This is the second of four chapters today.


"All right, ready?" Marill asked.

Scizor nodded, and Venonat bobbed his antennae.

"Right," she said. "Venonat, any other Pokémon around?"

"There's the Skuntank there, you already know about that one," Venonat replied, using his ability to scan the area. "And there's a Mightyena, but that's further away."

"Good," Marill told him. "Okay, if you see that Mightyena, or any other Pokémon moving in to join in, you let us know. Signal us, if you know what I mean."

The Poison-type nodded, and Scizor picked up Marill.

"Just remember, I have trouble with poison," she said, and he nodded. Then his wings buzzed, and he vaulted over the rubble they'd been hiding behind.

The Skuntank reacted immediately, swinging its tail around to shoot a Flamethrower jet at the two of them, and Scizor raised Marill like a weapon – having her shoot out a spray of water in a Surf, cutting a hole in the jet of flame and letting them both fly though without the destructive flames getting through to damage Scizor.

Blurring past Skuntank at close range, Scizor volleyed in a Bullet Punch with one fist before kicking out in an Aerial Ace. Marill got involved as well, shooting Skuntank with a Bubblebeam, and they were dodging away by the time Skuntank unleashed a massive cloud of foul-smelling poison gas.

"Back to Venonat," Marill whispered. "Drop me off, pick me up on the bounce."

"Got it," Scizor replied, and buzzed around to send Marill off to join their teammate. A spurt of poisonous liquid came firing up at them, and he rolled to protect her behind his Poison-resistant Steel body – then dropped her off about ten feet above the ground.

As soon as she landed, Marill glanced at Venonat. "Okay, where's he hiding?"

"He moved a bit," Venonat replied, displaying the flashing icon for where Skuntank was on his eyes. "And the Mightyena's getting closer."

"Right," Marill said. "Thanks."

She Bounced, and Scizor caught her in mid-air.

"He's there," she pointed down into the cloud, speaking softly again.

"Good," Scizor told her, and threw her up into the air.

She watched as Scizor dove into the cloud without her, waited a beat, then used Hydro Pump – blasting down a jet of water which hit Skuntank head-on, quenching his attempt to Flamethrower before it could really get started. Scizor blurred back and forth, disrupting the poison cloud as he moved, and bounced his Fury Cutter from Mightyena to Skuntank and back until both Dark-types were knocked out.

Then he flew up her Hydro Pump, washing the toxins off his skin, and caught her again.

"Back to Venonat," she said. "We need to pick our next target."


"I think I've worked something out," Piplup said to himself, looking around the side of one of the pillars. "Galactic has way too many Pokémon."

Ash shouted something, and a few seconds later a spike of incandescent fire pulsed overhead – accompanied by a sudden massive bang and a rumbling boom, as the Shadow Articuno used an intense Blizzard to shield itself from a focused Blast Burn attack.

The energy release was startling, and the sound continued to echo in the mostly-closed space for several more seconds – though even before it had begun to die down, an Alolan Golem had begun to volley magnetically accelerated lumps of rock upwards to hit Mega Charizard.

Chips of smashed magnetite dropped all over the place as Mega Charizard Rock Smashed them to bits, and Piplup jumped forwards – spinning on his long axis and spooling up a Whirlpool, and using it to dart across the intervening ground to get at the Golem.

It left off to shoot a Thunderbolt attack at him, and Piplup dismissed his Whirlpool again – leaving him with just a beak glowing for a Peck attack, which he used to block the electrical blast and send it flashing off to the side.

Closer now, Piplup spun up a Whirlpool again – this one off to one side of him, instead of actually surrounding him. He flicked it at Golem with a pirouette, surrounding the half-Rock half-Electric Pokémon in swirling, opaque water to keep him from being able to attack accurately, and used the residual momentum to do a twirl and slide to a halt on the glassy ground.

A Solrock charged up a Solarbeam to shoot at him a moment later, but Piplup was already moving again – first diving forwards in a roll, letting the beam of concentrated sunlight hit the ground behind him, then firing a brief Surf upwards and freezing it into ice with a blast of Ice Beam.

That gave him a few seconds of protection against a second Solarbeam, and he raised his flippers to catch the shield before it could shatter – then broke a hole in it with Peck, and fired a Bubblebeam up through the hole. Some of the bubbles missed, but several of them flew true, and Solrock nearly vanished in explosions for a few seconds before shielding itself with a Light Screen.

Jumping upwards, Piplup kept up his Bubblebeam while also using Whirlpool – shattering his short-lived frozen shield, and carrying the bits along to hammer Solrock's shield from all directions.

A blast of electrical energy flashed through the whirlpool, stunning him slightly, and he froze the whole thing just in time to avoid taking a second successive Thunderbolt – sending the electrical energy fizzing around the edge of the suddenly-frozen whirlpool instead of electrifying the whole thing. The Solrock had something to say about that, though, dropping straight down into it with a Flare Blitz that blew the ice away, and a high-speed Rock Throw smacked Piplup away.

The impact knocked him a third of the way across the entire battlefield, and he rolled over twice on landing only to bounce off an Ampharos. The Electric-type blasted at him with a Thunderbolt, and Piplup lunged back to his feet – avoiding the first hit, and catching the second in a Whirlpool before flinging the electrically-charged water mass skywards.

It hit Shadow Moltres, and Piplup almost started preening at his accuracy – then a Thunderbolt reminded him of what he was supposed to be doing. A red return beam came a moment later, and Piplup dodged away from that as well as the Thunderbolt – swirling up an icy shield to keep him safe from the electrical attack for a moment, then shaking his head firmly at his trainer.

He could keep fighting, so he would.


