PokeStones of the Dead - Chapter Twenty-Two

"Damn it!"

Temperance had time for only the single expletive to escape his mouth before the dragon would be upon him. Freezing the dragon would not do much good – it was too massive for the freezing spell to take effect too fast, anyway, and a massive chunk of ice falling onto his body would be no better than simply dropping down to receive the sword thrusting through his back. And so Temperance simply fell down, seemingly defenceless against the steel sword that Lance was holding up. Until his entire body became encapsulated in a fiery shield.

The fire barrier met the sword – and carved right through it, melting the metal in the process. So hot was the barrier that Lance was forced to drop the sword, and create a psychic barrier to protect him from the heat. Temperance decided that testing his fire against Lance's barrier would be too risky – with the dragon still overhead – and instead changed direction so that he avoided the dragon, then freezing it so that it was unable to control its movement, crashing down to the floor far below. The fire around Temperance's body dissipated – he did not have the energy – even if he had the power – to keep it around him permanently.

Lance's dark power ran out again, and he made a forced landing on the peak for a temporary recharge. Temperance was beginning to detect a pattern to this battle. Even though the raw strength of their power was even, Lance had a much greater number of powers to choose from. Taking the combination of the different types into account, Lance's variety of attacks and defensive spells put his own arsenal to shame. However, Lance's lack of the flying ability forced him to spend a moment after every assault descending to recharge his dark energy. This was when Temperance thought that he should make his move. Combining lightning and fire, he shot a combined projectile – primarily of fire, but lightning crackling around – at the grounded Lance. Then, he flew down at top speed, ice spear already in hand.

The same shield of rock was formed by Lance, holding it up to absorb the projectile. The fire could not melt the shield, while the lightning crackled harmlessly into the atmosphere on impact. Nevertheless, Temperance maintained the beam as long as he could – he had to keep Lance grounded for as long as possible. The impact on the shield increasing as he dropped to a lower level, Temperance suddenly stopped the beam and stabbed down on the shield with the ice spear. Ice and rock fragments where thrown into both combatant's faces as the titanic clash resulted in both objects exploding. Dust impairing his vision, but not his mind, Temperance quickly kicked out at the dark object visible in front of him, adding the power of lightning to the kick.

First blood.

Meanwhile, the lesser battles were raging all around the slopes of Death Peak. The fighters of freedom, directed by Lillette, were enjoying the upper hand against the largely uncoordinated undead Pokemon. Many of the Dead had been wiped out earlier through a pincer attack from the Kanto forces, with the three legendary birds raining destruction from the heavens. If the situation called for it, the three would assist Temperance in battle, but there appeared to be no real need for it at present. Therefore, their main duty was to now decimate the ranks of Dead – so that Temperance would have no unnecessary distractions from Lance's troops. Casualties were high, with many Pokemon and Dead alike killed from the massive battle on the peak of the mountain. When that dragon had fallen, at least thirty soldiers had been crushed, while the recent explosion had blown limbs straight off the weaker Dead. It was really chaotic.

"Moltres, Incinerate!"

Targeting an unfortunate Dead Lickitung nearby for death, Moltres ignited the core of the enemy. A red flame suddenly exploded from its chest, and soon the entire Pokemon was engulfed in flame. Moltres' ultimate attack, as Lillette knew from the research she had conducted.

"Explode it!"

Finally, Moltres put the poor Lickitung out of its mercy, adding more power into the internal burn – so that it exploded in a massive flame, the dark sky briefly illuminated in the brightness of the attack. The Pokemon chosen for death had been carefully chosen – it was at the centre of a massive bunch of Dead, meaning that no friendly forces would be hit by the blast. Instead, hordes of undead were sent flying in all directions, all on fire.

Lillette examined the battlefield, allowing a small sense of pride on marshalling the soldiers so well. Everywhere, the Dead were in retreat, going further up Death Peak. The high ground the enemy forces enjoyed would pose some problem, but the forces of Kanto had the far superior air presence. However, Lillette knew that no matter the victories they enjoyed here, it was nothing compared to the victory Temperance had to achieve.

