Yo home dogs and welcome to the next chapter! Had a lot of interesting content last chapter. This chapter took me a little longer to write than anticipated due to me getting side tracked with other stuff.

Guest review response

Melody: Thanks for telling me your guess one what you think Black's role in all of this is. I'm not going to say much about it yet but keep reading and you'll see the truth soon.

Chapter 55: Dark Matter

Point of View Stark

"Is any of what you said even possible" I asked the lucario in confusion. He responded with a nod. This was becoming a lot to take in and very bizarre.

"We'll be leaving tomorrow at dawn to apprehend Zygarde. I would like you to come Stark, I could use your skill and I believe it would help convince you" Mandus said as he leaned against one of the stone spires.

"I'll come but don't blame me if I'm a little cynical about this whole plan" I inquired as I thought of how ridiculous this all sounded. None of this sounded remotely possible even with legendaries especially the whole Ryder role.

"Get some rest, you'll need it" the lucario said. Assuming that-that was my queue to leave I gave a small bow with my head and I headed towards the exit. First things first I needed to find Vincent, he was my closest colleague at the moment and I needed someone to talk to this about.

Point of View Black

I yawned as I slowly rolled over and onto my three good paws. It was now very early in the morning and I had to meet up with Nia for that training thing. She promised me one early morning of training in exchange for one favor of her choice. I slowly got up on my tired legs and began making my way towards the exit of the hotel room.

It was now early morning. When I say early morning I mean really early in the morning… like four in the morning… Due to the new sleep schedule I was forced to get used to this was really early for me to be awake. My previous sleep schedule I'd still be awake for a few more hours.

I walked over towards the door as quietly as possible and I jumped up on the door and pulled the handle to open the door. Once the door cracked open I slowly went out into the hall that was actually lit up. Yes I did close the door behind me. Eventually I made it outside and I began making my way through the city streets. This reminded me of the day's I was running rogue and I had nothing.

The silent night was a reminder of how much my life has changed. I was no longer alone and that made life worth living again. I made my way through the empty city streets towards the park like where Nia said we'd meet. As I walked my rings lit up the streets with a blue light. I missed the moon and I knew I didn't get enough of it these days.

Eventually I made my way through the quiet city streets and to the park where I was supposed to meet Nia. Off in the distance I saw a glowing golden light off in the distance and I soon recognized the shape to be Nia. I ran over towards the glowing umbreon as fast as I could on my three good paws.

"Hey I'm here" I said to the umbreon who turned her head and noticed me.

"You actually showed up" Nia spoke back.

"What doubting me already" I said with minor offence.

"Okay let's go" Nia dropped the previous conversation and moved onto the next.

"What? Aren't we training here" I asked the umbreon with confusion.

"No, were going to train somewhere more secluded where no one will see what where doing. Anyone who knows that these attacks can only be used by killers will alert the police" Nia said with a point.

"I guess you got a solid point" I replied back as I followed the umbreon without an idea where our destination was.

"Where are we going then?"

"Deep into the forest where you can practice all you want without any distractions. Plus I have a little spot I like to hang out at around their" she said as she walked at a faster pace than I could keep up with on my three paws.

After we left the city we entered a forest off in the distance. Not the forest that was burned down, that'd be just silly. I walked through the forest carefully trying not to trip over any twigs or branches. The sky was now starting to get brighter from the sun that would soon arise and go through its daily cycle.

I found it strange that Nia wasn't being so hostile towards me. I mean she was nothing but evil to us when we talked to her in the past but now she was cooperating with me and actually doing something nice. I guess it wasn't for free though.

"We're here" Nia said as she stopped walking. This was my training ground it was actually not a bad spot. There was a stream that cut through the forest here with a giant log making a bridge across the stream. On top of all that the brush here was next to nothing so I'd have plenty of room to move around if I needed to.

"What's next" I asked Nia.

"Well next I'm going to have to explain how this works. Just stay with me it's very complicated to explain and its more of something you have to do to understand" Nia said.

"Okay I'm ready" I responded with confidence.

"Okay listen up because I'm not in the mood to repeat" Nia started off "First it is important to know that dark matter isn't a joke. You don't use this in your little gym battles. You use this to kill and it serves no other purpose" Nia said in a serious voice as she made full eye contact with me the whole time.

"Got it" I replied back fully understanding the power this power had.

"Dark matter occurs from the trauma it does to a umbreon's heart, it allows you to access dark more sinister abilities that most light hearted umbreon's wouldn't be able to use" Nia said as she sat on the ground and made herself comfortable for a long lecture.

