Greetings!

I apologize for the wait, but this chapter took a little longer to make. This was going to be combined with the next chapter, but I split it due to length. I am working on part two as we speak.

Anyways, these next few chapters are the climax of the Kalos Arc. Soon we will be in a new region with new shit going on. Don't worry, it won't just be a chase TDA around sort of thing. While there will be some of that, next arc I want to focus on character development. There's a lot I want to do with these characters that I haven't been able to yet. Remember Frenc? Me neither. I'd like to fix that.

Also I hope my dumbass gendered Zygarde correctly. Some stuff may have slipped through in editing.

See you at the bottom.

Chapter Twenty Two: Kalosian Brawl

Having now entered Terminus Cave, TDA and Giratina waited outside of Zygarde's chamber, preparing for an ambush. They had met little resistance as, like the other locations they had visited pertaining to Legendaries, there was a distinct lack of wild Pokemon, not that this was an issue for the pair of renegades. TDA looked towards his partner in crime, waiting for a nod of approval. Giratina wasn't hesitant to do so.

And with that, the two ran into the chamber. They had planned on Zygarde having followed Tranchant to Xerneas, so they were mildly surprised when they found a mass of green slime coating the walls. Nevertheless, they had also considered that this might happen.

"Looks like we're fighting, Giratina." TDA warned, moving closer to the dragon. Giratina nodded his head, adopting a defensive stance. The slime began to quiver, sliding off of the wall. TDA and Giratina inched closer to each other, standing back to back, ready for whatever was about to unfold. The slime began to split off into five different mounds, one of them significantly larger than the others, each beginning to take shape. Four of the mounds quickly took the shape of a canine, while the larger mound took the shape of a large snake-like creature. Then, each shape became fully tangible, revealing them to be none other than various parts of Zygarde.

"Shit, four ten percents and one fifty. This is going to be tough." TDA said offhandedly.

"Indeed. Zygarde must have only sent ten percent of themself after Xerneas. A surprisingly smart move on their part." Giratina said, beginning to extend his tentacles into a combat position. "But he will never defeat the likes of us." He said defiantly. The fifty percent form eyed the two.

"INTERLOPER DETECTED. IDENTIFICATION: GIRATINA ORIGIN FORME. THREAT LEVEL: RED. LEAVE IMMEDIATELY OR ELSE RISK ENGAGEMENT WITH EXTREME PREJUDICE." They said. Without waiting for a response, the four ten percent Zygardes charged the pair. Giratina shielded TDA, quickly striking the canine extensions of Zygarde with his tentacles. The ten percent forms were effortlessly thrown back, dissolving into green slime. Both Giratina and TDA were confused that they went down so easily, but they weren't complaining.

However, their moment of victory was short-lived, as the slime began to reassemble into four more dog-like forms, all of which immediately began to charge once more. Giratina growled in frustration and struck them again, once again reducing them to slime. And yet, a moment later, the piles of green sludge had reformed into four ten percent forms, which immediately rushed towards Giratina once more.

This process repeated a few more times. Giratina had hoped that eventually they would stop reforming, but it seemed there was no limit to how many times they could come back. Tiring of this stalemate, Giratina spoke up.

"I can do this all day. What do you have to gain by delaying the inevitable?" He demanded. The fifty percent form of Zygarde replied.

"AWAITING ALLIED ARRIVAL." They simply said. Giratina growled. Allies? That would be troublesome. He would personally like to avoid that, if possible, so he decided he'd have to deal with the smaller forms some other way. Improvising he grabbed all of the ten percents with his tentacles, and squeezed them as hard as he could, until they had reverted to slime. He then melded the slime together into a large ball. Then, focusing all of his energy into this, he created a ball of shadow around the slime, imprisoning it. He then let the bubble float upwards toward the ceiling, where it remained. He then dematerialized the ball, preventing Zygarde from potentially popping it.

"I doubt they'll be getting out of that." Giratina said mockingly. Zygarde's fifty percent form began to shudder, though whether it was out of fear or anger was hard to tell.

