It was morning once more, with the sun just barely breaking on the horizon, its golden light trickling into the indigo sky when I stood by a tree that rested on the outskirts of Solaceon Town. A fresh wind blew in, bringing the scents of the tranquil plains and rugged mountains from far away. Here, I waited patiently for Aurora. Mandite, however, was not quite as patient.
"How long is this going to take?" he groaned, "I hope she is saying all of her goodbyes right now, because I can't wait much longer!" Suddenly, we heard two people talking, their voices faint and somewhat in the distance.
"Speak of the devil," Mandite said, "here she comes now." The voices got louder as Zhoke and Aurora went around the corner. The expression on their faces made it very apparent that they still disagreed about Aurora's leaving.
"A promise is a promise, Zhoke," Aurora sighed, looking away from the blaziken's face. Zhoke took her paw and held it close to him.
"What if we never see each other again?" he said, "Please stay with me, my love," I felt my fur bristle and my throat tighten. To my relief, I saw Aurora shook her head.
"I'd love to," she said, with a tinge of regret, "but I told Lucario I would come – he and Mandite are probably waiting for me." In which we are; I couldn't help but feel a little pleased that we were a priority that was above Zhoke for once. I saw the feathers on the blaziken's neck raise with agitation as a hard glint appeared in his amber eyes.
"So," he said, with a sharp edge to his voice, "are you sure that this is not some cocktail scheme that he has up his sleeve? How can you be so sure that this is true?"
"You can just ask me," Mandite spoke boldly, stepping up to them, "it's about time, Aurora." he added, impatiently. Aurora, eager to avoid an argument with Zhoke, turned around and gave him one last hug good-bye. The anger in the blaziken's eyes faded, and his sharp expression softened. He gently touched Aurora's cheek with his, and nuzzled his beak against her neck, closing his eyes. I looked away as he rocked Aurora back and forth in his arms, not wanting to jump up and strangle him. Mandite suddenly became very engrossed with a stray page of a newspaper.
"Remember that I will always look out for you," Zhoke muttered in Aurora's sapphire velveted ear, "we'll be together again, one day." Aurora nodded, and in her soft gentle voice that seemed to melt my heart, she murmured,
"I'll miss you,"
"And I will too," Zhoke replied. Mandite and I waited for some time, with the young warrior staring off into the sky, humming nervously to himself. Meanwhile, I simply watched, and waited for their embrace to end, trying my best to endure the pangs of the tears in the wings of my heart. And, finally after for what seemed like ages, the two broke apart, giving each other one last tender touch.
"Take care," Aurora called. Zhoke nodded in response.
"You too," and with that said, the blaziken ran back into the darkness of the city, leaving Aurora looking very lost and broken. With empathy, feeling the very same way except for the fact I loved her and not Zhoke, I walked up to her and tapped her on the shoulder. Aurora turned around, her eyes glassy from tears, forming a shining layer above her magenta flames twisting and shrieking with pain. Oh, such look tore right through my soul, another deep ache in my chest erupting inside me. I could do nothing to take away her pain, for she loved Zhoke and not me. All I could do was attempt to ease it with a smile, in which I did.
"Come, Aurora," I said softly, trying to sound as comforting as I could, "let us depart." Aurora nodded, and walked towards the sun, her head bowed in grief. I watched her pass by me, feeling guilty that I had somewhat forced her to come. I can't let her be like this, suffering in heartbreak. Making up my mind, I called out to her,
"Aurora," She turned around to look at me. I took one moment's hesitation before saying,
"You don't have to go, Aurora. You could stay here with Zhoke, and both of you would be happy." Aurora stared at me blankly.
"Don't go like this," I begged, "if you are going to waste away, missing your love, then stay, please. We could go on – it's all right." Aurora shook her head.
"I feel indebted to go and fulfill my promise to Mandite," she said solemnly. This personality was just like any other lucario – we have purpose and a sense of duty when it calls. I knew the feeling very well, well enough to know that nothing can stop that desire to keep honest to their promises – even if it meant sacrificing time with a loved one. I sighed and closed me eyes; what have I done? I reopened them to see a hint of a smile playing on Aurora's face, to my surprise.
"Besides," she continued, "Mandite has the fortune cookies." I couldn't help but smile back, tears tickling the ends of my eyes from the joy that the Aurora I had missed for so long was finally making her way back. Mandite held up his backpack triumphantly, the scene of his serious mask mixed with a child's backpack being somewhat comical to me. I felt my smile grow wider.
"Let's go, team!" Mandite said pompously, and attempted to march forward. All he managed to do was kick his feet high and move five inches before he gave up on the idea altogether. Aurora's mouth curled into a small, half smile, playful embers lighting up in her fuchsia eyes.
"Well, what are we waiting for, Mandite?" she said, some of her liveliness showing through her somber tone. Mandite turned to look at her with a mild expression.
