Hello again everyone! I hope you're having a good week. I'm heading home from college tomorrow to spend Thanksgiving with my family, so I should have time to get another chapter done during the trip.
Shieldliger001: No worries about missing a review. I went back and fixed some grammar in the last chapter as it was bugging me. If you don't like hybrids you might not enjoy the direction this story takes, but I hope you will keep reading regardless. Caleb is from the author What Lies Beyond, as I said. He also shows up in another of my stories. Mew is most certainly evil, this plays out more in my other stories which are chronologically after this. Mew isn't corrupted, just sadistic and bored, and was never good good to begin with.
Rocker on: They are characters that were originally made by the author What Lies Beyond, and they showed up in A Tale of the Twilight. I might check it out, but I don't like reading unfinished stories. They tend to eat away at me because I want more. I went back and edited out all the grammar and logic errors I could find, so it should be better if you go back and re-read it. We'll see as for Latias and Latios, you never know how they will act. The 'gift' was always a genetic thing. The way it works is that his mind is more malleable so it can adapt to the changes far easier than a normal person.
On with the story!
I awoke to Alejandra nudging me. "Hey." She whispered in my ear. "I want to talk while they're still asleep.
I pushed myself up off the ground, blinking in the sunlight. "What is it?" I said, matching her volume.
She glanced at the sleeping forms of Caleb and Frost. "What do you think of them?" She asked.
I looked over as well. They were both fast asleep, as far as I could tell. "They seem like good people. Caleb does seem like he wants to help us."
"Yeah, it's just… yesterday Frost said something about revenge. I feel like we don't know these people and we're putting our trust in them."
"We've only known eachother for less than a week." I pointed out.
"Yeah, but that's different!" She said, voice still quiet. "Well, I guess it isn't really, but it feels different."
I sighed. "So what do you think we should do? I want you to be comfortable with what we're doing, so what would you like to do?"
She closed her eyes for a second. "For now, nothing. But please just be careful, I don't know what I would do if you got hurt."
It seemed that I had reached the same junction once again, the choice that had no right answer. Pain now, or the chance of so much more pain later. As it had been, so it was now. All I could do was hope, and trust in the goodness of Arceus.
"I would be lost without you, as well." I said. The image of my reflection once again surfaced, and once again I repressed it. This couldn't go on forever, I knew. It felt fruitless, like a kid trying to push a floating ball underwater, only for it to roll out from under them and surface once more. Eventually something would have to give, and I worried that it would be me.
I was pulled from my thoughts by a yawn from behind us. Caleb had woken up. "Good morning!" Alejandra said, cheerily, no hint of our previous conversation in her voice.
"We should get moving as soon as possible." He said, rubbed his eyes with one hand as he stood up. "Frost, get up, we're leaving!" He raised his voice, the sound causing Frost to jump to alert.
"Did you have to yell?" She asked, shaking her head.
"Yes. Now let's get going."
We set out, Caleb once again in the lead. He pulled a granola bar out of his coat, eating as he walked. "So how did you two meet?" Alejandra asked, after a few minutes.
"He came to my home when I was young. The specifics escape me, I must have been around two when we first met." Frost said.
"You startled me and I fell off of a rather large rock." Caleb said. "And your mom almost attacked me before I explained that you snuck up on me. After that I told you the story of Ho-oh and made you that promise."
Frost laughed. "Oh, I remember that now! I'm not sorry for surprising you."
"I already knew that." Caleb said with a sigh, then stopped suddenly, looking around.
"What's wrong?" I asked, looking up at him.
"I'm not sure, but do you hear anything?" he said. I listened carefully, and heard nothing. Too much nothing. Where were the sounds of life I had grown accustomed to hearing over the past two weeks?
"What do we do?" Alejandra asked.
Caleb glanced over at Frost. "I say keep moving, but be careful. There might be something nearby that we don't want to run into." Frost said, looking back and forth, examining the gaps between the trees.
