When I finally awoke, I was still a bit dazed. The first thing I noticed upon my vision clearing up was that I seemed to be in some kind of confinement. I didn't see King or the other person anwhere, though, which probably meant that they were elsewhere within the area. Still, that didn't mean that my first instinct wasn't to escape wherever I was being held. I look to the front of the area to see that the barrier was actually rather frail. I decided to loose an Aura Sphere to it, and it surprisingly worked. The "door" was destroyed, and I was free.

Upon doing so, however, I was immediately blocked again, this time by two Shadows in red, one of each gender. I had then remembered what Mew had told me at the beginning of our training. I proceeded to leap atop their shoulders and rip off their masks. After dissolving, they became a Glameow and a Poochyena. Fighting them off with Aura Spheres (and a Dazzling Gleam when the Poochyena lived the attack), I had won the battle. They happened to have dropped what I think was money. I decided to take it with me.

I heard King's voice call out to my left, and I followed his voice to another room far from mine. We probably met each other halfway from where we started. We clutched each other close, and didn't stop until we heard someone's throat-clearing from my right. We looked to see the other guy, Ollie, standing there with his arms folded. "So, you guys gonna let me out, or...?" he asked. Embarrassed a little, we did.

"Thanks," he said once we finally freed him. "You guys are way nicer than those other Grunts... Wait, now that I look at you two, are you guys the same ones who dragged me into this world?" I guess it would have been pretty hard to explain the masks if he didn't know much about the Pokeverse... Then again, we don't know about the masks either... "Yeah, upon closer inspection, it's definitely you two. I'm... honestly kinda diggin' the outfits. Really makes you two look real cool!" Flattery probably wouldn't help us get out of here, but at least it was good for morale!

"Anyway, we should probably find a way out of here. Who knows when those Shadows are gonna come back? Especially since they might know we're free... Let's go the way Genesis came. My direction was just a dead end," stated King. There was hardly any room to object. So I turned back, while the other two followed me. Arriving at another "door", opening it was very easy. I just turned some kind of wheel-like item on it, and pushed. When that didn't work, I tried pulling it, which did work. There was a large hallway waiting for us, with a room at the end that we could see far off. There were some Shadows there, too, which was very unfortunate. We knew taking them down was our only option.

After fighting our way through five rooms, five corridors and about 7 Shadows, we arrived at a much larger set of two doors. It felt like a powerful presence was beyond the doors, but we went through anyway. Upon entering this large new room, however, there was no apparent opposing force, even after looking around. Were they hidden? And then a voice rang out.

"Well, well, fellow Admins. What have we here? The intruders have escaped...?"

The voice sounded as snide as "J" when she took Mew. We turned towards a large staircase to see four more girls, each with different colored hair, headed right down towards us. One of them had orange hair, another had blue, and the ones with green and purple were linked arm-in-arm. They all had weird specs that matched their hair colors.

"M-muh?! I... I thought these four disbanded?!" Ollie cried out. He obviously knew something about these girls that we didn't.

"Please. As long as the Pokeverse exists, we four will always be together, in the mind of Leader Lysandre. Isn't that right, Bryony?" asked the one with purple hair.

"Exactly, Celosia," replied her green-haired partner. "This isn't the real world, after all!"

Ollie tilted his head in confusion. "Um... Isn't it, though? I mean, you girls are most DEFINITELY real. I can see you and everything..."

"Ah, but that's where you're wrong," said the snide-sounding one, who had orange hair. "All of us are actually just mental images of Lysandre's way of seeing us. Shadows of our real selves, I guess you could say." So THAT'S where the term comes from. "Maybe capturing them was a bad idea... Maybe we should battle them instead? What say you, Mable?"

The blue haired Mable nodded. "Perfect idea, Aliana. Shall we, then?" Each of them became a different Pokemon - in order of first name, they became Mightyena, Liepard, Manectric and Houndoom. (A.N. - Aliana was the Mightyena, Bryony was the Lipeard, etc.)

Fighting them was actually pretty bad of an idea - they were stronger than what we've faced so far, and they were outnumbering us, too. There was simply no way the two of us could take them down alone. We eventually lost. Brought to our knees, we were about to faint...

"Ooh, down and out. Guess you kids aren't so tough after all!" Aliana teased.

"Pathetic," said Celosia and Bryony at the same time. Mable just silently shook her head.

"Welp, you two had a good run. See you in the otherworld~!" chirped the former. Just when things were about to head too far south...

"This is madness."

Every head turned to Ollie. He was looking down, and his fists were bared. I think he was even slightly shaking, possibly out of anger. "I will not let you take out my new friends. There's no way I can just sit back and watch you four kill them. If it means protecting them, I... I'll fight. I'll take all of you out... for their sake!" No sooner than saying that, his eyes went wide as he clutched his heart area...

POV SHIFT - OLLIE

It felt like fire was burning away at the inside of me. It was an indescribable feeling, but it felt like something really similar. A voice rang out in my head the whole while...

