Chapter Eighteen – The Penultimate

There was a surprising influx of policemen into the tunnel ahead, and it was the sound of those many footsteps that made Cheren pause and glance back. For some reason, he expected maybe one or two officers to tag along, and the rest would stay behind and care for the injured men. Instead, their numbers still stood strong.

"You're not going to help them?" Cheren wondered, though he spun on his heel and continued forward regardless of the reply.

Officer Blake, whose appearance in this tunnel didn't particularly shock Cheren but instead made him a bit uncomfortable, was the first to respond. "We've been trained to handle these situations. When I first started, Officer Mallory explained that it was like when a little kid dropped his pencil box in grade school: other kids would swarm to help, but it usually just made it worse and cause a bigger distraction than necessary. So, basically, we supply our team with the minimal amount of productive help—they'll still get the job done, and the rest of us can stay on track."

Cheren's cheeks burned. Years ago, when Team Plasma had first been a problem, all of the gym leaders had taken care of the sages and let Hilda move forward. And Cheren had always been in a tag-team with Alder at the castle, leaving Hilda alone pretty much the whole time. Maybe if they knew better…

Well, that was done. Hilda won there.

"Mallory, what's your position?"

Cheren looked back once more to see an officer with a walkie-talkie held close to his lips. There wasn't even static in response, just silence, and it made Cheren's stomach roll. Suddenly, it was as if he was walking on a ship deck as the sea rolled beneath them, and Cheren stepped awkwardly forward and nearly tumbled to the ground.

"Hey, watch it," Blake warned, and Cheren pressed a hand to his forehead. He took a deep breath before pushing himself up and forward again with much more careful steps.

"Mallory, we need your position and an APB on the other two Shadow Triad members. One down," the officer pressed again, his voice rolling deep in the sewers. But during his pause, there was still no response from Mallory's squad. "Mallory, do you report?"

"He might've switched channels," another officer suggested.

As they walked down the tunnels, it was a constant flurry of desperation to hear from Officer Mallory. The melodic tone that came with the switching of the channels alternated with the officer's voice every minute or so, and it was enough to make Cheren grit his teeth. It was obvious, if not to them then to him, that Mallory wasn't going to answer. He never switched channels in the first place.

There was some hope, though, in the fact that one of the Shadows had been defeated—or defeated himself, anyway. Two were easier to take care of than three, after all.

Of course, some selfish part of Cheren intent on revenge wanted him to be the one to stop the Shadow Triad. Even though Cheren could never bring himself to hate N, he could very easily blame the Shadow Triad and hate them. And somewhere in his aching heart, he wanted them to all suffer at his hands for what they did.

Revenge wasn't the answer—it never was. But if the Shadow Triad needed to be stopped, anyway, then why couldn't Cheren be the one to deliver their punishment?

"Back on channel three," the officer with the walkie-talkie muttered. Then, into the device, he boomed, "Mallory, give me a position."

One of the other officers laughed a little bitterly, and Cheren looked over his shoulder at him with narrowed eyes. Truthfully, that chuckle, however unnecessary, embodied everything that everyone else thought. It was useless. The poor guy had gone through every single channel, and Officer Mallory wasn't replying on any of them. What was the use now?

But then something crackled, and every single person in that group froze.

"So noisy."

Cheren's breath came out long and low, and his eyes darted back and forth in the darkness ahead of them, as if the Shadow might come popping out of it at any moment. But there wasn't a flash of white from his hair, nor a blur of darkness dodging the light from the flashlights. Regardless, his heartbeat quickened at the sound of his voice.

"Mallory?"

"Wrong." The Shadow clicked his tongue—or he must've, anyway, not that anyone could tell. But the sound came through eerily on the walkie-talkie, like someone was right there tapping on the wall.

Cheren walked towards the officer and held out his hand. "Let me talk to him," he requested. The officer held onto the walkie-talkie, but after a moment, he placed it tentatively in the young man's hand. Cheren closed his fingers around it, surprised at its weight, but it was simple enough to press the button and talk.

