I sincerely apologize for the wait! My life has been consumed by college stuff and orientation stuff and graduation stuff and work and Fire Emblem Fates and my recently discovered obsession for the otome, visual novel, Shall We Date? games…

So yes, my life has been a whirlwind. But never fear, I'm gonna update as I can! My main priorities right now are Enlightening the Soul and Fire Emblem Awakening; Unbreakable Ties. Sooooo… yeah. Think of this as a celebration for the announcement of Sun and Moon. I'm going with moon, and I'm super excited. Have ya'll SEEN the trailers?!

Regardless, thank you for your patience, and enjoy!

Amy47101 does not own pokémon, only Vale and Sara.

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The Adventure Saga

Enlightening the Soul

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"Oh don't you dare look back

Just keep your eyes on me,

I said you're holding back

She said shut up and dance with me

This woman is my destiny

She said oh oh oh

Shut up and dance with me!"

Lyra was a horrible singer. It was plain and simple. While Lyra was not abundantly talented, she did possess a few things she was above average at, that much Silver was willing to admit. But singing? Singing was certainly not one of them.

"We were victims of the night,

The chemical, physical, kryptonite

Helpless to the bass and the fading light

Oh we were bound to get together

Bound to get together!"

Repels? Who needed them? Lyra's screeching, cracking voice was enough to send both trainer and pokémon running, all but one. One avid collector was the one fool who hurled a pokéball at her head, claiming her shrieks to be a a cry of a rare pokémon. Silver had to stand there arguing with this idiot for an hour before he finally annihilated his team in battle, and demanded Lyra to sing. The girl happily complied, opening her mouth and screeching lyrics to some pop song.

By the time she was through the first verse, the collector apologized profusely and ran for the hills.

And now she was singing some other awful tune that was driving him utterly mad.

He was searching for an excuse, any excuse, to get her to be quiet. So when he stumbled upon the Ice Path that would lead them to Blackthorn City, he promptly turned around and placed his hands on her shoulders, promptly easing her into quiet.

"Lyra, we're going to enter a cave." he said calmly with his eyes closed. "We don't know how the pokémon will react to loud noises, and we don't know if the cave is sturdy. Plus, the cave is made of mostly ice, and we don't want to be to loud, or else we might crack it. So would you please ease your singing for a little while?"

He opened his eyes and saw Lyra glancing at him curiously, then she tilted her head to the side, beaming at him.

"Okay, sure!"

Silver sighed in relief, then turned to the cave. Almost immediately as they stepped into the cave, it felt like they got blasted with the AC. Silver scowled a bit as he felt a shiver go down his spine.

"Oh, this is cool!" Lyra exclaimed, looking at the glittering ice that sparkled in front of them. "So pretty!"

Before Silver could shoot her a proper scowl for her dumb pun at the beginning, whether intentional or unintentional, Lyra simply stepped onto the ice and began to skate across the ice, despite the fact she was only in her red sneakers. She made it to the other side rather easily, standing on the stone path dotted with snow, brushing her shorts off as if she had gotten something on them, and then turned back to him.

"C'mon, Silvy!" she called. "It's fun!"

Silver wanted to call her out on her yelling, annoyed that she completely ignored his previous warning, but the thought left his mind when his leg jerked to the left, nearly causing him to stumble and fall flat on his face. Scowling at the ice, he slowly shuffled his way across, reveling in one silver lining.

At least Lyra isn't singing.

o.0.o.0.o

"Show off." Silver muttered disdainfully as Lyra happily landed from another jump.

He himself simply settled for sitting on his hind end, in the middle of a patch of ice, not exactly caring that the cold was now sitting into his rear. He stubbornly watched Lyra glide across the ice with ease, as if she was a seasoned skater. Though his stubborn pride initially demanded he outdo her, this time, he now stubbornly sat watching her, loathing that she was better than him.

Silver was a man of many talents, thanks to Mask. A decent fighter, both with pokémon and his own fists, able to outwit, outcon, and outsmart anyone for anything, a near expert thief, and not to shabby with a pencil and sketchpad, if he could say so himself. He was trained to handle any environment, including cold ones, but he was not trained to skate like some prima ballerina or whatever.

And the fact that Lyra was, once again, outdoing him was pissing him off.

"Having trouble?" Lyra asked, laughter lacing her voice. He wanted to scowl at her, but couldn't bring himself to do so. He knew she wasn't laughing at him, most likely coming off a euphoric high from her skating. But nonetheless, he averted her gaze and glowered at the ice, wishing that it would simply go away. "C'mon, Silvy, it's not so hard!"

