Chapter 11: Aftermath
When the three Beast Riders returned from Birth Island to Tin Tower, dozens of townspeople were waiting for them, ready to exalt them for their leadership, power, and courage. They had already heard about the defeat of the Legacy Hunters on the news. After the three legendary beasts had crossed the tower, Ho-oh deposited the three brave warriors on top of the tower. The legendary bird congratulated them once more.
"I am much indebted to you for your tremendous bravery. Now that the Legacy Hunters have been permanently dealt with and Lugia has retreated back to the ocean bottom, we have nothing do worry about for a long time. For that reason, I will stay atop this tower until something comes up again. If there is a reason you need to see me, you three are more than welcome to come and take care of that business you may have."
"O great rainbow Pokémon, there is no imminent, or even predictable, danger that the region will be in for years and years to come. Since that is the case, could we please stay with these people?" Raikou asked. "I understand that there is a rule stating that we cannot allow ourselves to be captured, but I also believe there is no reason to keep this tradition anymore. We may be guardians, but with the Legacy Hunters gone, there is really no one left to guard against. Considering that, will you let Josh capture me? It will benefit both myself and him. This is not out of any kind of selfishness; he wants to be with me forever, and I with him. Will you please consider making this exception? I am sure Entei and Suicune would agree with me."
Suicune responded, "Very well put. I also want to be with my rider forever." Entei also said the same thing in agreement. "With the three of us in agreement, will you at least consider making just one exception?"
"I concur that there is overwhelming evidence to allow yourselves to be captured by these three young men; they are by far the most skilled Beast Riders to this day. As a matter of fact, I wish I could tell you to let them capture all three of you, whether you wanted it or not. But we must remember that man has a tendency to do evil things. Though they are indeed very pure of heart...on second thought, these three would never turn evil. Still, I cannot dismiss the fear that something regretful will happen if your immense powers are completely entrusted to them. I believe that is the true reason for the rule. In conclusion, as much as I hate saying this, I must say no to that."
All six of them, beast and rider, were disappointed at Ho-oh's response to the request. "Can't we at least stay with them for a little while longer? Just another week or two, even? Surely there is nothing preventing us from doing that!"
"Hmmm... I can't see any harm in it. You three don't really get to interact with people very often, simply because of your immense power. But these young men are vastly different. If they saved Johto using this power, I think they can be trusted. I grant your request. You can be with them for one more week, starting tomorrow. Once that week is up, you must return to the Brass Tower and sleep once more. Josh, Ace, Aravan, did you hear me? You are allowed one week with the legendary Pokémon. Once that week ends, you must go back to the chamber beneath the Brass Tower. There, you are to return the swords back to their pedestals, and seal the chamber once more when you exit. Then, you must part with Raikou, Entei, and Suicune."
At that, the three riders mounted their beasts and headed down the stairs leading to the base of the tower. People from all over the town, including most of the students and professors at the college, made the long trip to the tower just to see the three legendary Pokémon and the three warriors. Several of the people in the crowd wanted the riders to draw their swords. The three of them took out their swords for a few seconds, letting the crowd take pictures. Even after the riders sheathed their blades again, the camera flashes kept coming relentlessly. After about an hour of interviews, the three heroes found their way out of the crowd and ran off for the college campus. The students and staff that didn't go to the tower were outside, waiting for them. They wanted to talk with the Beast Riders about what happened at Birth Island, but they had little energy left and wanted to rest.
Over the next two days and the morning after that, Ace and Aravan worked on finishing their research papers, knowing that they only had a week with Raikou, Entei, and Suicune. It was about midday Monday when the two had finished their papers. They were only about ten pages each, not nearly as long as Josh's. The two of them wanted Josh to evaluate their papers before they turned them in. Walking down the long hallway to Josh's door, they encountered each other and talked about their papers before coming to the door and knocking. "Who's there?" Josh asked from inside.
