This chapter reminded me just how much fun I have writing Diablos' dialogue. He's the type of character whose quirks and mannerisms feel especially distinct through his dialogue, and can likewise translate well when he's capable of adding body language. He's smug, can be hammy, can be mischievous, but even when things look bad, his reactions are delightful for me to write.
Diablos stepped back, silently marveling at how the wisp-like extension that served as his lower body split to perform the motion, and then immediately reformed once he had shifted. That was confirmation enough that his 'new' body was indeed ghostly in nature. Such flexibility in motion was almost unheard of from beings of flesh and blood.
An idle thought, and Diablos shifted his primary consciousness to the Spiritomb still sitting upon the table, gazing through its eyes at the curious figure he had become. Much like possessing a host from a distance, splitting his attention between the two bodies and minds required some additional focus and effort, but it was a feat well within his means. The Spiritomb's mouth curled into a grin, an expression soon mirrored by the pint-sized ghost.
Such a fascinating Pokemon. Its small size and unassuming appearance concealed incredible power and potential within. It was as though the numerous shackles and restraints upon him had been dismantled, and the taste of its power was genuinely intoxicating. Only adding to Diablos' fascination was the subtle realization that this Pokemon was not merely a host that he was borrowing, but genuinely a part of himself. Or, if Renard's comment was anything to go by, this Pokemon was his true self.
His true self...
Diablos frowned, returning his conscious mind to his new form. He felt much more 'at-home' with it as the focal point of his thoughts. Especially when compared to the restrictions upon his Spiritomb core, the form of the smaller ghost felt more...liberating. He could feel power within his body, and energy coursing through his hands. Yet all he had done so far had been instinctive. He had not consciously chosen to act, but had tapped into those abilities without thought.
The small ghost reached up and again took one of the golden rings dangling from his horns, inspecting the loop absently. It was a deceptively simple circle, golden in color, but otherwise unremarkable. Yet somehow...he had used it to create some sort of portal that instantly transported his Beedrill opponent to another location.
He did not know of any other Pokemon capable of such a thing. When gazing upon himself from the Spiritomb's perspective, his present species completely escaped identification. It was an uncomfortable realization in itself.
He had no idea what he even was.
Diablos absently flicked the golden ring upwards, and watched as it spun in the air, before returning to his hand like a boomerang. On a whim, Diablos moved his hand out of the way at the last moment, and the glittering hoop continued past him, but almost immediately looped back around to hang itself back on the horn he had originally taken it from.
"Convenient," he mused aloud with an enthusiastic grin. He was definitely looking forward to having the time to properly test and experiment with these abilities, and discover the scope of what he was capable of in this form. It would better suit him to fully understand the strengths and weaknesses of his powers before trying to utilize them on a greater scale, or with greater stakes. Instinct could only take him so far, and he was not comfortable relying too much on luck.
The miniature demon glanced down at the Lucarionite bracer still clutched in his left hand, the stone pulsing softly in the dim room. The stone's significance still eluded and frustrated him. Ever since Force had retrieved it from the Solaceon Ruins and left it under his care, Diablos had failed to uncover anything about it, other than rough theories. Never before had it resonated with him, nor had he uncovered even the faintest recollection of his past. He had gazed at it intently for hours at a time, yet never felt the tug of familiarity.
So why now had he recalled flashes of the event in which the Odd Keystone had been shattered, and he had been sealed? Why had he been so certain that the Pokemon responsible had been a female? Diablos strained his memory, attempting to re-experience the flash of realization that had come to him mere minutes ago, but within seconds, agonizing pain tore through his brain, and he clutched his head with an anguished yell, the Lucarionite falling from his grasp with a gentle clattering sound.
Pain thudded through his closed eyelids, bringing tears to his eyes. Nonsensical...a ghost should not be able to produce tears...but anger coursing through his chest shoved those musings aside. Diablos had not the faintest idea what the sudden anger was directed towards, as the emotion vanished as quickly as it had surfaced, although his headache did not subside so readily. Forcing his eyes open once more, he turned his gaze towards Renard.
The Ninetales was still standing beside the unconscious Beedrill, attempting to revive her while not taking his attention off of Diablos. The tension within the fire fox's body was undeniable, as if Renard had long ago abandoned the facade that he was not afraid of Diablos. If anything, the fear had grown more palpable ever since Diablos had emerged in this form.
"I believe thanks are in order," Diablos told the Ninetales, as pleasantly as he could while his head still throbbed with pain. Renard said nothing, his red eyes narrowed suspiciously at the other Pokemon. "If my understanding is correct that your Key Stone served a role in unlocking the seal, I quite literally couldn't do it without you."