"STATUS REPORT: YELLOW. FORTY PERCENT OF MASS INACCESSIBLE." They said in the same monotonous voice he'd been speaking in. Suddenly, the fifty percent form began to glow a bright green. "ACTIVATING LAND'S WRATH." They said. Immediately the ground began to rumble violently. TDA knew a thing or two about Legendary signature moves and began to panic as the ground jostled him. Fortunately for him, Giratina knew what was coming, and grabbed his companion with one of his tentacles, placing him on his back. The ground's rumbling climaxed… then stopped, leaving Giratina unharmed. TDA couldn't stifle his laughter.

"Are you an idiot!? You tried to use a Ground type move on a floating enemy!" How the hell did you think that would hit him?" TDA said in between laughter. Zygarde's head twitched, as if trying to display some sort of emotion, though it was hard to tell which emotion. Giratina opened his mouth, and began to charge a beam of pure shadow. He fired it, and it hit Zygarde square in the face, causing them to slide back several meters. Giratina, taking advantage of this, began to close in on them with his tentacles. However, Zygarde began to glow green again.

"ACTIVATING THOUSAND ARROWS." Zygarde said, slightly more aggressive than usual. All of a sudden, countless green beams came out of Zygarde's body, all of which hit Giratina, knocking him to the ground and causing TDA to fall off of him. Giratina roared in pain and tried to get up, but Zygarde was too fast for him.

"ACTIVATING THOUSAND WAVES." They said, as a green wave quickly spread outwards from them. The green wave hit Giratina, who bellowed in pain once more. The wave was coming for TDA as well, who could only stare with widened eyes as it hit him, sending him flying back right onto a cave wall, instantly shattering his back. He yelled in anguish as his bones broke and he hit the ground with a thud. He tried to stand back up, but he found he couldn't move a muscle, no matter how much he tried.

"I… can't move… Giratina…! Help…!" He said weakly. Giratina's eyes lit up in rage. He quickly rose up from the ground, glaring intensely at Zygarde. He yelled in fury and charged at the Snake of Order, intent on tearing every last cell that made up their body apart. He grabbed Zygarde with his tentacles and began to dig into their body, indiscriminately tearing at anything inside, even though there was nothing but the same slimy substance that Zygarde was made of.

Zygarde, unimpeded by this, used Dragon Pulse, hitting Giratina directly in the face. He yelled in pain, pulling his shadowy appendages out of Zygarde. They used this opportunity to use Dragon Pulse once more, knocking Giratina to the ground. Before the snake could do anything else, Giratina used Shadow Force, concealing himself. Zygarde adopted a defensive stance, knowing an attack was imminent and that he couldn't avoid it.

Sure enough, mere seconds later, Giratina materialized behind Zygarde, striking him in the back and knocking him to the ground. The angered eldritch dragon wasted little time in attacking Zygarde as many times as possible. As each tentacle struck the weakened snake, Giratina felt intense euphoria fill him. He wouldn't let anyone harm TDA like that and get away with it. He continued to strike Zygarde until they couldn't fight back, only twitching every now and then. Giratina decided to quit attacking. TDA was in terrible pain after all, and he had to mend his injuries as soon as possible. He moved quickly towards his comrade, who was still on the ground, trying to get up.

"Giratina… I can't move… I think that attack broke my spine or something… I think the fucker paralyzed me…" TDA said in between breaths. Giratina picked him up with one of his tentacles, preparing to heal him.

"Indeed, that seems to be the case. Fear not, for Zygarde has been incapacitated for the time being. I shall heal you, then we can both take care of Zygarde once and for all." Giratina reassured him. "This will hurt a lot. I'm sorry." With that, he began to heal TDA's broken back. He screamed in agony as Giratina's healing moved his bones back in place and reconnected his nerves. The pain was beyond anything he'd ever felt. It was as though someone had sharpened a knife to the point that it could trim a baby's hair, lit the knife on fire, and was jabbing it into him with maniacal glee. All TDA could do was hold back tears and screams of pain as Giratina muttered apologies as his nerves reconnected. And as soon as it had started, the pain ceased as though it had never been there at all.