"Tag in!" Mega Sceptile called, breaking into a run.

"You sure?" Glalie asked. "You might get cold feet."

"Not the time for it!" the Grass-type snapped. "Now!"

He jumped, and Glalie duly did as instructed – his horns glowing with blue light as he icecrafted overtime – and by the time Mega Sceptile was at the apex of his jump there were a pair of shimmering Ice-Dragonites flying along in a spiral which followed the route Glalie was taking. Mega Sceptile landed on one, his feet raising a cloud of sparks, and he began grinding along the ice-rail at high speed.

Glalie added a twist into the rail Mega Sceptile was actually using, and he used it to get a bit higher and launch his Leaf Storm projectile – making it burst as late as possible, so the Feraligatr he'd targeted took the entire brunt of the impact. Then he hooked his claws around the rail and jumped, switching to the other one, and a Fire Blast attack which had been aimed for him just shot through empty space instead.

Mega Sceptile charged up his arm blades next, seeing that Glalie was routing them through a section of the fighting with some ripe targets, and hit out with his Sacred Sword twice before switching rails back to the first one and doing the same thing all over again.

"Left!" he called, and Glalie swerved hard left. The attack Mega Sceptile had seen coming smashed both rails in front of him, and the Grass-type jumped sideways – bouncing off the head of a startled Onix, and sliding along its body to the tail with both Leaf Blades raising a shower of sparks. He jumped at the end, firing a second Leaf Storm missile behind him as he did, and landed back on one of Glalie's grind rails with a few steps to shed excess momentum.

Glalie shot out ice beams with all the ice-time he could spare from crafting the rails, and for a few seconds the two of them were a blur of elemental attacks and sword beams going in all directions.

Then a high-speed railgun rock smashed into the leading edge of Glalie's twin-dragons construct, shattering it, and Mega Sceptile jumped off just before it broke off under his feet. He twisted, shooting his now-regrown Leaf Storm missile back in the direction the attack had come from, then buzzed his leaves for a moment to extend his flight slightly.

That brought him down square on top of a Shadow Alakazam, one which spotted that he was coming a little too late, and a Night Slash got Mega Secptile through the last-minute shield. He swiped with his other arm, this one empowered with an X-Scissor, and tucked into a roll to maintain momentum and get right past the Psychic-type before it could continue to attack.

Glalie bounced off the floor just to one side of him, then began crafting again, and Mega Secptile ran right up onto the rails as they formed within an inch of the ground.

"Over that way," he suggested, then leaned over as they turned the corner.


Across the enclosed-space room, Blaziken was a blur of heat and light and fire.

He ducked away from a fast attack from a Mienshao, the arm whip passing an inch from his forehead, then sprang backwards onto his hands and kicked out with a Double Kick. Mienshao dodged both blows, backflipping away from Blaziken's strike, and Blaziken slammed both feet into the ground – turning his arm spring into a handstand – and switched his focus to the Mega Medicham already resuming an interrupted attack on him.

Four semisolid arms punched out at him at once, carrying charges of psychic energy, as the Mega Medicham also lashed out with her two real arms to try and overload him with targets. Blaziken's response to that was to push himself off the ground entirely, flipping back upright and whirling to kick out at all six arms at once – a separate Blaze Kick for each one – before landing with a momentary sliding skid which cancelled out the momentum he'd gained from the attack sequence.

Mienshao came back into the fight with a balletic Acrobatics attack, and Blaziken kicked the ground with a shoom of flame – sending a pulse outwards in all directions, but chiefly back towards Mienshao. That delayed the Fighting-type slightly, and Blaziken spun up a Fire Spin around himself to act as a shield and a source of momentum both at once – he had to keep turning anyway to avoid being caught off guard by his opponents, not just Mienshao and the Mega Medicham but a Sawk as well which occasionally contributed to the battle, and the Fire Spin made it easier to keep turning left.

That might have been a weakness in another Pokémon, but Blaziken was too used to fighting in two-Pokémon contests for that. He feinted low and went high, rising out of close-combat attack range where the Mienshao and the Sawk couldn't reach him easily, and did a high kick which he mixed into a Flame Burst. That forced Medicham to use her ghost arms to block the Fire-type attack rather than focus on him directly, and then Blaziken dropped back to ground level so fast he wrong-footed Mienshao's attempt to jump up and hit him with an Acrobatics in mid-air.

That Fighting-type got hit with a high-speed Fire Punch, but Blaziken couldn't follow up on it to make sure Mienshao was forced out of the fight because Sawk attacked with a Superpower. That had to be dodged away from, and the Sawk was the target of a Low Sweep which knocked him to the floor, but by then Mega Medicham was ready to attack again and Blaziken had to switch targets again.

He conjured a set of Shadow Claws for his feet and did a complete breakdancing spin, ripping at her ghost hands, then sprang back upright before Mienshao landed and jumped into the air. Psychic attacks followed him, which he blocked with another use of the Shadow Claws, and he spiked a Fire Blast down – then May shouted a warning, and Blaziken turned his focus to dealing with an incoming Rock Throw attack.

He snagged it out of the air with all four limbs, twisted, and kick-shot it directly down towards Mega Medicham as a Stone Edge attack. She dodged to the side, avoiding the direct hit that might have resulted, but the dodge took her into the still-spiralling Fire Spin Blaziken had set up earlier in the battle.

Flipping in the air, Blaziken landed feet-first and brought both clenched fists down together. A Heat Wave attack blasted out, hitting the Mega Medicham when she was already having to deal with increased temperature around her, and Blaziken followed it up with a Flare Blitz – only to take a Drain Punch to the back as Mienshao weighed in, forcing him to spin and change focus yet again.