"Indeed. It is against your place to have them die on you. If you cannot take care of them, how will you ever be able to take on caring for other Pokemon? Let's try and make things right, by taking down those who oppose your beautious goal. We are kindred spirits, so we shall be one forever. The power of the Rebirth Arcana is yours for the taking... Seize the opportunity to keep their power at bay, and keep your teammates alive!"

POV SHIFT - GENESIS

"RrrrrrRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHHHHHH!"

Tearing away a mask of his own, that same bluish-white flame bursrt over who would right then be our saving grace. Out of the flames came another Mythical Pokemon... Genesect. I was absolutely stunned. I had never seen another's Awakening before. Probably because it was the first one I've seen at all, and missed King's because of my own. But to see another with the same power as us... Incredible...

"Right on... I have my own Pokesona!" Ollie said in a powerful voice before turning to the four Shadows in front of us. "Ladies. Let's try this again. And this time... We'll win. LET'S RAVAGE THEM, GENESECT!" And right then, our battle was a lot less one-sided as we joined up with him, fully healed somehow.

One winnable fight later, and the four Shadows were brought to their knees, all at the same time. They all cried out in agony as they collapsed to the floor, begging for mercy. "Sorry, but we don't take kindly to those who oppose the light side. Let's go!" cried Ollie. But before we would be able to finish them off...

"What's going on here?"

Another turn of the head revealed a large man with orange hair like Aliana's. Only his was spread out like a pair of wings or something. He had a really sullen look to his, and he was dressed mostly in black. He stepped casually down the stairs and stopped at the base of them. "Ladies... I'm disappointed. Losing to a few intruders who look rather weak in terms of general power... Shameful."

Panic spread throughout the Shadows as they lined up and bowed very deeply to him. "SORRY, LYSANDRE!" they said sadly, and in unison. This Lysandre... He must be the owner of this Pokeverse branch. Then again, that WAS the name we used to get here.

The man turned to us and said, "Although frankly, I'm surprised that there was someone who actually managed to stumble onto this plane of thought in the first place, much less three. How exactly did you arrive here?" We were about to answer him when Ollie shouted, "NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS, DESPOT!" Awkward answer much?

"Hmmm... I guess it really isn't my business, is it?" he asked to seemingly nobody in particular. But he then shook his head and said, "No matter. As this Palace's ruler, I simply cannot allow you to parade around and find the source of my desires just so you can stop me from any further action. As such, I must eliminate you from this plane. Leave."

The second he finished that short monologue, a huge number of Shadows appeared around us save for the direction that probably lead back to the real world. Seeing that there was no way we could take on this many at once, we decided to leave.

POV SHIFT - READER(?)

"Do you think they'll come back?" -Mable
"Probably. But maybe it's for the best." -Lysandre
"For the best? What are you saying?" -Aliana
"You're planning something, aren't you?" -Mable

"...It's nothing. For now, we should upgrade security to protect my Treasure." -Lysandre
"YES SIR!" -everyone else, who then leave
"...Genesis, King, and Ollie, huh...?
"I wonder what the future holds for them... Will they become like that one guy who was here before them...?" -Lysandre

SCENE SHIFT - REAL WORLD

A girl sees the trio coming out of the lab.
"! Th-they... explored the old lab? How?
"That place was supposed to have been sealed for years... How did they even find a way in?

"This requires further investigation. Maybe the next time they'll drop by, I'll give them a quick interrogation..." -?

POV SHIFT - GENESIS

"Huff... Huff... Well... Looks like we're... finally out..." heaved Ollie as we returned to the real world. "I never thought... the Pokeverse... would be so... draining. I can hardly stand, and... my muscles are KILLING ME. Ughhhhh..."

"Yeah, it's hard to get used to..." agreed King, who was perfectly as fine as I was. I just nodded in silence.

"Jeez, I bet things would've gotten way uglier if I hadn't stepped in to help you guys. I couldn't just leave you to die, though, which is why I did what I did. Sorry if I was too much trouble," Ollie said, sounding a little better.

"No problem. You did what you wanted to do, and that was save us. That's a win in my book," said King.

"I'm just glad I was able to help. But man, do I need rest. It's probably about 7:45 PM right now. I promised Mom I'd be home by 9. We can probably resume our dungeon-crawling tomorrow. Let's meet back here in the morning, say... 8:15? See ya then, hopefully!" He then jogged off without our say in this. That night, we had another unified dream of Arceus.

"Well done, both of you. You had obtained the will of a Confidant who is willing to aid you in your mission. Strengthen bonds with various others like you two to form tight bonds for the inevitable final battle. I wish you the best of luck as you take on this first high-rank battle..."

Just then, King disappeared from them dream, leaving me all alone. "I believe that Confidant called you 'Genesis'? A very fitting name. I would like to bestow upon you a new power. When you exploit enemy weaknesses, you have the chance to barter with them. If lucky, you can make their power your own. I'll give you the power of six for now, but even more down the line. May you fare well with this new power..."

...