Cecilia could scarcely believe her luck. Actually, she had no idea whether it was good luck or bad luck, which may have played a part in her not being able to believe it. Not only had she come across Shadow again, but he happened to be exploring the Solaceon Ruins at the exact same time that she, Force, and Lin were. That was already ridiculous luck on its own, but they also had brought alone a Kadabra that could apparently decipher the Ruins' text with ease.

The problem was she had no idea how to feel about this. They had come after her group had made enough headway on the Unown hieroglyphics to proceed in their exploration, but at the same time this could prove to be useful for regrouping. She had promised Lin and Force that she wouldn't need too much time on her own, and the two of them had reluctantly agreed to meet up further in the Ruins.

Cecilia knew that Lin was worried about her emotional state ever since the confrontation at the Chateau, and that was the only reason the Weavile had agreed to give her some alone time after she had become frustrated over the absurdity of the hieroglyphic messages.

But Shadow's reappearance was going to make things infinitely more difficult. Guilt still writhed in the pit of Cecilia's stomach whenever she set eyes on the gorgeous Espeon, and while she certainly had other feelings and thoughts associated with him, the guilt and sadness were more prominent. How could she smile and flirt with him while knowing she was associated with the one who murdered his parents? Worse, he didn't even seem to know for sure if they were dead, although Diablos had confirmed this information.

What was she to do? Was it worse to keep the information buried, in the hopes he'd never figure out her unintentional part in his life being ripped apart? Could she risk telling him what she knew? How would he react to this? Would he hate her? Would he blame her for what happened? Or would he be grateful she had told him?

No, no, that was stupid, wishful thinking. Why would he be glad to be told that she knew his parents' murderer? He would doubtlessly turn his back on her. Ugh, and then there'd be the messier reprocussions, as any fond memories of her he had would be viewed under a different lens.

But if she didn't tell him, and he found out anyway, then he'd really have a reason to despise her for taking advantage of his trust and not admitting to her sins. He'd have reason to believe she was manipulating his emotional vulnerability for her own pleasure or something.

Damn...it was a lose/lose situation. It seemed that no matter what option she took, it would end with Shadow severing all ties with her, and leaving her behind. She could live with that, even as a personal penance. Damn her weak heart. Even if she could believe it wasn't her fault for his parents' death, the fact she knew their fate and the identity of their killer left her feeling even worse. Before she knew what had happened, she was able to honestly claim ignorance, and could be forgiven for that. She had come to terms with this overnight, after storming out of the Chateau. She could be forgiven for the role she played before. It hadn't been as if she had recommended Diablos attack his family, right? But now that she knew the details, would it be wrong to still pursue Shadow? Would it be worse to tell him or to hide the truth?

She didn't know.

And who would be able to give her advice? Lin was not really a good source for asking about relationships, because she had no interest in them herself. She was certainly wise, but Cecilia couldn't imagine the Weavile giving any better advice than to stop pursuing Shadow entirely, and avoid him like the plague. And Force probably had enough on his mind with his end of the situation to be able to give any sort of useful feedback on her dilemma. What if Shadow decided to turn his wrath on the Riolu simply because he was the puppet?

She was jolted from her thoughts by a rude Glaceon flicking his tail against her nose. She flinched at the contact, but then looked at him questioningly.

"Wrong way," he stated. It took several seconds for her to realize what he was saying. A/C had produced a small notepad from somewhere and had written down the translated instructions. Then, as a group, they had descended down the corresponding staircases. Each time, they emerged in a new corridor with more staircases, and never once hit a dead-end room like before. However, it seemed that when lost in her thoughts, Cecilia had drifted towards the nearest staircase instead of the one indicated by the plaque.

"Oh...right!" Cecilia giggled, managing a bright, sheepish smile. Even when troubled by her thoughts and conflicting emotions, the Quilava did her best to show off a positive demeanor. No one liked a downer, and even if this group could tell she was feeling down, she couldn't tell them what was on her mind, because that was the problem.

