Disclaimer: I don't own Pokemon; otherwise, I'd be stalking the company that makes Pokemon into Anime. So LAME!
Summary: After the death of Matsubusa's only daughter Enya, he seeks to rebuild her body and reincarnate her into a clone. The only flaw is that the new Enya has no recollection of her previous life. Who was she? And why can she seemingly move the earth, and control fire at will?
Prologue
At times, fires can be put out fairly quickly. Sometimes, they have spread so far; it's almost impossible to stop a flame from devouring everything in its path.
In that split second, she fell.
Collapsing in her own puddle of heavy, dense, red fluid, her life quickly trickling away as the wound eagerly let out its treasure for the earth to feed on. Her hair, an ever-flowing mass of fiery red danced after her as her legs gave out from under her and she fell to her knees. Her perfect hands, stained with her own blood grasped tightly, but uselessly at the rapier driven between her ribs, wedged deeply in her lungs as her heart continued to pump the blood in her body, unknowingly dehydrating itself of its own needs.
That painstaking moment was then forever ingrained in his mind's eye. And he did the only thing a father could do for his daughter. Dodging his foe's twin blades, he ran over to her, madly slicing his way through his opponents, breaking up fights, parrying blow after blow, beheading all the ones who dared to separate him from his daughter. Seizing her tightly, her frail form was hunched up over the rapier, trembling despite herself. Her quivering was not from the rain, pelting from the skies, dousing the ground and herding blood into the earth, but from pure fear itself.
"Daddy…" she managed through a cough, and blood made itself known everywhere. "I'm scared…"
He clutched at her tiny body, as if his gesture would prevent her soul from crossing over. He knew from experience, from all the times he had mercilessly plunged his own blades through the hearts of his foes. Even as he whispered his encouragement to her, he knew that he had to accept the facts of life. Enya, his little flame, was dying.
"Daddy?" She called again, in a voice that was 7 years younger than that of her body.
"Here, Enya…" He had to be brave. Fear was threatening to overcome him. For his Enya, he had to be brave.
She sniffed, looking very much like a child again. "I'm scared…" Came the small and weak answer, as a numbing sensation started to overtake her senses. Her power of movement faded away. "I… don't want to… be alone…"
He tried, and managed a bleak hopeless smile. "Enya… you are never alone."
Life wasn't fair. How was he supposed to know that that would be the day he would lose everything he ever cared for?
The blank, icy, lifeless eyes, that had once been so lively, flashing with the joy of cruelty, his angel, the demon in battle.
With a primitive and feral roar, he lunged into battle with the one who had slain his fallen angel. The last of his bloodline. His blades were also eager for fresh flesh and hissing blood. A simple swing was all it took, and steel embedded itself into flesh, soaking in the red fluid and meeting with hard bone. Blood spattered all over his opponent, and himself, blending in with the masquerade of red and black he himself had adorned.
But slaying this one man… would not bring back what he had lost.
His poor, beautiful tenshi… and she had been so intent with aiding him with his dream. A planet of earth, and earth only.
Fisting her fiery hair, he leaned forwards, and soaked in what was left of her warmth, long since dissolved when the rains had joined the battle. The dark, heavyset figure behind him went unnoticed as he drowned himself in his grief.
Down came the assassin's blade.
There was a heavy thunk and a metallic clashing sound of sword parrying blade.
"What's lost is lost!" A woman's voice shouted over the sound of war and rain. "Don't sit around, otherwise we'll lose you too, Matsubusa! And then, how will we finish our dream?"
Our dream. Awakening Groudon had also been Enya's dream. To see a legendary pokemon, and maybe, someday, own it as well. Too bad she never lived to see the day.
Another flash of lightning cracked the sky, and for a moment, the entire battlefield was illuminated. For that one solitary moment, Matsubusa could see rivers of blood, trickling and seeping into the earth. Yes, the price of his dream was blood; human blood would be shed, for a greater good. The Grim Reaper, angel of death, was here as well, delighting in the screams, the horror, fear radiating off the humans, and he would sit, and watch, collecting lost souls, and dragging them down into the depth of…
"Kagari…" He murmured, pulling on the dress of the woman who was gleefully driving her sword through her soon to be dead enemy.
"Hai?" Thick red liquid slid off her sword, tears of red.
"We must retreat. Both sides are losing too many people, and we can barely see our way through this fog, wind and rain."
Kagari lowered her sword with a sigh, an awkward and alien sound to the battlefield. Matsubusa was correct, as usual. The conditions were definitely not in their favor, and attacks were seemingly coming out of thin air. Their people were unable to see their attackers, and couldn't fire back or defend themselves with the barrage of attacks coming from all directions. And, there had already been one very important casualty.
As if he was sensing her thoughts, Matsubusa raised his head to meet Kagari's questioning glance. "No. My daughter will not remain here with the rest of these… weaklings."
