.15
Oh, you're up now.
Salutations from the other side, dear traveler! Sorry for putting you under. Trust me, you'd have gone crazy if you were awake.
…Hmm? Who am I? Well… I'm a friend. And there's an entire world out there that needs your help. In fact, you're their last hope.
You want what?
I'll have to erase your memories of this conversation, so you won't keep any of it. But we have a little time. Sit down— oh. Wait. You don't have a body yet. Silly me! Just float there, then.
It all started very long, long ago…
~\({O})/~
22.
Salutations From the Other Side
~\({O})/~
School Forest ~ Four Weeks Ago
~Riolu~
Riolu opened his mouth, and his tongue flopped out. Everything felt weird. He could smell the forest around him in much more detail than he was used to, and he was sure his tongue wasn't supposed to be hanging out of his mouth like that. It was only when he heard the rushing of the lake that Riolu thought to open his eyes.
He couldn't see as well, that was for sure. But his smell and hearing more than made up for it. He could hear the lake, and he could smell the lake, and his nose and ears together told him it was less than three feet away. That would take some getting used to. His feet, however…
Riolu cast a look at his hind paws, realizing that he didn't have the faintest idea of how to walk on those. All the while his tongue had been flopped out of his mouth, and it was beginning to drip slobber onto him. Riolu did his best to pull his tongue back into his mouth, but it took a few tries to get it right. And then, Riolu noticed: he was parched.
Luckily, that was what the lake was for.
Riolu crawled over to it on his elbows and knees, and after casting a look around and realizing there wouldn't be any ready-made cups waiting around for him in the middle of a forest—darn it—he gave up and stuck his tongue into the water to drink. He was able to drink his fill that way easily, although the water flowed too fast for Riolu to see his reflection.
Swish.
The thing that jarred him out of his stupor was the sound of something approaching from behind him. Riolu quickly turned over, looking in the direction of the noise. In the distance (although he couldn't tell for sure, the distance was a bit blurry), there stood what looked like a trio of cone-headed creatures with softly-flickering lights on their arms. The flickers made it hard to see. Riolu tilted his head for a minute. Were these natives? Maybe they could help him!
"Hey!" Riolu called out cheerfully, waving at them. "Hullo! Over here! Anyone think they can give me some directions?"
They didn't answer. Riolu's waving stopped for just a second. He was beginning to get a little unnerved. Maybe they couldn't hear him or something. He'd just wave harder.
"I'm a bit lost!" Riolu called out, unconsciously wagging his tail behind him. "Can you help me?"
The trio of pokemon turned to each other, and Riolu saw for sure the flickering lights on their hands. Red yellow green yellow red and then yellow again…
And then, just like that, they all turned back to face Riolu. Riolu gave them a complimentary wave. Just in case. Maybe…
All thoughts and hopes of a civil exchange were suddenly dashed from Riolu's mind. The creatures raised their arms, and then a large shadowy ball materialized out of nowhere and flew straight at Riolu—
—Riolu barely dived out of the way as it flew over the bush he was next to and exploded against something on the other side of the lake.
"Hey! Not cool!" Riolu yelled back at them. If the strange pokemon heard him, they didn't acknowledge it. They started to move towards him, and as the bushes pushed apart Riolu saw that they had no legs. They floated.
Riolu quickly glanced down at his own legs. He didn't know how these even worked, much less how to walk on them! But then one of the strange pokemon's lights flickered bright yellow again and blinked him in the face, and Riolu decided that now was as good a time as any to learn. He hopped to his feet—stumbled a bit—then ran off into the woods as fast as he could.
He didn't get far. He tripped on a root, which sent him tumbling down the forest floor until he landed in the middle of a ditch.
After half a minute of lying there, Riolu groaned. His leg hurt. It wasn't broken, but it wasn't like he was going anywhere fast. There was no time for this! Maybe—maybe he could—
Riolu looked down at his paws, then at all the mud under him. He didn't know how, but he knew: His hands were made for digging. And he was in a ditch. He could dig his way out.
Above him, the strange pokemon passed over, looking for him in vain. Riolu held his breath until they had disappeared, or at least he couldn't hear them anymore. Then he sat up. His leg wasn't throbbing in pain as much anymore. It was time to get to work.
Riolu spent the next few hours digging a hidey-hole for himself. At several points, he had to stop whenever he heard the swish of ferns being pushed aside, or the tell-tale beeping that came with the strange pokemon's presence. But Riolu was a diligent worker, and by the time that night fell Riolu had dug himself a large tunnel.
Before long, he felt hungry. He lay in the small, underground passage he had dug that was just big enough for him, clutching his belly in mild pain. He'd been working hard all day, not to mention the nagging feeling that something was off about him that he couldn't quite put his finge—paw on. Above him, he heard distant beeps in the distance. He couldn't just go out and forage for things, because then he would be caught and he didn't have the skills to fight or evade those strange pokemon yet.
Riolu decided to keep digging. He needed food sooner or later, but staying in this tunnel forever and waiting for the relentless pokemon to leave would just mean starving to death in here. Riolu was going to dig outside of their boundaries, and hope they didn't discover the tunnel in the ditch before he did.
And so he dug. For hours, until dirt piles littered the passage behind him and Riolu was sure it was sunrise again. He was almost ready to collapse. He looked back at the tunnel entrance, which he could still vaguely see from far away. He hadn't dug as long a distance as he had thought. Riolu leaned against the cavern wall in exhaustion. He was so tired, and so hungry, and so thirsty… Perhaps he'd just dig up here. This must be outside the strange pokemons' boundaries. And if not, maybe they were sleeping. Or maybe they'd moved on, thinking he was long gone at this point. Either way, this couldn't go on for much longer. Riolu needed out, and he needed out now.
Riolu dug up. It was hard at first, but he soon found that he was able to cling to the walls with his claws and bat the dirt down. Soon the entire ground above fell onto the floor of the cavern below and Riolu saw daylight, beautiful daylight, and he rejoiced, climbing out of the hole.
Swish.
In the distance. Riolu's head snapped back towards that. Did those pokemon never quit? He didn't think beyond that—he ran. The three strange pokemon emerged from the treeline behind him, almost like they had known he was there. And as Riolu glanced back towards them, he tripped.
He hit the ground hard. Riolu groaned, feeling all the aches and pains of his body come back to hit him full-force with that one collision against the ground. The strange pokemon didn't wait for him to recover. One of them raised its arms in his direction, and before Riolu had a chance to react a large shadowy ball flew out of nowhere and collided with him.
Riolu's body was pain, then stiff, and then everything went black.
~\({O})/~
It was a while before Riolu could move again. He was still parched, but everything felt hotter. Much hotter. He opened his eyes, and saw the blood-red sky above him.
That wasn't right.
Riolu sat up, looking around. All around him was a forest of dead trees. No leaves were anywhere to be seen, and the bark was pitch black. It rotted off the trees and curled up on the ground.
He slowly got to his feet, trying to ignore how everything about his poor body ached. Nothing about this was right. And he needed something to eat. And drink.