Frost gave her a look before turning and walking with the rest of the group. Only Shadow paused at the top of the next staircase for her to come over, a gesture she rewarded with a small smile, allowing herself to brush slightly against his side as she went down the stairs. She felt a twinge of guilt even doing something as innocently flirty as that. If she decided to give up the pursuit, she shouldn't lead him on like this. He seemed to have a bit of a mutual crush on her, and she could tell he hadn't had any serious relationship experience before, so it felt cruel to get his hopes up if she wasn't committed.

Could she even afford to be committed to anyone, even if she wasn't in this awkward position with Shadow? She'd never really taken romance too seriously. Hell, she never even took flings seriously. She just hated feeling lonely and unloved. Ugh, she needed to stop thinking this tripe right now. It was accomplishing nothing but getting her agitated and distracted, and she already was starting to worry about what would happen if Shadow met Force.

Her only hope on that front was that Lin and Force had no idea what Shadow looked like. Lin had adamantly refused to enter the Quilava's den when he was...visiting. And Force was never in a position to see the Espeon after he had evolved. But they both knew Shadow's name, and introductions seemed inevitable if they met.

The group had suddenly stopped, and Cecilia nearly collided with A/C before she realized this fact.

"What's-?" she began, but the reason for the stop was clear enough. They were in another corridor, larger than the others. The stone here was just as worn with age as the rest of the ruins, but the walls were decorated with various Unown symbols, larger than the ones written on the plaque in the entrance. The crumbling of the stairs and walls seemed less extreme than the entranceway, giving Cecilia the impression that this room had rarely been visited. However...

Fragments of bones littered sections of the room. Cecilia was no expert on identifying skeletons or remains, but she could guess that the bones had belonged to small Pokemon that had intruded upon the area. The floor also seemed damaged in areas, as if something powerful had uprooted sections of the rock and scattered the pieces to the wind.

There was only one other staircase, and it was located straight across the room from where they had come in.

This wasn't the real reason why they had stopped, though. The reason for that was hovering in the center of the room. At a glance, it appeared to be a bird, but it was not like any bird Cecilia had ever seen before. It had a sphere-shaped body with jagged green markings sandwiching a black stripe, which reminded the Quilava of a jagged mouth. Two blue eyes peered out from the black stripe, and it had two strange prongs sticking out from the sides of its body like spikes. It had yellow wings with four feathers apiece, each ending in a set of three stripes, alternating blue, red, blue. A third eye protruded from the top of its body on a black stalk, vaguely reminsicent of the Unown symbols, but different. And it had a four-feathered tail with the same color pattern as the wings.

"What is that?" Leaf wondered. Cecilia vaguely realized that the Leafeon did not sound nervous, although Shadow, Frost, and A/C had all tensed, observing the hovering creature uncertainly.

"Sigilyph," A/C whispered, as if afraid a normal tone would prompt the Pokemon to attack. "A guardian of ancient ruins...but very rarely seen in this part of the world."

"Beware our guardians..." Cecilia repeated, and her flames blazed to life. Her blue eyes lit up eagerly, and she stepped forward. A/C made a motion to try to stop her, but she ducked under the Kadabra's paw and kept moving.

"What are you doing?" Frost demanded, but Cecilia didn't bother looking back, instead keeping her gaze on the Sigilyph, which was focusing on her exclusively.

"Don't you sense the psychic barrier?" Cecilia retorted. She had felt the disruption in the air when she had left the staircase, and although it was faint, she could detect a similar vibe on the opposite end of the room, a ward that prevented unauthorized individuals to pass. "It's guarding the way forward."

"So you have to fight it?" Shadow wondered, biting his lip.

"Probably," Cecilia chirped in response. It was strange, though. Lin and Force should have come through this way already, assuming they didn't get tripped up by the directions, yet the Sigilyph appeared perfectly intact. Had they not needed to fight this guardian? Or maybe it was a guardian intended to trap intruders inside, rather than prevent intruders from accessing the lower levels entirely.

"And you volunteer?" Frost mused, placing noticeable emphasis on 'you'. Cecilia glanced back at him, and caught the smug, knowing look in the Glaceon's eye. Oh, so he remembered that she had claimed to be a subpar battler when they last met. He hadn't seemed to buy it back then, but she wasn't really trying to fool him.