Giratina gently placed him down, allowing him to get acclimated to being able to move once more. Having no difficulties in doing so, TDA started walking toward Zygarde, gesturing for Giratina to follow him. "Piece of shit… So this is the Legendary responsible for maintaining the balance of life and death?" He asked. Zygarde didn't reply. "You are letting the wrong people die." He added.

"LEVEL OF UNDERSTANDING: 8.1644167%. ELABORATE." Zygarde replied. TDA raised an eyebrow in annoyance.

"You and your trio could be going after those who actually deserve to die. Those who prey on the innocent, those whose sole purpose is to destroy lives, you could be could be having those people die. There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to who you let die, innocent or not."

"AURA TRIO DOES NOT DETERMINE WHO DIES."

"Hm? So you leave it to chance then?"

"XERNEAS IS THE SOURCE OF LIFE, FROM WHICH ALL BEINGS SPRING FROM. YVELTAL DOES NOT CAUSE DEATH, BUT MERELY GUIDES LOST SOULS WHEN THEIR TIME ARRIVES. THIS UNIT ACTS AS A MODERATOR, BUT OTHERWISE DOES NOT INTERFERE."

"But why? You three have this power over who lives and dies, but you don't use it? You could be killing all the pieces of shit in the world and make sure no one has to suffer because of them! Isn't it a god's job to look after their creations!?" TDA yelled. Zygarde didn't say anything for a moment.

"RESULTS IN COMPLACENCY." They simply said.

"I… what?" The confused human could only reply. Zygarde looked as if they were about to respond, but the sounds of rushing footsteps interrupted them. All three beings in the room snapped their attention towards this noise to find a rather large gathering, composed of both humans and Pokemon, some of which TDA was immediately able to recognize.

In the crowd he could identify Reshiram, Marcus and his Pokemon, that girl that accompanied them back in Johto, her Servine, and Zekrom. He could also see Xerneas, a human he presumed was hers, and a ten percent form of Zygarde as well as another human that presumably was theirs. TDA donned a defiant expression.

"Fine then. I was hoping we'd have a little more time, but this disgusting slime serpent distracted us." Giratina moved behind his human partner, ready to protect him. "We'll deal with you ourselves and take the orbs!"

…

It had taken a while to arrive at Terminus Cave, given the distance, Sarah and I had to fly on the backs of our dragons while Xerneas and Zygarde ran at top speed. Needless to say, I threw up several times on the way. Who could blame me? We were flying at top speed… I didn't even know Legendaries could go that fast... I'm just glad we were mainly flying over natural areas with little to no human life. If we had been flying over some city, I'd feel bad for whoever had to deal with my projectile vomit.

But I'm getting off topic. The important thing was that we had caught up to TDA, seemingly before he had the chance to steal Zygarde's orb. This was perfect. We had the chance to end him right here and prevent him from harming anyone else. Our last encounter didn't go so well, but surely the strength of Reshiram, Zekrom, Xerneas, and Zygarde would be enough… right?

I had no time to mull over such thoughts though. TDA was clearly intent on getting this over with, as Giratina immediately moved in to attack. He started by firing a ball of shadow at Reshiram, which made direct contact, causing my dragon partner to stumble. Zekrom immediately jumped in to protect her, using Dragon Claw on Giratina. Giratina growled and began to engage Zekrom in close combat, attempting to pierce him with his shadowy tentacles. Meanwhile, Xerneas targeted TDA, charging up a Moonblast. Giratina seemed to notice this, and used one of his tentacles to grab Xerneas by the neck, before tossing her into a cave wall.

Zygarde's ten percent form took advantage of this distraction and ran towards their fifty percent form, right past Giratina. Giratina, still locked in combat with Zekrom, was struck with Fusion Flare by an angered Reshiram. Sammy assisted her by using Razor Shell. These attacks weren't particularly effective on Giratina due to his type advantage, but combined they managed to distract him. Just enough for Zygarde to tackle Giratina. The attack didn't do much but it caused Giratina to become dazed. Near the ceiling, a bubble seemed to materialize.