Something caught the corner of Riolu's eye. Something blue amongst all the crimson. Riolu turned to see a blue flame dancing deeper in the forest. It flickered weakly, almost half-gone. Riolu could even see through it.
It danced around in the air gracefully, then zipped off in a different direction as if bidding Riolu to follow. Riolu stopped for a minute. Was this really the best option? The last pokemon he had tried to trust had brought him… here.
But where was 'here'? Riolu looked around at the dead trees and the red sky. He needed any help he could get. He'd just have to be on the lookout for a trap. And so Riolu reluctantly decided to follow it. There wasn't another good choice, in hindsight.
As Riolu walked, he noticed that the flame was beginning to get stronger. He couldn't deny that he was scared right now, and maybe that was making him see things, but it looked like the flame was slightly more solid. Less see-through. Maybe even the flame was a hallucination.
Riolu's stomach growled. He clutched it in hunger as he went. Boy, he hoped he could find something to eat soon.
The flame entered a large clearing in the middle of the dead woods, and then it stopped. Riolu followed it into the clearing, but no further. The flame was completely stationary, dancing and flickering brightly in place. It looked a lot more energetic than when Riolu had first seen it. A wave of fear came over Riolu suddenly. Had he just walked into some kind of trap?
Slowly, Riolu peeked his head out into the clearing, both ways. He didn't see anything but the trunks of more dead trees. And that flame, which had not moved an inch. Slowly, Riolu sighed in defeat. If this was a trap, he'd just have to spring it. He was too hungry to come up with a better solution right now.
Riolu took a single step out into the clearing, then quickly pulled his foot back. Nothing happened. Arrows didn't fly from the trees, and no monster emerged from the forest to devour him. Riolu mustered up all his courage, and then put his foot out again. And this time, it stayed there.
Riolu took another step. Then another. And another. Soon he was all the way out of the tree-line, and nothing had changed. Riolu let out a quiet sigh of relief. Then he quickly scampered up to the flame like the ground behind him was lava.
It stood still in the air, same as it had since he'd seen it. Riolu tentatively reached out a paw to touch it, but his paw went through completely. Riolu pulled it out then looked down at it, noticing how it was completely unharmed.
"BOO!"
"Aaauggh!" Riolu fell backwards onto the ground, edging away towards the treeline in fear. Slowly, he watched as the blue flame materialized completely, a candle forming at its base. A candle with a face.
"Oh, tasty, tasty beautiful fear!" the candle cried out in joy, seemingly devouring something that Riolu couldn't see. "For a moment…" the candle gasped between slurps. "…I thought I was going to disappear…"
"Fear?" Another voice piped up from a distance.
"Fear?"
"Where is it?"
"We can eat?"
"We can eat!"
"We're saved!"
Several more voices whistled through the bare treetops, and Riolu could only watch as more of the blue flames arrived to feast upon an invisible luncheon. And Riolu was terrified. He curled up in a ball on the ground, waiting for it all to be over, for this all to be just a dream—
"You can get up now. We've had our fill."
Riolu slowly peeked out from the ball he was currently curled up in. The candle that had led him here—he could tell because the flame on top was larger than the others—floated over him, a friendly expression upon its face.
"Yeah!" another candle piped up from amongst the horde of candles that were now all watching him. "You saved us!"
"I… what?" Riolu asked. His voice was raspy from lack of water, and it felt weird just talking. Never mind the fact that he was talking to floating ghost candles. With so many eyes on him, he couldn't help but feel a little nervous.
His stomach suddenly grumbled, and Riolu clutched it in pain. The candles all exchanged looks.
"Well, he fed us," said one. "'s only fair."
~\({O})/~
"So what are you guys all about?" Riolu asked, happily gnawing on a few carrot-like roots that the candle-things had picked for him. They barely had any taste and they smelled awful, but Riolu was just happy to eat something at this point.
"What do you mean?" one of the candles asked, lazily floating in the air.
"Like," Riolu said before biting off a large piece of the root. "What are you?"
All the candles exchanged weird looks at that line.
"Well…" one candle started. "We're Litwick. The former and forever occupants of the Ancient Barrow!"
"Until recently," said another.
"What's that mean?" Riolu asked.
"It's an unfortunate misconception," said the litwick who had led him here. "The public thinks we're soul eaters, and that we have to kill somemon every time we want to eat. Really, we just feed on negative auras. But all the superstition got troublesome to deal with, so we locked ourselves away in the Ancient Barrow and posed as ghosts. A little 'boo' here, some dishes re-arranged there, and we ate well. We were eating well. And then…" the litwick shuddered, too scared to go on.
"And then we were attacked," another, braver litwick continued in his place. "All this icky black goo came down the wall! None of us saw what it was. We were just hit by this strange black ball, and the next thing we knew we were all here."
"There's nothing to eat here," a smaller litwick piped up. "We almost disappeared from starvation!"
"But then you showed up," said a fourth, quieter litwick. "A lot of us owe you our lives."
Riolu set down what was left of his roots.
"So there's really nothing for you guys to eat here?" he asked.
One of the litwick shook their heads. "No living creatures," they said. "Nothing to feed off of."
Riolu stared at the ground. "And if I leave you…" he began. "…You'll just starve again?"
There was silence, but everymon knew the answer to that question.
"…How about we make a deal?" asked one of the litwick. "You just woke up here, right? You must think this place is pretty strange. We'll protect you! We can give you food, water, and shelter! And all you have to do is feed us!"
"Yeah!" the smaller litwick piped up. "The only pokemon you still have to meet is Solosis! And she'll be back soon!"
"Who's Solosis?" Riolu asked.
"Our leader," the first litwick said. "You'll meet her tonight, after she gets back from There."
"Where?"
The litwick pointed directly behind Riolu with his flame. "There."
Riolu looked behind himself, to where Litwick was pointing. And then he saw it: A large mountain, wreathed in flame. He quickly stood up and looked up at it. And then he didn't want to look at it. Riolu shut his eyes and turned away, but the image of the demonic mountain was burned into his brain now. Slowly, he opened them, making sure to look in the other direction.
"W-what is that?" he stammered.
"We call it the Bad Place," said one of the litwick. "Solosis has another name for it."
"Another name for what?"
The voice reverberated through Riolu's head. It came from everywhere and nowhere at once, but Riolu only had to glance where all the other litwick were glancing to find out who was speaking.
It looked like nothing he had ever seen before, a small ball with eyes encased in a larger coating of thick green slime. And it floated.
The large green ball of slime looked around, its eyes settling on Riolu.
"You're new," she 'said'. It was more like the words were broadcasted directly into his head. Despite the distance, Riolu heard it as if she was standing right in front of him.
"Uh… hi." Riolu offered a half-hearted wave in greeting..
Solosis sighed in exhaustion, then floated over.
"Did you find anything?" one of the litwick asked.
"Not yet," Solosis broadcasted. "I haven't been able to get close."
Noticing the falling look upon the litwick's face, Solosis quickly floated over.
"Cheer up! We'll figure it out soon enough. Maybe I'll bring some of you with me next time, see if we can make it up that cliff easier."