"Golduck, ready?" Misty called.

Good question, her not-technically-a-psychic-type replied. Let's find out, I guess.

"Right," Misty nodded. "Okay – Surf!"

She threw all her remaining Pokéballs in the air, and they flashed open all at once – Gyarados, Politoed, Seaking, Staryu, Starmie, Kingdra, Corsola and Caserin. All eight Pokémon used Surf at once, launching out massive amounts of water even as Gyarados was Mega-Evolving, and Golduck took control of the water before it hit the ground.

Misty stepped forwards, and the growing water bubble swallowed her up – leaving her with a kind of inner surface to walk on, an air bubble in the middle of the huge watery mass her team had created, and all of them plunged into it at once as well. It continued to grow until Misty waved her hand, then Golduck began moving it towards the nearest team of Galactic Pokémon.

A Thunder hit the water bubble and crackled off, diverted by a special Brine trick which provided a separate layer of absorptive salt water just under the bubble surface, and Misty called an instruction. "Bubblebeams!"

Just after she gave the order, a barrage of attacks flashed out of the side of her mobile aqua-fortress. They crashed into the team facing her – an Electabuzz, a Magmar and a Jynx – and knocked the Magmar out of the fight entirely, though the Jynx shielded herself and her other teammate after a moment and fought back with an Ice Beam.

Mega Gyarados laughed, firing back with a Hyper Beam, and the resultant crash heralded her drawing the attention of some of Galactic's big guns – ten seconds later they were fighting a Shadow Dragonite, which was flying around at high speed and exchanging fire with Misty's whole team at once. The water buffered the attacks, reducing their impact, and while great gouts of it were blasted away with each blow Corsola and Staryu and Politoed were able to replace it as fast as it was lost.

"What's this called?" Azurill asked, from Misty's shoulder.

"I call it Misty's Terrain," Misty answered. "Gyarados – Dragon Rage! Starmie, Swift… now, Ice Beam!"

The Shadow Dragonite lit itself on fire, and Misty frowned.

"Huh, I'll have to tell Lance about that trick..."


The two Togekiss made a slicing pass down through the air, firing Fairy Wind attacks which cut through Shadow Zoroark's illusions, and the Dark-type howled – a high-pitched, eerie sound which echoed even over the sound of attack blasts.

It pulled in a wave of shadow, the black substrate thickening and strengthening as it was bodily yanked closer, and for a long moment it was hidden inside a dome of absolute darkness… then the dome exploded outwards, dozens of illusion clones running in all directions.

Misty's Togekiss launched a shower of Swift stars, peppering some of the clones with attacks and shattering them, but most of them got past… and split up, spreading across the battle zone and finding targets to attack.


Tauros bellowed, hooves slamming down on the ground and firing out a powerful Solarbeam. The light beam hit his target a glancing blow, but it quickly dodged away – moving just a bit faster than Tauros could track the beam across – and one of the other members of the Bull-Dozer formation charged across to attack in close-quarters.

With two members missing they weren't as coordinated as they could be, but so long training together made them fearsome, and-

-Tauros turned, tails lashing, and snorted out a burst of Flamethrower at the blur approaching him. It dodged like quicksilver, flowing away from his attack in a way almost no real Pokémon could manage, then its claws shifted suddenly into wicked blades tipped with hissing purple energy.

The Shadow Zoroark clone swiped out with a Night Slash, scoring deep cuts down Tauros' side, then exploded into a wisp of smoke as Butterfree swept an Ominous Wind through the area.

"Aargh," the tough Normal-type said, wobbling a little as one leg refused to take the same amount of weight as normal. "That stings!"

"Go get help!" his teammate instructed. "Now!"

The injured Pokémon returned himself reluctantly.


"Look out!" Iris called. "Excadrill!"

Her Steel-type's claws flashed out, and he blocked the first attack by the oncoming shadow with a musical clash of darkness against steel. The faux-Zoroak seethed, distorting as it tried to get to him to harm him – or even get past him, to reach his trainer – and Excadrill blurred into a whirlwind of steel spikes and claws as he used Drill Run, stopping each attack with a crash before dodging away to get into position to block the next.

A blue light built up at the ends of his claws, and he jumped away – coming out of Drill Run again and sliding to a halt, then flinging the Focus Blast at the barely-vulpine clone coming after him.

Both the blast and the clone exploded at once, dissipating into wisps of blue and black, and when it had gone Excadrill had honed his claws against one another with a deliberately casual attitude.

"Good work!" Iris called. "I – Keldeo, look out! Left!"


As Keldeo turned his horn on the pair of clones sent after him, and used a hoof-blast to knock out a whole swathe of them as well, two more of them slipped through Mewtwo's shields and closed in on the Maple siblings.

Most of Max's attention was on keeping track of Casper, Roland and Latios, and he didn't see the pool of shadow approaching until it was already reforming into a sharp-edged whirlwind of fangs and claws.

"Max!" Cinder gasped, and vanished in a flash of red light – then came out of her Pokéball again less than a second later, still forming from a blur of white when she collided with the shadowy Zoroark. Her fangs flashed, diverting the faux-Pokémon from hitting her trainer, but it was tougher than a Beat Up double – snarling and thrashing, it resisted Cinder's Bite for several seconds, and when it finally gave up and collapsed back into a streamer of diffuse purple-black smoke Cinder let out a sigh of relief.

Then she yelped, suddenly noticing the pain from before, and put a paw to her chest – staring as it came away wet.

"Blood," Max said. "Cinder, you need to get over to Jirachi and the others and get healed!"

He picked up the Dark-type with a huff of effort. "Are you okay to walk, or-"

Another Shadow Zoroark clone pounced, then dissolved in a stream of water.