Giratina must have been using a part of his concentration to keep the bubble dematerialized. The bubble exploded, and a bunch of what looked like Zygarde's cells fell to the floor. Both of their active forms approached the puddle of cells as fast as possible. The ten percent form jumped into the puddle, disintegrating into its constituent cells and melding with the slimy mess. The fifty percent form began to glow a bright green as the cells approached them. Then, both the cells and Zygarde flashed a brilliant green light, blinding my vision.

When the glow subsided and I could see again, I saw that Zygarde had become… much bigger. They were almost unrecognizable, no longer resembling a snake or canine, but rather a large humanoid being, somewhat resembling a Golurk back from Unova. The only sign that this being was in fact Zygarde was the coloration of the body. They had ribbon-like appendages coming out of its shoulders, two of them with blue stripes and the other two with red. They still had a tail, though it was much bigger. Overall, Zygarde was absolutely humongous, easily dwarfing any human several times. Something about their shape was familiar though…

Then it hit me. In ancient legends, Zygarde is said to possess an extremely powerful form, a form they only use when balance is greatly disrupted. When fused with all of their cells, Zygarde becomes its Complete Forme, a towering monstrosity whose sole purpose is to restore balance.

This transformation had not gone unnoticed by everyone else, as they all had their eyes locked on Zygarde. Giratina immediately dropped his battle with Zekrom and darted for the Order Pokemon, intent on dispatching them before they became too much trouble. He struck Zygarde and… nothing happened. Zygarde barely even moved. Giratina struck them again, and the same thing happened… barely any sign of damage on the towering giant. The Renegade Pokemon moved in for a third attack, but Zygarde punched him square in the face, sending him back into a wall. They then seemed to focus intently before uterring three words in a deep, robotic voice.

"ACTIVATING CORE ENFORCER."

Zygarde began to glow a brilliant green and seemed to… levitate off the ground? There was no mistaking it, they were floating off the ground. The green glow began to coalesce towards the center of their body, before firing as a laser aimed straight at Giratina. It made direct contact, pinning the Renegade Pokemon to the ground. Zygarde moved the laser around, making the shape of a capital Z.

With Giratina distracted, Reshiram and Zekrom converged on TDA, intent on tearing him to shreds. Giratina however, was not going to have this, and used a stray tentacle to throw him to safety, using the other five appendages to attempt to shield himself from the blast of Core Enforcer, to little effect.

Eventually, the laser stopped as Zygarde seemingly ran out of energy. Giratina used Shadow Force, disappearing and reappearing behind the Order Pokemon, striking them in the back. Once again, Zygarde barely moved a centimeter, but they let out a grunt of pain. WIth Giratina focused on Zygarde and TDA struggling to get his bearings motioned for Absalon to come to her.

"Absalon! Rally to me post haste! We must assist mine friend!" She yelled. Absalon quickly ran to her. Xerneas lowered herself, allowing her partner to climb atop her back. "Watch for threats! Alert me to any attacks that may blindside us!" She added. Without another word, Xerneas charged for Giratina, charging up a Moonblast.

She launched the attack, catching Giratina off guard and overwhelming him due to the type effectiveness. The serpentine dragon diverted his attention to focus on Xerneas. He fired a ball of shadow at her, making direct contact and knocking Absalon off, who scrambled to get away. He followed up with multiple tentacle strikes, hitting Xerneas repeatedly. She used Moonblast once more, managing to escape Giratina's attacks. She used Geomancy, sharply increasing her power and resilience. She then cast Misty Terrain, filling the room with a pink aura and increasing the power of her Fairy Type moves. With all this empowerment, she used Moonblast, hitting her opponent square in the face. Giratina didn't stand a chance against such a powerful attack, the type effectiveness certainly not helping matters. He was instantly knocked to the floor where he lay, motionless. For a moment, I thought we'd won, but those hopes were dashed when I saw Giratina begin to stir. Evidently, he still had some fight in him.

He used Steel Wing, the type effectiveness and power causing Xerneas to get knocked back. Before she could react, he used Shadow Force, disappearing and reappearing behind her before striking her in the back. She fell to the ground and didn't get back up.