There were various murmurs of disappointment and interest from the litwick, but they soon dissipated. Nothing had changed, after all. Solosis herself soon fluttered over to Riolu, then lowered herself to his height.
"So what brings you here?" she asked. "Wait—don't tell me. You got zapped here too."
Unsure of what to say, Riolu nodded silently.
~\({O})/~
"We haven't got much, but… we're the only pokemon for miles out. Trust me. I've searched."
Solosis floated next to Riolu on one end of the clearing, where he sat against the trunk of a dead tree. Out in the middle of the clearing, the litwick fluttered from here to there in a large flurry of floating candles and blue flames, flying around and socializing with each other at speeds Riolu couldn't even possibly imagine.
"I've been feeding them as much as I can, but I'm only one pokemon when it comes down to it," Solosis said. "And litwick can't eat their own negative auras, or we'd never have to worry about this. They were all starving to death until you showed up."
Riolu connected the dots quickly.
"And…" he said. "You want me to help out?"
Solosis sent him a pleading look he wouldn't have thought was possible with those beady black eyes.
"Would you?" she asked.
Riolu was silent for a minute. That should have had an easy answer. He didn't have anywhere else to go. And… they'd fed him. He'd probably die on his own. But at the same time… did he want to be stuck here for the rest of his life? He looked up at the blood-red sky.
"Is the sky always like that?" he asked. "It doesn't feel right."
"It's been like that ever since we've been here. And wouldn't you believe it, this is the daytime."
"Really? What's it like at night?" Riolu asked.
"Black," Solosis answered. "Even this place can't take that away."
Riolu snickered through his nose. It sounded more like a snort.
"So, what do you think?" Solosis asked, giving him that pleading look once more. "Will you stay with us? Just until we all find a way out of here?"
Riolu shrugged. "I guess."
"Great!" Solosis suddenly sounded much more energetic.
"Oh, and one more thing you should know," she quickly said before Riolu could open his mouth in response. "You might hear things in the distance at night. Howls, screeches, pokemon crying out for help… whatever you do, don't leave the clearing. No matter what you hear. Got it?"
Riolu's ears flopped down in confusion. Something wasn't adding up. "I thought you said we were the only living things here for miles out."
"I said we were the only pokemon for miles out," Solosis said. "You'll steer clear of those, yes?"
Riolu nodded, suddenly looking a lot more fearful.
"Good!" Solosis broadcasted into his head cheerfully, leading him through the clearing. "I'll show you where you'll sleep."
~\({O})/~
Riolu slept in a pile of dirt near the far side of the clearing that had been bunched up to look like a bed. He felt his stomach grumble a little, but clutched it in silence. The roots had filled him for a bit, but now he was hungry again. He gritted his teeth and bore it in silence. It could wait until morning.
And yet, as the hours ran on, Riolu found himself still wide awake. He shouldn't have been this wide awake—he should have been exhausted from everything that he just happened in the past day—but it felt like his body didn't want to loosen up. He was still tense, like something was going to spring at him any moment and he had to be ready.
Maybe it was this place that was making him feel like that. Everything was deathly silent. At least, back in the other place, he could hear things chirping as he dug. Here, there was… nothing. It was dead. Everything here was dead.
"Heeeeeeeelp!"
Riolu immediately sat up in his bed of dirt, staring directly at where the voice had come from. t sounded like… he couldn't really tell what it sounded like, but it had come from very deep in the woods.
You might hear things in the distance at night.
Riolu stared at the trees intently, trying to see anything that might be in the distance. He could only see the absolute darkness that crept out from the treeline.
Whatever you do, don't leave the clearing. Got it?
That was suddenly a much harder set of instructions to follow. Riolu was scared out of his wits, sure. But if there was somemon that needed help out there…
Riolu slowly rose from his position, taking care not to upset the ghostly forms of the sleeping litwick all around him. Slowly, he tiptoed towards the treeline, trying to get a better idea of what might be out there. His ears pricked up, able to hear the cracking of sticks as something prowled in the distance far off. Another living creature?
He sniffed the air, remembering his heightened sense of smell. He smelled… eww, that was rancid. A disgusting scent wafted in through the trees, regaling Riolu with its foulness. He wrinkled up his nose and stepped back. It smelled like somemon had died long ago and was now rotting. Riolu stood in place, not sure what to do with this information. Maybe he should go wake Solosis—
A loud roar echoed through the trees, biting Riolu's ears with the force of a hammer. It heightened in pitch until it was the screech of a demon, and then Riolu heard whatever had been prowling through the woods suddenly romp off.
Without thinking, he quickly got back to his bed of dirt and laid down upon it, wide awake and scared witless.
He stayed awake the whole night.
~\({O})/~
"Rise and shine."
Slowly coming to. Riolu blinked himself awake, staring up at Solosis. He looked up at her briefly, yawned, then let his head fall back down against the dirt again. He felt tired. What had happened last night?
Slowly, it all came back to him. All the memories of his frightening encounter last night. What was that thin—
"BOO!"
Riolu jolted awake with a yelp, and the litwick feasted.
That was how it went for the next few days. The litwick, experienced and ever-creative in the art of frightening pokemon, found new ways to scare Riolu each day. In return, Riolu got roots to eat from them twice a day and water to drink, and so his belly stayed relatively not-empty and his throat wasn't scratchy. He quickly made friends with a few of them, having nothing else to do all day as they waited for Solosis. The one who had led him here was called Tall-Flame, and the other three litwick in Tall-Flame's gang were Small-Light, Flicker-Stem, and Violet-Fire. Small-Light had haunted a library for a while, and read a lot of things in books when he wasn't busy scaring the librarian. Violet-Fire would scare him the worst but ate very little herself, while Flicker-Stem was very young and had known little else but this place. Tall-Flame was adventurous, but also reckless. The other three constantly had to talk him down from pulling several reckless stunts, and it soon became obvious to Riolu that Tall-Flame had found him completely by accident.
This wasn't meant to be permanent. Every day, Solosis would wake Riolu and then leave early, and she would come back an hour before darkness fell, because it wasn't safe to go out at dark. Riolu had questioned her about it on several occasions, but Solosis was always very cryptic about the answers she gave.
"What are those noises?" Riolu asked one day, just after Solosis had come back from wherever she went all day. "I hear them every night. You said they aren't pokemon. But if everyone can hear those things, then that means there has to be some other sign of life out there, right?"
Solosis sighed, like she wasn't prepared to answer that question.
"Promise me you'll never go after those voices," she said, just to him. "They aren't what they pretend to be."
"What does that mean?" Riolu pressed, but Solosis refused to communicate with him beyond that.
"So," Riolu asked as he bit into a root. His nose wrinkled as he did. They smelled more and more awful with each day, but they were the only thing he had to eat at this point. "What's up with Solosis? You guys know why she goes to that mountain every day?"
Flicker-Stem floated next to him, staring at the same thing he was: the flame-wreathed mountain in the distance. It was colored the dark shade of rust that everything in this place was colored, and from a distance it seemed almost peaceful. Almost.