"And stay away!" May's Wartortle insisted, wrapping the water around her like a long cloak. "There's no telling how far I'll go when one of my friends is in danger!"

"Thanks," Cinder said, wincing. "I… think I'd better go by Pokéball, Max."

"Right," Max agreed, returning her, then hurried over to the medical area.


Ambipom backed slowly as her opponent pressured her, bats in all four hands and a set of iron ping-pong balls bouncing back and forth between her and the frustrated Beedrill. "It's called a rally!"

"Where did you even get those iron ping-pong balls, senorita?" Ludicolo asked, bouncing from foot to foot in a little miniature raincloud. "That seems to me to be the bigger question here."

"Does it matter?" Ambipom asked. "And why exactly are you making it rain, anyway? It's kind of inconvenient for me."

"Well, that's because it is convenient for others, of course," Ludicolo replied. "For example, your teammate needs the water in case he is interested in extra ice!"

"A fair point," Ambipom admitted. "But-"

"Duck!" Ludicolo instructed, without preamble, and fired a barrage of Razor Leaves. They barely inconvenienced the Beedrill Ambipom had been fighting before she hit the ground, but hammered into something hiding in the Beedrill's shadow, and Ambipom sprang upright before hammering all her remaining iron ping-pong balls at it in a volley.

The shadow Zoroark clone dissolved, and Ambipom panted a few times before throwing her bats at the Beedrill. Three of them got impaled on the stingers, and the last one clonked it on the head and knocked it out.

"Those were competition grade," Dawn's Pokémon complained.

"Senorita, I promise you that if we get out of this I will buy you replacements," Ludicolo told her. "Now find something else to fight with!"

"Hmm..." Ambipom said. "Do you know Bullet Seed?"

"As it happens, I do!"


"I have no idea how anyone except Mewtwo or you Porygon guys is supposed to keep track of everything that's going on," Drew admitted. "I – Crawdaunt, look out!"

The water-type spun his shellsabers and intercepted an attack with them, sending up a crash of sparks.

"It helps when you tell me which way to look out from," Crawdaunt said, then deactivated one shellsaber. The electricity that had been sparking around it all collapsed back into his claw, and he waved it in an arc to send out a spray of lightning bolts.

"Sorry," Drew replied. "I'm more used to, what, four Pokémon being involved at once? Not this many!"

The Dark-typed crustacean scuttled to the side a little, then twisted his claw with a tchack to switch it from blade to bubblebeam. He fired out an incredibly badly aimed stream of water blobs, none of which hit the darting shadow he was pointing his claw at, but the barrage did hit and smash three other ones running alongside it.

Drew blinked, and by the time he realized the shadow was coming directly for him it was almost on top of him. A whirl of sharp darkness and honed claws swiped at him, tearing the sleeve on his hastily raised arm, then the shadows got smashed to pieces by a thrown rock.

"W...what was that?" Drew asked, blinking a few times in shock, then felt his arm gingerly around the tears. "Oow… I think it cut me..."

My recommendation is that you see Brock, his assigned Porygon assistant stated. That injury should be cleaned and bandaged, just in case.

"Right," Drew said, putting his hand to his head for a moment, then looking for Brock. "That sounds like a really good idea..."


Not far away, Metagross meditated on the nature of truth and illusions.

Their minds exchanged information back and forth in a complex matrix, like juggling, except that it was a kind of juggling where one or another of the jugglers would periodically forget what they were doing and have to be reintroduced to the concept of a ball. Reminders on Galactic flashed about in an arabesque, keeping the gestalt Metagross mostly well informed, and the Psychic-type slammed a metal foot down to generate a pulse of kinetic energy before raising the foot again and firing it at a luckless Graveler.

The normal definition of reality is that it is the thing which continues existing even if you do not believe in it, Metagross mused, steely body pulsing faintly and shielding against a barrage of Pin Missile attacks from a Jolteon.

I wonder if it can truly be said that Team Galactic exists at all? Certainly they are there, but-

Metagross switched focus as two Pokémon came forwards to attack at once, one a Hydreigon and the other a Kommo-o. Both Pokémon seethed with the dark energy of a Shadow Pokémon, and the Psychic-type raised all four legs at once and began hovering off the ground.

They focused their attention on the Hydreigon first, firing a Flash Cannon, and the Kommo-o surged forwards with a clatter of scales into the vulnerable spot. A beam of light came flashing past, along with an Aura Sphere, and three-quarters of Metagross' awareness considered the actions of their trainer with approval as Ash came blurring into the fight to take the pressure off them.

The other quarter was quickly brought back up to speed, and Metagross parried a two-mouthed Flamethrower attack from the Hydreigon with a flash of shielding and a pulse of null-gravity to deprive the flames of convective force. Metagross then used Hyper Beam, slamming the Dark-type bodily backwards in the air, and absently crushed a Zoroark clone with a free foot before preparing a Zap Cannon attack.

The Shadow Hydreigon roared three Dark Pulses at once, the overlapping null-psychic interference forcing Metagross to land so they didn't crash, and then its two arms became the jaws of an immense Crunch attack. Metagross raised their legs to hold it open, and it became a test of strength as Ash fought the Kommo-o not ten yards away.

All in all, this was a good day so far.


"This is just… really infuriating," Brock said, looking Dawn's Quilava over. "I know Pokémon sometimes get hurt, but this is… something else."

Dawn nodded. "I know… is he going to be okay?"

"I think so," Brock replied. "It's a shallow cut, so it's mostly going to have been painful rather than anything else. You said he hit his head?"