With Xerneas dealt with, Giratina put all of his might into attacking Zygarde, striking them repeatedly with his tentacles. Zygarde began to flinch more with each strike, until they began to emit a sort of robotic screech. They retaliated, punching Giratina square in the face. He fired back with a ball of shadow, causing the Order Pokemon to stumble. Zygarde used Core Enforcer, but Giratina dodged it, retaliating with Shadow Force. This continued for a while, the two exchanging blows that didn't seem to affect each other much. However, Zygarde began to move slower. Were they tiring themselves? It appeared to be the case, and Giratina seemed to realize this, putting more effort into his attacks. Zygarde knelt down, too tired to continue fighting. The Renegade Pokemon seized the opportunity and used Shadow Force, striking Zygarde as hard as he could.

Zygarde exploded, their constituent cells splatting against the walls and floor. Additionally, a dark green sphere fell to the ground, evidently having been inside Zygarde. TDA rushed to grab it, and it dawned on me.

"That's the orb!" I yelled. Reshiram and Zekrom immediately went after TDA, but Giratina shielded him as usual. I was about to send Sammy and Grace after him, when a familiar laugh echoed behind me.

Even before I saw his sharp toothed grin and dead pupilless eyes, I knew who it was. Tranchant had once again shown himself, for the third time in the span of a few days. He was holding something too, a blue sphere… oh no.

"Bonjour, Marcus, black haired girl, and assorted divine pieces of merde! Would any of you happen to know where TDA is? Fucker said he'd be here." The Weavile spirit said quite casually, as if we were friends. No one said anything, but it didn't matter, as Tranchant had already spotted who he was looking for. "Ah, there he is! Hey! J'ai cherché le chose you wanted me to get… I think anyway!" He said.

"Hurry up and get over here! You're right near the enemy!" TDA yelled, still behind Giratina, who was battling Reshiram and Zekrom. I yelled for Sammy and Grace to attack Tranchant, but he had already dashed past us, too fast for us to react. Within a few seconds he was at TDA, handing him what I knew to be Xerneas's orb.

"Thank you, Tranchant. You've been a great help." He said to the Weavile, before shifting his attention to the rest of us. "All of you really are idiots. I expected that the Legendaries would at least have an ounce of cleverness, but it seems not. Now, I'm going to explain to you just how you fucked up." TDA grinned, and Reshiram, Zekrom, and Giratina had ceased fighting.

"I had Tranchant distract you this whole time, and you didn't even realize it. We used him to see which Legendary you would try to protect first, then sent him to battle you. While you dealt with him, Giratina and I took Yyveltal's orb. The second time he went after you, we started making our way here to Terminus Cave. We had betted on either Xerneas or Zygarde figuring something was up and all of you rushing here. While all of you scrambled to come here, we had Tranchant check up on Xerneas' den, just in case you left the orb unattended, and it looks like you did. It wouldn't have mattered either way. Had you taken it, we could have just beaten it out of you here. But now we have all three of Kalos' orbs. We have no reason to stay." TDA said. He looked at Giratina. "Let's get out of here." Giratina nodded, beginning to create a portal. He looked towards Tranchant. "Kill them all. I don't want these dogs following us anymore. Do that, and we will grant you your freedom. Use Giratina's power boost well." He added.

Giratina and TDA escaped through the portal, which closed after they entered it, leaving only Tranchant and the crushing realization that we had lost again. But… I couldn't think about that right now. Tranchant was here, and I could finally settle things with him. I'd made a vow to catch him and show him to Arceus. If I could do one thing right in this mission, I wanted it to be this.

"Well, Marcus! How about we end this once and for all?" Tranchant said, adopting a battle stance. I nodded.

"We won't lose!" I yelled. The dead Weavile chuckled.

"Wonderful! With you gone I will suffer no more!"

Then, a wall of ice formed around us, reaching up to the ceiling. Only myself, Sammy, Grace, Sarah, and Snek were inside the wall, the other Legendaries trapped outside.

"En garde, Marcus!" Tranchant yelled. And with that, we prepared for battle.

Eh, I don't think I'm that great at battle scenes. I hope this was enjoyable nonetheless.

Next chapter will have some important stuff besides battling, so look forward to that. Hopefully it won't take another month to come out.

Anyways, I hope you continue to enjoy this story!