Chapter 15

Cry havoc! Let slip the Absol of war!

Felix dropped a book.

He was in the elaborate Slateport library when he saw it. It had a glistening white coat like the first winter snows. The dark, crescent-shaped horn on its head clashed brightly with the white fur beneath it. It stood on all fours, only feet away from Felix.

It was an Absol.

Ironically enough, the book he had been reading was a history of war and peace, and he just now finished reading the chapter of the Yin and Yang in this world.

"Peace and War, these are the Yin and Yang. The Yin and Yang are symbolized by one creature and one creature only.

Absol.

Absol has the ability to determine when war will begin and end. When it feels war is coming, it will change from its pacific form to one that is compared to a demon. The horn on its head changes from black to pitch-white when it feels that danger may very well be near, most likely war. This phenomenon happens once every 20 000 years at the least, and has only happened a few times to date."

The Absol in front of Felix was anything but pacific. It growled in a ferocious manner as it advanced slowly towards him, its down-covered paws making soft tapping noises as they set down and lifted off the floor. Then, its horn began fading in color, and all of the black began growing on Absol's white fur, spreading like the plague. Absol, in no more than a few short moments, became an obvious creature of darkness. Felix was totally immobilized. He took a quick glance to the bookshelf beside him, and realized he had to act fast. He felt a pokeball on his belt, but it seemed to sound different when he tapped it then when he tapped any other ones, a more hollow sound, as if the tapping noise echoed through the inside of the red-and-white sphere. He smirked.

"Go! Pokeball!" He sent the pokeball hurtling towards the Absol, which was enveloped in a red light. He knew he wouldn't catch it, but it would buy him some time. He ran past it and out the doors, huffing and puffing.

When he got outside, he quickly took refuge in an alley. He glanced upwards when he heard an odd noise, and a thick, black fog pouring out from the top. He shuddered at the thought of being caught in that, which of course Kazo was.

He turned his head and aimed it at a traffic light that had just changed from red to green, sending a dozen cars continuing down the Slateport roads. Across that same street, he noticed, was a payphone endorsed by a company known as "Chime" a telecommunications company whose mascot was a singing Chimecho. He ran across the street, nearly avoiding a painful collision, and got to the phone. Stumbling, he pulled out a beat-up quarter from his pocket and slid it into its designated place, then proceeded to pick up the payphone.

He dialed in a long, ten digit phone number and then did all that he could, which in this case was wait.

Kari picked up her phone. She was getting a good deal of stares, seeing as her phone played the theme song to the pokemon TV series. She personally liked the tune, and would change her mom's cell phone's ring tone to it whenever she had the chance, and since she was trusted with it for as long as it took them to get home, she figured that she might as well change the tone.

"Yes?" she asked in a shrill, almost hiss-like voice.

"Kari! It's Felix."

"No duh."

"Kari, quick! Get to the boatyard… There's something awful going on…"

"What?!"

"HURRY!" He screamed on the other end. Without any further inquiries, she hung up her mom's cell phone and ran out the doors of the overcrowded pokecenter and towards the Old Port.

Felix had not meant to direct Kari to the Port. He had meant to tell her about the Absol and the prophecy he had read about, but he saw a shadow-like haze at the top of the water by the Port, and suddenly his mind was consumed by the mist. He walked slowly towards the port, his footsteps making loud tapping noises on the slightly cracked cement boardwalk.

He was only a few feet from the Port, when a huge object came hurtling to the water from up high, from what he guessed would be the Lighthouse. From what he saw, it was a woman who seemed to be diving instead of falling, and a glowing monster-like pokemon. They met the surface of the slightly choppy water with a significantly loud noise, and a spray of water that got Felix, who was at least a good 40 or 60 yards away from them, seeing as they were at the end of the port.

His steady walk quickened into a run. Within a minute or two, he had made it to the splash site. A bright light emanated from under the water and Felix saw a flash of lightning come from under the seas, and singe the tip of his hair, before fading away at the top of the lighthouse.