The Coordinator half-reached out. "Yes, that Shadow Zoroark construct threw him at the ground just before he hit it with the Flamethrower."

"It sounds like that's why he's out cold, then," Brock told her. "Chansey and the others are going to be able to take good care of him."

"Right," Dawn agreed, then winced as Mewtwo's shield pulsed with an impact. "This is just… I feel like we're really under a lot of pressure. Do you think they have any healing over there, because it might be a battle of attrition if they do..."

"Ash would know, he's the one who can see through solid objects – but I think he's kind of busy right now," Brock said. "Though it does seem like most of the Galactic Pokémon aren't actually trying to do more than knock our own Pokémon out. And they seem to be having Dialga and Palkia doing something which keeps them too occupied to use on us."

He looked over at Molly, who was still mostly focused on what she was doing – an alphabet of Unown hovering around her as she made little gestures fraught with meaning, and as the air around her pulsed with energy.

"Maybe what Molly's doing is going to help," he said. "But what really worries me is that I don't think we're seeing everything they've got… that pair of Shadow dragons over there is new. Maybe they're waiting until our Pokémon are tired out before doing something really big."

"I really hope you're wrong, Brock," Dawn winced. "But why aren't they just hitting us with everything at once?"

The whole of Spear Pillar lit up for a moment as Pikachu electrocuted something extremely hard, and Dawn chuckled.

"Oh, yeah, right… area attacks..."


"This guy just doesn't give up, does he?" Primeape demanded, bristling, then lunged in on the attack. His fists glowed with an almost-solid coating of Aura, and he lashed out with both of them at once – only for the Shadow Lucario to twist and block, using a pair of bone staffs which formed instantly to take the blow and shattered almost as quickly from the force of the impact.

Primeape bounced back, hit the ground, and launched himself straight at Shadow Lucario again. Roland flashed into the battle when he was halfway there, a four-element combined blade flashing, and swung it at the Shadow Lucario with one hand while his other hand maintained a steely Smart Strike for defence. That helped a little, as the Shadow Lucario had to waste a blow on smashing it before turning his attention to Roland himself, and a blast of unfocused dark Aura knocked Roland backwards before he could strike – but Primeape got his blow in, hammering into the corrupted Fighting-type with a powerful Close Combat.

Following up on his success, Primeape hit again in close succession, and then again – using bursts of Aura from his feet to keep him close enough to chain the attacks, aiming for a continuous combo that wouldn't let the Lucario react. He got five attacks off, each of them stunning blows, before the Shadow Pokémon simply flung him away with another eruption of untyped Aura.

Reaching out with his paws, Shadow Lucario physically grasped the sizzling Aura he'd used a moment before where it hung floating in the air – too dense to simply dissolve. Twisting it around, he pulled it together into coherency… then, a second later, snapped it taut and cracked it like a whip.

A ravening gout of flame cracked out at Primeape, setting his fur on fire, and Shadow Lucario turned his new weapon on Roland. The Gallade crossed his blades, making one water and the other ice, but what hit him was a surge of electrical energy as streams of vicious Aura transmuted to whatever element Shadow Lucario wanted right that moment.

Keldeo swung his blade down and fired a Fireblade attack, forcing Shadow Lucario to block, and Mega Lucario charged forwards into the gap. His paws sizzled with blue light as he compressed his own pure Aura into a defensive barrier, and he took hold of the multi-elemental whip before shifting his stance slightly and bodily yanking it out of Shadow Lucario's grasp.

Hurling it into the air, where it destabilized and exploded, Mega Lucario disdained paying any further attention to it to instead pressure the Shadow Pokémon further. The two Aura Pokémon fought in a dizzying display of close-combat mixed with snapcast Aura tricks, neither of them allowing the other even a second to work up something larger, and the flares and arcs of azure or corrosive purple which flashed out from both successful attacks and blows turned away filled the air with what seemed like a continual haze.

"Water!" Mega Lucario called, and Keldeo launched a Hydro Pump from both his hooves at once. His teammate took the water in a grip of Aura and shaped it, turning it into a weapon and a shield, and it lasted perhaps three seconds before the Shadow Lucario filled it with solar energy before detonating it with a Firepunch. The corrupted Shadow Pokémon followed up his attack with an Aura Sphere, and Roland teleported in for just long enough to block it before zipping away again.

Then Shadow Lucario committed heavily to an attack, accepting a brutal kick to the torso in order to knock Mega Lucario to the ground. Ash's Pokémon flipped back, springing away to recover, and the Shadow Pokémon blew up the ground underneath him to force him into the air before landing a Sky Uppercut which knocked him flying.

Keldeo took off straight up, catching Mega Lucario on his back, and below Roland pressed the engagement closely again – his blades a whirl of colour and light as he brought time for Mega Lucario to recover his equilibrium.


"How is it going?" Cyrus asked, his back to Charon – most of his attention on the battle going on throughout the Spear Pillar.

"We'd do better if we had Giratina," Charon replied. "The event horizon has formed, and we're expanding it, but it's not going as fast as it could – we're fighting Hawking radiation."

Cyrus nodded. "Understood. Continue."

He waved a hand. "Mars. Are you sure you can't get at the trainers?"

"We're doing our best," Mars told him. "That's Mewtwo, though – one of the strongest Pokémon ever recorded. Frankly I consider it an achievement he's not crushed us, and we are winning by attrition."

"Slowly," Charon said. "But surely, I suppose. Very well. And tell Jupiter and Saturn to be ready with their reserves – and if that shield goes down, take out the trainers immediately."

"Yes, sir," Mars agreed.

Charon turned back to the battle, then frowned slightly. "What is that?"

Mars followed his view, and blinked. "I… don't know..."