"Wait not that I would do this but let's say an umbreon killed a lot of people, wouldn't it make the ability of dark matter unstoppable" I asked.

"Yes and no. I knew an umbreon once who killed so much he eventually just lost feeling with his emotions. So my point is that killing over and over won't always have the same effect on the heart, sadly people get used to it" Nia said as she looked up towards the sky as if she was reflecting on something. "It's sad to think that someone could kill that much."

"Yeah" I replied in a bitter voice agreeing with her.

Nia then snapped out of her reflection and looked back at me "Now I'm not going to pry to much but I know you've killed, after all that's why you can use shadow ball" Nia stated. I nodded my head completely haunted by the thought of my sins as bloody images played in my head.

"When I was taught dark matter I was told to concentrate my negative emotions and manifest them into energy" Nia said and I tilted my head in confusion on what the hell that even meant.

"Wait what, manifest my emotions!" I yelled in absolute confusion "How the heck would I even go about that!"

"Calm down and like I said its one of those things that you got to get a feel for by doing it yourself and experimenting" Nia answered.

"Your not really being helpful" I replied back to her.

"Well I'm trying, don't like it take your problems somewhere else" Nia replied back in annoyance.

"Yeah-Yeah I know I need your help" I mumbled back to her as I tried to think of darker memories. I thought of it all every last horrid detail about what I did. All the emotions and all the… blood, the thought of blood instantly broke my concentration as I tried to get the image of the red substance out of my head.

"Is something wrong" Nia noticed the disturbed look on my face.

"Yeah, just trying to get this" I responded with minor frustration. Nia then walked over towards the stream and jumped on the log that went across the stream and went to the middle of it and lied down. It looked like a rather nice spot to be, or until you fall into the water.

Once I snapped out of that distraction I tried once again. I concentrated on the dark memories and the horrible deeds that I did. I emitted a small grunting noise as I tried to get some form of dark matter to form but I only looked like an idiot in the end.

"Nia this doesn't make sense, can you help I'm starting to feel stupid now" I yelled at the umbreon who was now trying to get some shut eye. Her eyes cracked open and she stood up and walked off her log and approached me.

"Okay I'll tell you what my friend told me when he taught me" Nia began to say "What do you hate about yourself for doing that, what compromises has it made towards who you are. Think of the self-disgust you hold for your sins, the burden and the way people look at you for it" Nia said. That idea was actually pushing it. I had no idea I had to dig into these kind of emotions to learn dark matter.

"What do I hate about myself" I asked in a uneasy voice.

"Yeah, this power is fueled off negative energy" Nia said.

Now that I think about it, my shadow ball did feel much stronger whenever I was in a bad mood, especially during my encounter with Vincent. "Well" Nia asked. "You can think it or say it" she said.

'I hate myself for countless reasons… I committed the ultimate taboo and no matter what I'm a monster. I'm the monster Gray think's I am' I thought mentally as I thought of all the emotions I have held in me. Being with Flare and my other friends helped mask these emotions but now I was digging back into them.

"Now concentrate it into a form, picture your hatred, sorrow and pain into energy" Nia commanded.

I concentrated as I thought of the horrible thoughts. My head echoed with many different voices of disapproval.

'Your nothing but a monster' A voice yelled to me in my head.

'Stay away from him, that thing looks dangerous' Another memory popped into my head.

'Look at those red eyes, the eyes of a demon' another voice yelled in my head. All these voices that spoke were true. I was a monster, people should stay away from me and my eyes were stained with the color of murder.

I concentrated a mixture of dark emotions as hard as I could, I could feel my heart growing heavier and heavier. My eyes were clamped shut as I thought of it all. It was all becoming overwhelming so fast.

"Black" Nia said to me and knocked me out of my thoughts. My eyes flipped open as I saw a surprised look on Nia's face along with a few dark particles that disappeared almost instantly.

"You were actually beginning to do it" she said in surprise. Wow it was that easy, I almost couldn't believe it.

"Why'd you stop me then" I asked in slight annoyance.

Nia let out a long sigh that sounded rather depressed "Because… I really don't think you should be learning this stuff now that I think of it" Nia said in a gloomy tone.

"Why" I asked her even though she has told me before.

"Because I don't want to see anyone end up like my friend" Nia said as she looked to the floor.

"What happened to your friend" I asked in curiosity. Nia looked up a little just barely making eye contact.

"With all the killing he's experienced he lost sight of who he really wanted to be" Nia replied quietly. "He may have not realized it but every time he killed someone it took him further and further away from who he really wanted to be. Towards the end he lacked most normal emotions and he just didn't care. He accepted that he was a demon that was meant to kill" Nia said in a voice that was now becoming a little shaky.