"Yeah, I need to burn some energy," she replied curtly, turning back to face the Sigilyph, which was now producing an odd humming sound, its body beginning to glow with psychic energy. Cecilia tensed into her usual battle stance, the flames on her body igniting with greater intensity. Without waiting for a cue, she launched herself at the Sigilyph, her flames growing rapidly until her body was practically surrounded by fire.

The eye on top of the Sigilyph's body glowed with an ominous blue light and Cecilia's lunge paused in mid-air. She was simply immobilized, unaffected by gravity or her own momentum. A moment later, an invisible force slammed into her back, hurling her into the ground with incredible speed and knocking the wind from her lungs.

"Ooh..." Shadow cringed, but Cecilia pushed herself back to her feet. The Sigilyph's middle eyes gleamed and a magenta beam of energy fired from the top of its eye stalk. Cecilia rolled sideways, the beam striking the stone floor and scattering loose pebbles and debris towards the back of the room. The Quilava didn't give the psychic guardian a chance to adjust its aim or switch tactics. Instead, she sped forward, feeling the waves of heat around her as her flames intensified, the heat adding a boost to her running speed. Then she leapt up, but rather than aim for the Sigilyph's body as she had done before, she plowed her weight into the guardian's tail.

It was a remarkably effective tactic. The flames around her body singed the feathers of the bird-like Pokemon, and her body weight threw it off balance. The Sigilyph's Psybeam changed direction erratically, but A/C threw up a psychic barrier to protect the group.

Cecilia landed and pivoted, then opened her mouth and launched a powerful stream of flames at the disoriented Sigilyph, drawing upon her pent-up frustration and emotions. Her flames engulfed the Pokemon, but she soon saw that the Sigilyph's wings were producing odd air currents that redirected the fire away from its body, escaping with only a few singes upon its yellow feathers.

The Quilava's gaze flicked around the chamber. The area was far too open to really take advantage of any maneuvering tactics, but a different idea was quickly making its way into her mind. As the Sigilyph turned its gaze back to her, she darted to the side with blinding speed, just in time to avoid a gust of air that she was sure would have cut through her skin had it made contact. A second razor-edged gust of wind sliced at her right side, but she rolled under it, feeling the current graze along her back, leaving a stinging sensation in its wake.

The psychic creature was pulling out the stops. Cecilia could already see what it was aiming at - it was forcing her within a specific range of movement, and slowly closing in. If she didn't change tactics immediately, she'd fall right into its trap and have nowhere to run when it launched its next attack.

From the corner of her eye, she saw the wind current slash at her hind legs, but this time, she didn't dodge. Instead, she focused all her energy on her rear flames, allowing the vents on her head to flicker out.

Right before the gust of air would have contacted her, she expelled all the pent-up heat from her back vents. The oxygen in the room was consumed at an alarming rate as heat billowed out from her body. The heat consumed the wind, cushioning the force of the strike, but also rapidly heating the current to ridiculous levels, so high that the current itself seemed to catch fire.

And then it hit, and Cecilia's hind legs collapsed, a deep gash forming, but a tiny wound compared to what would have happened otherwise. Furthermore, the heat passed onto the current met the heat-absorbent fur of the Quilava, and Cecilia felt wonderful warmth spread through her body. With so much heat within her, she grinned. Now for the best part.

Ignoring the pain in her legs, she leaned back, so that she was looking directly up at the Sigilyph. Its eye on top of the stalk blinked once, and then the guardian was consumed by a massive stream of fire, boosted to incredible power by the heated air that Cecilia had absorbed into herself. The Sigilyph's humming cut off abruptly, and several of the runes decorating the room lit up.

When Cecilia ceased her flames, the Sigilyph was gone. Not even a trace of the guardian was left, but the Quilava didn't let this detail concern her. It was incredibly unlikely that the creature had literally been burned to ash.

Cecilia was panting heavily, as often happened when she overexerted herself by spitting flames. The flames on her body had settled down into a quiet simmer, and she was acutely aware of the pain in her hind legs. On the bright side, she no longer could detect a psychic field protecting the stairways.