Temperance was pressing against Lance's leg with his own foot, adding more and more lightning to the point of contact. His aim was to cause some temporary paralysis through the blow, but Lance seemed only mildly annoyed by the hit. He disengaged from Temperance, siphoning off the last of Temperance's lightning energy from his body through his ground powers. Then Moltres' explosion took place, halting the combat between the two. Temperance was the first to react. Using his fire powers, he diverted the power of the fire explosion, directing it all towards Lance. The fireball created from Moltres' Incinerate ability defied the laws of physics, changing direction in mid-air and hurtling with full force towards the surprised Lance.

Lance tried to block the attack again, but Temperance added his own fire around the fireball, so that even the powers of the Creator itself could not defend against such a fire attack. The ball was powered – with brute force – straight through the rock, and hitting Lance, burning away his upper clothing. The sense of victory flooded through Temperance – he had won, he just had to explode the massive fireball now, and Lance would be gone. No one could survive something like that. As another fire explosion once again turned night into day, all troops on the battlefield turned towards the source.

Only to see Lance still there, the explosion doing no visible damage to him. Temperance was momentarily perplexed – surely he could not have withstood such a blast? Then he saw the trails of translucent energy, and realised that Lance had again used his ghost powers to disappear into the nether plane for a few moments, avoiding the explosion entirely. The battle would obviously last much longer than he had anticipated – causing damage to him was proving to be a much harder task than he thought. The elements of fire and lightning were not defensive. Ice, on the other hand, was inferior to things like rock in terms of hardiness. Lance, apart from having the superior shield, had the ability to disappear and teleport around the battle arena. Temperance had to go on the offensive, but with Lance's superb defensive capabilities, finding a way through was going to be exceedingly difficult.

So Temperance went at Lance like a madman, using his supreme agility through flying and the lightning power to dodge Lance's rock and water projectiles. Firing off a fire blast here, then a lightning bolt there, Temperance was now directing the groove and rhythm of the battle. And he was making it as fast as possible. The sharp increase in speed surprised Lance, as Temperance sent a small lightning jolt through Lance's hand, flicking his steel sword out of his grasp. Catching it in mid-air, Temperance ignited the steel – with flames flickering on the blade – and then struck a full-power blow at the paralysed Lance.

The fire carved right through the flesh, burning it and igniting it from within, much like what Moltres had done earlier. Lance's hand was horribly maimed, even as he summoned another sword and doused Temperance's own with water, resuming combat. The two swords flashed against one another again and again, but Temperance was once again gaining the upper hand. Lance's left arm was hanging limply by his side, completely useless. Temperance, on the other hand, was unhurt. And the difference in condition was showing. Every time Lance's sword moved to block Temperance, he would noticeably give ground, as Temperance – now no longer taking to the air, using all his energy into defeating Lance – added the power of fire, ice or lightning to his sword, all the while trying to get through Lance's defence and strike the critical blow.

Lillette observed the battle from above, having rose up on Xatu to arrange and correct the battle formation. The clash of swords on the peak was so fast that Lillette had trouble following the action. Around her, the three legendary birds continued decimating the army of Dead, while the Gym Leaders organised and encouraged the Kanto forces. The battle had not been completely smooth – casualties were still high, and the Dead were not willing to simply roll over and die on seeing the three legendary birds. Blaine, rallying his troops in the face of several tough-hided Dead, had been knocked back by the tail of an Onix, while Lillette's own Scizor had been knocked out by stray fireballs caused by Moltres itself. However, the combat so far had been generally successful. She decided to risk pulling one of the birds out to assist Temperance – even though Temperance himself could use all their attacks and more, their power added to Temperance's moves could break through Lance's defences – as demonstrated by the fireball earlier.