"And now you want to learn this! Why would you ever want to kill someone, this power isn't used for defense it's used to murder" Nia yelled at me as her emotions became deeper. This was a side of her I never really expected to surface from her.

I cringed a little at the thought of this argument, this umbreon was notorious for her attitude but now she was more emotional. "Like I said I need it to protect my friends and my paws may get a little dirty from this but if so then so be it" I replied back with a stern voice. "Besides don't you want to kill the same pokemon?"

Nia's ear's instantly pricked up as she heard me say that "I only have interest in killing one person and that's my old trainer. He's responsible for a lot of death and the death of my friend" Nia replied back at me. "I know what I'm saying is hypocritical but this is one last job that I have to complete before I can move on."

"Well just like you I have my own personal reasons for doing this and you should understand" I said back to the emotional umbreon. Nia remained quiet after that response.

"You know that were going to hell right" Nia replied back in a bitter voice.

"Sorry but I don't believe any religions" I replied back with a cold voice. Why would I believe legendaries after all that's happened to me?

"Well I do" Nia almost instantly replied back.

"Well thanks for your input but even if any god or legendary based creator did exist I would resent them for letting me suffer so much" I said with resentment towards the idea of legendaries looking down on us. Why would I believe such a joke, what proof is there and how could I believe after all of my suffering. If anything they're looking down at us laughing at the world that's falling apart.

"You believe what you want" Nia said as she began to walk back towards that log she was resting on previously over the stream.

"Hey where are you going" I yelled to the umbreon as she walked to her log.

"Just go back to learning how to be a killer, I'll be here if you really need me" she said back to me with a bit of attitude.

'What a hand full.' I really didn't understand this girl, she was bipolar or something. Yesterday she was very evil and now she's talking to me about religions and going to hell and getting emotional.

Point of View Stark

"Vincent we need to talk really quick" I asked the white espeon who was napping next to an old tree in the shade that was provided by its massive size. We were still in sanctum but soon we'd be leaving on our wild goose chase.

"What do you need to talk about" Vincent replied as he opened one of his eyes to look at me.

"Mandus told me the whole plan and I wanted to know if you actually buy into all of this."

"Are you kidding me" Vincent yelled out as he sat up "Of course I do" Vincent finished saying.

Every muscle in my face strained from resisting a pissed off frown "I thought you were a smart pokemon that believed logic" I stated.

"I am and that whole plan is logical" Vincent replied back to me.

"Are you insane" I yelled at the espeon who jumped at my fury.

"Please elaborate, what's wrong" Vincent asked.

"Seriously do I have to say it" I snapped back at him.

"Yes you do because I don't see why you are so angry" Vincent replied with a bit of irritation.

"You throw away your whole normal life for this bullshit conspiracy and your letting this all happen to your brother" I continued to yell. "Your brother is going to die in vain along with the rest of your family if you don't do something!"

"Stark" Vincent said with a dramatic pause "Are you jealous" Vincent asked a question that echoed in my ears.

"Jealous?" I repeated part of the question back to him.

"Are you jealous that I had a family and I just threw it away like that" Vincent interrogated.

The question ran through my brain for a second. Was it jealousy? I was always somewhat envious of other people's families but that was when I was younger mostly. It was annoying though talking to Vincent and hearing him not care a single bit about the family he killed and the only brother that remains is paying for it to this day.

"I'll tell you what Stark, wait until after we prove Zygarde is real, if we fail to prove his existence to you then I'll let you say what you want to say" Vincent proposed to me.

"Whatever" I snidely said back as I walked away from the espeon. Here I went to talk to him for insight and instead he crawled under my skin. Way to make me feel welcomed to sanctum. Since when the hell did I let pokemon like him upset me like that?

I walked deep off into the woods alone where no one could hear or see me. I looked around cautiously at every nook and cranny to make sure I was alone. Now was a good time to contact Zero and see if he'd let me get the hell out of here before I was forced to search for a myth.

"Zero are you listening, I'd like to talk really quick" I said out loud hoping that he was watching me from the Genesis base.

"I'm here" the psychic replied to me within my head.

"Did you catch all that back when I talked to Mandus?"

"Yeah I did…" He said in a grim voice.

"Well I got all the info I could now can I please leave. I upheld my end of the bargain and got you their plan" I said with seriousness in my tone.

"I'm afraid it's still too early for that" Zero said.

"Are you kidding me" I yelled as loud as I could. "You promised me that if I got some info on that Kurokami thing you'd let me go, now honor your words."

"No that's not it" Zero replied back.

"What the hell do you mean that's not it" I yelled again.