"There...that was fun," Cecilia giggled, looking back at the group. With a slightly guilty twinge in her stomach, she saw that the intense heat produced in that skirmish had taken its toll on the other Pokemon. Leaf was panting as if he hadn't had water in days, Frost's fur had lost much of its icy qualities, and Shadow looked like he was going to pass out. A/C was the only one who seemed like she was coping well, but Cecilia suspected the real problem hadn't been the heat itself, but rather the lack of ventilation within the underground chambers.

"That was...impressive," A/C noted. "Are you all right? You appear injured..."

"I can't actually tell how bad it is," Cecilia admitted, straining to see over her shoulder. After a few moments of struggling, and finding the vantage point lacking, she started to shift onto her back before deciding that it'd be more appropriate, in present company, to let someone else judge the extent of the injury rather than becoming a contortionist to see it herself.

"Allow me, I work at the Solaceon Pokemon Center," A/C said, coming closer and inspecting the Quilava's wound. Cecilia cringed when the Kadabra lightly brushed the gash. "Could be much worse," A/C reported. "Some bandaging is all you'd need. Hm, but I'd need to get some fireproof ones from the Center. Would you mind terribly if I took you there to get patched up?"

"Um...I guess not?" Cecilia said slowly.

"Hmm...and Leaf, you look like you need water," A/C said, giving the Leafeon a concerned look. The young Pokemon nodded eagerly, and the Kadabra glanced at Shadow, who shrugged. "Does anyone else want to be taken out of here for a few minutes?"

"I'm fine," Frost said, blowing an icy wind over his fur, restoring the sheen to the needles. Shadow seemed tempted by the offer, but then sort of sighed and shook his head.

"Very well, we shouldn't be long," A/C said with a smile.

"Wait," Cecilia said, a bit of desperation trickling into her tone. The Kadabra blinked, but the Quilava focused on Shadow. If Frost and Shadow were going to remain in the Ruins, even for a few minutes, the odds of them running into Lin and Force were much higher, and she needed to get some sort of a message across. But what was she going to say? "Um...can we talk later?"

"...sure?" Shadow answered, giving the Quilava a blank look.

"I'll try to explain later, sorry," Cecilia finished weakly.

"Okay," the Espeon said, still looking confused, but accepting the answer. "Uh...it's a date?"

In spite of herself, Cecilia giggled. Frost rolled his eyes, but A/C seemed a little amused, observing the interactions with a faint smile. Leaf was busy keeping A/C's body between him and Cecilia's flames, and therefore was oblivious to the entire conversation. After a moment of silence, A/C's eyes glowed and the three of them vanished in a flash of light, leaving Frost and Shadow alone.

"Don't even start," Shadow growled to the Glaceon, who was smirking widely.

"Wouldn't dream of it," Frost drawled, and began walking towards the opposite staircase, the one leading further into the Ruins. Shadow cast the ice Eon a suspicious look and hesitantly followed. Uneasiness was growing rapidly in his chest, but he didn't want to be alone in this room.


"Find anything, Lin?" Force asked.

Lin shook her head. The room they now stood in was massive compared to the more compact nature of the previous corridors. The walls displayed innumerable carvings, each adorned with the same hieroglyphic text as the plaque upstairs, but the room itself felt odd. There was an odd sense of foreboding in the atmosphere, vaguely reminiscent of the Mt. Coronet chamber where they had uncovered the Keystone fragment, but not as intense nor as obvious.

Several decorative pillars, which may have once held significant objects, stood in the center of the room, but they were bare now, and Lin doubted she and Force were the only ones to ever find this room.

Needless to say, she had immediately recommended Force to do an aura scan of the area, while she took the more traditional route of walking around the room and inspecting almost every square inch of the walls and carvings for clues. Much like the Coronet chamber, she felt like something was hidden here, and that the ornate nature of the room was intended to be a ruse. Something obvious and expected, to draw attention away from the real purpose of the room. Even the pillars and their presumed previous contents seemed like a ploy for treasure hunters to simply grab the shiny loot and flee without really searching the place.