Renard glared in silence, and his tails lashed in agitation. Diablos grinned briefly. Part of him longed to claim that he had planned this turn of events, but the reality could not be further from the truth. Diablos had had no idea that the Ninetales' Key Stone would break whatever seal had bound his "true form" to the Spiritomb prison. Even worse, he recognized that had such a twist of fate not occurred, this situation could have had disastrous results. True, he probably could have phased through the floor and escaped, but it might have taken him a few moments to think of that option, and in the intervening time, the Mega Beedrill might have torn him to shreds. His instinctive use of the ring portal had been another stroke of good fortune, and if there was one thing Diablos had learned in recent months, it was not to press his luck.
"As a display of my gratitude, I shall direct your attention to the door. Use it, and depart in peace," Diablos said, stepping further away from the fire fox and gesturing grandly to the door leading out of the room, and by extension, the Chateau itself. "Take your unconscious friend with you, and I'll even permit you to take your personal belongings with you."
"Just like that?" Renard queried, his tone impressively neutral for a statement that brimmed with skepticism.
"Incredible to fathom, I know," Diablos chuckled, his yellow eyes glittering mischievously. "Why not press my current advantage? Simply put, because it does not benefit me to do so. You have done me an incredible service by unlocking this form, and the situation has reversed so completely that retreat is your most viable option."
"You presume that I pose no threat to you?" Renard asked quietly.
"On the contrary...I know you pose a threat to me," Diablos retorted, his grin widening. Renard blinked. "A severe threat, I might add. I offer you the option to leave, not out of arrogance, but as an act of caution. I have not regained all my memories, so I know not what I've done in the past to earn your ire. Your vengeful heart has endured for centuries, so the power of your darkness must be immense...but you hold it back. You are afraid to let it act through you...so you have refrained from taking the initiative to attack me. Even your greatest show of aggression thus far was simply to enable Bee-Bee to attack more effectively. That is why I want you to leave."
"...why would you tell me all that?" Renard asked, looking a little bewildered, although his tone remained neutral.
"Because having that information does not help you," Diablos answered with a chuckle. "If nothing else, knowing that you pose a threat benefits me. Merely having the potential to defeat me is not an assurance that you will succeed, after all. The stakes are too high for you to risk direct engagement of your own initiative, but if I press my advantage, your darkness will likely surface as a means to protect yourself. Drawing out your darkness by force is a fine strategy when I am restricted to the point of merely wishing to leech off the nearest, most potent source of nourishment, but it is foolish to provoke you in my current state. In any case, there is no need for me to rush."
"You talk far too much," Renard growled.
"And you talk far too little," Diablos replied, unfazed. "Do I need to incentivize your departure? Hmm...ah, I've got just the thing..."
Diablos gestured casually, and telekinetically lifted the Lucarionite off the floor. Renard watched the object warily, as Diablos guided it nearer to his face. With a simple gesture of one finger, Diablos dangled the bracer in front of Renard's muzzle, as if jingling a set of keys in front of a Skitty.
"Come on, boy! Follow the glowing stone! You want this? Come and get it!" Diablos chortled, leading the bracer a little further from Renard's muzzle, goading the Ninetales to follow it. Renard's expression was stony, and he stared straight ahead, not even a trace of amusement within his eyes. "Tch...and I thought you had gotten all sentimental over this," the djinn Pokemon lamented, upon noting the lack of response from the Ninetales.
"I don't believe you'd actually give that back to me, so why would I indulge your taunting?" Renard replied coldly.
"...give it 'back' to you?" Diablos repeated, perplexed. For a fraction of an instant, Renard looked pained, as if he realized his error at the last second. "Whatever do you mean?"
"Nothing. We'll be leaving," Renard answered quickly, but it was becoming more and more apparent to Diablos that the unfeeling facade was crumbling away before his eyes. The Ninetales' response was too abrupt, and he was suddenly too eager to depart. He had already turned his back to the two ghosts, and was working out a way to gather up the unconscious Beedrill.
"That's fine, I'll just keep this, then," Diablos responded with a shrug. Renard's body tensed for a moment, but he gave no reply. The stone embedded in the metal bracer pulsed rhythmically, drawing the demon's gaze. "Was she a Lucario?" he mused absently, but winced as a throb of pain shot through his head again. Ugh...trying to forcibly recall his memories was still not a good idea.
"Hm?" Renard grunted, evidently thinking that Diablos was talking to him.
"Nothing, talking to myself," Diablos muttered, massaging his forehead. "Trying to figure out why this stone caused me to suddenly remember that some bitch broke-"
An impossibly cold chill descended upon the room, so intense that Diablos broke off his sentence with a sharp gasp. His mind went momentarily blank, and his psychic hold on the bracer vanished, causing it to drop to the floor with a clatter.