Taking the girl in her blood-soaked arms, Kagari nodded grimly to her leader, and called out a black and white bird pokemon, Swellow. The limp and soggy weight of Enya would increase the difficulty of traveling in the rough winds, above a battlefield, no less. Arrows would be scouting the sky, and escape through air was nearly impossible. But what other choice did she have? The leader trusted her with the body of his 15-year old daughter, and she had to get it back to the desert without getting killed herself, otherwise the mission would be considered null and void.
The wind was not in her favor, and neither were the circumstances, but somehow, she had to perform the impossible. "Fly."
How funny, that a simple one-syllable word, might either condemn her to certain death by arrows or lightning strikes, or allow her to escape unscathed from this bloody war.
2 weeks later…"What's lost, is lost" Kagari repeated the four words she had told Matsubusa during the battle. She cocked her head towards one of her companions. "Isn't that right, Hokage?"
"Don't drag me into this…again." Hokage stated plainly, folding his arms, and shutting his eye. "Yes, that is right. But apparently, Matsubusa doesn't think so."
"He has almost lost complete interest in our first purpose," Another man grunted, walking over to the duo. "But now he's overly obsessed with his new plans."
"Homura…please don't tell me he's going to go on with that cloning plan?" A frown graced her face as Kagari pulled her red hood lower over her black hair, almost hoping that the thick fabric would keep the truth from crashing into her ears.
"Alright. But, he is."
"I said, don't tell me!" Kagari shouted, clamping her hands over her ears and stomping off arrogantly.
"How can he be so positive that it will work?" Hokage questioned. "It might go terribly wrong, and he might end up with some sort of mutated toad instead."
"As I said, he's obsessed." Homura reported in a purposely-loud voice, so that it reached Kagari, who was still pacing away. "As long as it holds likeness, I suppose."
"…I understand that he will use his daughter's DNA to formally rebuild her body through cloning, but without enough power or an excellent power source, the clone- body, will die"
"And this time, even solar energy, the most vast energy of this planet won't be sufficient."
"SHUT UP… just shut up…" Kagari moaned louder than ever, burying her head in her arms as she took a seat on the rock ground. "He loved her, and she loved him. She's gone, and he's still here. Why doesn't he just accept the fact she's gone," Her voice got louder as she spoke each statement. "NOT COMING BACK, WILL NEVER BE BACK, AND A CLONE WON'T REPLACE HIS DAUGHTER?"
"Well, you can't blame a man for trying." Homura said, making his way to Kagari. "He lost his wife in some accident as well. Do you think he's willing to lose his daughter as well?"
"No… he's not. But dead is dead." She just couldn't get it. Matsubusa had slayed many in battle as well, each of those people he had killed also had relatives, families, loved ones. If he killed, if all of them killed, then why couldn't he just see that his daughter could be killed as well? "At least not everyone thinks like Matsubusa. Otherwise, we'd have cloned zombies walking the earth."
Covering a planet in land was obviously attainable. Bringing the dead back to life was not. Hokage and Homura clearly pitied their leader, but were visibly unsure of Matsubusa's plan. Everyday, it was the same. Matsubusa had locked himself in his room, cutting himself off from the rest of Team Magma, even the Fireheads. Only Groudon knew what the boss was sprouting in that room of his.
On the fifth week of Enya's burial in the desert, Matsubusa finally stumbled out of his room, and nearly collapsed onto a poor bypassing grunt. Luckily, Homura had caught him before that happened, and rightened him upright again.
Matsubusa had changed visually from the last time they had seen him, walking in a zombie-like state into his room and throwing the door shut behind him, shutting the rest of the world out. Now, he had dark rings around his eyes, and his pale skin exaggerated his age. But on his lips, was a smile of triumph.
"I have it."
It was insane. A joke. Yet a highly respected attempt. Matsubusa had the scientists working from daybreak to night, with backbreaking data, information, and plans. It was one of the few times the Fireheads had ever been left out on a project or mission, but then again, they knew when to keep out of Matsubusa's way. Once again, out of pure boredom, Kagari offered to set Slateport on fire, just to watch the people run and scream.
"And set up a beacon for Team Aqua?" Matsubusa retorted, and bustled on his way, shouting orders this way and that.
"Jeez… old grouch" Kagari muttered, disheartened at being turned down.
As soon as Matsubusa was safely out of sight, Hokage threw her a grin. "Don't mind him. He'll be back to his old self when this project fails."
"You really think it might?" mused Kagari. "Such little hope."
"You're so encouraging."
"So? You're not being a cheerleader either?"
"Men aren't cheerleaders."
"I'm not a man. I'm not a cheerleader." Kagari returned Hokage's goading smile. "So now, to ease our boredom, we resort to complete and utter nonsense?"
"Just enough to pass the time" came the quick response.
Being on break also had some upsides to it, other than boredom. While Matsubusa was busy with the scientists, he left the rest of Team Magma unattended. Which would leave the direct subordinates of the leader in charge of the rest. Kagari shared a knowing smile with Hokage.
"Bannai's in for it now, isn't he?"