He cast his gaze to her, and saw her holding out her hand, smiling, cheeks bright red from the cold.

"I'll help you out, okay, Silvy?"

Against his better judgement, he reached for her hand.

"Don't call me Silvy." he spat at her. She cocked her head and giggled, gripping his hand and beginning to pull. Resistant, Silver, snatched her wrist, now pathetically on his knees. "Give me your other hand."

"Huh?"

"Give me your other hand!" he snapped, louder this time. Lyra blinked, then smiled, holding out her other hand. Taking the help, he pulled himself up shakily, then fell to one knee. Lyra smiled.

"Am I supposed to drag you across the ice?" she teased. Silver swore, if it was anyone else, his blood would be boiling at their teasing. He found himself pursing his lips, about to shoot an insult back, when Lyra smiled. That seemed to put him at ease for a moment.

"Focus on standing, then we'll go from there." Lyra encouraged. Silver nodded, still gripping her hands, then shakily stood. Embarrassed, he looked at his legs. He felt like a newborn girafarig, trying to walk for the first time. He felt vulnerable and… and weird. He didn't know many emotions besides bitter resentment and the need for vengeance against anyone who dared to cross him. Anything else he simply suppressed with an icy cold glare and serious outlook which basically got him through life.

But now… Now he felt an uncomfortably tight squeeze around his heart, around the constant hammering it had been doing since Lyra had taken hold of his hands. All he could think of was the worst case scenario, of falling down and making a fool of himself, then having Lyra laugh at him. Of course, he knew such a possibility was unreasonable on his part, since Lyra was not the type to laugh at a person who fell, but rather, flutter around them in concern until the situation was deemed comfortable enough for both to laugh with each other, rather than at one another. She was the type to encourage him in a good way, not berate him for his mistakes.

But the thought still haunted his mind, and it was driving him crazy.

Embarrassed, stupid. You're scared of embarrassing yourself in front of her.

Now he really wanted to faceplant into the ice. Instead of the realization easing his tension and worry, it only made him more embarrassed, more worried, and more annoyed with his own weakness.

Upon realizing this, he felt his legs quiver, and he jerked forward. Lyra yelped, wrapping her arms around him in an awkward hug as she tried to help, but that only made his need to get away from her worse. While his arms flailed about trying to regain his balance, Lyra tightened her grip, trying to balance his weight on the slippery ice.

"Crap, Lyra just let me-!" he was about to order, only for Lyra to also loose her footing. She fell back with a yelp. Silver was well aware that he landed on top of her, as there was no where else to really land, but he just wasn't willing to get up because he wasn't really willing to face her or the looming embarrassment. Somehow, fate managed to prove him wrong; the worst case scenario was not falling on his rear and having Lyra laugh at him, but rather, falling on top of Lyra and having her say nothing at all.

How does one properly respond to this situation?! She wasn't saying anything, and he certainly wasn't going to say anything. What would he say?! He slipped? That was obvious, but it sounded so stupid…!

"Um, Silver?"

Forcing himself to face the music, he slowly got up. Lyra refused to meet his gaze, simply bringing her forefingers together under him.

"I… If you're tired, I understand, but you're kinda…" she swallowed. "Uh… squishing me."

Silver scrambled… rolled off her, then crab-walked slash butt scooched as quickly as he could away from her. Lyra sat up, offering a smile. Silver averted his gaze, feeling as if he couldn't breathe properly.

"Silver-"

Before she could finish her sentence, something popped from her waist. Silver recognized the sound of a pokéball opening up, glancing at a small form at Lyra's feet. Lyra glanced down curiously.

"Growlithe…?"

Then the pokémon leapt at his face in a flurry of angry barks and claws. Silver let out a cry as he began to wrestle with the damned pokémon, Lyra's voice vaguely hitting his ears in the background.

"Growlithe, no!"

o.0.o.0.o

"I'm sorry Silver…" Lyra trailed off as they sat on a patch of non-iced over path, hesitantly dabbing some ointment on the cuts that now marred his face. "Growlithe has always been a little hard to handle, but he doesn't usually outright attack people though… Except for, well, that one time…"

Oh, he remembered that demon pokémon perfectly well, way back when they infiltrated the Rocket base. Judging by the way she blushed bright crimson, she remembered too. Upon the mentioning of that incident, Growlithe barked, proudly holding his head high. Silver narrowed his eyes. Damned thing was proud of mauling him.