"Solosis calls it Reverse Mountain," Flicker-Stem said. "She said that in the world—the real world, not this place—there's a mountain just like it standing right there. And on top of Reverse Mountain is the way back to the real world."
Riolu chewed his roots silently as he gazed up at it.
"…Then why haven't we left already?" he asked.
"Because there's no way up the mountain," Flicker-Stem said. "It's too hot."
That made Riolu glance at Flicker-Stem in shock.
"Then…" he said, with a mouth full of awful-smelling root. "...We're stuck here forever?"
Flicker-Stem frowned. "We were already stuck here," he said. "Every day Solosis goes out to the mountain and looks for a way out of here."
"But she hasn't found one yet," Riolu finished.
"You're getting it," Thin-Stem said.
"Then how does she know that there's a way out on top of the mountain?" Riolu asked.
"I don't think she does," Flicker-Stem replied. Riolu could hear the doubt beginning to creep into the edges of his voice.
It was a week before anything notable happened.
~\({O})/~
My paws are now tied. I cannot bring any more saviors from beyond. You are the last.
You won't remember anything I say, but I know you are up to the task. I've made you into exactly what the world needs from you. You'll be the one to save us all, you have to be. There's no-one else.
Go calmly and bravely, dear Espurr, into the new world…
~\({O})/~
Litwick Campground
~Riolu~
Riolu lay on his bed of dirt, with his eyes squeezed shut. He still heard the voices, but it had been a week, and he'd almost learned to ignore them at this point. Or at least sleep while he heard the howling and screeches that reverberated through the woods. He didn't think Solosis knew what they were. Maybe she had spent too many nights listening to those voices as they kept her up at night.
Riolu would understand. A few nights of hearing them, and he never wanted to hear them again. He rolled away from the woods in front of him, gazing at the sleeping pile of litwick that cast a soft blue glow over the campsite. He was beginning to feel sleepy, and finally the woods had gone silent around him. Perhaps he could get a good night's worth of sleep this time—
A low rumbling caught Riolu's ears, and then the sharp noise of something blasting up into the sky like thunder made them lower in shock. Riolu quickly sat up, looking around in confusion. His eyes settled in on the new direction: It was due south.
Opening his eyes, Riolu was met with the image of a thin pillar of light streaking up into the sky. That was… using the mountain as a landmark, Riolu quickly checked. That was to the southeast.
~\({O})/~
Somemon very, very far away glanced out from his tent to watch the large pillar of light brightening up the sky to the southwest.
"Interesting…" Wartortle muttered to himself.
~\({O})/~
~Riolu~
Riolu looked one way, then the other. Then back at the stream of light again. It didn't look that far off, but… Did it make sense to leave the clearing to go looking for it? Riolu was torn.
It was a few minutes before he properly decided. Quietly, Riolu crept off his bed of dirt, and took a few hesitant steps towards the treeline. It would just be there and back again. No sweat. And if he found something, then it was even better! That made up Riolu's mind. He took a few more confident steps, and then sprinted for the treeline.
He ran through the woods, heading due south. Looking up, he could still see the stream flaring up in the sky. It looked no larger than it had before.
He'd grown good enough at using his feet now that he could run without looking at the ground. He closed his eyes, and let himself focus on what was in front of him instead—
A tree branch sent Riolu stumbling to his feet, and he struggled to pick himself up and continue onward. Okay. He'd keep his eyes on the ground from now on.
Before long, the forest ended. Riolu found himself stumbling to a stop in a second large clearing. He looked around in confusion.
He stood in the middle of what looked like a village, but it was almost completely leveled—no building still had its roof intact, and many of the houses had been leveled from the top half up. The shorter walls didn't even extend a foot off the ground. Which was half as tall as he was, but several feet short of a complete building.
The light had slowly died down by now. Riolu looked upwards towards the sky to see that the large flare of light was thinning. It threatened to leave Riolu in complete darkness, but still lit up the area just enough for him to see.
In the distance behind him, a stick snapped. Riolu glanced back towards the woods from which he had come anxiously. Was something there?
On instinct, Riolu hid behind one of the building's walls, crouching down to avoid being seen. Something was out there, and he knew there was only one thing it could have been.
Slowly, he heard it stomp around. The footsteps were heavy, like the creature they belonged to was bulky. Riolu barely dared to breathe.
He stayed like that for a minute, breathing silently as he could, his paws clenching the rust-red dust on the ground. He heard the monster stomp around a bit more, almost like it was looking around for something. It sniffed the air audibly. It smelled him.
Riolu decided to take a peek. If he was going to figure out what to do, he needed to know what he was dealing with first. Ever-so-slowly, he twisted his head around the stone wall he was hiding behind, trying to get a good look at what was in the middle of the village square.
The only reason he could see it was because it was blacker than anything else. It looked without a stable form, and Riolu saw it dripping black fluid onto the ground as it walked. He took a heavy breath, trying to stomach what he was seeing. His teeth began to chatter, and he realized his whole body was trembling.
The monster suddenly snapped its head towards where Riolu was hiding, and Riolu quickly pulled his head back behind the wall. He heard the monster begin to stomp again, and each stomp was getting louder and louder…
It knew where he was. Riolu had to act. He sprung up from where he was sitting, dashing down the beaten path southwards once more. He heard its horrible screech from behind him as he ran.
So panicked and focused on getting away, Riolu didn't see much of where he went. It was the ruins of a town, that much he knew—a destroyed house here, the ruins of a bridge there—but he was more focused upon outrunning the thing that had taken chase after him. He could hear it galloping after him as he went. And it was gaining ground. If Riolu didn't do something fast to throw it off, he was going to get caught.
A sudden scent invaded his nostrils, the same one that he'd smelled in varying quantities as far back as he could remember. But this time, it was incredibly strong. Maybe… Riolu quickly took a hard right, heading southeast into the forest, and then dived behind the trunk of a dead oak. He remained completely quiet. The monster galloped past, not even sparing a look towards the forest as it passed. Riolu waited half a minute to uncup his paw from over his nose. Then, once he was sure it was safe—or about as safe as it was going to be in a place like this—he continued onward.
Riolu walked now. He stepped through the woods carefully, too afraid to do anything that could lead to making noise and setting the monster back on his trail. As he walked, he followed the smell of slow decay, which was only getting stronger as he headed southwest. And soon, he came upon the source of the smell: What looked like a strange amalgamation of a tree and a beating heart. Riolu watched it perplexedly as it slowly thumped, and his eyes followed it downwards to all the roots snaking out from under it.
Most of the roots had been chopped and severed off somewhere, and when Riolu leaned over to investigate, he realized the smell was coming from there. He quickly sat up, trying not to gag. These were the same roots he'd been eating since he got here. Was this where they all came from? He looked up at the beating heart once more, noticing how it was beginning to shrivel up at the bottom from lack of nutrients. Riolu tilted his head, perplexed.
As disgusting as the roots smelled and looked, they were there, so, as much as he didn't want to, Riolu ate. And once he was sure that the monster wouldn't be coming back for him, he slept.