"This is Cheren. I wanted to let you know that your trio's down to two." Cheren raised his finger from the talk button and waited. He didn't know what he expected…

But it wasn't laughter.

The Shadow Triad was an interesting group in that they didn't act particularly villainous. Sure, they were terrible people who sent their Pokémon to do terrible things, but they were relatively polite—especially to N. For people who encompassed evil in their very beings, to someone who heard them speak, they sounded tame.

Yet that laughter in that moment… it was one of the first times that Cheren would describe one of the Shadows as wicked. The laugh might've been better described as a cackle, but even that wouldn't do it justice. It boomed, up and down, up and down, and Cheren could picture the Shadow's chest rising and falling visibly with the quick bursts.

"Isn't yours by now, as well?" the Shadow wondered once he had control of himself again. "Mmm, I don't know. You have quite a group there."

"Where are you? Is the other one there?" Cheren demanded, but he didn't let his voice come off as desperate. He was the one ruling this board—the tables had turned from last time, when he was just a pawn. Now the king was in trouble, the stalemate turning into check.

The Shadow hummed, as if that was necessary to broadcast. Cheren glanced around at the other officers, all of whom were staring at the walkie-talkie with serious expressions. But Blake, who took a step closer to Cheren without him even realizing it, let his lip curl up in disgust, and it wouldn't be a surprise if he smacked that little black box to the ground.

"I'm afraid it's only me. I'll come to you right now, Leader Cheren. Please be patient."

Patient? Cheren thought. There was no reason that the Shadow would ever need to tell anyone to be patient considering how fast he and the others could move. Was that just a trick to make sure some of the officers in this group who didn't know better would let their guards down?

"He'll be here quickly. Prepare yourselves," Cheren warned, putting a hand on Rosa's Arcanine. Other officers let out their Pokémon, too, making it crammed in that tunnel. There was no way that they'd be able to fight in a place like this—it was easier in one of the openings. But maybe that'd mean the Shadow wouldn't fight, either.

But there was a problem. The Shadow said he was alone, which meant that it was more likely than not that N wasn't with him. The third Shadow was still somewhere with N, so Cheren or the policemen would need to get the information out of this one. And poor Cheren knew as well as anyone how difficult that would be.

The Shadow appeared as though walking out of a fog not a minute after his final message on the walkie-talkie. Just behind him, his two Bisharp and an Accelgor appeared from the darkness into the light. One of the officers pointed his flashlight directly onto the Shadow's face, but the man didn't even raise a hand to shield himself.

"Where's N?" Cheren's voice was soft, respectful, and everything that the man in front of him didn't deserve.

"With Lord Ghetsis." The Shadow's voice, too, was respectful. He took a step forward, out of the light so that it hit his chest instead, and pulled his mask down.

Cheren wasn't quite sure what he expected—that the Shadows wore that stupid piece of black cloth over their mouths because they had been critically injured. But his mouth was perfectly normal; his lips were light pink; his chin was pointed; everything was as it was supposed to be.

It took the gym leader aback a little, but he shook himself back into reality. "Ghetsis is here?"

"Not quite. But he has seemed to find himself again. It's such a relief," the Shadow explained—even his teeth, Cheren noted, were perfectly white and straight. "He won't be happy that my brother has fallen, though. I suppose it can't be helped. There are far more of you than there are us. Surely I'll be next."

"Then why don't you just tell us where Ghetsis and N are? The policemen will have to arrest you, but it's better than being crushed by falling concrete. Oh," Cheren added, rubbing his hand back and forth on Arcanine's back. "My Pokémon. And Rosa's—N's, too, if you have them. You should tell us where those are, too."

The Shadow put a finger to the corner of his mouth, his eyes turned up towards the ceiling. "I have yours. One of my brother's has Rosa's, and the other has N's. But I'm afraid I can't just give them back, nor can I tell you where my lord is. You see, I'm under strict orders. However, if you can defeat me, too, you are free to take all I have."

Officer Blake stepped forward beside Cheren, but the young gym leader held up a hand. "Sorry. He's mine."

