Disclaimer: The author claims no right to the Pokémon characters in this fanfic, which are the copyrighted property of Nintendo. All original characters and lands in this fanfic belong solely to the author.
A/N: Okay, so after something like two or three years of writers block..., I've decided to pick this story back up, which hopefully I'll be able to finish this time since I have so many new ideas for it than originally planned. So now here is the the updated rewrite of a rewrite, Shades of the Past (now with a prologue!).
Shades of the Past
by Kellnoa's Sorrow
Look not mournfully into the past. It comes not back again.
Wisely improve the present. It is thine.
Go forth to meetthe shadowy future, without fear.
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1807-1882
Prologue
They had come without warning, fear and death quick to follow into the depths of the night. Not a sound was made nor a blade disturbed as they had made their way into the village, like the shadows that crept as the moon traveled its path. In some ways they were shadows, or at the least savages, as some who had the misfortuned of surviving would come to call them; they had to have been soulless, possessing no remnants of humanity, in order to arouse such atrocity without guilt or conscience, but pleasure and indifference. Nevertheless, their presence, however daunting, remained unknown for quite some time, so for the villagers it was one night out of many, no different from any other that consituted their uniform little world.
And now that world was turning to ash, quite literally from the perspective of one young girl. She was frightened beyond belief as she cowered in the corner of her closet, screaming for her mother. She looked on through the slits of the shingled door with horror as she saw her once beautiful room destroy itself, the pink and white color of the walls completely obscured by the dancing orange glow of flames. The bed in which she had slept soundly only hours before, the toys of which she had forgotten to put away, her belongings, her life...they were all alight, food for the fire that inched towards her haven. Add to the fact that she could hear the terrified screams of friends and neighbors just beyond the wall behind her, and she was, quite literally, in hell.
All she could do was cry out to a mother that would not, and for that matter could not, come at the top of her voice; it was now nothing more than a horse whisper, having been scorched by the searing heat. The situation seemed hopeless as she tried to push her back further into the wall, the flames just outside the wooden door. In mere moments, she would be dead.
Yet through all this, she continued to grasp a strangely shaped plush toy to her chest, the only thing that brought her some comfort in these last moments of her life. It resembled a lapras, taken from her favorite book The Littlest Lapras, which her mother had helped her to make. Due to a mistake, it was light green, with a short stubby neck on a broad body. Its four flippers did not match in size, and its head did not have a horn characteristic to the species. In addition, there was no actuall shell since they couldn't find the right material to make one, so the girl had cut faces from photos she had, and pasted them onto the plush's back into the shape of a shell. It didn't look like much when the girl was done, but she had made it, and it possessed bits of her family and friends. It was good enough for her, even at this point in her life.
Just as the closet door burst into flames and she had given up all hope, she saw a dark figure step into the room; the sight of another person lifted her spirits. As he made his way into the room, the flames consuming the carpet seemed to recede in front of him as though in the presence of power, creating a safe path that led right to the closet door. He follwed that path, and before the little girl knew it, the door was open, and the figure stared down at her.
At first she was relieved that someone had finally come to get her, perhaps to take her somewhere far from the nightmare that surrounded her. A place where she would be reunited with her family, free to live out the remainder of their lives without having to deal with tragedies similar to the one that befell her town.
She looked up at his face with a smile, but she did not recieve one in return. In fact, she couldn't see any features of his face at all; facing the closet with the only light coming from behind, she could only make out the faint orange glow that was reflected in his eyes. It made her feel uncomfortable, and her smile disappeared.
She whimpered when she saw something emerge from behind his legs. A pair of red eyes remained fixed onto her, both set in a long and narrow head covered in cream colored fur, as was the rest of its body. The ninetails, if the girl wasn't mistaken, seemed excited in the midst of the flames, its fur appearing rough or stiff, a rather feral look, as though each strand were on its end.
The figure stepped back before giving a command to his pokémon, who gave a quick nod in return before opening its maw in attack. The interior began to glow a bright red, flames slowly licking the corners of its mouth.
"No...please..." she barely whispered, pleading to the figure with frightened eyes.
It did no good. The figure simply gave the command before the pokémon let loose a stream of fire aimed right at her. She screamed for the first several seconds, after which it finally died down. And so it was for many of the villagers....
Loved ones lost, friends torn asunder, it was a night to surely be remembered....
E N D P R O L O G U E : S H A D E S O F T H E P A S T