"Hey." Came a voice behind him, laying a hand on his shoulder. His heart jumped into his mouth when he heard the voice, but resumed its rightful place as he turned around and realized it was only Kari.

"Why'd you call me here?" She asked sharply. Felix thought for a second, and then remembered the haze. He turned his head towards the ocean, and saw the purple haze once more.

"Hello? Earth to Felix!" He got out of his sudden trance and turned to face Kari. "Look." He pointed out to the sea, but Kari raised an eyebrow and blinked twice, before looking down at Felix. "What am I looking at, exactly?"

"Don't you see the haze?" Felix inquired, looking out to the sea once more just to make sure he wasn't hallucinating. Once positive he was really seeing a haze, he sighed. "Are you okay, Felix?" He didn't answer.

Suddenly, a voice shattering the awkward silence made them both jump.

"He's fine." They turned around to see a man in familiar blue robes.

"Eli?" asked Kari, noticing that the old sage got younger by a few decades.

"No. My name is Shakaram Vislaa III, but you may simply call me Sheik."

"But isn't Sheik an Arabic word for old man?"

"I am old."

"Sure don't look it." Kari said.

"Old is a relative term. For many pokemon, my age is old. For many humans, I'm not very old."

Kari managed to break a smile, while she secretly thought this "Sheik" was insane. Felix, however, thought he seemed to be a respectable philosopher.

"The reason you mistake me for Eli is because of my robe, we both come from the same clan."

"Clan?"

"Yes. We are a group of unnamed pacifists that are having a reunion in Slateport. We all wear the same robes, and feel we exist for only one purpose."

There was a silence.

"… Which is?" Felix asked impatiently.

"We were put on this Earth to stop the destruction of the Earth."

"Kind of dark, isn't it?"

"Well, someone has to do it."

"True."

Felix intervened in Kari and Sheik's conversation. "Um, Mr. Sheik, sir, why are you here?"

"Ah yes. The reason I saw you was, from the moment I set foot in Slateport, I felt an immeasurable evil lurking around seemingly every corner. The evil seems to be generated from that mist over there."

"Ha! I knew there was a mist there!"

"Then why can't I…"

"See it?" Sheik said, answering Kari's question. Kari nodded.

"I can't either. But I can feel it."

"So I am insane?" Felix asked nervously.

"No, but unbelievably gifted. Felix, you have something called Thyrdsiite."

"Thirdsight?"

"No, Thyrdsiite. T, H, Y, R, D, S, double "I", T, E." Sheik replied, spelling out the word.

Felix, unsure of how Sheik detected his spelling error, answered.

"What's that?"

"A fancy way of saying a side effect that comes with telekinesis. Basically, all it is is that you can see things that are meant to be hidden, for some reason or another. But only if it is masked by a Dark or Psychic type pokemon. That's why you can see the mist."

"But how does that help?"

"Tricky, actually. You can only see a mist, but not what is actually being cloaked."

"That… kinda sucks."

"Yes, it does rather. But that is why you must see what's under it."

"How the heck are we supposed to do that?" Kari asked, being added to the conversation once more.

"With these." Sheik said, pulling out two rings, each one large enough to fit on his finger. He smirked. "Just add water."

He dropped them into the ocean, and each one revealed a small boat, with a moonlight-powered jet at the back of it. Slowly, Kari and Felix lowered themselves into the boat, and began setting out to sea…

On the top of a cliff, near where the two kids left on their rafts, a creature of darkness, once of peace, stared at them, growling. It then looked up to the crater-filled moon, whose light lit up the creature's pitch black fur and white horn. It blinked, and then howled in a low voice. Its howl was answered by another from far across the land… And then another…

War was coming.


Whoa! Already 15 chapters... Seems like I've been writing this forever. There should be at least a good 10 or so more chapters, but what you should really look forward to is the sequel, which I have planned in my head better than chapter 16 :p

Later,

GU