~\({O})/~
~?~
For so long It had gone without any other creatures within its domain. For over 10,000 years It had traversed the cursed lands It inhabited all alone. It had been over 10,000 years since It and Its brethren had last feasted. And now they would feast again.
Living beings were returning to the Voidlands, a sign of much greater things to come. It salivated at the prospect of even more creatures to devour. It prowled through the woods, tracking the scent of the one It had chased. The scent reached a dead end once the smell of a distortion hub nearby became too strong, so It followed the track leading the other way. It travelled up through the remains of the wrecked village, and over the hill, up towards the direction of the burning mountain. The creature's stench lead a clear path back to where he had come from. It grinned as it grew eyes and saw light, and then it was Riolu.
Solosis was roused by the sound of somemon pattering around the camp. She blinked her eyes open sleepily, her gaze settling on Riolu.
"Ugh.." she groaned, still trying to get her mind into a state aware enough to deal with the matter at hand. "What are you doing up? It's not like you to be awake this early—"
Riolu suddenly sprouted a large black gooey clawed arm, and Solosis barely had any time to react before it slammed down upon her.
Psychic power glowed from under Its arm, and then It was blown back by Solosis, who rose up into the air.
"It's going to take a bit more than that to get rid of me," she broadcasted. "Everymon awake! We've been found out!"
It growled, Solosis' psychic jerk sending a searing pain into Its head for a second. All of the litwick were jolted awake by the sudden sharp signal, and once they saw It the situation was clear. They all quickly began to flee through the woods as fast as they could. The clearing was empty of litwick within seconds.
It snarled through a muzzle that was now only barely riolu. Its feast was escaping! Not if It had anything to say about it. But a sudden psybeam sent It reeling backwards, and It realized perhaps an appetizer was in order instead.
Solosis shone with light, and then suddenly in her place stood a mighty giratina.
"Have at you!" the giratina yelled. Then she charged forward.
~\({O})/~
The Ancient Barrow ~ Present Day
~Espurr~
While Riolu told his story, Espurr took a moment to catch her breath and let her brain catch up with the rest of her body. This was obviously a deeper floor of the dungeon, but none of her friends had caught up with her yet. She briefly wondered if they were all oka—
A gurgling noise came from the wall right above Espurr. Riolu glanced at the noise, and Espurr turned around. Not a second too soon. An arm erupted from the wall and grabbed for Espurr's head. Espurr barely scooted back enough for it to miss, then stumbled to her feet.
"Run!" she cried out, pulling Riolu to his feet and fleeing the dungeon. She heard the shadow exit the wall completely as they both sprinted into the main hallway and took a hard left, but it soon went silent. Espurr heard the echoes of a silent pop reverberate through the hallway, the signal of the monster slipping back into the wall.
"Keep clear of the walls," Espurr said once she could no longer hear it. She gravitated towards the center. "It's not gone. It's just waiting for a moment to grab us."
Riolu nodded, still breathing heavily.
They continued down the hall silently; the attack left them a bit too jarred for talking. Espurr made sure she was behind Riolu, just in case. Riolu didn't seem to mind, if only because he didn't have to worry about watching his back anymore. After a couple minutes of walking, Espurr spoke.
"That thing," she said. "You knew what it was. Mind explaining?"
"Yeah. The pokemon in the Voidlands had a name for them," Riolu said. "We called them Void Shadows."
~\({O})/~
The Voidlands
~Riolu~
Slowly coming to. Riolu yawned himself awake.
After a week of being woken up by somemon scaring him back into existence, it felt strange for Riolu to wake up on his own accord. The sky greeted him instantly, blood-red once more. Riolu stretched, then slowly rose from his position against the weird heart… tree thing. He wrinkled his nose up at the smell. It seemed much more pungent than it had been yesterday, and the strange beating heart looked just a little more shriveled up than it was before.
He ate some more of the roots for breakfast. They were still edible even though they rotted. After finishing the roots, Riolu felt a bit parched. The litwick had always given him some water whenever they had gone out to collect roots, and he'd taken it for granted. But clearly they hadn't gotten the water from here.
He had a choice now. Go back to Solosis' camp, or continue onwards. Riolu looked ahead, where he could still see the remnants of flickering light in the sky. He'd come this far… going back now was a waste. He had to see what had made that light! And more importantly, if it was the key to a way out of here.
And so Riolu made his decision. He turned southeast, checked to make sure the coast was clear, and then hiked off in that direction.
It felt like he travelled for hours, across desert dunes of rust-red sand and the occasional ruins of other buildings and forests. Every so often he would come across more beating heart-trees, their roots snaking through the ground in twisted layers almost twenty feet out. Riolu steered clear of them, mostly.
For a while, that was all there was—a desert of red dust. Riolu was beginning to feel discouraged; maybe he'd run out of luck. He was stranded all the way out in the middle of nowhere, with no cover to take, nothing to drink, and no-mon to keep him company. His tongue unfurled from his mouth, parched enough that it felt dry against the air. He was all alone. Riolu was really beginning to regret leaving the litwick camp…
And then he heard noise. Distant noise. The noise of two pokemon talking to each other. Riolu didn't think twice. He sprinted towards the sound, running up a large red dune of sand.
"Hey!" he yelled, waving his arms up in the air as he ran. "I'm over here!"
The pair of pokemon who had been making the noise, a brionne and a seviper, turned to look at him as he ran. But suddenly their expressions hardened, and they began to charge up attacks—
Riolu only had a second to change his joyful look to one of terror before he was hit with the combined power of pure beams of water and grass energy. Unequipped to handle such a pair of attack, they both sent Riolu flying straight back down the dune he had been climbing. Hehit the sand hard, tumbling to the bottom in a heap. The two pokemon were on him in an instant, and the next thing Riolu knew he was coiled tightly in Seviper's grip.
"What do you think? Seviper asked Brionne. "A straggler not from the camp, all alone in the middle of this desert? I think he's one of Them."
Brionne looked at Riolu, tied up in Seviper's grip. "I think he would have changed by now if he was one of Them."
Seviper looked at her disappointedly. "And that's what Eddie said the last time this happened! When was the last time you saw him?"
"Not since then," Brionne sighed through gritted teeth.
"Point in case." Seviper said. "We should get rid of him."
Brionne looked unsure.
"But what if he's for real?" she asked.
"We can't take that chance," Seviper pointed out. "He could just be a smart one."
"What are you talking about?" Riolu muttered, regaining his bearings enough to speak again.
"See?" Brionne stated, brashly gesturing to him with her flipper. "He speaks."
"They all speak," Seviper's tail rattled, a sign of distrust. "At first."
"Give him a chance to explain himself before killing him!" Brionne pleaded. "You yourself said you could tell a Shadow alibi from a real 'mon."
Seviper pouted for a moment. Then she hissed in annoyance.
"Fine," she said, turning to Riolu. "You. Talk fast. Who are you?"
"Hurting," Riolu muttered, still way too constricted for comfort within Seviper's coils. Seviper squeezed him tighter, causing Riolu to gasp in pain.
"Not funny. Talk. Who are you?" Seviper stared him down. Riolu stammered.
Riolu looked into Seviper's slits-for-eyes, and came to the conclusion that the best option was to talk fast.