Aravan opened the door about halfway, revealing Ace and himself to Josh. He was sitting on the floor, playing a videogame. "Oh, it's you two. What's up?" he asked as he paused the game.
"I...er, we, that is, both of us, just finished our papers. And we want you to look at them," Ace answered.
"No problem. Because of what's going on, the professor doesn't want his class meeting until the paper is due. Nothing was going on in the class this week anyway, according to him, so he wanted the class to talk to us about our experiences with the legendary beasts. It even fascinates him. I was planning on going into that field on Raikou tomorrow, but I have nothing planned today. Sure, I'll review your papers. You see, I told everyone here that if they wanted to ride Raikou with me tomorrow through Thursday in the afternoon, I would. You doing anything those three afternoons?"
Both of them repiled, "Not that I can think of. Besides, it'll be fun."
"How long will it take to review our papers?" Ace added.
"Give me a half-hour for each one. But while you're here..."
"Yeah?"
"I've been playing F-Zero GX for the past hour or so before you came, and I have two extra controllers. Want to join me?" Josh asked both of them.
Aravan and Ace accepted. "I'm kind of bored anyway. I have this game, too. I don't know how good you are at it, but I don't think I'm very good," Ace added.
"I used to play this with my friend last year all the time. Though it was his game, I kept beating him for some reason," Aravan recalled.
"I don't know how good you are," Josh replied, "but I think this will be a good match. How long do you have to stay here?" He then looked up at the clock. "It's about half-past four now."
"If you want to order pizza, we can stay as late as you want, up to a half-hour before lights out."
"We won't need that much time. I think I'll review your two papers at about nine and get them back to you tomorrow morning. But let's forget about those and get this baby started!" At that, Josh turned on the game console, and the three of them began playing together. When they saw how many machines and tracks were available to them, they knew what kind of skill they were up against.
"You've unlocked the Diamond Cup!" Ace exclaimed.
"Yep, and I've also been working on unlocking more machines for you. A few weeks before the professor announced the papers were due, I unlocked the Cosmic Dolphin, the Silver Rat, and Rainbox Phoenix, and the Dark Schneider for use, as well as a few custom machines. Do you use custom machines?" he asked Ace.
"Shoot," he responded quickly.
"Don't worry about a thing. The game is in your room, right?"
"Yeah, of course it's there."
"Then go get your memory card real quick."
"Sure. Be back in about ten or fifteen minutes." With that, Ace rushed out the door. While he was gone, Josh and Aravan practiced on some of the easier tracks. They could only get a few runs in before Ace returned with the memory card. Josh shut the game off, put Ace's memory card in the other slot, and turned it back on. About a couple of minutes later, the three of them had already set everything up in-game.
"How about we set up a huge Grand Prix with just the three of us and one computer player?" Josh then explained the system. "We play all 20 tracks one time each. First place gets nine points, second place six, third three and fourth one. Whoever has the most points at the end wins."
"Sounds good, except on one condition. The two of us have never played any of the Diamond Cup tracks. We each have one practice run on those tracks before the one that counts," Ace requested.
"Fine. We'll pizza break at the halfway point. Now, let's race!"
For the rest of that night, the three Beast Riders played that racing game. All of them had a lot of fun with it. Early in the Grand Prix, where the tracks were easier, Josh started off badly, losing points to Ace. Aravan couldn't get much together at the start, and worsened as the night went on.
After the pizza break, however, Josh's polish started to show on the more difficult tracks, especially on the four-star, five-star, and six-star rated tracks. Though Ace continued to get off to quick starts every race, he had to slow down to keep his machine on the track after the first lap of every race, allowing Josh to blow past him. This really showed on the Trident track, where Josh smoked Ace, finishing almost twenty-five seconds ahead of him.
By the time they finished, it was half past seven. "I had a lot of fun, even though you guys smoked me. In a real race, that wouldn't have happened," Aravan said defiantly.
"Is that a challenge?" Josh wondered.
