Chapter Twenty-three: Presence

Running From Myself

I rolled over to my side and yawned. My eyes opened. The room was dark. That was normal for Celestic. Some days are nice and bright but most are dark and gloomy. I rolled out of bed and headed for the kitchen. Grandmother was already out. I found some old bread and ate it for breakfast.

Thumper wondered out to the room. He slept in my bed last night. "Hello there." I said. If Grandmother knew he was out roaming about, she would freak out. I sat on the couch and he jumped up with me. "Today we're getting our butts in action." Grandmother would hate that word, too. One thing that changed while I was away was my dialect. I picked up new words and phrases that Grandmother wouldn't approve of.

"I am going to the shop to pick up every book I can find on possessions. I will once and for all rid my spirit fiend and try to get my life back to normal." I smiled and finished the bread. I quickly got dressed, fixed my hair, slid on my coat and headed out.

Hoping Jamie would be there, I practically jogged through the fog. I couldn't see her the day before because she was busy. Busy with what I don't know, but I wanted to see her today.

I made it to the shop and walked through the door. The smell of ash filled my nose, a fire burned in the nearby fireplace, making the room welcoming and cozy.

"Cyn-Cyn!" Clarice hopped off of the old desk and ran over to me. I picked her up and sat her on my hip.

"Hey Clarice. Jamie around?"

She shook her head. "She went out to the mountain, she'll be back soon. She said she wants to see you but her research is always important." She rolled her eyes the grand way I did.

I laughed. "Sounds like her." I put her down. "I'm going to do some reading, stay out of trouble." I pushed her hair out of her face and walked into the next room. The next room was the Cornet Mountain room. It was filled with artifacts and maps, very interesting if you were into that thing.

Grandmother and Lilliana were over at the huge, antique desk. They both leaned over it and studied some old piece of paper. They were too lost in a debate to realize I walked in.

"No, Carolina, I'm telling you that that's the flower from the old times."

"You are insane. That's nothing but a frost flower."

I rolled my eyes and smirked. They were a funny bunch to watch. I turned to my left and went into the small library room. It looked a lot like my grandfathers study, they probably both held the same amount of books, but I knew that Grandfather wouldn't have a book of possessions in his office.

It took me a half an hour, but I finally found three books that were slightly on the subject. One was a book on psychic energy, an ancient book of the arcane and a book on Ghost Type Pokémon. Hopefully that would shine some light on my little issue.

I sat at the desk and turned on the lamp. I picked the arcane book. Thumbing through it I saw many diagrams. They were of intersecting lines forming shapes. Orbs or star-like shapes. The most frequent was different shapes of an eyeball. Sort of interesting, actually. I stopped at one of the diagrams.

It was a purple circle with pink lines waving through it. The title was "Joining Into Another." Seemed right. I read the paragraph underneath, basically it meant that the colors were joining another and the circle symbolized matrimony. How helpful.

After a while of reading about arcane symbols I tossed the book to the side. Great, my journey of discovery was going so well. I grabbed the Ghost Pokémon book, thinking it would be better.

One of the first entries was about Sableye. I read aloud. "Sableye, the soul stealing Pokémon, is one of the most feared Pokémon. Because it lacks proper eyeballs, the windows to the soul, it is said to have no soul. It usually is quite friendly, however, and only tricks wondering travelers for attention. Only on rare occasions has someone 'lost a soul' to this Pokémon and when that has happened the Pokémon has given the soul, or parts of it, back." This could be my problem. "The Pokémon only steals your soul for a very limited time and normally leaves you alone unless you have mental problems and no willpower." Yeah, not my problem.

The next was about Sableye's fellow Dark and Ghost Type Spiritomb. I knew she wasn't playing with my emotions, but it was worth a peak to learn about her, right? Spiritomb is a dangerous Ghost and Dark Type Pokémon. This Pokémon was created when Legendaries came together and banned certain spirit Pokémon to an underground world. When this happened some of the sprits clumped together and formed one Pokémon: Spiritomb. Spiritomb's bark is worse than its bite, however, and hasn't been known to do bad unless it's provoked. In which case, it usually uses its puddle-forming abilities and disappearing and reappearing abilities to scare people. Looked like I was safe there.