The almost-forgotten portal to the outside world rippled, then something came through – several somethings, Legendary Pokémon flying through all at once.

Latias and Latios. Lugia. Kyurem. Reshiram and Zekrom, the last two dragons carrying Dialga and Palkia underneath them.

Max did a double-take. "Wait – what the heck? May, look?"

His sister turned to stare, and so did Gary and Zoey.

"That doesn't look possible," Gary said, as the Reshiram and the Zekrom flew overhead before dropping their passengers with a crash. "There's only one Dialga and one Palkia, and they're over there!"

"I… don't think those are Pokémon," May replied.

There was a feedback screech, and the newcomer Latias and Latios launched out a salvo of projectiles which impacted on the Shadow Moltres overhead – almost hiding it in a cloud of explosions – as the newly arrived Tao Trio began gaining height and the Lugia shrugged off a salvo of beam attacks.

"This time I don't want to hear anyone complaining about the motto!" Jessie called out. "Because, no matter how you look at it, we are definitely protecting the world from devastation this time!"


"That's Team Rocket," Brock realized, blinking. "I mean… I kind of get it, but at the same time… how?"

There was a shuff as a shoulder-launched missile flashed out from the Team Galactic area, followed a moment later by a flick of white light and a bang as the warhead exploded some way short of the target.

That was a white-light laser, Dragon stated, her projector flashing as it manifested her body for her to have a better look – her voice almost drowned out by the roar of turbofans as the Mecha Latios banked around. Point defence? That's not exactly easy.

Her form shivered, flickering for a moment, then shunted her over to her Pokédex as a new hard-light projection took shape on her armoured projector. This one was much less like a normal Porygon, a vector-drawing of a reptile with two legs and two batlike arm-wings, and it began to speak as soon as it stabilized.

Hi Mom! Sorry about being rude, but I still have your access codes. You might want to change them, by the way. But that's not important right now – what is important is that I'm multiplexed across, like, eight different giant robots, and I can't help run the avionics on all of them. But you've got loads of siblings who can come up and help, right?

The draconic construct waved a wing. Oh, and hello everyone else. I'm Wyvern, you've never heard of me but I've heard of you. I'm kind of an accidental fork-clone of Dragon, so… surprise?

I'd make a joke about grounded, but we're busy, Dragon replied. Transferring… all right, you should have your uncles and aunts for assistance in a moment.

Thanks, Mom, Wyvern replied. We'll catch up later, okay? And you should really change your security codes.

"So… changing the locks once the kid's moved out?" Dawn asked.

Shut up, Dragon grumbled.


The Reshiram-bot banked, turbine howling as it maintained temperature for the heat-ray, and Cacturne did her best to grip her seat with her needles.

Wincing as half-a-dozen heavy attacks hit the armour, she triggered the heat-ray and swept it over a group of Team Galactic grunts – the internal targeting system spotting anything that looked like a weapon and quickly heating it up, until they had to drop it and the internals of the guns or missile launchers broke down from overload.

Only a moment later the Shadow Birds overhead took an interest in her, and a blast of black lightning smacked into the craft. The armour was tough, but Cacturne winced as she left the couch for a moment before thumping back down.

There was a sudden change to the engine pitch and the Reshiram slid sideways, avoiding the next attack, and Cacturne blinked as the screen changed in front of he.

BabbageOs installing, a voice said. Making A Difference. Engine. Hello, you're Cacturne without a nickname I take it?

"Yep!" Cacturne confirmed, most of her attention back on steering the giant robot – trying to line up a shot with the heat-ray on Shadow Articuno. Her hand flicked half a dozen switches on a countermeasures control at once, triggering a salvo of flares which dazzled Shadow Zapdos and led a heat-seeking missile fired from the ground to thump into that instead of the craft. "Thanks for the help, I think Wyvern was kind of overloaded."

The mecha-Kyurem swept past in the other direction, shooting a freeze ray at the still-dazed Shadow Zapdos, but by now Team Galactic was starting to redirect the attention of their ground-based Pokémon as well. A shower of high-speed attacks flashed up at the Rocket mechas, some of them getting though the Porygon-operated point defence, and Babbage let out an electronic sigh.

Fenris needs to improve his algorithms, that one shouldn't have reached the Mecha Kyurem, the Porygon opined, then winced. Whoops!

Cacturne threw them into a hard skew turn, the mecha's turbine keening as it shunted power to the lift fans, and the Mecha Reshiram nearly crashed into the ground before levelling out and shooting a salvo of rockets up at Shadow Moltres.

I'll concentrate on helping you, shall I? Babbage decided. Good, um, cactus.


"Wow!" Donphan said, staring up at the fighting overhead, then ducked reflexively as the robotic Latias passed about four feet over his head – spinning on its axis, then firing out a salvo of countermeasures more as a shotgun attack than anything. The shower of flares peppered Shadow Articuno with burning fragments for a second or two, until the Ice-type shredded them with Sheer Cold, and a rain of icy shards came flying back down at the faux-Dragon type – but by the time they reached where the target had been, it was elsewhere.

"My friend, you should pay attention to the fight," the Rota Lucario advised, landing next to Donphan for a moment.

"Right, sorry!" Donphan agreed, and spun up to speed with a quick Rollout. He skidded on the glassy floor surface, then got traction, and shot forwards towards a likely-looking target.

The Rota Lucario ran alongside him, then just behind, letting the Ground-type shield him from the Electric attacks their Electivire target launched his way. One came high enough to pass over Donphan's spinning form, and the Rota Lucario dropped down to slide along on one arm for a moment so the attack shot over his head.

