with the Frontier Brains to get something to drink (in Lucy's words, "If it doesn't make me blind after two glasses I'm going to feed the bartender to my Steelix. Or something."). The police had gone to find their missing colleagues and help organize the crowd with the help of confused rescue officials who showed up at the scene moments after the tsunami was dissipated, expecting there to be far more casualties than a big fat zero. The Elite trainers had gone to help them. That left Brock pretty much by himself on the beach. He didn't count May or her Pokemon, because May was currently sitting on the sand sobbing while being comforted by her Pokemon (and he thought she was too plain for him to try to take advantage of in her state of emotional distress), and he didn't count Politoed because he was having too much fun clapping by himself. "Oh well, at least I've still got you, right Crobat?" There was no response. Brock looked around then checked his sole Pokeball. "Crobat?" His purple bat was nowhere to be seen. It was then that Brock remembered that Crobat was dead, so would not be showing up anytime soon. Feeling miserable and lonely, Brock sat down in the sand, a deep pout on his face.
Politoed waddled over, still clapping, in an attempt to cheer him up. With a sigh, Brock started clapping along with the frog, having nothing better to do.
…
When Latias opened her eyes, she saw the stars proud and bright in the night sky. Well, I suppose that's a pleasant side effect of blowing up the island, Latias thought to herself. Once the smoke from the fireworks and the big explosion are gone, you can actually see the stars for a change. She giggled at this thought, slightly giddy from exhaustion. She had to use a lot of power to stop that wave.
She noticed that although she was damp and cold, she was not nearly as wet as she should have been, seeing as how she was in the ocean. She also did not feel the gentle rocking of waves around her or the wetness of water, which indicated she was not currently in the water. That, and the fact that she could feel the surface she was lying on was solid, smooth, slick, and oily, confirmed this suspicion.
Rolling over (feeling woozy from fatigue) she looked down and saw she was resting on a sloping, almost spherical dark blue shape. Two beady black eyes, set far apart from each other, rolled up to look at her. She blinked. The eyes blinked. "Hello," she said.
"Hello," the Pokemon beneath her said, his deep voice resonating through his skin into her body and causing her to tingle, nearly making her laugh. "What's a pretty thing like you doing out here?"
She blinked. "Saving a city from a giant wave," she said innocently.
"Ah. Okay," said the Wailmer. "Do you do that often?"
"Not that often, no," she said. "Although it's sort of in my job description."
"And do you always faint after doing it?"
"If the wave's big enough, yes."
"Huh," he said. "Doubt I could Surf a wave as big as that one."
"No," she agreed. "You couldn't." She glanced around the horizon wearily. "Oh look!" she said, spotting Ho-Oh and Gyarados approaching from the distance. "Those are my friends! Can you take me to them?"
"Okay." The Wailmer flexed its tail, paddling swiftly towards the flying sea serpent and phoenix. Latias was almost lulled to sleep by the rhythmic motions of the whale's body undulating beneath her, but knew if she did she might fall off, and inconvenience the nice Wailmer who had rescued her.
Soon enough, the whale had been spotted by Gyarados and Ho-Oh, and both of them flew lower, hovering above the water's surface. Ho-Oh, being a bird, had to circle, but stayed very close. "Latias!" he cried. "Are you all right?"
How sweet! She thought, touched and still a bit delirious from exhaustion. He actually cares about my health! "I'm fine, da!" she called up to him.
"You look like a mess," Bayleef joked from Gyarados' head, amused. "All damp and soaked and covered in wet down."
"You try stopping a giant tidal wave all by yourself and see how good you look when you're done!" Latias responded good-naturedly.
Gyarados lowered his head and gently picked Latias up in his jaws. The serpent's warm mouth and tongue felt good against her cold skin. "Thank you for helping me!" she said to the Wailmer.
"Eh, don't mention it. Nice meeting you!" He said, submerging himself.
"You know, I think a Wailmer was one of the Pokemon who brought you to us when we first met, after the Soul Dew broke," Misty recalled. "Wonder if they're related?"
"Probably not," Togetic said. "It's a big ocean."
"Yes, and very wet and cold," Latias yawned. "So can we please go back to the hotel, where it's nice and warm and I can take a shower to get all this sea salt and stuff out of my feathers?"