"You bet! No way is Suicune going to lose to you!"
"Oh, so it's that kind of challenge!" Josh seemed interested in Aravan's trash talk. "If that's the case, you're on!"
"Well, neither of you are going to win, because Entei and I can smoke both of you!" Ace said in the same defiant tone as Aravan.
"Well, you two have plenty of time to train yourselves--you have tomorrow, Wednesday, and Thursday mornings to get up to speed. The race will be Friday, and it will start at high noon. I'm going to post a public announcement on the bulletin board tomorrow. Thanks for coming over; I had a lot of fun. See you tomorrow."
For the next three days, Ace and Aravan went out to the open field north of campus, ready to train themselves for the challenge on Friday. The two of them got so involved in their training that they forgot about their peers wanting to ride with them. Josh had to handle it all alone each of the three days. Only a few people outside of the Pokémon Legends History class got to ride Raikou with Josh. All of them enjoyed the experience, even though Josh didn't push the Legend of Thunder very fast at all. Though the tiger never ran faster than forty miles per hour, Josh still had a lot of fun. Even the professor climbed up on Raikou with Josh. Despite that he had to wait until late Thursday to do it, it was still an experience he would never forget. "I wish I could go fast like you do all the time, Josh, but I would probably fall off and break every bone in my body. Still, that was a nice experience for me. I appreciate your patience and sharing."
"Thanks," Josh responded. "I'm sorry that I couldn't get to all of you these three days, but...I told Ace and Aravan to be here to help, and they never showed up. But perhaps it's for the best, since they've probably been training for the race tomorrow. If they've been training this hard, I assure you it will be a good race."
"So that's what all of that painted grass is out there for... to point out the race path. It's all over the campus grounds," the professor reasoned.
"Precisely. I tried to make the course a challenge to run. If it weren't as curvy as it is, this wouldn't be a contest. I'm trying to make the course fair to all three of the Beast Riders. I'm looking forward to this."
Meanwhile, Aravan and Ace had just finished up their training. Both of them had raced across the field at their beast's respective top speeds. When they exited through the gap in the trees, they noticed part of the white line that was the outside of the racetrack. "This wasn't there before. What do you suppose it is?" Aravan asked.
"The only thing that I can think of is..." Ace cut the sentence off. "Looks like Josh wants to make this race a really big event, if he's getting track markers set up. I suggest we follow this line. That way, we will know the course."
Both of them turned their Pokémon to the right and started following the line. It weaved around many of the buildings and sports fields on campus, including the soccer and football fields, the gym, the main parking lot, and the main building. The two legends and their riders made two laps around the track before calling it a day. After the riders went inside for the evening, all three beasts were a little bit concerned about being in this race the next day.
"Are you sure we should be doing this? We are being used in a human competition. Isn't that against the rules?" Raikou was concerned, recalling the deal the three of them made with Ho-oh five days before.
"That may be, but this is clearly a private event with no prizes of any kind," Suicune recalled. "This is just a fun event for everyone, us included. I highly doubt we will get in trouble for this."
"I'm with you," Entei agreed. "As long as they don't get anything else out of this, I don't see why we should be restricted from racing. I never got a chance to do this before, and I don't see why I should put it off any longer."
"Oh... All right, you win."
That next afternoon, there were red plastic barriers set up all around where the white lines were, except around the dorm building; there, the barrier was only on the outside. There were students from the campus lined almost all the way around the outside of the track, but the biggest crowd was along the start/finish line, located just outside the dorm building. A half-hour before the race was scheduled to start, the three Beast Riders were discussing the regulations with the referees. These referees were volunteers from the student body.
"The red barriers that wind around the campus grounds mark the track bounds. You are not to jump over them or intentionally knock them down, or you will be disqualified. Extremespeed and/or Quick Attack boosting will be prohibited during the first lap of the race. You may not intentionally attack or ram other racers. The first one to complete five laps around the track will be declared the winner. Is that clear?"