"Growlithe, don't be like that." Lyra scolded, shaking her head as she stood. "We'll talk about this later. Return."

Pulling out his pokéball, she pressed the button in the middle and promptly returned him. Silver stared at her oddly. She glanced at him, then kneeled by his side.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine." he responded. "But do you really… talk to them?"

Lyra blinked, cocking her head.

"You mean my pokémon?" she asked, fingers brushing her pokéballs. Silver nodded. "Of course I do, doesn't everyone?"

Silver shrugged, deciding to not push the subject further. He himself never talked to his pokémon, so he simply chalked it up to another one of Lyra's oddities.

"Anyways!" Lyra sang out, standing up. "Lets keep going. Maybe we can challenge the gym leader if we go quick enough." she turned to him, bouncing excitedly on the balls of her feet. "If you need help, I'll help you, okay?"

"If I wanted your help, I'd ask for it." Silver shot back, rolling his eyes.

Standing up, he faced a new patch of ice. While Lyra was already halfway across, he himself decided to play it safe and decided to hug the wall. Lyra noticed his lagging, and happily decided to stick by him, keeping him company while he slowly crossed the ice. While he knew that she wasn't trying to intentionally show off, it didn't make the fact that she was so much better at this any less irritating.

"How did you get to be so good at this, anyways?"

"Oh." Lyra murmured quietly, forcing Silver to look up at her. "Well… my Dad really liked roller skating, so…" she trailed off, shrugging. Silver suddenly felt the awkwardness rise, wanting to kick himself for unintentionally bringing up her father, but then remembered that it was unintentional, and he really had no reason to blame himself.

Lyra didn't say anything, so he didn't say anything.

And of course, at that time, he slipped.

"Whoops!" Lyra laughed, grabbing onto his arm and steadying him. "You okay?"

"I'm fine." Silver said, shooting her a stern look. "Are you?"

"Hm?"

"It's just…" he sighed, averting his gaze. Should he push it? "You… seem…"

He simply couldn't fit the words together, to ask her what was going on, if she was really okay. And he was fairly certain that if he did ask her, then she would just lie to him to cover it up. Glancing at her, she was staring back, curious, if not concerned. He sighed, shaking his arms free of her hands.

"Lyra…"

"I'll be fine." she immediately said. Silver blinked, opening his mouth to say something. He never dubbed Lyra as the type to pick up on, well… anything, let alone his emotions. "You're worried about me, right? It's okay, a lot of people worry." She crossed her arms behind her back, thoughtfully staring off into space. "But from what I know, I think I can handle myself okay. I… always have before." she turned back to him and smiled. "But now you're helping me out and it's all okay now!"

Silver averted his gaze. He was quiet for a moment. He scowled as he slipped again, gripping the rock wall with his body angled awkwardly, his feet struggling to stand upright again.

"Give me your hand." he muttered under his breath. She glanced at him. He was about to snap his request again, when Lyra simply took one hand into hers and, using all the strength she had, heaved him into an upright position. He hesitantly kept one hand on the wall, not wanting to fall and make a fool of himself again.

"You've gotta let it go, Silvy." Lyra urged. He glared at her. She offered a smile back. "I was scared my first time too, and I was doing the same thing you were doing. Clinging to a sense of stability." she paused for a moment. "Here!"

Then she reached up with her other hand, and plopped it on his head, her palm resting against his forehead, fingers combing gently through his bangs. Silver, at that, froze. He was not familiar with acts of affection or warmth in any way, only really learning of them when he first met Lyra. As he had continued interactions with her, he found himself actually looking forward to her little conversations, and though he was unwilling to admit it out loud, he had decided to seek out Lyra for not only her help with the Blackthorn gym, but also simply to experience… whatever she was doing to him.

But this was way out there, even for her. Half of his mind trying to figure out what the heck she was doing while the other half was experiencing some sort of odd affection. Even though he was still unsure on what the point of her actions were, he found it endearing and cute, as Lyra rightfully was.

"Disappear, fear!" she said in a sing-songy voice. Silver felt his lips twitch in a smile, but he held back, for just a moment.

"And that was…?"

"Just a little something to get rid of your fear of falling." Lyra explained.

"And if I wasn't scared?" he asked, taking her hand from his head and holding it in his other hand.

"Then consider it a reminder to know that I'm right here, supporting you." Lyra said, gripping his hands tighter, and pushing off, skating backwards. Silver followed, focusing on her feet, trying to figure out what she did wrong. "Silver, look up."