"I- I- I'm Riolu," he said. "Just Riolu. I've been here for a week."
"And?" Seviper prompted.
"And what?" Riolu asked.
"Where were you before that?" Seviper hissed.
"I…" Riolu stammered. "I… I don't know. I think I hit my head pretty badly. Everything's new to me."
Seviper sent Brionne a silent 'See?' glance. Brionne looked down to the ground. Riolu glanced at her pleadingly. She took a deep breath, then looked at him again.
"Oh. Well, that sucks." Brionne frowned. Her eyes darkened. "But you see why we have to be suspicious of you, right?"
She began to charge up an attack, and Seviper did the same. Riolu scrambled backwards in fear.
"You don't believe me?" he asked in horror.
"You know what the biggest tell is when somemon's a Shadow?" Seviper asked. "They never remember anything. They copy the body but not the memories. Most pokemon never see it coming until it's too late. If you're interested in staying alive…" the coils around Riolu's body began to tighten just a little. "You nip it in the bud before it can happen." And with that, she began to charge up an attack of her own. Riolu looked down at his paws. Could he fight? Should he fight?
"W- Wait!" he called out, just before the two of them could fire. "I can prove I'm who I say I am!"
That made Brionne hesitate for a minute. She still eyed him suspiciously, but she paused. "Then talk."
"I—" Riolu began, trying to organize his thoughts. "I didn't wake up in this place, I got zapped here! I woke up in a forest in the middle of nowhere, and these weird pokemon with lights on their arms chased me and hit me with this attack. The next thing I know I'm here. I really have been here for a week."
"A week? All on your own?" Seviper scoffed. "Likely story."
"Not alone," Riolu shook his head. "There's a whole clan of litwick back in the woods that looked after me. They were looking for a way out of here, but they eat fear. They needed me to give them fear to eat."
Brionne kept her attack stance, but Riolu could tell she was having second thoughts.
"Why'd you leave?" Seviper asked firmly.
"Last night, I saw this pillar of light appear in the sky. I wanted to go investigate," Riolu said. I thought I would be there and right back, but it was farther away than I thought. There was something out there in the woods. It tried to chase me, but I got away. And then I came across this place."
"And you don't remember anything."
Riolu shook his head. "Nothing before I woke up in those woods. I'm telling the truth, I swear! If I was one of those monsters that attacked me last night I would have attacked you by now!"
Seviper and Brionne exchanged looks.
"It is a complicated alibi for a Shadow," Brionne admitted.
Seviper sighed.
Fine," she said. "But we're taking him to Wartortle before anything else happens."
~\({O})/~
The two of them hoisted Riolu up with flippers and tails, and began to drag him across the dunes of rust-red sand. It wasn't five minutes of travelling before the sounds of distant noise began to reach Riolu. His ears pricked up, and then so did he. That sounded like…
And then, after they'd passed the crest of the last rust-red dune, he saw it. All the way from the near distance to the coastline of a blood-red sea, long, paw-made tents covered the dusty ground, and occupying those tents were hundreds of living, breathing pokemon, wonderful living beings! Noticing that Riolu was fidgeting a lot in excitement, Brionne and Seviper let Riolu down.
"Don't run," Seviper hissed in his ear. Eager not to get on her bad side and feel the crushing sensation of her coils around his midsection again, he hurriedly nodded. Seviper and Brionne led him down towards the civilization.
All around there were pokemon going about their day, but none of them paid Riolu any mind. They all looked like they had just reached the end of a very long journey. Seviper and Brionne dragged Riolu towards the center, where a somewhat grander tent stood.
"Where are you taking me?" Riolu asked, looking at the tent.
"Quiet," said Seviper. "We need to make sure you're the real deal. Wartortle will see to that."
They approached the tent, where a line of pokemon had already amassed. They took issue as Brionne and Seviper pushed past them.
"Hey!" one of them, a joltik, squeaked out angrily. "What's the deal? No pushing in line!"
"This is important," Seviper hissed back.
"We found an outsider," Brionne quickly added, hoping to avoid a conflict. "It's urgent."
The joltik looked mighty annoyed, but settled for grumbling to itself instead. It cleared the way for Brionne and Seviper to pass.
They dragged Riolu into the tent, and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the candle-lit darkness. Inside, a largeish, turtle-like pokemon was studying several charts and stone tablets intently.
"Hmm?" he asked as Brionne and Seviper entered. He looked up, his face immediately twisting into something bemused when he saw the three pokemon staring at him from the doorway. He set the tablet aside. "And do what do I owe the pleasure of seeing the two of you? ...And apparently a strangled riolu," he added, glancing at Riolu in confusion.
Brionne nudged Riolu forward.
"Explain yourself."
Riolu did. He told Wartortle about waking up, the strange pokemon who had hunted him down, the litwick, Reverse Mountain, the pillar of light, and his amnesia. All through the story Wartortle nodded and hmmm'd in thought, but he stayed interested. His eyes looked like they were piecing things together even as Riolu said them. At the end, when Riolu had finished talking, Wartortle set aside the stone tablet he had had in his lap, and stared directly at Riolu.
"I think the three of you should stay for a little while," he said.
~\({O})/~
"Every so often, the world we live in is struck by a major crisis," Wartortle began. "Natural disasters, the decay of time, an apocalypse of ice and snow. I've lived through it all, and I fear that we are in the midst of another. But for every apocalypse, there is a savior. A single Chosen One who must bear the burden of saving the world for all pokemon who live on it. I was the first of these saviors, sent in to combat a meteor that ran off its natural course. The second worked at the most prestigious exploration guild of its time, and the third helped found the largest city on the planet. If your story is true, then you may very well be the fourth."
Riolu and Brionne didn't make a sound as Wartortle spoke. He picked up one of the tablets, and set it down in front of them. "These tablets were found on the Air Continent, where I and everymon in this encampment come from. They were written in ancient Human text; thus, I am the only 'mon present who can decipher them without studying their language." He pushed it towards Riolu. "Read."
Riolu looked at the tablets, staring at nonsense. He didn't recognize any of the markings, but when he read over the words he somehow knew what they said.
"We have been here forty-two days now," Riolu said, his eyes flicking over the nonsense as he read. "There's no internet. No power. No cell-phone reception. Not another person or pokemon to be seen. These stone tablets are the only method of preserving information now. At night, they come for us, and we cannot keep driving them off. I fear we will not see the morning at this rate. There's nothing to eat. Nothing to drink. No way out."
Riolu looked at Wartortle, who cleared his throat.
"…It's an improper translation, but close enough." Wartortle took back the tablet, but even Riolu could see that his face lit up with hope. "Your story checks out. You are the chosen one. You are the fourth Human. And…" Wartortle's claws began to shake with excitement.
"There's a lot we have to go over. If the three of you will stay just a little longer…"
~\({O})/~
Wartortle hopped to life like a slowpoke who had just been given all the energy of a young pichu. He sprinted to and from all the old books and tablets that lay around his tent, arranging things like a presentation. The line outside had been called off long ago. Off to the side, Riolu and Brionne were made to sit. Seviper had left long ago.