All three of them nodded their heads to indicate that they knew the rules. Another official came forward and showed the participants the course map. "The course has been designed carefully so that each of you has an approximately equal chance of winning. It does not come down to the attributes of your Pokémon; instead, it will be how you use those attributes to your advantage that will determine the winner of this contest. It has also been designed so that you can maintain top speed for much of the course; however, there are enough curves such that you will not be able to take them at such high speeds."
About twenty minutes later, the three Beast Riders came in atop their Pokémon. The beasts jumped over the outside wall and made their way to the start/finish line. About five yards off the ground was a time, lap, and position display for the crowd to reference. As the swift beasts came in, the time display read 0'00"000 and the lap display read Lap 1/5. The position display was blank. When they stopped at the start/finish line, the crowd started cheering for them wildly and took more pictures of them. An official with a microphone came onto the track and made an announcement before the start of the race.
"Please disable the flash on all your cameras now. If you cannot do so, then you must put the camera away. Also, please do not throw anything onto the track." He then left for trackside. "Let's get this race started!" At that, the three beasts walked up to the start/finish line and made serious, competitive glances at each other. They were ready to race just as much as the riders were. When the three participants were ready, the position display lit up, showing Aravan in first, Ace in second, and Josh in third. The same official, now at trackside, yelled into the microphone. Meanwhile, the three riders were trash talking to each other after they put the visors on their helmets down.
"Three!"
"I'm going to go by you two so fast, you won't even be able to see my dust!" Josh gloated.
"Two!"
"Of course I won't be able to see your dust. That's because I'll be in front of you the whole time!" Aravan responded. Suicune started generating a vicious wind behind itself, ready to jump with it.
"One!"
"Try to keep me in sight. Entei runs faster than wildfire spreads!"
"GOOOOOOOO!"
When the official said "Go," all three beasts darted down the opening stretch. The wind Suicune generated vaulted it forward at 70 miles per hour in the first few seconds of the race, causing Aravan to take an early lead. The first five seconds of the race was a chance to get up to speed. Suicune's control over the wind gave it explosive acceleration performance. The first curve, about six seconds into the race, was a mild S-curve. This obstacle was no problem for any of them, especially at their slow speeds.
The next portion of the track was fairly straight, with a gentle left turn separating two straightaways about four seconds each at maximum speed. All three beasts used this straight stretch to increase their speed. Entei and Raikou didn't have near the acceleration performance Suicune had, but they also had a much higher maximum speed than Suicune. Using this short straight section as a speed-increasing opportunity, the three beasts increased their speed to well over 100 miles per hour. Raikou and Entei, however, were faster here than Suicune was. Though Aravan was still in first place, he lost ground on this section as Raikou passed Entei. Both of them, however, were still a good four tenths of a second behind Aravan and Suicune.
After the straight stretch, the track featured another S-curve. This one was smoother than the one before, but more drawn out. Though all three speeding beasts took it with no problems on this lap, it would come to haunt them on future laps, when they would be running much faster. Suicune went on the outside before heading through the second turn back to the right. It bolted through the apex of the turn, accelerating out of it. What Aravan forgot is that turn continued past the S-curve. The water-type ended up on the outside of the big turn back to the right, and gave up considerable ground to Raikou. Ace also had trouble interpreting where the turn ended, and lost ground to Raikou, but gained ground on the leader.
The next section was a straight stretch about as long as the previous one, but it had a 90-degree left turn at the end. Ace and Entei fell to the outside, gaining ground on both of their competitors. Knowing that this turn was ahead, Josh was afraid to speed Raikou up. When the three of them came into the turn at about 140 miles per hour, Suicune stayed in the middle of the track. Raikou sped into the turn and wound up on the outside of the track. Being on the outside edge of this turn gave Ace an advantage. He went into the turn early and passed the apex of it, coming out of the turn roughly 30 miles per hour faster than either of his rivals. Consequently, they passed Josh. "Crap!" Josh muttered to himself as he found himself in last place.
