Hey guys, sorry about the reupload, I tried posting this chapter before I went to work on the mobile site and it wound up not being up to par with my standards, so I just decided to reupload it now. Sorry about bringing Cilan into this story, but he's still important. To make it up for you all however I did tone him down personality wise to the point where he's a bearable character. I had to actually watch a lot of Black and White to get up to par with the series and if I have to hear one more food pun I'm going to kill myself, not like Iris was any better. The heating is broke in the bonus room to my home where I write and draw and there was a record snowfall in my state, so I'm mad about having to watch Cilan and am mad because I'm freezing. But I put up with it because I love my work, and I love to entertain you guys. Here's a fair warning to you all that this chapter will be graphic in nature. *I DO NOT OWN POKEMON OR STEVEN UNIVERSE*
"Alright dude, just focus on what you desire to become." Amethyst directed Ash. The two sat together in Amethyst's extremely messy room, having had to push a lot of the clutter and garbage to the side so that they could both sit on the ground to focus on unlocking Ash's gem's abilities. Today's lesson was shapeshifting.
Ash himself sat and stared at his fingers, determined to unlock his shapeshifting powers. Deciding to try and become Pikachu, he stared intently at his fingers and expected them to become little Pikachus. But after a few minutes of concentration, nothing happened.
"Must be those pesky bones in your body holding you back" Amethyst concluded.
Ash sighed, "no, Clemont said something about taking away my gem's ability to shapeshift."
"Well he also said you couldn't fuse, yet Lash happened".
The mention of Lash brought the pain of losing Lapis back to him and he fell back into his depression. Amethyst saw the look of defeat on her friend's face and she realized she had made a mistake in bringing it up. "Oh my gosh, Ash I didn't mean-"
"It's alright Am" he told her as Pikachu hopped onto his shoulder. When he yawned, he decided to try and get some sleep and left Amethyst's room. But looking at the clock, he realized the two of them had been training all night long and the sun was beginning to rise. When he dropped onto the couch, he noticed someone was missing. "Where's Steven?"
"Sleeping over at Connie's. Don't you remember?" Amethyst answered him.
"Oh yeah" he said remembering Steven talking about sleeping over, excited about spending time with his best friend following their falling out. His phone began to vibrate and Jamie's phone number appeared on the screen. When he picked up, Serena's voice came from the receiver.
"Ash you have to get down here! Clemont's freaking out!" she pleaded. Hearing his friend screaming in the background, he hung up and ran out the door. When he finally reached Jamie's house, he saw Jamie and Bonnie both waiting outside while he heard both Clemont and Serena screaming inside.
"What's happening?"
"Clemont started screaming in his sleep, and next thing we know he's throwing stuff and lashing out at us. Serena's in there trying to calm him down."
Pushing past Jamie, he forced his way inside the house and sure enough Clemont was in the living room barricaded behind the couch. "Clemont it's me, let's talk".
Serena immediately grabbed onto him out of fear, "he won't stop screaming Ash, he keeps screaming about Homeworld. I think he's having a flashback".
"IT'S ALL HOPELESS!" Clemont screamed from behind the couch. "FILTHY, LEGLESS LIAR! MURDERER!" to everyone's horror, Clemont had a knife and stabbed the sofa so hard the blade bent. Ash grabbed Serena and pulled her back when they saw he was armed. "GIVE ME MY SISTER BACK!"
"Clemont it's us!" Ash tried to reason with him. "Ash and Serena, we're your friends!"
"ASH! THANK ARCEUS, THEY HAVE BONNIE!"
"No Clemont, you're not on Homeworld anymore!" he then ran outside and grabbed Bonnie, bringing her back inside. "See Clemont? She's safe, you're safe! Please drop the knife".
"Big brother, you're scaring me"
Clemont peaked his head over the furniture and at the sight of his sister and friends, he finally snapped back to reality. "Bonnie? Guys? What happened?" he asked dropping the knife, Serena picking it up and pocketing it.
"Come on, let's take you outside." Ash insisted while leading the boy genius away from the home.
"You were screaming something about being a liar," Serena asked concerned, "do you remember why?"
He sighed, "because I did lie to you all. I told you there were no other artificial Gem trainers aside Ash, May and Dawn. There were more, oh so many more" he confessed.
