"Riley..!" Ash said under breath, witnessing in anger as his nemesis' hand clutched the throat of his unconscious Sceptile.
"I know you're seeing me through Greninja's eyes, Ash. I know all about your bond phenomenon." Riley replied, leering menacingly at the Water type. "But I have no reason to settle for your tag in when I can just find your real body myself."
"Greninja!" Ash shouted, his voice in his Pokemon's head. "Aerial Ace!"
"Ko!" Greninja spoke, rushing Riley down.
Releasing Sceptile, Riley began toying with Greninja, effortlessly swaying side to side as Greninja's fists failed to hit their mark. Taking a bounding leap up the mountain, Riley disregarded Greninja completely, his goal on Ash himself. With his communicator not functioning in the Hall of Origin, and with Greninja being nowhere close to his slaves guarding the entrance, Ash had to resort to another tactic to buy time and save his servants.
"You two! Go help your slave sisters guard the entrance!" Ash ordered Misty and Lei.
"Yes, Master!" The duo obeyed, rushing down the flight of stairs back to the entrance.
As Ash continued to survey the area through Greninja's eyes, things continued to look more and more dire as it went on. Even though Groudon was defeated, several other Legendary Pokémon, all under Riley' control, were scaling the mountain. Hundreds of Team Rocket grunts were coming from the other side as well, effectively walling Ash on two fronts. With Cynthia alone fighting against Team Rocket, and only his Greninja still able to move, Ash began to consider that he needed to intervene.
All of the sudden, flashes of light across the mountainside appeared. Finally, Ash's backup had arrived. With all of Sabrina's psychic might she could muster, all of Ash's Team Rose had no assembled. With the War Thunder blimp in the air and all of Ash's Pokémon on scene, the tide of battle had changed.
"I'm sorry, Master..." Sabrina panted over the comms, her mental state weakened from exertion. "I couldn't transport the whole army here. Only a couple hundred made it..."
"Wait, something's wrong!" Annabel noticed, realizing Ash didn't respond. "I can sense him, and yet he can't respond?"
"We got Legendaries aplenty, incoming!" Hilda shouted, noting the teeming mass of Legendaries beelining it up the mountain.
"Well, I got one, myself!" Bonnie said, clutching a pokeball. "Come on out, Squishy!"
Summoning her Zygarde to her side, it's feeble ten percent form soon converting into its half powered fifty percent avatar, Bonnie hopped upon his back.
"I'll guide our Master's slaves here! Serena, Annabel, you get your butts up the mountain and help Ash win!"
"Yeah!" The duo replied back, making their way up the mountain.
Calling upon her Metagross, Annabel had it use Psychic on her and Serena, allowing their two to reserve their strength in aura from the battle soon ahead of them.
"Cynthia, this is Annabel! I sense that you are on the other side of Coronet! Are you all right?" The violet haired woman asked.
"I'm much better now that you're here, my fellow slaves!" Cynthia panted excitedly, her Pokémon as well as her own body reaching their limits.
Just as a horde of Rocket's powered up shadow Pokémon began to launch another wave, a blast of combined attacks blew them away.
"What the?!" A Rocket grunt gasped.
"Who did that?!" Another one shouted.
"We'll handle this from here, ma'am!" A familiar voice to Cynthia called out.
"Looker!" Cynthia looked behind her, thankful for his assistance.
"Let us in the imperial army handle these runts! Go and protect our Emperor!" Looker shouted, his Arcanine forming a wall with other Pokémon of the imperial army.
"Thank you!" Cynthia said, overjoyed to get a reprieve from the ceaseless waves of grunts.
Using her essentia suit to scale up the mountain at breakneck speeds, leaving Looker to lead the army of Alola against the forces of evil. On the other side of Mt. Coronet, Ash' sex slaves continued to attempt to push back the encroaching Legendaries, with many of Ash's Pokémon running interference and evacuation for the Pokémon living in the area.
"Can we really do this?" May gasped, realizing their Pokemon's moves were having little effect on the enemy.