"The name of the project is just Kurokami but there's something more to all of this that they're not telling you" Zero warned me.

"Please enlighten me" I said with a snide attitude.

"Kurokami is something completely different than that. I'm not authorized to tell you but I'm going to talk to my superior's as soon as I can to get permission to fill you in."

"This is a joke" I said in a pissy voice.

"I'm trying my best to help you through this Stark, honestly."

"I don't even know why I'm bothering to help you, in the end your just going to kill me anyways" I said as I remembered how pointless it was.

"Genesis always honors a promise. You have my word that you'll be free afterwards" Zero said with an honest voice, but I knew better than to trust someone like him. I've lived my whole life with liars that came in many forms.

"Not going to work on me Zero, in the end I'm just another loose end to you guys, just get it over with" I provoked.

"Stark I promise that you'll be free after this, if not at least do it to stop these psychopaths" Zero pleaded.

"I'm going back to base now so leave me alone until I need you again" I demanded as I walked back towards sanctum. Zero didn't reply at all and I was left in silence. I just couldn't listen to him anymore, everyone around me was pissing me off and at this point I just wanted to kill someone.

Halfway through the walk back I began to feel off. My vision began to become blurry and my head felt like it was spinning. I felt a substance exiting my nostril and I rubbed it off with my right paw. A quick observation of the liquid on my paw showed that it was blood. This was just like that time back when we fought those pokemon traffickers back in Luminose. The blood continued to exit my nose as I grew weaker and weaker with each step along with a nocuous feeling. Soon my mouth was filled with a metallic taste and blood exited my mouth slowly.

"W-…What's wrong with me" I faintly asked myself as I lost my balance and fell onto the ground. My whole body felt out of whack just like that one time and I couldn't tell why. My body continued to grow weak and my vision began to slowly grow dark as I slowly lost consciousness. Eventually I gave into my weakness and laid unconscious on the ground.

Point of View Black

I continued to think of the dark memories that haunted me my whole life. Although I could never quite get it the same as the first time I got it. That talk with Nia through me off a little honestly. She did have a point, this wasn't something I should want to learn and I could seriously kill someone with this stuff.

"You can stop whenever you want you know" Nia said in a lazy voice towards me from that log she comfortably lied on. I knew I could stop but I had little intention to. It was now dawn and the sun was coming up.

"Well I need to get this down" I replied back as I went back to concentrating.

"Well a break can only help you after all" she said with a reasonable point.

I let out a small sigh as I stretched out my body "Eh I guess you got somewhat of a point" I admitted as I made my way towards her log that she happily lied on. I carefully balanced my way across the log being careful not to fall into the stream of water below us that emitted a soothing sound to the ears. Eventually I made my way to her and I sat next to her.

We sat in silence for a few minutes and every few seconds Nia would stare at me awkwardly as if something was bothering her "Okay I have to ask, what the hell is up that that cast" she demanded a answer.

"Well you see I broke my arm when in an epic battl-" Nia quickly disrupted my anecdote "No I mean what the hell is up with the swastikas and pentagrams and… does that say forever single" she nitpicked every detail on my cast that Hesh cursed me with.

"You can thank my pikachu friend for that" I replied back in slight embarrassment. Second off how did Hesh and Nia know how to read, I can barely recognize some numbers let alone a whole entire language.

"How do you know how to read, I'm just curious" I asked before she could say anything else about my cast.

"Things like that come easy to me, I have a perfect memory on almost anything, so learning literacy came pretty easy to me" she said. She learned it no problem, me I get scared just from seeing the inside of a children's book with like five words per page.

"So if you have a perfect memory then why are you living on the streets like this, shouldn't you be doing something with your life" I asked.

"Like I said, I have one last thing to do before I can move on, plus it's not that simple for me" She replied.

"I don't see how but I'll trust your words" I said.

"Weird question but how'd you get that scar on your chest" Nia asked as she looked at the snake like scar on my chest. Apparently we were both nitpicking each other's lives now.

'Just had to ask that one question didn't you Nia' I screamed in my head mentally.

"Umm how'd you get your scar on your head" I asked quickly trying to change the subject to the scar that was on the ring on her head. Not the cut from the glass shard Hesh had to pull out. That scar on her head was there the first time I met Nia.

"Don't change the subject" She saw straight through my tactic and that was a sign that she really wasn't stupid.

"Okay fine I'll tell you how, but then you tell me about yours" I proposed to her. Scars are kind of like stories honestly. There is a story behind every scar and like all stories some are great and some are boring.

"Sure" she replied back to me accepting the agreement.

