Ash dreamt that he was sprinting through Lumiose city on his own, taking in all the beautiful sights that were displayed before him: the smell of freshly baked pastry, the myriad colours of the greenery, the roar of the oncoming traffic and the smiles of the people. Despite all of that, he remained frowning and hurried on. If his prediction was correct, the peaceful scenery was about to change in a matter of seconds.
As if on cue, a building nearby exploded into bits of rubble, hit by an unknown projectile. People started screaming and running away for their lives. Car tyres screeched as drivers attempted to steer to safety. Trees were on fire and burning quickly, releasing large amounts of thick, black smoke into the air. Ash coughed and swept the smoke from his eyes, revealing the same scene that he had always dreamt of. Cars were flipped, with some sirens still ringing, most the buildings were reduced to rubble and many injured people were lying on the ground, struggling to move. However, in the midst of this chaos, one single person remained standing upright.
The mysterious figure was clad in dark blue armor from chest to toe, with the center of his chest protruding out. Crimson red lines were formed on the armor. His shoulder and arms had small sharp edges sticking out. His boots were sharp and pointy. What really stood out was that instead of a helmet, his head was covered with a hood. That didn't matter to Ash as he noticed that under the robe was a set of glowing dark red eyes, staring directly at the raven-haired trainer. Before he had a chance to react, the figure leapt to where he was standing and held a razor-sharp katana, pointing it at his throat. The figure whispered, " If he does not kill you first, your power will."
Hurriedly sitting up on his bed, Ash took a quick look at his surroundings, which seemed fine to him. Slipping into his shoes, he let out a frustrated sigh. What the heck was that all about? He had dreamt the same scene multiple times now and to be frank, it did scare him.
He also vaguely recalled Lucario telling him, "Dreams are insights into the future," or something along those lines. If that were true, a major event would happen sometime soon.
-Line Break-
"Focus on building a chest plate armor for now. Imagine the armor you would want to wear." Ash was currently doing aura practice with Lucario deep in a forest not to far off Lumiose city, away from the hustle and bustle and the prying eyes of the media, who were desperately trying to get an exclusive coverage for his battle with Iris.
The raven-haired trainer closed his eyes and thought hard. Although he didn't voice out loud, Ash was actually getting excited by the minute at the prospect of donning on 'cool' looking armor and going head-on in a battle against an unknown enemy.
The Aura Pokémon standing beside him sensed Ash's inner child awakening and clapped lightly to get his attention. "After all these years, you're still a kid inside aren't you?" Lucario smirked.
"Ah, shut up." Ash lightly smacked Lucario on the head, chuckling as he did so. "Back to training."
An hour later, Ash was perspiring profusely and his concentration was waning by the minute. Although he managed to successfully create armor out of aura, it strangely resembled the one the stranger was wearing in his dream. Even Lucario took a long hard look at the armor he'd created and muttered, "It's somewhat off but looks almost exactly like the real one." Still, his creation was not complete as he still lacked a helmet. Ash shrugged and decided he'd use a hood as a temporary substitute.
Moving on, Ash prepared to do swordplay practice with Lucario and Mewtwo. The Aura user closed his eyes, withdrew his right hand to the left side of his waist and seemingly out of nowhere, pulled out a katana and got into a stance. The katana he wielded was long and slender, with one sharp edge. Ash was proud of himself for being able to summon the katana when needed. When he first started, he'd pulled out a butter knife, much to the amusement of his Pokémon. It took him a month to be finally stopped being teased by everyone, but some still cheekily brought it up from time to time, annoying him.
Charging towards Lucario and Mewtwo, Ash trailed his sword behind him to reduce friction. Noticing the oncoming multiple aura spheres fired rapidly by both Pokémon, Ash twisted the blade sideways and slashed across the first projectile before proceeding to somersault over the following shots. He attempted to close the gap between him and Lucario, hoping to take the Aura Pokémon out before fighting against Mewtwo. Switching gear, Lucario stopped firing and his claws grew blinding white. He leapt forward and started to engage Ash on close combat while Mewtwo kept firing quick shots at Ash to make him lose focus. The duo was engaged in a fierce fight. Lucario attempted disarm Ash by catching his katana in between his claws, twisting it sideways and forcing him to drop his weapon. He merely smiled as the katana stuck between Lucario's claws dissolved into tiny blue fragments and reappeared in his hand again.
While practicing summoning his katana with his aura, Ash picked up a new skill along the way. He'd realized that should he lose his weapon halfway through the fight, all he needed to do was to break his connection to the current weapon and concentrate to reform it again.