Force's aura had confirmed her suspicions - there was definitely something amiss here, but it was more time consuming to narrow down his range, what with the vibes around them that something was watching their every move.

"Ugh, what's taking Cece so long?" Lin sighed, impatiently staring at the winding staircase that she and Force had come down from. The Quilava had been so frustrated after deciphering the plaque that she had gone outside to get some air, but even for her, the absence was becoming excessively long. She knew how to decipher the text, so she should have been able to follow the directions and meet back up with them by now.

"She was coming closer just a moment ago," Force said, but Lin didn't like the hesitant way he worded that statement. He was staring at his glowing paw with a puzzled look.

"And then what happened?" Lin prompted.

"I...don't actually sense her aura here any more," the Riolu said carefully. "I might just be getting too much interference, though...I'm picking up some different auras...hmm..."

The blue glow around Force's paw began to pulse oddly, remaining primarily blue, but occasionally flickering with a black aura. Force gazed at this phenomenon intensely, but did not comment. In the odd lighting of the room, it seemed that his red eyes were flickering as well, shifting from red to yellow and back again, but every time Lin tried to get a clearer look, they appeared normal.

"Should we be worried?" Lin asked finally.

"I'm not sure, they're coming closer," Force said. He turned back to the wall he was inspecting and waved his aura-engulfed paw absently. At that moment, several of the room's runes lit up, and a dull groaning sound echoed throughout the room. "Ooh! Lin, I think I found something!"

"Really, what?" the Weavile asked, making her way across the room to where the Riolu was standing. The section of the floor at his feet, marked with several unusual runes, had slid partially open, and Lin could see the steps of a small staircase leading down. "A hidden trapdoor...interesting," she murmured.

It took the two of them combined to pull up the floor panel and set it aside. Inky blackness awaited them below, and only the first few steps of the stairs here served as an indication that this was an intentional passageway, and not just a hole in the ground. However, Lin was more transfixed by the runes inscribed upon the trapdoor. They were not the same symbols that decorated the walls, and had an ominous vibe about them. More unnerving was she could not figure out what had prompted the door to open in the first place, and the runes that had lit up around the room had faded once again, leaving no clues on that front.

"Should we go down?" Force asked, shooting a look at Lin.

"I want to wait for Cece," Lin said seriously. "We could probably use her fire."

"Sounds good, I'll just...um...Lin, something's coming," he said, casting a nervous glance at the staircase leading to the upper floors. The aura flames in his paw again pulsed between blue and black colors, and the Weavile turned towards the stairs, her red eyes narrowing. Force was definitely right, she could hear the sound of voices and paws on the stairs, but they weren't Cecilia's.

A few moments passed, and two Pokemon emerged from the stairway. One of them was a quadruped with light blue fur, easily identifiable as a Glaceon due to the species' distinct dangles framing its face. The other caused the Weavile to do a brief double-take. What she initially assumed was a Dark-Type of some sort was instead an Espeon, but its fur was jet black.

Both Pokemon gazed around the room, awed by the size and beauty of the room. Behind her, Force grunted in pain, and she looked back at him in alarm, seeing that he was clutching his chest with one paw, but as quickly as it happened, the discomfort seemed to fade away, but he eyed the other Pokemon warily. Neither of them had seemed to notice the two of them, but Lin stepped forward, clearing her throat loudly to draw their attention.

"Are you two the reason for Cece's delay?" she demanded, using a firm, no-nonsense tone she reserved for when she had no intent of letting someone avoid an answer. The two Eons blinked at her, the Espeon in particular looking alarmed.

"Huh? No...Cece's fine, she's..." the Espeon paused, and Lin narrowed her eyes and flexed her claws. On one hand, no one other than her ever referred to the Quilava by the nickname Cece. Even the other members of their group seemed uncomfortable calling her that. His hesitation was another matter, and she didn't like that sort of reaction under the circumstances.

"Pokemon Center, getting bandages for a small injury she picked up fighting a Sigilyph. You must be one of the friends she mentioned," the Glaceon interjected, and Lin turned her gaze to him instead. He had a dismissive tone in his words, as if he considered the matter completely trivial and not worth discussing at length.