"Sure," Misty said. "You may have to wait in line though…" she sobered up. "I think all of us could use a good shower…" Nobody bothered to ask why she said that. The meaning behind her words was rather clear. Some of them, such as May, still had blood on them…and even for those who didn't, and had their memories altered, the events of this night were not going to go away easily, no matter how much they tried to wash it off.
"Ah, Latias…" Ho-Oh said uneasily as they turned and started to fly back to Ever Grande. "That was…ah…"
"Yes, da?" she asked drowsily. From her position in Gyarados' mouth, she could hear his heartbeat. It was so soothing and repetitive and almost hypnotic.
"I…um…" He stammered helplessly for a moment before sighing, taking a deep breath, and said, in a rush, "That was some good work you did."
She smiled. "Thank you, da. I knew deep down you cared." The phoenix flushed and glanced away, not wanting her to see.
Latias laughed to herself, yawned, and relaxed in the Atrocious Pokemon's jaws, staring dreamily out at the stars. Mmm, these stars are nice, but I can see them much clearer back at the Cleft, she thought sleepily, her eyes drooping. Or out in space for that matter. Maybe when…this is all over…the king and I can take Gardevoir and Mewtwo up to our…summer house on the moon. Assuming it's still there, of course, it has been a hundred thousand years. The view from up there is simply…divine… Smiling happily, her eyes shut tight, the dragon Latias went to sleep in Gyarados' mouth, dreaming of joyous times past and future, with her friends and her golden-eyed king, dancing together under the stars.
Misty yawned and leaned back against Bayleef, who was also getting tired. Togetic had already fallen asleep in Misty's lap. "It really has been a long day," she said quietly, sadly. She glanced down at the soul cradled in her arms and smiled, her spirits lifting almost at once. "You know…I wonder what your mom will say when she finds out about this, Ash…" She laughed, and she almost thought she could hear Ash laughing with her.
…
"Father, is this really necessary?" Lance asked as Drake anchored his boat on the shores of Dragon Rock.
"Boy, for the time being I think it's going to be for the best if ye be as far away from the mainland as possible …" The seaman sighed and glanced at his son sadly. "And now that we be here, I think it's time we have a good long talk…over some grog, perhaps…about what's become of ye."
"Father, I was only trying to do what I thought was best! I was following my best judgment, like you've always told me to!" Lance argued.
"Yeah, well, sometimes a person's best judgment can be really stupid, ye know that!" Drake snapped angrily. "Boy, if ye weren't too big for it I'd take ye over my knee and-" He stopped in mid-sentence.
"Father, what-" Lance froze too.
Facing them, floating patiently in a line above the stony surface of Dragon Rock, were several dozen very large, very cold, very hungry-looking Glalie. "Hello," said the largest of them, a female. "We've been waiting for you."
Drake paled. "Oh blast it all…I fergot to feed them this week…"
"F-father?" Lance asked, terrified by the icy stares the Glalie gave them. "What should we do?"
"Don't make any sudden moves," Drake muttered out of the corner of his mouth. "Reach fer yer Pokeball…slowly…"
"Dear," the biggest Glalie asked a small Snorunt. "Are these the ones who killed your father and the others?"
The small Eskimo Pokemon narrowed his eyes. "No…" he growled. "But they're the ones who sent the murderers in in the first place."
"That's good enough for me," the Glalie said, narrowing her eyes.
Drake's face paled as the expressions on the ice Pokemon's frozen faces hardened. Disregarding his original advice, his hand snapped down to grab Salamence's Pokeball-
And was frozen solid, as was Lance, in a huge blast of Sheer Cold from all the Glalie, killing both the dragon trainers instantly.
The head Glalie laughed. "As they say, revenge is a dish best served cold…and who knows that better than we?" She licked her lips. "Come, my friends…we have been abused and underfed by these dragon fools long enough…let us show them how grateful we are to have been allowed to live on this island of theirs for so many years…"
The Glalie and several Snorunt closed in on father and son, ready to feed.
…
High above the world…
The evil one smiled to himself as Phoenetrice and the Shining and Alpha Rangers kneeled before him. "And so it comes to pass. All is as I have foreseen it." He laughed and leaned back in his seat. "Everything is going according to plan…"
…
And that is that. The Hero mini-arc is done, and with it we are just a tiny bit closer to the end. I'm leaving for Egypt soon, so I don't know if I'll get another chapter done before then. In case I don't, merry consumer-based holiday exploited by numerous greedy corporations so they can steal your money by making you spend it on lots of junk!
As the evil one said in his deception, TTFN! Tata for now!