Changing tactics, Lucario fired an Aura sphere into the ground, covering the air around them in a thick layer of dust and dirt. Despite this, Ash remained alert, standing still and observing his surroundings, preparing himself for any sudden attack. Before the dust cleared, two silhouettes jumped at Ash, one from the front and the other from the back. Dodging the last minute, Ash immediately turned around, swept one off balance and knocked the other back a few metres to give him space. He groaned as his two best fighting Pokémon were up against him: Infernape and Heracross.
"This isn't a fair fight." Ash glared pointedly at the duo, to which Lucario shrugged. "Your enemies aren't going to play fair either in battle."
"Fair point." Ash lifted his katana upright again, ready to go for another round.
-Line Break-
The battle ended in an amusing fashion, with Ash using Heracross' weakness to his own advantage: Sap. During the battle, when Heracross attempted to use megahorn, Ash met it head on and deflected the attack into the tree, leaving a hole and a beautiful sight of tree sap. This baited Heracross to the sap, effectively ending the battle in Ash's favour. At that point, he decided to call it a day there and headed back to the room to freshen up, unaware of a pair of eyes watching him closely.
"Now I've got you in my sights, Aura Knight."
Ash decided to take the rest of the day off, as there were no expected tournament battles being held. As he lounged on the sofa, he quickly did a mental checklist. Gary and Paul were doing some battling practice in a private area; Alain and Mairin were visiting Professor Syacamore at his lab. From what Ash remembered, the trio wouldn't be back till nighttime, so he still had some free time to do more training in the night against his Pokémon. Suiting up, he gathered his Pokéballs and headed off to the forest again with Lucario and Mewtwo trailing behind.
While looking for a deserted area to train in the forest, Ash picked up a muffled noise and gestured to the duo behind him to back down. From his hiding spot, the Aura guardian spotted a broad jet-black aircraft descending downwards from the sky, landing with minimal noise. The back of the aircraft opened, revealing two grunts escorting someone strapped on to a chair.
Those two grunts obviously belonged to Team Magma, but something different that Ash noticed was that although they were grunts, they had a standard military uniform and were holding assault rifles.
"I don't get it." Ash muttered as the soldiers bypassed him. "Since when did they even get guns and armour?"
Lucario responded, "They have definitely became more of a threat from the past. Even if they are grunts, they stand a higher chance of killing you now."
"Great. And I was hoping they'd be punching bags for me."
Ash watched as the soldiers escorted the chair towards a seemingly empty space. Walking around, one of the soldiers suddenly stooped downwards and swiped a card across that area. Suddenly, a large patch of earth seemingly caved in, revealing an entrance. As the soldiers entered the underground base, the raven-haired trainer and the others slipped in.
"We'll follow these two until we know their objective."
"Understood. What about the hostage?"
"Take whoever that person is. Don't leave them behind."
Their voices were soon drowned out by the grunts.
"What's with capturing and bringing this hostage here? What does he plan to do to her?"
Her? Ash wondered silently.
"He's probably got plans for her. Something about a bargaining chip? Also, I overhead him saying something about 'crushing his soul'. Sounds like the Shadow knight's got a personal vendetta against this target."
"Huh. Anyway, what's gonna happen within the next few days?"
"We shouldn't discuss our plan here right? Not especially when there's intruders near us…" Ash stiffened when the duo turned in their direction. "Call for backup."
Having no choice, the Aura guardian mouthed to Lucario: attack.
Springing into action, Ash sent one guard sprawling with a hard blow to the head and Lucario took out the other guard. Mewtwo undid the straps, releasing the hostage. Throwing a quick glance at a hostage, Ash confirmed, "She's unconscious at the moment… wait…"
Ash again stared at the hostage, stunned and unable to speak. Lucario also recognized the hostage and drew in a sharp breath.
"It can't be…"
There was no doubt about that. The blue ribbon, often seen in her outfit his adventures, still remained on her current outfit.
He was staring at an unconscious Serena.
-Line Break-
"This seriously messes things up." Ash shouted as he hoisted Serena on his back and sprinting towards the exit, with Lucario and Mewtwo by his side. "Why is she here?"
"Now's not the time for questions." Lucario snapped at him as they burst out of the exit running. "We need to get out of here first. It's still not safe here."
Ash was getting frustrated and confused. He had originally planned to gather intel there, only to end up being discovered by grunts (the lowest of the lowest…really?) and escaping with Serena on his back. None of these made sense to him. What did Team Magma plan on doing? What was Serena doing there? How was she related to all this?