"So who is Wartortle?" Riolu asked as he leaned against the tent. "He looks important."
"He is important," Brionne said. "He's the leader of the Rescuer's Guild in Pokemon Plaza. Or… he's the last living leader. This is the happiest I've seen him in a while."
"Last living?" Riolu asked. "What happened to the others?"
"What do you think happened?" Brionne lowered her voice, then looked at Wartortle to make sure he hadn't heard. He was still stacking books. "Void Shadow got 'em."
"Are the Shadows those monsters that come out at night?" Riolu pried.
"Yes," Brionne answered in a whisper. "They… they absorb pokemon. Wartortle has a few theories on what happens after that, but we don't know where they go. And his theories are… far-fetched, for lack of a better word. I think he's too hopeful, honestly."
Riolu nodded silently.
"There's one Void Shadow in particular you need to watch out for," Brionne continued. "Wartortle calls it Nyarlathotep, from some book he read. It's bigger than all the others. Stronger. We think it commands them." She leaned in close. "That's what killed the rest of Team Go-Getters."
"All ready!" Wartortle gestured from the other side of the tent. "Both of you, over here. I need to show you what I've been planning to get us out of here."
He pushed another tablet towards Riolu. "That last tablet I gave you wasn't the whole story. There is a whole series of these, which I have poured over relentlessly. This is the only one that matters. Read."
"Last week one of ours went on a journey towards the mountain," Riolu read. "Today we saw it erupt in a pillar of light that stayed in the sky for over a day. Tomorrow, we hope to complete the same journey. This will be the last entry I leave here. I wish well to any others who find this stone. May you also escape this evil place."
"Now initially, my plan was to give us some time to rest before we continue on towards the mountain. Our journey here was long and relentless. But then that beam of light shooting up into the sky! And then we met you… it must be a sign. We set out tomorrow. Huzzah!" Wartortle jumped into the air in joy, then quickly hurry-scurried towards the entrance of the tent.
"Hey," he said to the furret guarding the tent, his voice hushed and joyful. "Give the order. We leave tomorrow, for a way back to the real world! Spread the good news!"
The furret's dull face brightened up. It nodded eagerly, before scampering off in manic excitement. Wartortle turned back to Brionne and Riolu. "Bryony, you are not to let him out of your sight the whole way there!"
Riolu looked at Brionne after Wartortle had gone. She grinned sheepishly; whether it was out of embarrassment or general excitement Riolu couldn't tell.
"And… yeah. Bryony's my name," she said. "Might as well learn it."
~\({O})/~
The Ancient Barrow
~Espurr~
"So you're a Human," Espurr said as they hiked. "Just like me."
"Yeah," Riolu breathed. "Been here a month." He took a turn down another corridor, and Espurr followed. Then it clicked. He looked back, staring at her in shock.
"Wait—you're a Human too?" he asked in shock. Espurr nodded. Riolu quickened his pace.
"Then you need to stick with me," he said. "The sooner we can leave this place, the better," he said. "We just need to find the stairs."
"I can't." Espurr shook her head.
"Wha—" Riolu turned around. "Why not?"
"I came here with five other pokemon," Espurr said. "They're still up in the dungeon. I'm not leaving without them."
Riolu was still for a minute. There was a brief silence in between them.
"It's here in the dungeon, you know," Riolu said. "Nyarlathotep. And if you guys got separated, then… your friends are probably dead. Sorry to say."
No. That wasn't true. Espurr refused to believe that. She shook her head silently. There had to be a way to tell. There just had to be…
Espurr shut her eyes, and reached out with her sixth sense. Somewhere, if she reached far enough, there just had to be some kind of tell, some evidence that they were still alive. Because if they weren't she didn't…
Espurr experienced something completely foreign to her in her three weeks of life—a single tear fell down her cheek. And her eyes were brimming up with more of them. She squinted them shut, forcing the tears out. Breathing heavily, she wiped them from her eyelids, fighting back the pressure that was beginning to build under her ear-flaps. No. She couldn't break down. Not here. Not now. Not when she knew they were still alive. And she knew they were still alive. They had to be. She'd figure out why she knew later, she'd find some reason, some train of logic—
"I'm sorry, but it's true," Riolu stressed from where he was standing. "If we don't get out of here, then none of us are leaving—"
The walls began to shift again around them, accompanied by a gurgling noise. Espurr's head snapped towards it; she gladly took the opportunity to banish the grief from her head.
"We stayed still too long," she said. "Run!"
An arm shot out of the goo, and both Espurr and Riolu sprang into action.
~\({O})/~
Wartortle's Colony ~ Nighttime
~Riolu~
Riolu awoke to the sound of distant chaos and howling outside. The flaps of the tent they were in were being battered by a strong wind. If it weren't sealed they would have been blown off by now. Alongside him, Bryony rose, seeing and hearing the same thing.
Opening the tent flaps, they saw that the camp had devolved into a frenzied chaos. And the reason dawned upon them quickly: In the distance to the north, a wall of red dust was approaching. It howled and raged, bringing winds stronger than the ones battering the tents now, and it was going to swallow their camp in just—
—Riolu's vision suddenly swam with red particles. Dust engulfed the camp, and the strong winds howled and threatened to blow the tents clean away. It was nearly impossible to see more than six feet in either direction. It was all Riolu could do to keep the dust out of his eyes, and any of the pokemon he could see around him were doing the same. Even Bryony was squinting.
Then, over the raging winds, clearly audible above it all: A loud, droning roar that heightened in pitch until it was a bloodcurdling screech.
"VOID SHADOW!" came an accompanying shout through the dust that was much closer.
The pokemon in the immediate vicinity quickly started to panic even more.
"It's Nyarlathotep!"
"It's coming for us!"
"Calm down!" Even the raging and howling of the storm wasn't enough to trump Wartortle's shout. "They're still far out. We have enough time to prepare. Anymon able to fight, join me at the front lines. The rest of you start the pack up process. We need to retreat."
"What's happening?" Riolu asked.
"Shadows," Byrony said. "They're attacking."
They were quickly interrupted by a pair of pokemon tromping past them, quicjly headed in the direction of the front lines.
"You two!" That was Wartortle. Riolu and Bryony looked back towards the turtle pokemon, who was ushering them back towards him. "With me."
Wartortle led them back into an empty side tent and sat them down.
"You're going with the evacuation caravan. We'll hold them off at the front lines until everymon's ready to go."
"How did they find us?"
"They attack every other week or so," Bryony explained. "We can outrun them, but they always catch up. But they've never had a storm before…"
"And the last attack was only a day ago," Wartortle added, thinking. "If this was a co-incidence, I'll be darned. The storm is strategic. It lowers our visibility. We'll be lucky to escape with half the camp if we don't flee effectively."
"Guildmaster Wartortle!" The furret from before poked its head into the tent, trying to shake the dust out of its fur. "They're getting close."
"Acknowledged," Wartortle said. He walked back towards the tent, looking back at Riolu and Bryony. "Remember: With the escape caravan. Don't dawdle."
Riolu and Bryony nodded.