"We're waiting for you, slowpoke," he said slyly, and then dashed off, his laughs cackling in the distance. I grinned with childish glee, and bolted right after the energetic creature, with Aurora running as fast as the wind by my side. At that moment, we caught each other's eyes, and Aurora smiled a full, dazzling smile. I closed my eyes, feeling the wild, free wind flow over my fur.
Welcome back, Aurora.
~*~
"I wanna stop and eat lunch!" For a while now, Mandite complained about how famished he was, but both Aurora and I said it was more urgent for us to cover as much ground as possible. Now, Mandite would not move a centimeter until he had something to eat. Sighing with exasperation, we had no choice but to rest and eat. So here we are now, sitting on a hill by the mountainside, where the forest and the mountain clashed together in a mixed setting, so unique and wonderful. Humming to himself, Mandite dug around in his backpack for something to eat as I carefully studied my reflection in a clear pool nearby. It has been a while since I have seen myself. When I peered in, I realized that I looked very much like my father, so similar that I almost thought my father was actually there. My appearance was quite different than it was several years ago, which reminded me how much I have grown. I was practically an adult now – I am eighteen in a little more than a year, which was the official age of adulthood for males. Females become adults a little earlier – when they are sixteen. I broke my gaze away from my reflection and looked up and Aurora, who was busying herself with a berry. Next year, she would be an adult. It shocked me how time passed so quickly, and how it only seemed like yesterday we had met as six and eight year olds at the edge of a forest clearing. Thinking back on previous years, it amazed me how much things have changed.
"Anyone up for a cookie?" Both Aurora and myself looked up and requested a fortune cookie. Mandite tossed one to each of us, the crinkling of plastic muffled by my paws enclosing around one of these small packages. When I opened them, I saw that the cookie inside was once again split in half. I was about to complain, but then I decided that the cookie would taste just the same as it would if it was whole, so there was no need to complain. I carefully opened the small, plastic wrapping.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" My ears pricked up to an ear-splitting scream, looking up just in time to see Mandite fall over, his mask toppling off his face to reveal a very frightened face. Shocked and concerned, Aurora and I rushed to the young child's side.
"I AM TOO YOUNG FOR THIS!!!!" He wailed in despair, thrashing about in distressed motions. Aurora gently touched his frantic arm, but Mandite threw himself to his feet, and started to rant like a lunatic.
"I AM ONLY SEVEN YEARS OLD AND THEY SEND ME A MESSAGE ABOUT A WIFE I DON'T EVEN HAVE?!!!!!!" he cried out in panic, "I AM CURSED FOR ALL ETERNITY!!!!!!!!!! SOMEONE HELP ME!!!!!!! I DON'T WANNA GET MARRIED!!!!!!" Aurora patted his arm, hesitating slightly, not knowing how to handle the situation. Tearing my eyes away from the quizzical sight, my eyes lit upon a slip of paper, which I assumed was Mandite's. I picked up the slightly crinkled paper in my paws, and held it close to my face to read the tiny words.
You and your wife will have a long and happy life together. ;D
I couldn't help but chuckle, finding Mandite's reaction quite ridiculously exaggerated to the point it was silly. Mandite blinked and glared at me.
"It is NOT funny," he retorted, his green eyes suddenly brightening, "but of course you would find it funny, because you and Auro-" Knowing what he was going to say next, I quickly snatched up his backpack and shoved it into his unsuspecting face, drowning out the rest of the sentence with muffled sounds. As Mandite tried to push it away, Aurora gave me a sharp look.
"What are you doing?" she asked, and I felt the words get caught in my throat. I coughed and fumbled with the words on my tongue.
"Mandite is inhaling too much oxygen," I said, thinking off the top of my head, "I think he needs to slow his breathing down." Aurora gave me a funny look, but left it at that. She walked over to the reflecting pool to eat her fortune cookie, perhaps giving herself some time alone to think about Zhoke. I watched her go, my emotions becoming mixed, when suddenly I felt a hard tug on my arm the caused me to collapse onto the ground. I heard Mandite hiss in my ear.
"What was that for?" Exasperated, I turned to face him.
"What you said was uncalled for" I growled in a soft tone, so that Aurora couldn't hear us. Mandite exhaled sharply, fitting his fallen mask back onto his face.
"What I was about to say was perfectly true," he retorted, adjusting his mask to suit his liking, "and you know it – I mean, c'mon, it is kinda obvious." So, Mandite did know I held a secret passion for Aurora, which wasn't so much as a secret anymore. I glared at Mandite with my father's scarlet gaze, but Mandite simply left matters as they were and walked off to eat his lunch. I stared at him, and sighed. What he was about to say, before I stopped him, is that I wished for a life where Aurora was my mate till my life ended. Aurora is a good friend, and I love her, but at the moment I would rather not think about her as a mate – especially since that she is more interested in Zhoke than me. Besides, it is close to impossible that we would be mates anyways, knowing each other so well that she probably feels that I am her older brother. That would be awkward, in some sense. As for me, I feel that she is my best friend and secret love, but to think of her as a mate would be a step too large.