I read on about more Ghost Types. None could sneak into you and possess you. I needed to dig deeper, much deeper. Maybe the issue wasn't Ghost Types at all. If it's Pokémon.

Well, I hoped it was Pokémon. I opened the psychic energy book. The first part was the 'Introductory to the Psychic World." I skipped that part. The first chapter was on psychic reading, skipped. The second chapter was on connecting to the spirit world, there we go.

A whole chapter on connecting to the spirit world later, I still didn't know how to rid the thing. But I did have a few good ways to communicate with my presence. Or spirit rather. I closed the book and tried to stuff it in my bag. The problem was I didn't carry my bag around. Looked like getting back to 'normal' was harder than I thought.

After sneaking the book out of the shop, I headed for home. I was ready to get to communicating.

Shouldn't I have known that my plans don't ever, ever, ever go as planned?

"Cynthia!" I heard. I looked towards the sound, Jamie was running to me. She collided with me and embraced me. "Cynthia! Oh my goodness it's so great to see you!"

I hugged her back. I grinned. "It's good to see you too!" She stepped back. Her long brown hair still looked the same, my hair was still longest, and her face had looked like it aged in the short time I was away. She looked more like a woman and less like a child.

"So what are you doing back home, Miss Future Champion?" She asked. I forgot how peppy she was.

"Oh you know, taking a break. It's rough out there." Had I just lied to Jamie? Yes I did. Why? Because I realized she had turned into one of the fans 'resting on my shoulders' and I was letting her down by quitting.

"I'm sure it is. I've watched your battles, I've been busy here, you know. I've been going to Cornet all the time and studying all sorts of Celestic things. We have such a cool origin. I can't wait until I'm the elder and can make decisions. No offense to your grandmamma or anything." I also forgot how much she talked.

I couldn't help but laugh. I busted out laughing. I missed her so much it hurt to just think about.

"What?" She started to chuckle, but she had no idea what I was laughing at.

"I missed you a lot Jamie. So much." I hugged her again and then we started for my house.

It wasn't until we sat on my sofa that she noticed my book. "Whoa, Cyn, has being a trainer made you all weird?" She pulled the book out of my hand and flipped through it.

Yes. I fake laughed. "No, I just thought it would be interesting."

She gave me a weird look then handed the book back. "Whatever sinks your ship Cynie." She went on to talk about Mt. Cornet and occasionally stop and twirl her finger in her hair. I little quirk that was so Jamie it was laughable. In fact, I did chuckle at her once or twice. She would reply with sticking her tongue out or something childish like that.

We talked for another few hours. Just catching up, apparently I missed a lot. I was sad I couldn't fully return the favor, but I told her all about my Pokémon. She seemed to think Gabite was cute being grumpy. I respectively disagreed. Well, not really respectively.

Even though we talked for so long Ember didn't come up until later. "You know, Isis is still sick." She said.

I sighed. "Yes… I'll have to go visit them and get them to tell me what happened, maybe I could go out and find him."

Jamie nodded. "I wish he was back. He left without saying goodbye." Her voice was filled with sorrow.

"I know. It would have been nice if he said something to someone. He would have made it to Jubilife by now if he wanted to be a trainer."

"Yeah, makes you wonder what happened." I nodded and agreed. I didn't want to think about what happened, but the thoughts still came around my head. Ember made it to Hearthrome and died. He tried to campout in the woods and died. He was involved in a bombing and died. They didn't end after that, they got worse and more… Descriptive.

Jamie, noting my in-thought look, stood up off the couch. "Cyn, you shouldn't start your insane worrying. You need to just get up and get your mind thinking about something else."

I looked at my book, I really needed to sit down and talk to my spirit, instead I stood up and walked outside with my friend. We sat at the pond and dipped our feet in, something we did quite often. Clarice and a few other children were running around playing. For some people that would have been relaxing, but not for me. I needed to clear my head.

I laid back and looked at the sky. Before I left off, how did I clear my head? I normally could just sit down and clear it easily, that wouldn't happen. After I left off I would always get a clear mind after training. That doesn't sound like a bad way. I thought.

"Jamie, do you want to meet my Pokémon?"

Jamie and I finished training at dinnertime. We went back to her family's house. Grandmother and Lilliana stood in the front room of the shop.