"Now you've done it," Renard whispered, his back still kept towards Diablos. His tails fluttered elegantly, in stark contrast to the rigidness of the rest of his body. Yet nothing could compare to the absolute coldness of his tone. Even the sudden chill of the room felt tepid by comparison. Strangely, the fire fox showed no reaction to the temperature change, as if it did not affect him at all.
Just as Diablos had opened his mouth to speak, the Ninetales spun on his heels in one swift, fluid motion. Small spheres of energy detached from the tips of each of the fox's nine tails, their conjuring unnoticed, due to the elegant fluttering motions, and launched themselves at the Hoopa.
The projectiles bombarded Diablos so rapidly that he didn't have time to dodge or create any sort of defense. As each bolt of energy made contact, they burst into a cloud of ice crystals, assaulting his mind and body with a fresh wave of agonizing cold.
"Ice...how could you be producing ice?!" Diablos demanded, wincing as he discovered the entire lower half of his body was now encased in a block of ice. Cold permeated his entire form, causing his mind to feel more sluggish, and his body similarly unresponsive. "You're a Fire-type! Your species should not have access to Ice-type abilities!"
Renard gazed coldly back at the semi-trapped Hoopa, and Diablos realized, with a jolt of alarm, that the Ninetales' red eyes were glowing with the eerie blue light that he had used before to break the Spiritomb's eye contact. Unlike before, it did not fade within moments, nor did it visibly take any sort of toll on Renard's energy. His tails continued to flutter elegantly, and he took a step closer.
If Renard had been afraid of Diablos before, that fear had vanished, and it was now Diablos' turn to feel afraid. He understood that Renard had trained his mind and body for decades longer than the average Pokemon's entire lifespan, and that those glowing eyes indicated a number of unnatural abilities at his disposal, but this pressure was something else entirely.
"How are you using Ice?!" Diablos repeated, glowering at the Ninetales, and extending a tendril of psychic energy towards the fire fox's mind, probing for an answer. However, the moment he touched Renard's mind, he received a mental backlash so intense that he was forced to withdraw, lest he suffer a headache much more severe than the ones caused by straining his memory too far. The Hoopa's scowl deepened.
"Hidden Power," Renard intoned. He stepped closer still, all but ignoring the miniature's ghost's struggle to free itself from its icy prison. "But it is due to Serena's power that it can be so formidable."
"Serena?" Diablos repeated blankly, and in spite of the gravity of his situation, he smirked. "You gave your darkness a name?"
"Darkness is the manifestation of a heart's desires," Renard murmured knowingly. "Serena is a part of me, a piece of my very soul. I see no reason for her not to have a name. Her desires reflect my own...but I will remain in control."
"How appropriate," Diablos snickered. He raised his arm, conjuring a blob of purple energy into his palm, before slamming the sphere against the icy prison confining his lower body. The Shadow Ball detonated with enough force to shatter the majority of the ice, liberating the Hoopa enough for him to retreat several paces away from the fire fox. "Vengeance is a dish best served cold, as the adage goes. How fitting that your darkness literalizes the concept."
"No, I am not in pursuit of vengeance," the Ninetales insisted, speaking more to himself than Diablos. "I just want it back...since I can't have her back..."
Renard's voice cracked at the end of his statement, and he stumbled forward, his eye color flickering between blue and red, and then back again. The Ninetales appeared abruptly fatigued, yet the resolve in his stance was undeniable. He gritted his teeth, and with visible effort, managed to prop himself upright, his breath coming out in shaky pants.
The fire fox extended his paw along the floor, until it finally came to rest upon the Lucarionite bracer that Diablos had fumbled when the temperature had plummeted. The marble-like stone embedded in the bracelet glowed warmly, and the tension in Renard's body seemed to dissipate, like smoke against the wind.
The Key Stone dangling from the Ninetale's neck blazed to life, glowing as brightly and consistently as its counterpart, and a pale pink aura gradually enveloped Renard's body. Diablos watched, in stunned disbelief bordering on horror, as his opponent became empowered by energy his species allegedly should have had no right to be compatible with.
"It hurts so much," Renard breathed, moisture leaking profusely from his eyes as he looked up at Diablos. "Sorrow pours out from within my heart and suffocates me..."
A shudder racked the Fire-type's body, and his voice sounded hoarse and constricted. Even with the present tears, Diablos could read nothing but pain within Renard's eyes. Pain spanning years, decades, even. Perhaps even centuries. The pain caused by loss. The pain wrought by despair. Pain emanating from every crevasse of the Ninetales' heart.
It was of little surprise. The curse of outliving everyone you know and love was bound to take its toll eventually. How long had Renard been saddled with such intense sorrow?