"Okay so you may remember a grumpy absol in our group and if so may it be noted that he is a racist fucking asshole" I said with spite. Nia frowned awkwardly as I belittled my teammate.

"Anyways long story short me and him got into a fight and yeah… it ended with this" I said as I remembered the pain I endured that night and how this scar was going to stick with me forever.

"I'm sorry to hear that" Nia replied back with sympathy in her voice.

"Its fine, now what about your scar" I said pointing to the scar on her head that made the golden ring almost look like a crescent.

"Well I got this scar around a year ago"

"Uh huh" I said with curiosity growing inside me about the origin of that scar.

"One year ago I took a bullet for someone precious to me, due to the thick skull's umbreon's have the bullet penetrated my skull but stopped in the frontal lobe of my brain" she said.

"Whoa-whoa wait a second you survived a bullet to the head" I said with disbelief.

"It's not the first time it's happened, although most who do survive such a wound are left with serious brain damage."

"And you weren't" I asked.

"No I have a lot of brain damage and I had to go through a lot of therapy as well" Nia told me "The bullet stopped in my frontal lobe, the long term memory part of the brain" Nia answered.

"I thought you said you had a perfect memory though…" I asked finding a flaw in her story.

"I do, only because I take daily injections of nanomachines that have to be replaced once a weak" Nia confused me with her fancy science slangs.

"Nanomachines" I questioned.

"Little robotic cells that carryout specific functions in your body, the nanomachines I get help connect the neurons in my brain. Since brain cells don't divide or reproduce in anyway, the nanotechnology fills the blank spots and as a result my mind outperforms the average human mind memory wise, as long as I get my nanomachine injection on a regular basis" Nia lectured.

"So what your saying is that you're a cyborg" I chuckled.

"Well umm… if you want to put it that way sure, but I do believe I need to be at least one third machine to qualify" Nia replied back with a smirk.

"I see…" This was odd. I was talking to her and enjoying a conversation with her. Maybe that imposter was right about her being a good pokemon once you got to know her. But… how does he know all of this?

"Hey Nia weird question but do you know any jolteon's, specifically any that are cryptic assholes" I asked not knowing what to expect.

"I don't know any personally, last one I saw was your friend" She replied back. "Actually there was one that tried hitting on me and stuff but I ended up breaking his nose after he made a few unappreciated comments" Nia said as she reflected back on the jolteon.

"Do you know his name" I asked.

"His name was Dan and Mew was he fat and smelly" Nia chuckled. "He had far roles on his fat roles… I was embarrassed that he was trying to hook up with me" Nia continued to tell me about the pig of a jolteon.

"Yeah never mind I think we're thinking of two different pokemon" I replied back.

"Who are you looking for then" Nia asked.

"A ghost of some kind" I replied back honestly with a smirk on my face from how silly that must have sounded.

"Okay… well I'm no paranormal expert." Well no duh your not. I sure as hell wouldn't call you if my house was haunted. Then again who would I call?

After a thirty minutes of random conversations having very little to do with my dark matter training I realized that I was gone for a bit longer than intended and if I didn't hurry back Alex was going to flip the world upside down in order to find me.

"Nia I should probably get going, my trainer is a little annoyed with me always going missing. He's probably looking for me as we speak" I said as I got up and carefully balanced myself and walked off the log we were on.

"Well I'll see you later I guess" Nia called out.

"Maybe, I'm almost dying left and right so you may want to be quick if you wanna see me again" I joked as I made my way back to Cyllage.

Chapter End

Author Note: So that concludes that chapter. The beginning did skip over what Ryder's role in all of this is, that's because I have plans lol. So the beginning was interesting as we watch Black tap into some darker memories and thoughts about who he murdered. I know I'm not letting much up on that and that's because I have plans for a good way to break the ice one of these days.

Even later in the chapter we see Stark experience that one problem again where he became weak and bleed out his mouth and nostrils. I'm no expert on anatomy but that's not normal...

The final part of the chapter which shifted back to Black and Nia we get some awesome character building. We got to see Nia actually being friendly for a change along with some of her feelings and humor. And at least we got an answer on what the medicine was. Now onto Nanomachines... those are real if your curious and they're more being developed than already in use. I'm no expert on what they can all do but they can do a lot of things. Its just basically microscopic cells that can carry out many functions. So nano technology can help a brain but I'm sure it wouldn't be cheap... Gotta wonder how Nia gets that stuff lol.

Anyways here's a fun question you can feel free to answer. In a tournament including all the characters in this story who do you think would come out in the top three strongest? (Up to date in the story and excluding legendaries that were mentioned)

Thanks to everyone who reads and follows and faved this story. I appreciate all of your support!