I became too troubled with the topic, so I just allowed it to drop away, trying to think of something else. In doing so, I remembered the main, most important reason why we were out in the wild again. Either way, Mandite is going home, whether I survive or not. But how can we find a portal that leads him homeward bound if I did not even know what one looks like? And how do we know if it is the right one?
"Mandite?" I asked, and he looked up, giving silent permission to ask him a question, "How do you know that you are looking at a portal when you see one?" Mandite tapped the side of his mask thoughtfully, leaning to one side.
"Hmm," he blinked, a brief moment of darkness on his face, "well, I remember that the portal I always used looked like a hexagonal, translucent blue membrane framed with a gold border. I don't know what the portals look like around here, but I guess I have a basic to look for." He shrugged, finally taking out a sandwich, or at least what I think was a sandwich – I am not very familiar with human foods. Aside that point, Mandite lifted his mask so it uncovered his mouth and swallowed the whole sandwich. He let his mask once again cover face, looking as though nothing bizarre happened.
"Where do you think these portals may be?" I asked. Mandite hummed, resuming his habit of tapping the side of his mask.
"Well," he said, thinking deeply, looking up into the sparse canopy above us, "portals are almost always in a secluded area, where people rarely have gone to before, otherwise we would have millions of people crossing back and forth between worlds. Aside from that, they could be just about anywhere."
"Even in the water and sky?" I asked curiously. Mandite made a sharp bob of his head.
"Even in the water and sky – in fact, there is more portals in the water, the sky, and even in the ground," Mandite stomped the ground below him with his foot for emphasis, "The ones at ground level are the rarest, since they would be the easiest to reach – and we don't want that happening."
"How would you know all of this?" I asked him – Mandite proved to be more knowledgeable about the topic of portals than I had initially thought. Mandite's eyes flashed a bright blue, instead of green.
"Uncle Tally," he said happily – I should have known this was coming, "one of his jobs is to check on the portals to other worlds, for each dimension's safety, and he told me all about it! It is an extremely important job."
"Aside from that," he continued, "I use them myself to go back and forth between the world where we live in and the world where Popstar is located." Popstar? I was becoming confused. Did Mandite mean to say that there were more worlds than just his and mine? Before I could get my questions straightened, Mandite hoisted his backpack onto the top of his head – his unique and peculiar way for carrying it – and declared we should move forward, and take the most difficult routes through the mountains. I dropped the subject, and walked over to Aurora and roused her from her dazed lament. As I watched her walk pass me, and Mandite heading up towards the craggy mountainside, I took a deep breath. I had a feeling this journey was going to be a long, and dangerous one. And yet, I felt that at the end, there is going to be a great accomplishment. Whose? I don't know – all I hope for it is our accomplishment and not the fortune cookie's. I followed after Aurora, and braced myself for the hard trek ahead.
~*~
It was dark, with only the starlight, the campfire, and Mandite's eyes lighting up the night. We had finally stopped our hike for a well-deserved, and highly needed rest. Already, we had crossed a canyon, climbed two mountains, and scrambled through a cave in nine hours, searching all the while for an elusive portal. After eating our fill, we began to nod off to sleep. But before that, I wanted to ask Mandite a few questions that had bothered me for a while.
"Mandite?" I asked the young warrior. A dreary yellow eye opened in the dark.
"Hmm?" he answered.
"In the world that you live in," I continued, "how many species are there?" Mandite exhaled sharply in amusement.
"Millions, billions of species," he laughed, his eye closing again.
"What do you call your species?" I asked. Both of Mandite's eyes opened, and faced me directly, two yellow ovals in the dark. There was a sudden, sad tilt of his lids over his eyes that surprised me.
"I don't know," he said quietly, "I think I am the only one." I felt my own eyes widen from shock.
"But," I stumbled over my words, "you uncle -"
"Uncle Tally adopted me – he's not my blood uncle." Mandite said, his voice becoming even more depressed, his eyes gazing away. I began to wish that I haven't even started this conversation.
"So," I said, "what species is Uncle Tally, then?"
"Rat," he said, "and part something else – he told me long ago and I can't remember." I was about to ask what was a rat, but Mandite sounded to pained to talk about it. Instead, I asked,
"Are you sure you're the only one of you?" Mandite looked directly at me again.
"Well," he sighed, "there actually may be another guy – I don't know."
"Do you know his name?" I asked. Mandite blinked.