So Zapdos flew to the peak, Thunderbolts directed at the already stretched Lance. Temperance's relentless barrage of blows had left Lance unable to counterattack, instead simply blocking Temperance's sword continuously. Zapdos' arrival was too much for Lance, as Temperance combined lightning with lightning, his sword gleaming with the static electricity. Lance disengaged, taking to the air once again. Temperance's heavy horizontal slash hit empty air, and the backswing of his own sword was too slow to prevent Lance from unleashing a hose-like jet of water that threw him off Death Peak, totally drenched. Temperance realised that Lance had now recovered from Temperance's fast attacks, and he was now controlling the pace of the battle. The sudden change of tack from melee combat to projectile attacks caught Temperance off guard. Recovering before his body hit the ground a thousand feet below, Temperance flew back up to assist Zapdos, who was twisting and turning in the air to avoid blasts of dark energy, huge rocks, water pulses, and poison barbs, among other projectiles. A fan of flame forced Lance to stop his attacks for the time being, as Zapdos took the chance to launch a massive Thunderbolt at Lance, who simply disappeared into the nether realm again, avoiding both attacks.

Lance reappeared with two dark dragons, sending one after Zapdos and other after Temperance. The snarling, enormous dragon was on Temperance in an instant. Temperance – with access to Ice attacks, one of the only effective elements against the mighty dragons – was not unduly worried at first, but when the dragon countered his ice beam with a dark blast of pure energy from its mouth, then resumed its charge, Temperance appreciated the mighty speed and power of the dragon type. He thought of Gyarados and Flygon – his two own dragons – and recalled himself giving his Pokemon to Lillette for use in the battle. And he remembered that Lance was also a dragon-type master. Changing direction to avoid the dragon's sharp horn, Temperance waited for the dragon to pass him by, then made use of the dragon's bulky body and subsequently low agility to slash at it with its sword, adding sharp ice crystals to the blade. The dragon fell, but not before unleashing a final blast of dark energy at Temperance, clipping his knees. Instantly, his entire leg below the knee felt numb, as if the dark power had removed all feeling from the afflicted area. Shrugging it off, he flew to Zapdos, who was having more trouble with the dragon.

Lightning attacks were poor against the dragon type, and Zapdos had already been hit once by the spiralling tail of the dragon as it passed by. Sending a surprise Ice Beam towards the attacking dragon, Temperance flew to the legendary bird's aid. Dodging Lance's projectiles as well as the dragon's own dark energy blasts, Temperance again did a precision slash at the dragon's wings, crippling it and causing it to fall down exactly like its counterpart had fallen a few minutes ago. The two dragons vanquished, Temperance triumphantly turned towards Lance, sword ready for his next assault.

And then Temperance made his mistake.

Lance, dark energy gone, once again fell towards the peak, but then he appeared to lose his balance, stumbling and falling close to a forest a few feet below the peak. Temperance thought that Lance must have been weakened after the battle earlier, and sped down with full force, sword raised to finish the grounded Lance off –

Only to find his arms and legs suddenly bound by the vines on the trees, Lance's powers of grass finally called into play. More and more vines snaked around Temperance's body, holding him firmly stuck in his position, his sword and elemental powers useless. Razor leaves now spun towards Temperance from the forest, making a new wound with each impact. Blood stained Temperance's clothes, as Lance picked himself up – his trap an unparalleled success – and called off the razor leaves shooting from the forest. Bloody, bruised and beaten, Temperance's mind flashed in and out of consciousness. Despite his efforts, no fire burned the plants away, as Lance came closer and closer to his helpless body.

Dark energy was channelled in Lance's right hand, his left arm still limp, but it would not be needed for this final attack. The dark power would blow a hole straight through Temperance, and even if he had the power of Psychic, such an injury could not be recovered from. Facing death, Temperance closed his eyes, and thought of Lillette, now probably watching in horror. Some part of his mind told him that this could not be – he had been seen unhurt crying over Lillette's body, and he could not die now. But all the evidence was conflicting.

"Good-bye."

Dark energy flew towards Temperance, the maelstrom of power tearing away the binds on his arms and legs. But that was to have no consequence on the outcome – there was no way Temperance could avoid the massive projectile, regardless of his legendary speed. Temperance braced himself for impact, eyes unable to shut, his wide pupils facing impending doom –

Then a flash of yellow flew past Temperance, before it was totally consumed by the dark energy, taking every drop of power Lance had put into that dark blast. Temperance was now free to move, but remained rooted to the spot, mouth open in horror, tears already starting to fall over the slain Zapdos.