After a shorter straightaway following the 90-degree turn to the left, there was another similar turn fast approaching. Raikou slowed down a touch to get good position out of the turn. Following this turn was the longest straight stretch of the entire track. Coming out of that last turn on the inside of the track, Josh told Raikou to book it. And it did. Rushing across the straight stretch at nearly 200 miles per hour, Raikou rushed past Ace and even Aravan. Both of them started speeding up, close to maximum speed as well.
Josh wished he could get to the outside, but Aravan was too close to him to go there. He would have to let him pass or slow down going into the 90-degree curve at the end of the stretch. He chose to slow down at the curve. Luckily for Josh, Aravan and Suicune didn't pass him, despite the fact that he ended up on the outside of the turn.
Two more 90-degree turns, with short straightaways in between, tested the mettle of the Beast Riders once more. Suicune, demonstrating incredible agility, took them down the center of the track, losing hardly any speed and passing Raikou again in the process. Entei took one of the turns perfectly, but lost a lot of speed trying to get through the second one.
The track transitioned into a gentle turn to the left. All three of them were able to take the gentle curve at top speed, allowing Josh and Ace to repair some of the damage done from the last series of curves. When Aravan increased his lead to about a quarter of a second, the track suddenly started turning back around to the right, at a slightly larger angle. This threw Aravan and Suicune in the back of the entire turn, causing Raikou to whiz by in the middle of the track. It was so bad that even Entei caught up to Suicune.
Just over a minute into the first lap, the track narrowed coming into a straightaway similar to the one at the beginning of the lap. This allowed Raikou to extend its lead slightly, with Aravan and Ace now about eight tenths of a second behind.
The rest of the track was composed of gentle turns and an absence of straightaways, until the last turn on the track approached; it was a brutal, thin S-curve. Josh pulled back on Raikou hard, causing its speed to drop significantly. This was necessary to get through the turn without rubbing the outside wall. The rider then noted to himself to direct Raikou to the outside of this turn on future laps. Entei drifted through the turn, passing Suicune. This final turn gave Aravan a hard time. Suicune's feet seemed to grip the ground like bubble gum. The beast turned through both sections of the S-curve so quickly that it jerked the rider to the other side after the second turn. This caused Aravan to become slightly disoriented and lose a little more time to Entei as all three Beast Riders crossed the start/finish line, advancing to the second lap. A message flashed on the second screen a short distance from the starting line. The message read, "Booster OK!" Behind that message was Josh's lap time of 1'31"772.
Not surprisingly, the first few turns of the second lap were much harder than the first time around. After all, the three beasts were running close to 200 miles per hour this time. Boosting strategy would now play a role in the race. The long, gentle S-curve would prove to be a nightmare turn for the remainder of the race. Knowing how the curves would come, Suicune stayed in the center of them, only occasionally drifting outside. Raikou and Entei could not take that curve at the same speed, and thus lost ground to Suicune. Coming up to another straight stretch, Aravan knew he had to get ground back. He had Suicune enter a brief Extremespeed Boost. Suicune's crystal was glowing for the time it was in the boost, racing past the other two beasts at 215 miles per hour.
Suicune slowed down enough to take the two 90-degree left turns. Picking up a lesson from Entei, Raikou drifted through both turns, gaining ground on both competitors far ahead of him. On the long straightaway to come, all three burst into Extremespeed, and Suicune's lack of boosted speed started to show. Josh's 250 mile-per-hour tiger darted past Suicune, and Entei caught up to the adversary. By the time everyone fell back to normal speeds, Josh and Raikou were more than a second ahead of Suicune. That ground was made up quickly in the curvy backstretch of the track. By the time the third lap rolled around, Josh was still in the lead, but Ace and Aravan were coming strong from behind. The second screen showed Josh's lap time of 1'25"658, as well as the short time interval of a tenth of a second between him and Ace.