Rising back to his feet, he fired an Aura spike – one without the huge force Ash's Mega Lucario could put behind it, so it was nothing more than a fingerflick at that range, but enough to make the Electivire flinch. Thus distracted, he didn't dodge out of the way in time when Donphan ran him over.

"Take that!" Donphan announced, spinning in mid-air, then dropped down for an Earthquake. Sir Aaron's Lucario jumped with the accompaniment of a burst of Aura, so he was airborne for the moment the attack pulsed out, and a surprised Darmanitan staggered back before turning to punch out at Lucario.

The Fighting-type caught the attack with a pulse of Aura, then saw something blur towards him at speed. Donphan slugged him in the side, driven by a massive burst of psychic force from a Shadow Alakazam, and both Pokémon went flying through the air towards the opposite wall.

Wincing, Aaron's Lucario twisted to point his footpaws towards the wall, and used a burst of Aura-jet rockets to slow himself – then gasped, as the effort sent a spike of pain through his torso. One forepaw caught Donphan, so the Ground-type didn't hit the wall either, and Lucario landed with a skid before rolling over once and managing to brake to a stop.

"Ow," he said, succinctly. "I think that's a rib..."

Donphan seemed to be out cold, though thankfully his Aura was still strong.

"What a mess."


"Whoops – whoa!" Staraptor said, doubling back to avoid taking a hit from a big gout of flame. "That's very bad manners."

The Shadow Moltres shot another stream of shadowy fire down at him, and Staraptor halted in mid-air – flipping over backwards and swinging his wings as cutting edges towards the oncoming attack. Each swipe sent a blade of air upwards, disrupting the leading edge of the Shadow Fire, and finally Staraptor crossed his wings over his chest before sweeping them both out at once in an X-motion.

The Shadow Fire fell apart, cut into four sections, and Staraptor flipped over to pull out of his dive just before he hit the ground.

"Hey, Buizel!" he called, spotting the Water-type not far off the ground – hovering on a jet of water, shooting ice attacks at an enemy Tangrowth. "Want to help me swat a Fire-type?"

"Bit busy right now," Buizel replied, as Staraptor came around for another pass.

Frowning, Staraptor looked closer, and saw that the Tangrowth was trying to Constrict Piplup and Pachirisu. Some of its vines were reaching out for Buizel as well, but the Water-type's ice missiles were managing to remain on top of things there at least.

"Well, allow me to expostulate," the Flying-type decided. He hammered the air with his wings, slowing himself to a stalling speed, then dropped right down in front of the Tangrowth with both wings held ready.

A moment to adjust his stance, and he waded in with Wing Attacks in a blur of flashing feathers and the occasional Peck. The sheer lack of sophistication of the strategy took Tangrowth aback, and it tried to snag his wings to reel him in.

Buizel watched the next few seconds with interest, taking the opportunity to catch his breath, then nodded. "Nice."

Staraptor brushed his wings together, examining the tied-in-knots Tangrowth. "Thanks. You two will be okay, right?"

Piplup gave Staraptor an incredulous look.

"Forget I asked," Staraptor decided.

"We'll be fine," Pachirisu said. "And thanks for the save, though… I don't get what it has to do with expostulating."

"I'll have to explain!" Staraptor said, and Buizel flicked him with both tails. "Later."

The two took off, Buizel a moment later to avoid splashing Staraptor with his Aqua Jet, and the Water-type dropped into a flank position a moment later.

"So, there's some sort of plan here?" Buizel asked.

"Glad you asked!" Staraptor replied. "Basically I need covering water to stop me from catching fire. Apart from that, you decide."

Buizel did a roll. "Whatever."

Taking that as a go-ahead, Staraptor accelerated – climbing into the space in the middle of the Spear Pillar's pocket reality, then banking around a little to come in on an interception course with the now-battered Shadow Moltres.

The corrupted Fire-type noticed him, and shot a spike of flame at him, but Buizel followed the plan and shot an extra-sized Hydro Pump ahead of him. The blast of water nearly stopped him in his tracks, but it was also enough to soak up the heat of the Shadow Fire blast, and Staraptor shot through the resulting cloud of hot mist without more than a wince.

Team Rocket's Mecha-Latis salvoed laserfire at the Shadow Bird trio at about the same time, distracting Shadow Moltres from really concentrating on Staraptor, and then he was close enough to give Shadow Moltres a smack on the side of the head with his wing. Flipping around with the force of the impact, he cupped his wings for a moment to steal some momentum from Shadow Moltres' airstream and pull up into a chase position.

The Mecha-Kyurem's freeze ray blasts went past them both, one getting a glancing blow on Shadow Moltres, and the Fire-type screeched in rage and pain before detonating in a massive wash of flame. Staraptor got more than just singed by the defensive attack, but powered through – helped by a steady stream of water missiles from Buizel which kept his temperature down – to smack Shadow Moltres on first one wing, then the other.

Shadow Moltres turned his head, aiming his beak for Staraptor to knock him out of the air with a Shadow Fire attack, then gulped as Buizel hit him on the underside of the beak with a contact Aqua Jet. The Water-type blurred around in a series of C-shaped trajectories after that, icy water spilling out as he hit Shadow Moltres again and again – the top of the head, the back, both wings several times – and Staraptor got in as well, pulling back before using a short-range Brave Bird and smacking into the Fire-type.

"Hey, Pidgeot!" he called, flying up a little. "Delifticate us!"

Pidgeot complied, throwing a Tailwind at them which cancelled out all the lift from the wings of both Flying-types, and Shadow Moltres finally realized what the Pokémon he was fighting were trying to do – but Buizel and Staraptor had smacked him too many times before he realized what was going on, and he was already in a dive.