Ash and Serena looked at each other shocked as the three walked the boardwalk in the early morning sun. "How many?"
Clemont sniffled. "Ten, twenty at most. But they…" he began to break down again. "...They did not survive the process. Twenty people Ash, innocent people, some of them no older than Bonnie, and I killed them. And I now have to live with that guys."
The two held onto him with sympathy "You were the Diamond's tool Clemont, they killed those people. They will be avenged. And we're here for you".
The prep work for Fishstew Pizza was taking more time than usual thanks to Brock's absence. Kofi was working on finishing up the pizza dough by himself as Kiki moped the floor. After Nanefua became mayor, the restaurant began to see a spike in business and popularity and the family found themselves very overworked and tired all the time. Kiki looked at her father's face and saw the stress from having to do all this work alone after Brock's abduction. She was taken out of her daze by the sound of someone knocking on the window as if to get her attention. She jumped back in surprise, but then felt relieved when she saw it was a teenage boy knocking and not someone dangerous. "Sorry, we don't open till eleven thirty", she told him.
But the boy knocked again, more loudly this time. Kiki thought he just didn't hear her at first, and pushed the door slightly open to tell him. "Sorry we don't open unt-"
But the teenage boy cut her off by grabbing her by the throat and lifting her into the air. "You will tell me the location of Lapis Lazuli" he demanded coldly.
Kiki's scream echoed through the boardwalk, loud enough for Ash, Serena and Clemont to hear and charged to the building, just in time to see Kofi trying to defend his family.
"GET AWAY FROM MY DAUGHTER!" he screamed armed with a meat cleaver. But his threats didn't seem to affect the assailant, in fact he seemed to be ignoring him. Seeing no choice to protect his family and blinded by rage, the restaurateur swung the cleaver down on the boy's arm.
"KOFI DON'T!" Ash screamed as Serena and Clemont covered their eyes, expecting to see a gory mess. But to everyone's surprise, the cleaver only dug into the boy's arm at the elbow and did not sever.
With the cleaver still in his arm, the boy turned his attention to Kofi completely unfazed by the blow, dropped Kiki and began to advance on him. It was then that Ash knew that this guy wasn't just some punk looking to rob them, this guy was of Gem descent. "Let's go Pikachu"
"Sylveon, join him!" Serena called, summoning her fairy type.
"Chespin, get ready!" Clemont also exclaimed.
"Hey buddy!" Ash taunted the boy "why don't you pick on someone your own size!?"
The Fishstew attacker finally turned around to see who challenged him. But Ash suddenly gasped when he saw that he knew the familiar face looking him in the eyes.
"Gary?"
Gary Oak looked at the three trainers and pokemon in a cold manner and had no soul in his eye, the singular was used to describe his eye because he only had one eye, while in his left eye socket was a dark blue sapphire gemstone with a bright, white streak running through it. He began to slowly walk towards the three, icicles forming under his feet with each step he took. He didn't wear a belt to carry his pokeballs, rather he had a stash around his torso holding them.
"You know this guy Ash?" Serena asked.
But Ash was ignoring her. "Gary, it's me Ash. I know you're angry at Clemont here for what he did to you, and I'm sorry this happened, but we can help you. The Crystal Gems are not your enemy Gary, you don't have to do this".
"Ash I don't think he's listening" Serena concluded when he finally reached them.
"Pikachu, thunderbolt!"
"Sylveon, swift!"
"Chespin, pin missile!"
The three attacks all locked together and created a small explosion. Gary however jumped out of the way and directly into Ash and knocking him onto the ground. "You will tell me where Lapis Lazuli is!"
Serena came to his defense and lunged into Gary, dropping the knife she took off Clemont earlier in the process. She tried to pin him to the ground, but Gary easily overpowered her and pushed her off him. He now finally pulled the meat cleaver out of his arm and threw it down to her. Putting her hand up to defend herself, the cleaver sunk into her upper arm, splitting her wrist open and severing her left thumb in the process. Gary pulled the cleaver back out and prepared to deliver the finishing blow as she screamed in pain. Ash came to her rescue and pounced onto Gary this time, causing him to drop the blade. Clemont then went to her and tried to stop the bleeding.
"I don't want to fight you Gary!" he exclaimed as he struggled against his former rival.