He dared to cast his gaze upwards. Lyra was smiling at him, bright and warm. She giggled slightly.

"You're being silly. The thing I've found with skating is that the less you focus, the more you just feel what you're doing, the easier it is."

"Must be an easy task for you." Silver said calmly, a hint of teasing in his voice. Even he took note of that. Most of his insults to Lyra were just that, venomous insults meant to hurt her. But once he realized that his insults weren't really affecting her, he found that they took on more of a teasing tone rather than an insulting one.

Lyra, in turn, beamed.

"And soon, for you as well!"

Silver glanced up at her, focusing on her face. She was smiling her usual bright, infectious smile, any former thoughts of her father seemingly gone, or at least replaced when she focused on helping him. Something about the idea of continuing to learn to skate from her, to help her make what must have been a nostalgically depressing experience for her at least a little better, made him both proud and happy.

Her mother couldn't do that for her, and neither could her friends. As far Lyra with an expression other than a smile. He's seen her cry and mourn, seen her worried and scared… He's seen her at her strongest point and at her weakest points. He was fairly certain that the only emotion that he hasn't seen from her was anger, but at this point, he wondered if Lyra was even capable of being angry at anyone for anything.

As he thought about this, he realized, with an odd feeling of realization and awe, that Lyra's seen every side of him as well. She's seen him when he was angry, she's seen him when he was happy and when he was worried. And recently, she's learned the entirety of his life, his kidnapping, his connections to Team Rocket, his connections to Vale… everything. The only thing she probably didn't know was just how connected to Team Rocket he was due to his father.

He knew that having someone else knowing all this information about him should have been a liability, according to Mask. That's why they were kidnapped so young. Not only so they wouldn't remember a home to go back to and could be easily molded into something he wanted, but also so they couldn't share memories and experiences that would make them connectable to each other. People connecting made them something worth protecting, and that made them a liability in a fight.

But with Lyra… it was almost like a pact of trust.

When they managed to get to another patch of none frozen stone, he heard a giggle. He glanced at her.

"What?"

At that, she threw her arms around his neck in a hug, surprising him.

"You did it Silvy! Congratulations, you did it!"

Silver flinched for a moment, not expecting the sudden physical content, then slowly let his arms wrap around her waist. She didn't protest or anything, she didn't even flinch. Despite the cold, he felt his face heating up. They stood there like that for a short while, before Lyra unlatched her arms from his neck and stepped back, cheeks seeming to have flushed a deeper shade of red. She twiddled her thumbs as he himself stepped back.

"W-Well, we should get going, right? We've got a lot of ground to cover…" she trailed off, her words failing her.

Silver himself found himself smiling, slightly, at her embarrassed fumbles. As she turned to walk away, he instinctively grabbed her hand again. She let out something that was a cross between a surprised yelp and astonished gasp. She turned back to him, not to pull away, but rather to question his actions. Silver, at that point, couldn't think of an excuse good enough. Scowling at his own stupidity and lack of a proper explanation, he felt Lyra trying to pull away. Did she think he was scowling at her? That wasn't the case at all, he thought as he gripped her hand tighter.

"Don't." he ordered. His eyes shot forward, to a stairwell. "There's a stairwell up ahead. You've been lucky so far, but I'm not letting you slip and break your neck, got it?"

Now he felt like kicking himself. No way Lyra was going to buy that flimsy excuse.

But as Lyra was, she smiled, and nodded.

"Okay! Thanks for looking out for me!" she chirped.

Then again, any excuse was a good excuse if he got to feel the warmth of her hand.

o.0.o.0.o

Lyra found herself grinning as Silver began to get the hang of skating, but even more so when he reached out for her hand. She wasn't sure one his exact motives, but he was happy that he was looking out for her, even more so when he cautiously led her up the flight of stairs. Even though the cave itself was cold, her entire face felt hot, like she had a fever.

But she knew it wasn't a fever, but something different.

That's when she found herself staring at the back of Silver's head, brow furrowed in concentration. She wasn't going to say she was ignorant of what she was feeling, because she knows what a crush was. When she was a kid, she remembered having her heart race in the presence of Ethan, embarrassed, but silently encouraging whenever his parents or other adults would comment on how cute they were as a couple.

Eventually, she grew out of that childish little crush when she realized she only felt that way because Ethan was the only male friend she had that would talk to her on a regular basis. When Leaf became champion, she began to focus her feelings on the two male dexholders, Gary Oak and Fire Red. But once again, as true shippers do, she suppressed those feelings in support for the FirexDayna ship and the LeafxGary ship.