"I am," Lin confirmed, flicking one end of her scarf over her shoulder and fixing the Glaceon with a cool glare. "And how exactly do you know Ce-" she blinked, her sentence dropping off mid-word. She took a moment to examine the Glaceon more carefully, observing his stance, the look in his eyes, and his facial expression. All of this took roughly a second of time, but the information each detail gave her was incredibly important.

She pegged the Glaceon at roughly four years old, probably a little less. He had significant battle prowess, justifying his confident demeanor, but the demeanor extended too far, making him prickly and arrogant. His eyes were bright and eager - he was in good spirits, and enjoying the conflict between them despite the potential to escalate into violence. He was already shifting into a battle stance, a foolish move if he was going to talk down a potential foe. He was watching her just as closely, so he knew how to get a read on people and their intentions, but the little smirk he wore was proof that he overvalued his ability to do so. To act like he was in control of a situation like this...how foolish. And yet it was the last detail she needed to confirm his identity to herself.

"Hm...it's been a long time, hasn't it, Frost?" she said quietly. The Glaceon lost his smirk at once, and his dark eyes widened in alarm, but then composed himself.

"Do I know..." he began, but then his eyes fell upon the blue scarf draped around her neck. "Oh, of course. Lin, right? It's been almost a full year, I believe. Or has it been longer?"

"Longer," Lin replied. "You never saw me after I evolved. I left the mountain soon after."

"You know her?" the Espeon wondered, taken aback. Lin glanced at him briefly, but immediately labeled him as no threat. That was not to say she would underestimate him if he attacked her, but he was a psychic type with very little battle confidence, and his body was inadequately physically trained to suggest high stamina or strength. He was definitely younger than Frost, and probably a recent evolution.

"Yeah, she was a Sneasel living up on Mt. Coronet near my parents' den," Frost replied with a smirk. "She took me under her wing for a while. Said I had incredible potential. I can't credit her for all my training, but she certainly helped."

"Your arrogance is unbecoming," Lin stated stiffly. "I'd hate to see how you talk to people you don't know."

Frost scowled and his eyes narrowed slightly. "And I suppose you're one to talk?"

The ebony Espeon, as if sensing the situation escalating, began to inch away from the Glaceon, but neither ice Pokemon paid him any further attention.

"You don't have to take it personally," Lin said, keeping her voice calm and even. "But the way you talk and hold yourself is uninviting and arrogant. Dismissive, even. These are signs of poor self-esteem, for you force-feed others a vibe of confidence you don't possess."

"Excuse me?" Frost snorted. "Are you saying I don't have the right to be confident in my strength?"

"Confidence in itself is an indicator of strength. If you are confident towards your strength, you are becoming conceited. Arrogance is unbecoming and limits your growth. Do you really believe you've reached the peak of your strength?" Lin replied crisply. "If you've adopted such an attitude towards battle strength, then perhaps I was rash in judging your potential so favorably."

These words had a profound impact on the Glaceon, but unfortunately only served to demonstrate her point. Anger flashed behind Frost's eyes and the temperature of the room plummeted, so that every breath either of them took released icy mist into the air. Being an Ice-Type herself, Lin was unfazed. If anything, she found the temperature to be quite underwhelming, for she had been born and raised to endure the harshest cold Sinnoh had to offer.

"Is that so? Then fight me, and see for yourself how strong I am now," Frost growled.

"Idiot," Lin spat, genuinely disgusted by her protege's response. "You rush into battle over a petty wound to your pride? Is your ego really so fragile that you'd misjudge your opponent's strength so rashly?"

"No matter how much you preach, I don't see rejecting my challenge to be a display of your confidence, Lin," Frost retorted smugly. "Are you afraid I'll make you eat your words?"

Lin frowned. "I see. There's no dissuading you...a shame, I used to like that quality in you."

A small smile flicked across her face as she flexed her claws, already feeling the familiar thrill of battle rushing into her.

"Then again, you always did need to learn things first-hand."