Gary however simply pushed him off,and pinned him to the ground. Before he could deliver the finishing blow, Pearl's spear was hurled into his shoulder. Gary stumbled back with the spear in his shoulder, finally feeling pain, as Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl joined them.
"Where are Peridot and James?"
"They're getting Steven and Connie. Who's your friend?" Amethyst asked.
"His name's Gary Oak. But he's an artificial Gem from Homeworld, I think he's under some sort of trance. But that's not important now, Serena needs to go to the hospital."
"On it!" Amethyst declared, shapeshifting into an ambulance and allowing Clemont to escort Serena, now pale from blood loss, to safety. With Serena getting to safety, Ash, Garnet and Pearl prepared for battle.
"Last chance Gary! I can't promise what these two are going to do to you! Stand down and we'll help you!"
But Gary was clearly ignoring them, and released all six of the pokemon from his belt. Standing in front of the trio were now Blastoise, Electivire, Umbreon, Nidoking, Arcanine and Dodrio.
"Gary's mine, don't hurt the pokemon too much" Ash instructed.
"No promises" Pearl answered.
"Pearl" Garnet scolded her.
Garnet took on Blastoise, Nidoking and Dodrio, while Pearl took on the other pokemon with Pikachu. Ash on the other hand, took on his former rival head on. He threw a punch that was instantly dodged by Gary, and then knocked Pearl's spear out of his hands with a second punch. Gary threw himself at him and knocked him back into Fishstew through the window, shattering it in the process. With Ash on the floor, he picked up a chair and prepared to bash it over Ash's head. Ash was just able to roll out of the way as Gary smashed the chair with intent to kill.
"Stop destroying my shop!" Kofi screamed to them while hiding from behind the counter.
"You rather he destroy you?"
Gary grabbed the leg of the smashed chair and once again jabbed at him as if it were a sword.
"Ash catch!" Kiki yelled tossing him a metal pizza paddle to defend himself with. Which he caught and smashed it into Gary's face with enough force to break it. But Gary's gem ability had granted him some sort of high tolerance for pain, and only stumbled back. He grabbed another chair and threw it at him, shattering it when Ash dodged and it struck the wall. As Ash tried to regain his balance, Gary charged him again and pushed him into the wall armed with the chair leg again trying to push it into Ash's head.
"Remember who I am Gary!" he pleaded "I said I don't want to have to hurt you Gary, but I will if I have to!" he explained by twisting his wrist until it snapped, causing him to drop his stake from his broken wrist. Not wanting Gary to cause anymore damage inside the restaurant, he then kicked him as hard as possible through the broken window back into the battle between Gem and Pokemon. When Gary regained awareness to his surroundings, he snatched the knife from the ground and charged Ash again.
Ash felt a burning pain in his chest as the blade penetrated his body. Gary pushed further and repeatedly struck him in the face until he fell, despite this he continued to strike him until Garnet threw Gary off of him and returned the favor with a series of blows.
"ASH!" Pearl screamed as she embraced him
"PIKAPI!"
"Pearl" he choked out through his blood filled mouth as he began to feel light headed.
"You're going to be okay Ash" she sobbed, pulling the knife from his chest and created a large pool of crimson liquid.
"Pearl" he weakly told her, "tell Lapis I" but that was all he was able to say before his wounds took him, and Pearl watched the life leave his eyes and die in her arms.
"ASH!? ASH! PLEASE NO!" she screamed through her tears. Garnet was also looking down at him devastated, with all three of her eyes dropping tears as she held Pikachu in grief.
Although Garnet had beaten him to the brink of death, broken his nose and knocked at least five of his teeth out, Gary slowly got back up and grabbed a large chunk of glass ready to stab Garnet. But just as he got up, a car came crashing down on top of him, courtesy of Peridot.
"ASH!" Steven screamed as he, Connie and James joined them. "Ash speak to me!" he then screamed trying to shake him. After a few attempts to revive him using his healing power, but the damage was done.
"Steven, he's gone you can't heal him"
"NO! I CAN BRING HIM BACK! I BROUGHT LARS BACK , I CAN DO IT FOR HIM TOO!" he screamed while repeatedly slapping his saliva covered palm onto his cut. When he finally saw it was all for naught, he broke down into Pearl's chest and sobbed over his brother's death.