Perhaps his initial conclusion had been faulty. Perhaps it was not truly the drive for vengeance that fueled Renard's darkness. Rather, it was driven by the emotional pain that ripped at his heart. Memories of those he had loved and lost, and the haunting knowledge that all his past, present, and future friends, companions, or lovers would likewise depart this world before he would. Maybe the unfeeling face the Ninetales showed the world was born of a futile desire to stop feeling entirely. To truly become numb to his pain.
Darkness was not a wholly selfish concept. It could easily be inspired by an agonizing determination to keep from losing another acquaintance prematurely, and Renard's passive behavior could be an attempt at acceptance - knowing that no matter how long he prolonged the struggle, everyone around him would likely succumb to oblivion before he would.
"To be burdened with such feelings...I pity you," Diablos murmured, the words leaving his mouth without conscious thought. Even more astonishing was the realization that he genuinely meant that statement, even if it changed absolutely nothing about the situation. His thoughts were currently based on guesswork, but either way, he had no desire to delve deeper into the Ninetales' psyche.
"Shut up!" Renard snarled, and his tails fanned out violently. Brilliant bursts of energy erupted from his tails, each surrounded by a pink glow similar to the one that presently engulfed his body.
Diablos had more than sufficient time to defend against the fresh assault, but he chose to seize one of the rings that dangled from his horn and swipe it through the air like a cleaver. The ring expanded during the motion, growing into a shield-sized hoop that hovered before his body. The bombardment of dazzling light crystals passed through the golden ring into the portal contained within its border, and disappeared, leaving the Hoopa unharmed.
A second golden hoop materialized behind Renard, and the shining light projectiles emerged from the portal, their momentum intact. The Ninetales spun around with alarming speed, his tails batting most of the projectiles aside, and he shrugged off the impacts of the ones he failed to deflect.
"What the-?!"
A startled cry from the doorway seized Diablos' attention, and he turned to see a familiar, fairy-like Pokemon with an egg-shaped body hovering there, wary confusion painted across his face. He was soon joined by an equally familiar, tan quadruped with blue fur along its back, and active flames burning from its head and hindquarters. Taking up the rear of the small group of arrivals were two bipedal Pokemon, one that was humanoid, with green hair and seemingly dressed in a white skirt, and the other was a taller, significantly less familiar Pokemon. Blue and black fur covered the majority of its body, save for its chest, which had yellow fur. A silver spike protruded from its chest and the back of its paws, and black antenna-like appendages dangled from the back of its head. It took only a moment for Diablos to see the resemblance between this Pokemon and its unevolved counterpart.
"Oh, wow, a Ninetales really DID break into my house," Plasma commented, the Rotom inexplicably peering over Kaito's shoulder. The fairy Pokemon twitched and cast the electric ghost an annoyed look, which of course went unnoticed.
"What's going on?" Cecilia wondered, coming further into the room and shifting into a defensive battle stance, her blue eyes darting around the room, before settling upon the Spiritomb still settled upon the center table. "Wait, how'd you-?" she sputtered, addressing the Spiritomb, evidently oblivious to the presence of the shadowy djinn.
"That's quite a long story, my dear," Diablos answered, speaking through the Spiritomb, the jagged mouth curling into a smile. "In any case, regaining my mobility is by far the least fascinating of the recent developments here, but we can catch up on things once the present matter has been tidied up. Are you sure you did not wish to reconsider the option of departing in peace, Renard?"
The Ninetales scowled, but he was visibly conflicted at seeing five other Pokemon arrive. Diablos could see the struggle reflected in the fire fox's eyes. The decision of whether to retreat passively, with his tails tucked between his legs, or whether to persist and cause unnecessary collateral damage. The room was too confined to realistically flee from in the midst of combat.
"Oh, but I almost forgot," the Spiritomb continued with a smirk. "If you leave, I insist we retain possession of that stone you covet so highly. Force may be able to make use of it, and your sentimental attachment to it does not equate to ownership."
"That's fine," Renard snapped. Using one of his tails, he scooped up the bracer, and flung it with impressive force towards the Lucario. It bounced off the jackal's chest, and Force fumbled to catch it before it hit the ground. He stared at the bracer in bewilderment, then back at the Ninetales. "Cherish it. For your sake," he told the Lucario coldly.
"H-huh?"
"Now let us pass," Renard growled, addressing the other Pokemon, using his tails to scoop up the still-unconscious Beedrill, and set her upon his back. "Before I do something I'll later regret."
Without a word, the group of Pokemon moved to the side, allowing the Ninetales to depart without resistance. No one spoke until the Chateau's front door slammed behind Renard, although Diablos could not imagine how he had accomplished that.
"Wh-what was that about?" Iris stammered, wrapping her arms around herself as if a winter storm had been left in the Ninetales' wake.