"Good luck," Wartortle said. "I'll see you on the other side." And then he ducked through the tent flaps. Just like that, he was gone.
That left Riolu and Bryony to sit inside the tent, waiting for the caravan that was supposed to be forming to make itself visible through the storm. The tent flaps stayed wide open, lifted by the storm's winds, but the caravan never came.
All they could hear were the disturbing sounds in the distance. Distant screams, the crashing of supplies and debris, and more often than anything else, the droning screeches of the void shadows.
"We should go," Bryony said, after half a minute of waiting.
"What about the caravan?" Riolu asked.
"I don't think it's coming. Somemon usually shows up by now."
The sudden noise of an explosion nearby caught their attention before anything else could be said. It was followed by the sound of several pokemon's screams, and it was far too close for comfort.
"We can worry about that as it comes," Bryony hissed over the weather. "Move now."
Riolu couldn't disagree. Then they both bolted for the tent flaps.
Riolu peeked out, checking both ways to make sure the coast was clear. A wall of rust slammed into his face, making him retract his snout into the tent almost instantly. He pulled his head back in, coughing. "I can't see anyth—"
But they could hear. The howling of the wind to the right, an explosion to the left. The battle was that way.
"This way," he said, pointing to the right. Bryony nodded, and they quickly slipped out the tent.
They ran, away from the battle and all the screaming. The storm had gotten stronger; it was almost impossible to see anything in it now. Riolu could barely see the outlines of the other half-packed tents through all the rust-red dust, and he had to squint to keep it out of his eyes.
There were pokemon dying back there, and the concept was just becoming solidified in his mind. It made him woozy, and only the fear of falling and dying himself stopped him from tripping over his own feet. Riolu heard the shrieks behind him as he ran, and he tried to blot it out with his paws. But his face needed the attention more. He shielded his eyes and nose with them instead.
Something enormous suddenly crashed into the tent up ahead of them—
Riolu and Bryony skidded to a stop in their tracks. The monster reared its head, and Riolu saw that it looked like a blaziken, but something was very off. The texture was all wrong, and the head was a mix between red feathers and the long, tubular, jet-black head of something else. Its many sharp, needle teeth met the air as a ropelike tongue extended out between them. And it had no eyes.
"This way!" Bryony shouted, and so Riolu did. They went left, hoping the monster hadn't noticed them.
The camp was completely ruined by now. Tents had been torn off their foundations by the storm's wind. Wares and belongings lay speared on debris, while books, papers, and food flew through the air. Supply crates were in shambles, and the few pokemon that could be seen were either running in terror or helplessly looking for others in vain. The scene was still a sea of red rust, and neither Riolu nor Bryony could see more than hazy silhouettes a few feet out. They didn't know which direction to run in anymore. Where was the front line—no, where had it been? And where was the way out?
"Which way do we go?" Riolu yelled out to Bryony over the howling of the wind.
Bryony looked around. "There has to be somewhere!" she yelled back to him. "I—I don't know! I don't—" she continued to stammer to herself, looking for some way ahead, any way ahead. There was a loud thud behind them. The thud of a loud footstep. Then another. Riolu spun around to see that the blaziken monster from before was stomping towards them. Scarlet feathers retreated into its body, replaced with black goo that oozed out from the gaps. Black, muscular arms stretched out of its form, and impossibly sharp claws speared the sand. An uncanny mouth of fangs glistened amongst an ovular head as black as the rest of it. Dropping down into a hunch, the Void Shadow let out a beckoning call that droned up on into a screech.
"R-run!" Riolu stammered out, and suddenly the direction they ran in wasn't an issue anymore. He and Bryony turned tail to flee the best they could.
The Void Shadow bounded towards them, closing the gap in no time. It batted Bryony to the side effortlessly and lunged for Riolu—
"Oi!"
A cascade of water slammed into the Void Shadow from the side, sending it flying off into the distance. It slammed against a still-standing tent, crushing it to the ground. Riolu looked over to see Wartortle approaching through the storm from the opposite direction. His right leg had been twisted out of shape and wasn't even functional as a leg anymore; yet he was limping over to where Riolu was intently.
Bryony had made her way back over to Riolu at this point.
"Wartortle!" she cried out. "Sir! Are you okay? What happened to your leg?"
"Go," he said urgently. "You're too important to lose."
"No, come with us!" she pleaded.
"I can't," Wartortle said. He glanced in the direction the Void Shadow had been thrown, making sure it hadn't gotten up yet. "Not with this le, I'll slow you down too much. Leave while you can."
"You're going to die if we leave!" Bryony said. "We'll find a healer, just let us help you!"
Nothing came from Wartortle's mouth, but his eyes reflected Bryony's answer: I know.
Riolu faltered.
"Bryony…" he said. "We should go."
From behind Wartortle, the Void Shadow suddenly bounded out—
Wartortle spun on his feet and blasted the Void Shadow back with another torrent of water. The Void Shadow was sent flying back once again; the motion of turning on his mangled right leg around sent Wartortle falling to his knees.
He gasped in pain, looking at Riolu and Bryony.
"What are you still doing here?" he spat, his voice hoarse from pain. "Go! Get! Fly, you fools!"
The Void Shadow approached from the depths of the storm once more. It sniffed the air, and its head snapped towards Riolu and Bryony—
"Oy! Nyarlathotep!" Wartortle cried out from where he was laying, staring the void shadow down. A third water attack poked a sizeable gash in the Shadow's neck. It wasn't as effective as it had been before. Nyarlathotep snarled loudly, then spun towards where Wartortle was. Then it bounded over to Wartortle and grabbed him by the neck.
"No! Stop!" Bryony shouted. Nyarlathotep's attention snapped back to Bryony, but Wartortle bit down upon its hand. A high-pressure water stream blew half of Nyarlathotep's claws away. His eyes focused on Riolu and Bryony both: Run.
Nyarlathotep screeched in rage. It squeezed its claws down hard, harder, squeezing the breath out of Watortle…
There was a sickening snap, and Wartortle went limp.
~\({O})/~
Pokemon Plaza ~ Air Continent
Broad Daylight
In the deserted main square of Pokemon Plaza, hundreds of stone statues began to quiver in place. A high-pitched hum reverberated all around the plaza. Then the statues all exploded, one after the other, into shards and slivers of stone.
~\({O})/~
Ravaged Colony
Nyarlathotep's body seemed to expand. The mangled remains of Wartortle was sucked into Its chest, and then Nyarlathotep Itself turned back to look at Riolu and Bryony.
But they were already gone.
They both ran, though the wreckage of broken and burning tents. Through the relentless dust storm. Through the silence, the everlasting, ever-burning silence, until there was nothing but dust and the howling of the wind. All the Void Shadows had gone. Riolu and Bryony collapsed in a sand hovel on the other side of the dune.
Silence remained, because there was nothing to say. At some point, the two of them drifted off, among the howling winds and the sea of red outside their burrow.
Only the howling of the wind and Nyarlathotep's horrific screeches kept them company.
~\({O})/~
Music of the week!
The Shortening of The Way - Hans Zimmer