Peridot lifted the car off Gary and saw that although his body was broken and crushed, he was still barely breathing. Steven healed his wounds and Garnet bubbled him, and sent him back to the Temple. With Gary out of the way, the others all surrounded Ash's body.
"Is he really?" James asked.
While the group surrounded Ash's body, his Gem suddenly began to glow a soft orange color and a crust began to form along Ash's limp body. When the light finally dissipated, he was completely cocooned in the crystal.
The group lifted the cocoon and brought it inside of the Temple, resting it on Steven's bed. Using a microscope from Steven's toy chemistry set, Peridot examined a sample taken from it.
"It's, made of jasper." She concluded.
"Never have I seen something like this happen before" Pearl stated as she held Steven in mourning. "Garnet, what does it mean?"
But Garnet simply stared at the bundle that was Ash, not knowing just what to do or say.
Of the entire group, Pikachu was taking it the hardest. He refused to leave his trainer's side no matter what. The rest of Ash's pokemon wanted this as well, but were too large to fit inside the already cramped house, so they all had to wait outside the Temple with Gary's pokemon to mourn their master and friend. Pikachu began to repeatedly shock the cocoon in a last ditch attempt to save his master, but each shock became weaker, and following each shock was a repeated failure.
"Pikachu" Garnet told the distraught pokemon while kneeling to be at his height, "he's gone".
The door burst open and Amethyst and Greg came running inside upon returning from the hospital, as Clemont had stayed behind to watch over Serena at the hospital, and to deliver her the frim news. Seeing what they were told about Ash was true, Greg charged over to his son's bed and cried.
Ash awoke with the biggest headache he'd ever had in his life to the sight of everybody looking sad. "Uh, I feel like my head's been kicked in"
"It was" a familiar voice told him.
Ash looked out Steven's window and saw the person who told him this was standing outside on the back deck. Someone he thought he'd never see again. "Skinny?!" he asked out of pure shock. "Guys look!" he exclaimed turning to face everyone. But he found himself being completely ignored. "Uh, guys? What are you all doing?"
"They can't hear you Ash"
The memory of his fight with Gary then came back to him, "wait, you can't be here you're dead. Does this mean I'm?"
"Technically speaking, yes. Officially, no. Look, I'm not here to give you some sort of spiritual advice or anything, this is just a side effect to the process".
"What process?"
"Healing, I'm just your guide in this situation. Come on, I know someone you probably really want to give a piece of your mind to". She reached out her arm and Ash followed the scrawny Jasper through town, stopping just outside Fishstew Pizza to see the aftermath of the battle. Broken glass and blood, his blood, littered the boardwalk. Seeing the carnage, he remembered the others who got caught up in it.
"Are Serena and Gary going to be alright?"
"Well, they haven't shown up here yet, so they must've survived. Nasty stuff I gotta say, I mean, he chopped her finger off!
"Don't remind me Skinny"
"Sorry, come on, let's keep moving." She continued to lead him across town to the site of where Ash's downward spiral began. The charred remains of where the barn once was, was now a mess of the mangled remains of the support beams that once stood, and the ashes and tinder scattered over the floor of what little remained of his previous life. A blinding light came from the sky above him, and Ash got to see who Skinny had brought him to.
"You just couldn't let me stay happy, huh Arceus?"
"It was not my place to intervene, Chosen One. You have my sympathy, but you do not have my apologies."
"And why so? Why did you get to step in when you literally intervened in my journey by giving the other's pokemon?"
"Destiny required it, and I was granted to act"
"I see, you decide to act when it's convenient for you, and you meddle with destiny to get your way, screw whoever gets hurt because you didn't do anything when they needed your help the most."
"I DO NOT CONTROL DESTINY!" The creator pokemon boomed angrily down at him.
"Tell that to Skinny here, to Gary, to Lapis!" he screamed back
"Dude, I don't think screaming at him is a good idea, and that's coming from me". Skinny tried to warn him.
"It is true that some destinies are set in stone Chosen One" Arceus told him in a more calm manner, "but many destinies, including those of you and your friends, are always changing because of your decisions. Take what happened to you for example, you were supposed to die just now had density had its way with you. Yet you are now going to live on account of Skinny's destiny of becoming part of you. We all have a destiny Ash Ketchum, even myself. But destiny's can be subject to change by even the slightest decision. Now go, and make your destiny clear." The light which brought Arceus into his vision returned, and everything soon went dark.