After Raikou and Entei zoomed by him on the second lap, Aravan caught onto the fact that Suicune's boosted speed was not very high. This lap, he would try using Suicune's boost on shorter sections of the track, like the one near the beginning. It seemed to work well, as Aravan regained the lead. Suicune took the long S-curve beautifully, just as on the previous lap. On both sections after the long turn, Aravan had Suicune boost again. Raikou and Entei could not take the turns as closely as Suicune, nor could they boost in the places it did. All this added up to about a one-second lead for Aravan.
The long straight stretch next to the open field was where Josh and Ace cut Aravan's lead down. Both of them boosted past Aravan. With Entei having a higher boosted speed than either of them, Ace took the lead. Drifting through every corner perfectly, the fire-type pulled far away from the other two Beast Riders, adding up to a nearly two-second interval at the start of lap four. The three beasts ran essentially the same route on the fourth lap, and in the same amount of time. Suicune and Raikou were running neck and neck when the white flag wove--two seconds behind Ace and Entei.
When the two of them crossed the start/finish line at nearly the same time, Aravan yelled at Josh, "See you later!" After taking the mild S-curve, Suicune zoomed past Raikou, leaving Josh and his beast far behind. "We can't give up yet," Josh said. "There is some way to make up all this ground. We have to be aggressive."
They did get more aggressive, boosting where they didn't before. After the long turn back to the right, Raikou came out of the next 90-degree turn in Extremespeed, cutting Ace's margin in half. Suicune was also making a last-ditch effort, going up to boosted speed on nearly every straight stretch; but it wasn't going to be enough to catch up to Entei in time. But Ace choked. He came into the 90-degree curve before slowing down enough, and lost much of his lead. Because of this mistake, it was now anyone's race, but Suicune had an advantage; the curvy backstretch of the track was all that was left. Taking the curves gracefully and precisely, Suicune passed both of its competitors and held the lead all the way to the checkered flag. Raikou and Entei finished second and third, respectively.
The crowd was cheering not only for Aravan, but for all three riders, as well as their beasts. Most of the people there had never seen the legendary Pokémon before, let alone seeing them run that fast.
The next morning, Raikou informed all three Beast Riders that their time together was up. "It's been a very fun week, and that was a fun race yesterday. But we have to return to the tower now."
Aravan was a little bit sad that he had to part with Suicune, as were the other two riders. They got together and climbed astride the legendary Pokémon for the last time. Suicune then spoke to them.
"Before you leave the tower, you must lay the swords to rest in the pedestals you found them, and close the seal to this chamber. You will not be able to leave the tower with us." All three riders shed a few tears on the way to the tower. Upon arrival, the three of them descended into the secret chamber. Rushing through the three passages, they reached the three empty pedestals. The three riders jumped off their Pokémon and slowly walked over to the same pedestal they pulled their respective swords from. One at a time, they stuck the blades back in the pedestals. When they did, their light armor fell off and mysteriously vanished without a trace.
"Well, let's go." They climbed back on their Pokémon, headed back for the main chamber.
"It truly has been nice being with you, Josh," Raikou acknowledged. "I can hardly bear to part with you, but it's a rule I have to follow."
When the three Pokémon reached the main chamber, the riders jumped off and walked out the entrance to the tower. All three of them looked back as the beasts sent one final message to them. "See you again!" they cried back.
To get back to the campus, they all flew on their Pokémon; Josh on Pidgeot, and Ace and Aravan on Flygon. Josh then remembered about the research papers he was supposed to review. "Crap! I forgot all about those papers!"
For their entire flight back to campus, Ho-oh was watching from the tower above. "They handled it so maturely, even after that intense competition after the fighting. They truly are legendary heroes. Perhaps I was wrong to make them part. They were closer to the Pokémon than anyone else in history. It would be worth considering to let those young men capture the legendary Pokémon. It's something I would never have conceived before. Perhaps I should talk about it with them if they come up here to visit me again..."
THE END