"Ko!" Greninja's voice croaked, the Water type asking for the slaves' attention.
Seeing Greninja carrying the unconscious bodies of Lucario and Sceptile on either shoulder, May and Dawn helped set them down, healing the Pokémon with their aura. Greninja pointed further down the mountain where Charizard and Infernape were thrown, with Hilda and Rosa running off to check on them.
"There's nothing we can do against them!" Dawn said to Greninja, knowing Ash saw through his eyes. "What do we do Master?!"
Ash knew he had to break his moral to kill with Groudon. Knowing his slaves held back from killing because their will reflected his own, he had to give them the approval to hold nothing back. With a solemn expression on both of their faces, Ash and Greninja alike traced a line across their throat, the motion picked up by his slaves.
"I see..." Dawn replied sadly. "If that's what's needed to win this battle..."
"We have no choice..." May agreed, moving her hand to her earpiece. "Slave sisters, our Master has given us orders. In order to stop the Pokémon of legend from reaching the summit, we have to...attack with lethal force..."
The message picked up by everyone, Bonnie looked down to her Zygarde. "Are you ok with us doing this? Killing them?"
"It brings me no joy to see my brothers and sisters under the thumb of a madman." Zygarde replied to Bonnie through telepathy. "If Ash can revive our Father like you said he could, then Father can bring back my family. I will do what I must to free them from his control."
As the battle on both side of Coronet began to escalate, at the top of the mountain, Riley had already cleared a path for himself, completely devastating the slaves guarding the doors to the Hall of Origin without a sweat.
"It would be such a shame to kill such beautiful women." Riley thought to himself, pondering over the bodies of the unconscious women before him. "Perhaps after I kill him, I'll make his puppets my own!"
Noticing the battles on either side of him, and even more so noticing Serena and Annabel approaching, Riley scoffed.
"Not the time for detractions. I need them to buy me more time." The madman said to himself aloud, clenching his fist to emit a dark essence from himself.
All of the sudden, all of the shadow enhanced Pokémon howled in rage, their bodies receiving a jolt in power beyond what they could take. Suddenly, the Pokémon of Legend and the ones possessed by Team Rocket flew into violent rage, attacking everything and everyone but shadow Pokémon, including Team Rocket itself.
"What?!" A grunt gasped as he was pounced upon by the Skuntank he was commanding just a moment ago.
"AGHHHHH!!" Another grunt screamed as the man's face began to be slashed apart by his own Persian's claws.
"What is this?!" Archer screamed, Riley's second in command completely caught off guard as he tried to wrestle a shadow enhanced Arbok off him.
Looker and the imperial army had no time to be confused by the sudden betrayal, for they too soon became descended upon by feral and savage beasts, their own Pokémon struggling to predict and keep up with such wild and erratic movements. As the Legendaries too becomes engulfed in primal, viscous instincts, Riley sneered, knowing that besides the two coming up the mountain, Ash would not receive any more back up for a long time, if ever, in his mind.
Seeing Riley enter the Hall, Annabel yelled out to him.
"You bastard! What did you do?!"
"These slaves!" Serena gasped, their wounds severe, yet still reversible. "I'll stay here and heal them, you go after Riley!"
"But-"
"You're a better fighter than I ever could be!" Serena asserted herself. "If our Master has a chance at winning, its you!"
"Serena..."
"We aren't like most of our Master's slaves, we both obey him without his Mind Stone's influence. If we wish for that influence to stay in this world, then we can't hesitate. Go!"
"Right!" Annabel replied, getting her act together, not know why she protested to begin with.
She reflected on what the time flower showed her months ago in the Aura Temple. The man she saw speaking of her Master fighting the last pretender the the Aura Guardian's name would be aided by his servants, with her in particular standing out. She knew she came from parents who belonged to Riley' guild before they hid her away in an orphanage and died. Fate was playing out, and her role was about to be laid out before her, and her Master.
Making her way to the top of the staircase, Annabel only had a moment to take in the scenery of the void before noticing Riley standing several dozen feet before her, with her Master meeting his gaze just a few feet away himself, the young emperor standing between Riley and the Stones of Power.