Back at the Temple, all was quiet. There was no more crying, no more talking, no one even seemed to breathe. The dead silence was broken by the sound of cracking rock, and a bright, orange light appeared under the crust of Ash's cocoon. With a mighty crash, it burst open, and the circular Jasper stone found on Ash's chest popped out and began floating down towards the middle of the living room, destroying the vassal in the process. A mannequin-like figure of light appeared around it, and the body of Ash fell onto the floor once the light vanished.
"ASH!" everyone screamed with joy to see he was alive. Soon enough, he was ambushed by the entire group squeezing him out of concern.
"Aw geez, guys I can't breathe" he joked, causing everyone to back away.
"Ash" Pearl said in shock "your jacket"
"Yeah, what about it?"
"Well, look at it" Steven insisted, beaming with pride.
He removed his blue jacket and examined it. Before, a white circle had surrounded the collar of it where his neck was, but now the circle was a star.
"You were poofed," Pearl concluded, "and you reformed. But, that's not possible, how?"
"Clemont really outdid himself with me I guess". Although he had finally gained his official Crystal Gem star, this was the least of his concerns. "What happened to Gary?"
"He's not going anywhere, got all locked up in the bubble room" Garnet explained.
He turned his gaze to the Temple door, "alright, let's get my friend back"
Lapis had absolutely no recollection of how she got there, but here she was once again standing on the sandy beach of Beach City. Witnessing a free for all battle between Garnet, Pearl and a number of pokemon she did not recognize on the beach, she backed away in fear of being hurt. There she saw him, Ash was standing in the window of the restaurant where they had their first date fighting a boy his age with spiked, brown hair. She watched Ash knock his opponent onto the sand, but he suddenly got back up. Before she could warn her beloved, the other boy had grabbed a blade and stabbed him.
"ASH!" She screamed before waking up covered in sweat. She had to take a few moments before she remembered where she was, and looked over to the other side of the bed she lay on in the Striaton City Gym. Despite knowing it was just a nightmare, she had a feeling deep down that something was wrong. And now she definitely wasn't getting any sleep tonight. She looked at the clock on the wall, it read 4:36 AM.
Slowly she crept out of bed and tiptoed down the hallway to not wake her hosts. She then reached the gym's battlefield and dining room to the restaurant. She sat alone at a table and began to admire the city through the window. Striaton City was illuminated by the full moon, and the empty streets pinned with streetlights created a beautiful aesthetic. But the calm environment provided no sense of relief for her gloom, and she longingly looked to the sky, hopping Ash was alright.
Turning her head, she saw the light inside the kitchen was on. When she gently pushed open the swinging door, she saw someone inside stirring something in a large saucepan.
"Can't sleep either huh?" Cilan asked her as he stirred his creation.
"Yes. Sorry if I woke you"
"No, I've been up since one. Care for some hot cocoa?" He poured both of them a mug of the chocolaty beverage and they both sat down in the dining room. "So what's bothering you?"
"Just a bad dream. What about you? What are you worried about?"
He took a sip from his mug, "during my travels with Ash, we encountered several events that nearly cost us our lives. You think you'd be used to dealing with the kind of stuff we're going to encounter on our journey together. But the part that's keeping me up tonight is, I'm scared. I'm scared for what's going to happen once we leave. I'm scared about what's going to happen to my brothers. I'm scared for what'll happen if we fail. But when I think more and more about it, I guess it's alright to be scared about something as big as this. Being scared is a natural reaction to things wouldn't you say?"
She nodded, thinking of how she ran because of how scared she was.
"We had to change our plans, the plane won't take you because you're not a citizen. We're going to have to board a boat. We'll leave at dawn."
"Cilan?"
"Yes?"
"When we do find Cynthia, how can you be sure she'll help us? What if she doesn't believe us?"
He finished his cocca, "I believe she will. The real question is, are you prepared to travel with me and my brothers?"
She levitated her drink into the air and played with it a little, creating different patterns out of nervousness. "Yes"
Cilan smiled eagerly as he poured another cup for himself "then there's nothing holding us back".
With their worries laid to rest, the two sat there talking about their experiences with Ash while waiting for the sun to rise. A tone of worry for their future in their voices, but smiles on their faces nonetheless.