"Cynthia, Jamie, dinner will be ready soon." Lilliana said.

The evening went on. We had dinner with Jamie's family, who was basically my family, and then Grandmother and I went home. We sat and watched the nightly news together then I went to my room. "Time to contact the ghost world." I said. Surprisingly, there was some enthusiasm in my voice.

I sat cross-legged on my bed. I skimmed the book just to make sure I would get this right. I closed the book and tossed it to the side.

I took deep, even breaths and attempted to focus my mind. According to the book, a clear and open mind would call the spirits. So far the presence didn't show up. Just when I was losing hope, I felt the hand on my shoulder.

Next step was to start the conversation very openly, 'let them in' as the book said. "Hello." I tried to sound calm. "I am glad you came." I heard a faint whisper, I couldn't hear what it said. Another step was to start asking questions. 'Questions are spirits favorite things' said the book. "Why are you following me?" I kept my calm and cool tone. I felt the presence move around the room, the hand was still on my shoulder.

No answer. "Why do you control my emotions?" A black shadow appeared at the foot of my bed. "Why do you feed me peace?" I asked.

"When you needed it you got it."

"Why?" Nothing. "Please cooperate."

"You need to cooperate."

"Why? Why do I need to cooperate?" Silence. "Please tell me. Why won't you tell me?"

"You have not shown yourself worthy."

"Worthy? Why do I need to be worthy?"

"So many questions. Not enough answers." And with that the shadow and the hand left. The room felt very empty.

I looked through the book again. I did everything right… But it didn't work. I tried again. This time I was going to try a different approach. The book said to start talking and to start the conversation.

My head had cleared. The hand returned. "I really need to talk to you. I need you. I need your guidance and quite frankly I need your peace."

"Lies."

It was worth a shot.

I sighed and lost my calm. "Listen, I need you to cooperate and talk to me. If you don't I can figure out how to get rid of you and you won't have your fun anymore." Anger rose in me.

"I cannot tell you… I can show you."

"Show me? How so?"

"Do you want me to show you?"

"Tell me how—"

"Do you want me to show you?" It repeated.

"…Yes." I was unsure, but was quickly okay when peace started coursing through me. I collapsed on the bed. I felt amazing. I missed the peace. I closed my eyes.

Just then I sunk into a dream. I was in a cave, an old cave at that. There was Unknown Writing that covered the wall. A pink gem floated into the scene. It started circling around. Then, a huge Pokémon appeared.

It was a purple color with great shadowy wings. It stood on six legs and had two gem-like stones on its chest. It was a legendary, but not one I was familiar with. "Danger…" The mighty voice rang out. "Danger draws near."

"I know." I recognized my presence's voice.

"Arceus' decree has been put to order. You know what you must do."

"I do. I will obey immediately, I do not want it to happen again. Stay safe."

"Same to you." A bright light came from the gem, and the scene changed. I was looking at the statue that was bombed in Eterna Forest. The poem started playing in my head.

The power of three, united we stand. Whispers in the wind, spots in the sand.

The power of one, united we stand. Come together, only in the Tinkers right hand.

Broken are we because of true power, we come together in only one holy hour.

Broken are we, the power of three.

My eyes shot open and I gasped for breath. "That was weird." I sat up. The black shadow appeared again. "How was that supposed to help me? That didn't make any sense and it sure as Sinnoh didn't tell me why you won't tell me anything." I said, annoyance clear in my voice.

"You will learn more overtime… Danger draws near…" It left just as someone knocked on my door.

"Yes?"

Grandmother stepped in. "Sleep well Granddaughter." She smiled gently.

"Sleep well." I returned a smile. Grandmother closed the door and I laid back down.

This is going to be harder than I thought…

A/N. Well duh stupid Cynthia. Well HELLO everyone. Sorry for the wait, I wanted this out here a few days ago but, to state the obvious, that didn't happen... Okay, so, tell me what you think about this chapter, although I'm sure you will, hehe, I'm happy with how this came out, but the next chapter I'm not so any criticism will go to perfecting the next chapter which is a lot like this one. Oops, hope that didn't ruin anything for you.

Thanks for reading! Shoutout to all who reviewed/followed/favorite!