"Ash! I'm here!!" Annabel panted, winded from sprinting up the long staircase.
"Annabel..!" Ash gasped before Riley laughed hysterically.
"Splendid! Oh, just splendid!" He shouted, forming a lavish dance only befitting that of a madman. "It looked like the whole gang is here!"
"What does that mean?" Ash asked, thoroughly confusing on what Riley could possibly say next.
"I told you how Annabel was the daughter to a pair of powerful Aura users, but I never told you who they truly were!" The madman exclaimed, looking over his shoulder back at Annabel.
"Whatever earth shattering reveal you have to deceive me with won't work, asshole! Let's finish this!" Ash shouted, lunging at Riley before he could get another word in.
Before he knew it, Ash was suddenly back in place from where he was standing a moment ago. Disoriented and confused, Ash couldn't even utter a word. Looking back over his shoulder again, Riley noticed that Annabel was still approaching, still farther away from him then Ash was, yet not back where she was a moment ago.
"Tch, too far, huh?" He scoffed before turning back to Ash. "You see Ash, you are a lot more involved in this story than you think. Haven't you ever wondered where your father ever was?"
"Whatever you care to say, I'm not listening!" Ash said, attempting to lunge at Riley again, only to once again return to his spot a moment prior.
Noticing Riley's shoulder glowing just before Ash attacked, Annabel kept her distance, her spot in the room unchanged unlike Ash.
"YOU DON'T GET TO TAKE THIS AWAY FROM ME!!" Riley screamed at Ash with an insane, guttural shout, practically frothing at the mouth. "Before I get the glory of ending your father's bloodline in one swoop, let me tell you a tale."
"I sorry, did you say in one foul swoop?" Annabel asked. "What do you mean?"
"I'm talking here!" Riley shouted, before regaining his composure. "Let's turn the clock back a few hundred years. The augurs of the Monastery in Kanto had foretold of a prophesy of where the world would face its ruin. Only through the power of the chosen one could this calamity be averted. My ancestor, ambitious as he was, foresaw a different outcome to this story. If the world was to face ruin, our dying little cult could retreat into our temples. When the world had been destroyed and the remnants of it scattered and confused, we would emerge from hiding and return to our rightful places as rulers of the world. People would look to us, begging us to use our powers to help heal the world. We'd become gods of our own."
"So your corrupted ancestor poisoned the minds of other Guardians, causing the coup and destroying the true protectors of peace." Annabel scoffed, remembering what the man in the time flower matched what Riley just described.
"Those pacifists were too weak and too limited by their morals." Riley sneered. "Through their silent annihilation came our time to rise, but my ancestors misjudged the timing of the apocalypse event. Centuries passed, and we held on to the prophesy while most of the world forgot about it. We had just about given up on such a future until he arrived."
"He?" Ash asked, realizing some strange force made him a captive audience member that prevented any attack he attempted.
"Annabel's father. A child gifted in Aura right from when we recruited him. He was a quick study on what we told him. We suspected him to be the Chosen One from the prophesy, someone my Master could manipulate to his own ends. He was in our group for a decade and a half, joined even before I was born. I was but a ten years old when I met him myself, before he left our guild in ruin." Riley replied. "We taught him of our plan to take over the world after it had been devastated by a cataclysm, hoping our years of training made him servile. He seemed to support our plan, until my Master discovered he was a mole from the beginning."
"You mean-" Annabel began to ask, piecing it together.
"That's right, your father was a survivor to the purge of those Boy Scouts. We were sure we exterminating the Guardians, but only until it was too late that we discovered one had been hidden away, plotting their revenge." Riley scoffed. "He even managed to convince your mother, one of our most devoted followers, to betray us. The two fell in love and ran away, hoping to find a way to beat us."
"So that would be around the time they left Annabel in an orphanage, then. You also told me they died soon after. Still don't see how that applies to me." Ash protested, finding this whole dialogue to be an insane rambling.