The corrupted Pokémon fired a massive blast of flame down at the ground, wanting to cause an explosion he could use to lift him back to altitude, but Staraptor had thought of that as well – they came crashing down right on top of Misty's team, and her collection of Water-types were able to produce and control enough water between them to soak up the entire blast and vent it out as steam somewhere else.

Buizel, Staraptor and Shadow Moltres all crashed into Misty's Terrain, and the Fire-type's flames sizzled as they tried to burn despite being underwater. Shadow Moltres did his best to wrestle his way to the edge of the water, as well, but Mega Gyarados was on top of him and wrapping him in coils of Water-type to keep him from escaping.

Golduck waved a hand, and Staraptor splashed out of the water bubble – feathers askew, covered in scorch marks, and absolutely soaked.

"Totally worth it," he declared. Then he winced, as Mega Latias took a direct hit from a missile.

She still looked all right, protected by her shield, but that had to have stung...


"Misty's Togekiss just got hit," Drew pointed, singling out where the Fairy-type was surrounded by shadowy tendrils reaching up from the ground below. Flashes of rose flame spurted out as Togekiss tried to escape by using Sacred Fire, and after a long moment of tension Dawn's Togekiss came swooping in and blasted the whole mass with Dazzling Gleam.

Misty's Togekiss exploded out of the mass, but she seemed the worse for wear, and after a long moment Mewtwo nodded. One of the Pokéballs orbiting him flashed, returning her, and again a moment later to send her out again.

"Hey!" Togekiss protested. "That's not fair!"

Togekiss, you should already know that we cannot be sure, Mewtwo told her, hands glowing faintly as he maintained the bunker shield. Just about every Pokémon here would keep fighting through serious pain and injury to help their friends, and so we must make sure you are genuinely all right to keep fighting.

Togekiss humphed. "I know you don't like it, though."

She looked towards the Shadow Zoroark fight still going on, where Casper was throwing Shadow Balls around as if they were free and swiping with his Shadow Claws every time he was even vaguely in trouble, and shook her head. "And… that Shadow Zoroark, and all the Shadow Pokémon – they're in so much pain, and rage, and loss… I want to help them, but I don't know how."

Raising her wings to take off again, Togekiss winced suddenly.

I saw that, Mewtwo told her. Over to the medical area so Dragon and Brock can check you over.


"No sign of Giratina," Charon said, half to himself. "That's strange. I suppose it's possible that they might have worked out that that's what we want, but..."

He waved his hand up at the battle in the sky, where Legendary Pokémon and Mega-Evolutions and several giant robots fought back and forth. "It looks like they're using everything else."

"So what good is all the prep work we did?" Saturn asked him. "Can this even work without Giratina?"

"Yes, it can work without Giratina," Charon told him. "As I distinctly said, the event horizon has formed and it's expanding. Before long we'll be past the asymptotic zone and the pressure trying to close it off will ease – that's much easier in here because the conception of 'space' it's being pressured by is smaller – and then we can start feeding in the stored power as well. At that point we won't need the expertise of Dialga and Palkia, just their power, to open the aperture."

"That's… good," Saturn guessed.

His Toxicroak frowned, looking around, and Saturn looked over at him. "What is it? Is something wrong?"

The Poison-type twitched, looking like he was about to react to something, then paused. Again.

"That looks like Anticipation," Charon said. "I wonder if he's reacting to the formation of-"

A blur came flashing out of the darkness, knocking Toxicroak off his feet, and the blue-and-black Pokémon flipped over once before landing in a combat stance.

The source of the blur slid to a halt as well, a Croagunk who dropped into his own fighting stance, and the two stared at one another for a moment before moving simultaneously into an odd stop-start martial arts battle – neither Pokémon committing enough that they might be hit by the other.

"A Croagunk," Saturn frowned. "Where did it – how did it get here?"

"It's been suspected that Anticipation could be tuned to be an effective threat detection system," Charon replied, one hand on the two Pokéballs on his belt. "It makes sense a Pokémon could sneak through the fighting if-"

"That's not – ergh," Saturn said. "What I mean is, could there be any others?"

"Only if they were similarly stealthy," Charon told him.

"That's what I wanted to know. Bronzor, look around – any other Pokémon who shouldn't be here?"

Saturn's Bronzor quickly scanned the area, metal face shining as it did, then returned a negative. "Zor."

"Then hit that Croagunk with a Psychic attack."

Croagunk dodged high before the attack even fired, flipping over, and fired a salvo of Sludge Bombs at his opponents. They barely even damaged Toxicroak and the one which hit Bronzor splashed off without having any effect whatsoever, though Charon winced as one of the blobs of sizzling poison landed quite close to his rats-nest of equipment.

"Get rid of it before it damages my machinery," he said, then blinked – looking more closely at the blob.

It seemed to be larger than it should have been.

Then a Forretress appeared out of it, said something, and exploded.

"Stop them!" Charon demanded, throwing both his Pokéballs, and a Rampardos and a Bastiodon emerged with a flash. Both Fossils roared, charging at the highly explosive Bug Pokémon, and the Rampardos stepped on a console with a crunch – wrecking it even more than it already had been.

One of Croagunk's other Sludge Bombs turned out to have contained a Pokémon as well, this one turning into Steelix, and the Steel-type slammed Toxicroak with his tail before Mega-Evolving in a flare of light.

Croagunk caught both borrowed Pokéballs as he landed, one in each hand, and watched the chaos develop.


AN:

Naturally, with a battle this big and this important, it's very hard to keep track. As far as possible, just about everyone able to get an appearance has one, but there's so many of them that I simply can't provide an account of where everyone is at all times...

Also, Team Rocket's Giant Robots.