His thoughts were rudely interrupted by a sudden puff of smoke before him, obscuring his vision and disorientating him. Coughing and swiping away the smoke, it revealed that they were currently in another open field.
"This… is weird. There's no one chasing after us at all. It's too quiet." Ash stood up and scanned his surroundings, suddenly hearing these next few words:
"Now I've got you where I want, Aura knight."
Milliseconds later, a figure clad in black sped towards Ash and slashed upwards. Reacting instantly, Ash summoned his katana and parried his blow, flying back a few metres after the attack. Lucario and Mewtwo attempted to help Ash, but he gestured for them to stay put. The message was loud and clear: he would handle the fight on his own.
The attacker stood up. He was clad in black from head to toe, his helmet having a 'V' shape on it to see through and his armour was radiating black smoke. He also wielded two crimson red swords.
"Let me guess, you work for Team Magma don't you."
The Shadow knight stared at him before letting out a low chuckle. His helmet must have contained a voice changer or sorts, since his voice was distorted. "Wrong, Aura knight. Or should I say, Ash Ketchum?"
Ash's eyes widened. Very few people knew about his current state, so how did this stranger before him know?
"Escaping to Mount Silver to train for a number of years…let's see if you've even improved at all." The Shadow knight pointed his sword at Ash.
"Bring it on." Ash lifted his katana and got into a stance ready to attack.
The two knights stared at each other before suddenly disappearing, only to reappear at random areas of the field. It was a blur flurry of swords clashing against one another repeatedly. Ash was surprised at the Shadow knight's swordsmanship. He was particularly adept at wielding two swords and didn't seem to have an opening at all. He was the same, if not better than Ash. Needing some breathing space, Ash backed off, giving the Shadow knight to close the gap and slash at his right leg, leaving a large gaping wound.
"Who are you? What are you planning?" Ash demanded.
"Shadow knight will do. You see Ketchum, what's going down within the next few days is nothing of your concern. As you saw, even the grunts have improved greatly from the past. With military equipment and weapons, they're a force to be reckoned with. You alone don't stand a chance against one organization, let alone three."
"Three?" Ash clenched his fists.
"Oh, I forgot to mention." The Shadow knight laughed menacingly. "Team Magma, Team Aqua and Team Rocket are working together on this project. I care nothing for this event, but they had offered me something in return. Something so wonderful… that I will never refuse."
In the distance, police sirens were heard. The Shadow knight sheathed one sword and turned to Ash. "Beating you right now would be too easy, honestly, but I'll keep you alive and kicking for now. I'll kill you slowly, so as you die, you can watch your 'friends' die and as for her," he pointed towards Serena, "Well, I'll keep her alive for myself. She'll be treated…well." He threw his head back and laughed.
"I'll crush you right here right now. I'll make you so weak that you won't be able to touch her." Ash drew his katana and pointed at the Shadow knight. Suddenly, his right leg buckled and Ash dropped his left knee.
"That fight just now was just a simple demonstration of what I can do." Blood was flowing out his right leg profusely and the Aura trainer started to feel dizzy. "You're as weak as before, being the hotshot wannabe Pokémon master. I'll see you sometime soon." Sweeping his sword upwards, black smoke covered where he was standing, and he disappeared.
"The Shadow knight… he knows too much about me… he must be stopped…" Ash lost consciousness and drifted off to sleep.
Note: I have changed my name from c00k33s to Alta1r. (Yes I know it's a lame username.)
Just for visualization purposes, Ash's armour is based off Takeru's armour, Lapis, from the anime Taimadou Gakuen Shiken Shoutai. The Shadow knight's armour is based off Berserker from Fate Zero.
And that's it for now. Right now, I have a request.
From now till the end of the tournament, I would appreciate some suggestions or ideas on what I can write. After a long time, trying to write again really is a difficult task. Often I find myself typing, deleting and typing again. The cycle repeats.
Also, I feel that my story is lacking in certain parts. For example, I feel that each chapter is somewhat short with 2500+ words only, and for that I apologise. I am terrible at writing long chapters. In addition, I'll being going on a holiday two weeks from now, so I'm unsure if I'm able to write another chapter by then. Please don't flame me if I'm unable to!
Another thing I noticed that my descriptions of things like scenery, armour, weapons and people are quite badly detailed (in my opinion) so I'll try to improve by the next chapter.
Again, thank you all so much for the feedback the previous chapter (although it was so long ago XD). For now, I look forward to your reviews. Constructive feedbacks are welcome, and until then, take care!