"I'm getting there, fuck wit! Anyways, I did tell you they died, didn't I? That was a lie. Well, a lie that would deceive us anyways. At least, for a while. Before my Master passed from old age, he told me to seek out any traces of the two to ensure their fate was sealed. When I was a teenager, I set out of my quest, only to find out an interesting truth. Annabel's mother might have died, that much I confirmed. But her father was nowhere to be found."
Annabel and Ash remained silent, fearing that if they spoke up, it would make the madman snap. At least for the time being, Ash just allowed Riley to continued his monologue, his own pride allowing Ash the time he needed for the Stone's mending and resurrection rituals to continue in the background.
"But- heh heh, hahaha! Something truly amazing happened!" Riley said. "I hear many years later that the cataclysm event was starting to happen, right in the Orange Islands, and that the Chosen One had been revealed! At first, I thought the Chosen One was her father after all, but then I found out some child sharing that man's name happens to be the Chosen One.
"What?!" Ash gasped.
"You mean?!" Annabel gasped.
"That's right!" Riley said. "After I met you ten years ago on Iron Island in Sinnoh, that's when I could sense it! The same blood running through that man's veins was in your own, and her's as well! That man faked his death, lived a second life after his wife died, conceived a second child and ran away to keep your identity safe from me! He even gave your own mother some half baked facade that he was a Pokémon trainer, Ash! I mean, could you believe that?! My investigation saw through that ruse in no time!"
"You mean, Annabel and I are-"
"Yes! Half siblings, sharing in power from your father! Annabel is your older sister, my dear, stupid Ash!" Riley cackled, his madness creeping out from his momentarily emotionless dialogue. "I knew our extinction plan wouldn't work after hearing you stopped the apocalypse, but our guild had back up plans!"
"The Stones!" Ash gasped.
"Yes! I had planned to use you to make me an army of slave children, gifted in Aura. I was so excited to see what sort of power child you two would have brought into this world- until you went and foiled my plans again! I can still take it all back though! Here, in the Hall of Origin, lay the foundations for creation and destruction. Our world's roots lie in this chamber. All I need to do is kill you, take the Hall of Origin for my own, and using my powers I will create a new apocalypse! I knew you'd open the door to the shrine! Your greed and desire to mend the Life Stone have given me the keys to the engine of death I will create! I will purge humanity and Pokémon down to a sliver of the current population! Anyone left alive will bend to me or be crushed under my heel!"
As Riley once again howled with psychotic laughter, Ash turned to Annabel, who was just as surprised by this truth as he was. Everything Riley had said up to this point was truthful, and even if he was lying, there was no point in retorting now. All he attempted to do was offset Ash so he could be easier to kill, Ash knew this. Looking back to Riley and then back to Annabel, Ash began to ask a question.
"Do-"
"I know what you're gonna say, Ash. Let's just get kick his ass first, and then we'll talk about it!"
"Yeah!" Ash replied, his voice raising, fists raised, blood pumping. "Let's do it!"
As the two rushed down their adversary, the Adamant and Lusterous Orbs embedded in Riley's shoulders began to glow, the deranged man raising his hands in both directions.
"Come at me then!" He yelled.
Author's Note: Hello once again, dear readers, I'm back with another chapter in the final arc of the fanfic. As you all can see, Annabel is Ash's half sister. I had something like this planned for a while now with Annabel, and with this chapter, I do hope it paid off. I know a great portion of my work surrounds Amourshipping. It's easily my favorite ship in the show, but Annabel's relationship with Ash, however brief it was compared to others, definitely felt like a close bond, something I could see a big sister having with a younger brother, romantics aside. Maybe that's just me, but who knows.
With many of my chapters devoted to Annabel, her relationship with Ash, and her prophecy read to her by the augur of the Aura Guardians in chapter 70 this was definitely my longest running attempt at introduction subtle foreshadowing moments into my work. Do you feel upset at this reveal? Pleased? Confused? Anywhere in between? Feel free to tell me in your reviews. I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, and I hope to hear from you soon! Happy reading!