And just the flicker of the Shadow's lips was all it took to start that battle—the battle for which Cheren had been yearning. Even though Rosa's Arcanine was all he had, he would take back his team and everyone else. Besides, it had always been a team effort. Rosa, N, and Cheren agreed to work together to find Hilda. Now, he had to thank the two of them. If not for N, Rosa wouldn't have come along—and without Rosa, he would probably be dead.

Cheren didn't expect the Shadow to play fair now, since the group hadn't the whole time, so it was no surprise that all three of his Pokémon struck at once. The Bisharp moved forward without orders, striking into the crowd of policemen instead of at Cheren, but the Accelgor made its target clear.

"Extreme speed," Cheren ordered. "Save the others first!"

Arcanine couldn't very well send flames into the crowd in a tunnel this small, and Arcanine didn't have much room to move. But it managed to pin a Bisharp sending it flying back towards the Shadow. A moment later, it had the other.

"You're not so scary by yourself," Cheren muttered. "Use Flamethrower now!"

He didn't notice that Accelgor moved out of range, so when a powerful blast burst from it and knocked Cheren backwards, he never saw it coming. He fell against a few of the other officers, knocking them over, too.

"Cheren!" Blake yelled.

He rubbed his head and pushed himself to his feet. "Sorry," he muttered. His vision blurred when he tried to look back at the Shadow's team. Where were they? "Arcanine!"

Rosa's Pokémon was one step ahead of him. The Bisharp had to be finished—with an attack as powerful as Arcanine's Flamethrower with four times damage on the both, there was no way they could endure it. But Accelgor was still somewhere beyond Cheren's blurred vision.

With another eruption of flames from the beast, it was safe to say that the Accelgor was no longer able to fight, either. That the Shadow Triad had once been so problematic and so overpowered was like a foreign concept now. And it was true that it had been circumstances only that made them unstoppable before. Rosa essentially had them beat when they first found them—but they snatched Cheren and ran. Whatever happened between N and the Shadows was unknown to him, but Rosa wouldn't have let them win unless they tricked her.

Cheren walked forward as the flames dissipated, stepping over the fallen Accelgor and holding his hands out. The Shadow barely moved when Cheren shoved him to the floor, and Arcanine hurried over to place a paw on his chest. Cheren stood just above him, and the amount of power he felt standing over him was indescribable.

But Cheren's strength was that of the heart—he couldn't forget that.

"Where is Ghetsis? Tell me right now."

The Shadow laughed again, just as he had on the walkie-talkie, but the sound in person made Cheren's hair stand on end. No matter how polite the Shadow Triad spoke—no matter the façade they put up—this was the proof that they were what was wrong with this world. There was no amusement in that laugh—just cruelty.

"We've already failed, anyway. How can I show my face to Lord Ghetsis now?" The Shadow wasn't looking at Cheren but instead had his eyes pointed down. "The sewers are connected to the Relic Passage." The Shadow held up a hand and pointed towards the officers. "Back that way."

Cheren gestured for an officer to come forward, and one of the women hurried over and flipped the Shadow onto his back to handcuff him. It was like another weight was lifted off Cheren's shoulders—he couldn't say he felt more energized, but he did feel better.

"You know," Cheren began, watching as another officer came over and held onto the Shadow's arm with the policewoman. "N was willing to give Ghetsis the benefit of the doubt. I'm sure he's very disappointed. I really hoped for his sake that I was wrong, so… you know… I'm a little disappointed, too."

The Shadow was sent outside with the other one—one alive, one dead—and Cheren received both his Pokémon back and Rosa's. Officer Corby and the other injured officers had been evacuated from the sewers, and even Cheren's team was leaving the inner radius of the sewers. He was pleased to think that he'd never have to go back in.

But it wasn't over yet. The entrance to the Relic Passage was pretty close to the entrance—close enough that when Cheren looked over his shoulder in the tunnel that led to it, he could see, now that his vision wasn't so blurry anymore, some light filtering in from the city above. It was almost heartbreaking.