We set out again, and it seemed like every sound was amplified with the loss of ambient noise. The crunch of twigs underfoot, the crackling of dead leaves like gunshots in this oppressive silence.
We walked like this for almost an hour before we reached a clearing, almost perfectly circular, a monolithic rock in the center. "Since it hasn't stopped do you think we're being followed?" I asked.
"Good call." Caleb said. "We should-"
The blast of fire rushed towards me, the trees on either side of its origin bursting into flame at the sheer heat. My half a second's shock was enough, I wasn't going to be able to dodge this. Alejandra moved, faster than I had known she could. In an instant she stood between me and the blast. The wave of fire collapsed on top of her, folding into her and disappearing, stopped in it's tracks. The fire subsided, leaving Alejandra glowing like a torch.
"Tobias!" An all too familiar voice roared. "Stop hiding behind them and fight me! A weakling like you doesn't deserve to live!"
"Why are you doing this, Joshua!" I yelled. "I don't want to fight you!"
"Well I do!" He yelled back, stepping into the clearing. He had evolved, it seemed, and as an arcanine he now towered over me. "You're relying on others to fight for you! You're weak! You don't deserve to enjoy this world while I suffer!"
"Having help doesn't make him weak. It makes him a stronger person than you could ever be." Alejandra said, still glowing with internal fire.
"Now!" Caleb yelled, charging at Joshua. Frost attacked from the side, where she had crept unnoticed until now. She had mega-evolved at some point, angelic wings protruding from her back.
Joshua ignored them, running past their attacks and charging me. I didn't hesitate this time, dashing to the side to avoid his attack. Alejandra, however, was a fraction of a second too slow. His leg slammed into her as he ran, sending her through the air and into the trunk of a tree.
"No!" I yelled, rushing to her side, panicking. She was out cold, but still breathing.
"Did I hurt your girlfriend?" Joshua snarled, slowly advancing towards us. "Good! The weak don't deserve happiness."
"I'll catch up to you, run!" Frost shouted, placing herself between us and him. Caleb ran over to us, gently scooping up Alejandra from the ground.
"You aren't getting away!" Joshua shouted, beginning a charge only for Frost to trip him, sending him to the ground.
"Follow me!" Caleb said. "We need to get her to a pokemon center as soon as we can." We began to run, now on a path I recognized. We were nearing the edge of the forest.
"Will Frost be ok?" I asked, once I had calmed down some.
"She can handle herself, and she's fast enough to catch up to us, we've just gotta keep going." Caleb said. "That was the other one who was changed, wasn't it?"
"Yeah." I said. "I don't know what his problem is, I kept trying to help him but he just wouldn't accept it."
"That's an understatement if I've ever heard one. He wants you dead." Caleb said.
I didn't respond. It struck me then, that this was my fault. I had been kind to Joshua, and Alejandra got hurt because I game him chances to change himself. If I had just left him on the cliff this never would have happened, but I wasn't sure I would have been able to live with myself if I made that decision.
We reached the edge of the forest, looking out over the rolling hills. Caleb stopped, turning around. I followed his lead, seeing Frost walking towards us. She was breathing heavily, slightly favoring her front left leg. "I lead him off track a bit, then turned around." She said, once she had caught her breath. "I don't think I was able to get him off our trail though, we need to keep moving."
"Are you hurt at all?" Caleb asked.
She shook her head. "Don't worry about me, how's Alejandra holding up?"
Caleb looked down at her still form, cradled in his arms. "Still unconscious. No way to tell how hurt she is though."
"How far are we from a pokemon center?" I asked.
"It's probably five hours from here." Caleb said, pulling out a pokedex. "Yeah, says seven hour walk, we can make five or lower if we run."
"What are we waiting for then, we need to go, now!" I said, panic setting once more. I couldn't stand to see Alejandra like this, both out of guilt and out of a selfish need I felt for her. Caleb gave me this sad look, before closing his eyes and turning away. We ran in silence, and I felt tears running down my face.