And even then, when she first met Fire, her heart raced in excited anticipation of meeting her idol and senior.

But now, whenever she got a chance to spend time with Silver, she became more concerned with how she looked, and overanalyzed every little thing both she did in his presence and he did towards her. She found herself suddenly very intrigued by the fact that he long hair.

From her past history of crushes, she tended to like guys with short, albeit, wild hair. Silver was completely different in a sense that he kept his hair relatively long and simple, falling past his shoulders, the only unkept part being that silly little spike that stuck up atop his head. She figured that it was just permanently like that, but that also brought to question why Silver kept his hair long in the first place. Based on what she knew so far, Silver had to keep his presence pretty low-key, since he was being pursued by Mask still, and long red hair was pretty noticeable on a guy. This eventually led her to wanting to know what kind of shampoo he used, going through the products in her head.

Lyra decided to stop thinking when it went from shampoo to imaging Silver in the shower. She needed conversation. Something, anything to talk about.

"S-So Silver!" she managed. Silver turned, giving her an odd look. She only saw his profile, but that brought attention to his eyes, which were the most beautiful shade of silver she's ever seen, like the color that seemed to surround the moon in an ethereal glow on certain nights. "U-Um…"

"Is something wrong?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"W-Well… Just… uh… why do you keep you hair long?"

He frowned, dropping her hand and turning around, crossing his arms.

"Excuse me?"

"I was just wondering!" Lyra said with a nervous laugh. Silver furrowed his brow, picking at one of the strands and staring at it.

"For the most part…" he started, allowing the strand to fall back into place. "It's long because I don't care to cut it. But if I think about it deeper…" he averted his gaze. "Well, I remember when I was little, really little, my mother… kind of liked my long hair."

"You remembered that?!" Lyra exclaimed. "That's amazing, Silver!"

"It's not anything special, all of us are bound to remember small, important things from when we were children." he scowled, perhaps recalling who his mother was. "But now that I know who my mother really is, I think I'm going to cut it."

"What?! No!" Lyra exclaimed, darting closer to him. "I don't care what you think you have to do to separate yourself from your mother, I like your long hair!"

She suddenly clapped her hands over her mouth. Had she really just said that out loud?! Silver himself widened his eyes a fraction, then raised one eyebrow in her direction.

"You do?"

Unsure of what else to say, she didn't remove her hands and simply nodded.

"Huh." Silver murmured.

Lyra, now desperate to get Silver's focus off her, whipped around, and saw a patch of bright color amongst the gray and blue of the cavern.

"What's that?!" she exclaimed a little loudly. "Lets go check it out!"

Grabbing Silver's wrist, she dragged him closer to the patch of color, seeing that it was a young woman with her hair done up and dressed in a kimono.

"Me oh my…" she murmured to herself, head bowed. Lyra, ever willing to help people, turned came closer.

"Ma'am?" she asked. "Do you need help?"

The kimono girl glanced over her shoulder, and Lyra gasped in awe of her appearance. The same one she's run into all those other times…!

"Is that you, Lyra?" she asked, squinting to look at her. Lyra stepped forward.

"It is, it is!" she grinned. The kimono girl smiled.

"Fancy meeting you here! and the young man with you…?"

"This is Silver! We're traveling to Blackthorn City to challenge the gym leader together!" Lyra grinned. Silver cocked his head curiously.

"You know each other?" he asked, shooting a glance to Lyra.

"Yeah! I've run into her a bunch of times!" Lyra exclaimed. "So what're you doing here?"

"To tell the truth…my sandals frozen on the ice, and I am stuck here." the kimono girl smiled, resuming to staring at her shoes. "In other words, my flip-flops are quick-frozen to the ground." she let out a small giggle, then turned back to Lyra and Silver. "Well, it's no laughing matter. Would you push my back?"

"Sure!" Lyra said, easily crossing the ice and giving the kimono girl a good shove. As if she had simply stopped on the ice, the kimono girl continued going until she reached the exit. She turned back to the two. Lyra was already making her way back to help Silver, who was still trying to retain his dignity before the kimono girl by staying put.

"You really are very kind." she smiled. "Thank you!"

"You're welcome!" Lyra smiled, offering a small wave as the girl disappeared beyond the cave opening.

o.0.o.0.o

Aaaaaand yeah. After a long due update I finally got this finished.

Amy47101 signing off! ^.^