When they passed from the concrete walls of the sewers into the earthy walls of the cave, Cheren couldn't help but feel as if this was leading to some sort of conclusion. And maybe it was truly so—when he turned his flashlight on the walls, he noticed something peculiar.

"N…"

Cheren reached a hand out and let his fingers follow the line drawn on the wall that led to the zig-zag of the letter N and back to a line again. That was a sign if he ever saw one, and Cheren had to admit himself a bit surprised that the Shadow hadn't lied to him. N was somewhere in these caves after all, and he was smart enough to leave a trail behind.

"Uh, Cheren…"

Officer Blake tapped him on the shoulder and pointed up. Cheren looked up at the roof of the cave, and his eyes went wide at the sight. How he hadn't heard it was a mystery, since now that he was paying attention, it was much like the sound a typhoon made as it passed on the shore.

Golbats, possibly dozens of them, were flying above them—not just flying, even, but swarming to something. They moved in a frenzy, hurrying to somewhere, and Cheren had a feeling that he knew who made them move in the first place. There was only one person he knew who could command wild Pokémon.

"Hurry," Cheren called, and he forced his body beyond its power to run. Sure enough, the Golbats were following the same trail that N left behind.

When Cheren and the policemen made it to the end of the line, they watched as the Golbat filed into the room in front of them—it glowed orange, and Cheren could see some torches on the wall that must've provided that warm light. And that light was enough to make the scene playing out within that room perfectly visible.

The space was filled with Pokémon—two Bisharp, a Banette, a Hydreigon, and a Cofagrigus… but mostly Golbats. And all of those Golbats were circling around someone and dropping like flies as they were hit by the other Pokémon. But still, the rest flew on, making that barrier for as long as they could hold on.

Cheren, with his team returned to him, sent out his Stoutland. "Use Giga Impact on the Hydreigon," he ordered, watching as the dragon prepared for its own attack. Stoutland, though large, moved surprisingly quick. And just as the Hydreigon opened its mouth, Stoutland charged at it, knocking it out of mid-air.

Everything changed in that instance. The Golbat flew up, perhaps in sheer shock, revealing the green-haired man behind their barrier; the last Shadow of the bunch turned his eyes on the fallen Hydreigon, and the third and oldest man's face contorted as his gaze met Cheren's. The battle even stopped.

"Cheren! You're okay!" N shouted.

"Barely," Cheren muttered in response, and he walked forward towards his friend.

With every step the young man took, Ghetsis's face twisted even further. His eyes kept flickering between him and the police behind him, all of whom had entered the room and had their own Pokémon by their sides. Realistically, there was no way that Ghetsis was going to make it out of here as a free man—and he seemed to know that.

"Ignore them!" the crazed man screeched. "The only one that matters is him!" He jabbed a finger towards N, and the Shadow bowed. "Kill anyone who gets in the way!"

N just stuck his fingers in his mouth and blew. The whistle that came out was loud enough that Cheren had to cover an ear, but its effect was undeniable; the Golbat that had flown back up to the ceiling started swarming again, and N raised a hand above his head.

"I'm sorry, but I must use you again! Please, friends, protect our team!" N shouted, and when he lowered his hand, the Golbat flew, moving behind him and Cheren to a spot in front of the policemen.

Cheren's Stoutland, recovered from its attacked, hurried back to his side, as well. "Two-on-two is fair, right?" he asked, reaching into his pocket and returning with a few Poké Balls—all that he could fit. "Who are you taking?"

N smiled, taking the balls from Cheren. "My father. Can you handle the Shadow?"

"Might be the last one I can, so it's a good thing he's the last one." Cheren wiped his brow and sighed. "And when this is all done, I think we need to talk."

Author's Note: I put a Lion King reference in there, and it felt great.

One more chapter. Yay! I'm normally very opposed to having a story end with nineteen chapters (like, really, I just yearn for one more—mostly because I hate the number nine), but what works is what works, right? And I'm seriously, seriously crossing my fingers that I can finish this week.