"His name was Kirby," he said, "but he wasn't blue like me, nor he had wings – he was cotton candy pink with red feet and markings. When I met him, he was only a baby, really – but he fought like no tomorrow."
"The last time I saw him, he was chasing after this treasure box," he continued, "and that was that." Mandite's eyes closed, and he sighed. Poor kid, I thought, all alone in the world. I wonder what happened to Uncle Tally? I wanted to know, but I guess that Mandite had enough for today. I watched him fall asleep as I waited for sleep to wash over me. Suddenly, I heard a shuffling noise, and I looked over to see Aurora sit next to me. Surprised, I said,
"I thought you were asleep," Aurora shook her head.
"I can't," she said wearily. I could tell she was deeply affected by something, for she usually fell asleep easily.
"You miss Zhoke, don't you?" I asked, perhaps redundantly. It was obvious enough she missed the blaziken, but I guess provided some comfort. She nodded.
"I wanted to talk to someone," Aurora said, hugging her knees, "anyone," I looked at her, with hurt welling up in my heart. I still missed her, somehow.
"I feel alone," she said, "even though you and Mandite are here." I nodded. So do I, I thought. I blinked, trying my best to keep my feelings from overflowing and exposed.
"You can talk to me," I offered kindly. Aurora looked up at me with her magenta, flame filled teardrops.
"I thought you were mad at me, still," she said sadly, looking away at the ground. I felt my eyes widen, feeling very surprised and bewildered.
"I never was mad at you Aurora," I said, using a paw to gently tilt her chin so she could see that I was being sincere, "I was only anxious and frustrated, that's all." Aurora blinked, and broke eye contact, and sighed. We sat there in silence for a while, before Aurora decided to change the topic.
"Where did you grow up?" she asked curiously, "You never talked about where you lived as a riolu." I leaned back a little, thinking.
"I grew up by the sea," I told her, "that's why I can swim."
"What was it like, where you lived?" Aurora asked eagerly. I smiled.
"It was sandy, and the sky stretched on and on over a vast blue sea, with little white plumes of foam rocking with the tide." I said, closing my eyes and imagining, "there is the constant, calming sound of the water washing itself on the shore, and the sun is warm. Sometimes, when the sun goes down, there is the most beautiful sunset ever imaginable – there are pinks, golds, blues, reds, all streaked in the sky as one, amazing painting." I breathed, reminiscing with fond memories of my childhood. I opened my eyes and looked down at Aurora, who had been imagining the scene of my childhood home with me.
"Can we go there, someday?" she asked. I smiled, not knowing when or how after when this expedition was over, but her voice was so soft and pleading, like when she was younger, I couldn't help but smile.
"Maybe," I said, "perhaps you can go yourself with Zhoke, just you two." To my surprise, Aurora shook her head.
"That would be nice," she said, "but I imagined it was just you and me and Mandite – I think it would be nicer if I went with my friends first." My heart ruffled its tattered wings in confusion, and in delight.
"Besides," Aurora laughed, "Zhoke is not exactly the guy who loves the water." I felt myself laugh as well, knowing full well that fire-types was not too fond of the water. Our laughs faded to chuckles, both of us thinking about our own memories and dreams, with me feeling pleasantly content.
"What do your parents look like?" she asked, a while after her laughs faded away altogether. I thought hard, trying to remember and describe what they look like.
"I can't really describe how my mother looked like – basically, she looked like a lucario, except she always had a soft smile," I said, "and my father basically looks like me – or more of I look like my father." Aurora laughed.
"Well, you must have a pretty handsome father, then," she said, smiling. I was shocked, and I felt my face flush with heat. Aurora suddenly realized what she had said, and quickly stammered,
"I meant that as a compliment," she coughed, "to you – and your father," I felt another rush of hot blood heat my face, and I looked away. Aurora seemed equally as embarrassed, keeping awkwardly quiet. She finally let out a laugh, and I looked back at her, my face cooling.
"It's funny," she said, "I am glad that Zhoke wasn't here, now, or else he would have heard that and took it the wrong way." I laughed, too.
"He would be mad, I bet," I said, smiling, and Aurora laughed again, her gentle voice floating to the stars above.
"He would be very mad," she said, and smiled at me, her eyes flickering and sparkling. Looking at those eyes, the ones that I fell in love with so long ago, made me feel sad that I could never be any closer to Aurora than this. Something broke inside me, and I closed my eyes, and sighed, bowing my head.
"Lucario," I heard Aurora's soft voice by my ear, "what's wrong?" I opened my eyes and looked at her, smiling painfully.
"Don't worry about me, Aurora," I said to her, "I'll be fine."
At least I hope so.
Real sorry for the delay, readers! I finally got it done (I hope it is worthy enough for you guys), but I won't be able to update again until I finish my school projects - a bummer for me.
Yay or Nay? Rate and Review, as always! Thanks! ^^