Authoress' Note:
Sorry for the delay! Had a busy weekend, so I've been trying to write this through the week.
As we are reaching the final chapter, I want to thank everyone who has stick around through the development of this story. I hope you've been enjoying the ride. :D
I believe we have one more chapter to go (If I don't misjudge this thing again, that is) before we can call this completed. So please enjoy the reading and expect the last chapter soon.
Chapter 14 'The Sacrifice'
Ash couldn't move. As much as he wanted to stand up and continue forward, he couldn't. He felt as if he moved the wrong way, his very soul would shatter into nothing. So he stayed there, taking deep breaths and trying to keep himself conscious. That was as much as he could do to not lose his concentration and risk the last of his Aura to flee away from him. Then he felt a hand on his back.
"You are doing very well. Please don't give up."
As if encouraged by those words, he felt his Aura getting a bit stronger.
.:oOo:.
"Ghaaa!"
Screams in three different pitches echoed through the silent forest just as three officer fell through a hole in the ground. They had been making their way to the volcano when the ground gave in below them.
"Nator?" the Turtonator with them, stepped closer to the edge and peer over the hole with slight concern. Seeing the trap wasn't too deep, the fire type figured they wouldn't need his help to climb out of it, so he turned around and looked back at the volcano over the trees with an impatient frown.
"I knew this was a bad idea…" the officer just below the human pile complained.
.:oOo:.
"Chespin! Pin Missile!"
The attack came flying over the four Houndoom they were battling, going in an arc directed at the ground behind them.
"Ha! Where are you aiming at, kid?" One of the scientists mocked.
Clemont's answer came in the form of a smirk, as his Bunnelby dug out of the ground near his feet.
"Nice job, Bunnelby."
"Wait, what are you-?" The admin then noticed the missiles had failed to explode when hitting the ground and instead had gone through small holes that certainly haven't been there second before.
"Underground tunnels?" A female scientist guessed.
They realized too late what it meant for them as several explosions cracked the ground to pieces all around them and their Pokémon. The surprise attack was wide enough to get several of them out for the count.
"Wow…" Kiawe whispered, noting how anyone in the proximity that hadn't been hit by the explosion were dealt by Clemont's electric type Pokémon, who had taken complete advantage of the electric field Tapu Koko had provided. "He's good…"
Kukui nodded. "The guy he battled first did mention Clemont was a Gym Leader," he reasoned. Turning around to see where said scientist was after being defeated, he found him typing away on a second keyboard in desperation. Kukui wondered what used could that have when the device attached to it was no longer working, until he noticed the screen. They were graphs of energy flow. He started in realization, turning from his still unconscious student, to the crystalized seal and back… and he swore.
"What is it?" Kiawe asked in bafflement at his teacher's colorful choice of words.
"The seal is somehow still connected to Ash. We need to get him far away from it or it'll keep absorbing his energy."
"What?!" Kiawe jumped to his feet, but stopped half through his actions at seeing the three Pokémon still slumped beside his friend. "Should we actually move them while they are like this?"
"No time to check for alternatives. We have to do it."
"Nobody is going anywhere!" A voice behind them got their attention to the nearest crumbled wall, where Celosia and Ariana had jumped in from.
"It's them again!" Kiawe exclaimed in frustration.
"We found your strange talking PokéDex, in the forest," Aliana pointed out as she lifted said device in her hand. "We thought you might want it back…"
"Professor!" Rotom exclaimed with impossible tears of panic cascading down his metallic case.
"Stay right where you are or we'll skip the theory and figure out how this thing works the practical way," Celosia threatened them.
Professor Kukui gritted his teeth but didn't make any moves besides kneeling back down to his original position. Their timing couldn't have been worse.
.:oOo:.
The sound of battle and the intensity of the consequential tremors incremented as they entered a long hallway that connected to the main chamber. Sophocles took a deep breath, trying to brave up. He had run ahead with the rest of the group truly willing to help, but the techno-geek wasn't sure what he could really do. Not even the incident in the mall had made him feel this horribly terrified. He was just happy Officer Jenny had decided to follow them. Surely if things went south, she would know what to do.
"They got Rotom," Mallow whispered in apprehension from her position behind the chamber's doorway.
"What do we do?" Lana asked, turning to Officer Jenny for instructions.
"I'll appreciate if you stay put for the remaining of our time before Fenriar is released," a deep voice answered for her from behind the group.
With a flinch of surprise, they turned around slowly finding the man responsible for the whole odyssey standing tall as collected as ever.
"Lysandre!" Serena exclaimed in surprised recognition as Braixen jumped ahead in front of her trainer.
"You better stop what you people are doing and let everyone go!" Bonny threaten the man.
"Lysandre, you are under arrest! Put your hands in the air and stay were you are," Officer Jenny ordered as Gumshoos followed her movements with a harsh expression.
The man only reaction was to smile before doing as he was told. "If that puts your minds at ease," he relented. "But as I explained to your allies before, you are too late to stop our plan…"
.:oOo:.
The three Pokémon opened their eyes simultaneously as their conscience woke up inside an immense space of pure darkness.
"Gren-ni-nija?"
"We are at the right place," Mewtwo nodded. "The emptiness is just a result of the low reserves of Aura."
The ground beneath them suddenly shook violently as the sound of a grieving howl resounded all around them. That's when they saw it. A beast as dark as the night was crouching down building up a dark energy attack just in front of a considerably smaller figure.
"Pikapi!" Pikachu didn't wait and sprinted away towards his identified trainer, avoiding raining Shadow Balls left and right as he went.
Greninja and Mewtwo had rushed after the electric type almost instantly. With so many energy balls falling all around them, Mewtwo had to wonder how the human child was still standing, until he noticed what was happening. It wasn't just luck. There was a thin shield of Aura around Ash that was only visible whenever one of the Shadow Balls managed to hit it.
"Pikapi! Pipika?" Pikachu skid to a stop right in front of his trainer trying to gain his attention, but there was something odd about him. His face was devoid of any expression and his eyes were distant and unfocused with a slight Aura glow dancing around them.
"He is having a linked vision," Mewtwo informed the other two. "It seems he's been trying to make contact with Fenriar."
Both of Ash's Pokémon shared a worried look.
"He won't respond until the vision is over. The only thing we can do is try to keep him safe while it happens."
With nods of agreement, they turned around to faced Fenriar.
.:oOo:.
Ash could feel it. When Fenriar was offered a chance to prove it was not vent on destroying anything, it expected many things. Tests of its worth as a being with honor, tasks in behalf of someone in need to prove its usefulness, maybe even just a plain yes or no based interview to get to know it's psyche... but this… this felt suspiciously wrong somehow…
"How effective are these restrains of yours?" one of the council men was asking a woman in robes who called herself a witch; an Aromatisse standing beside her.
"They've been tested to restrain a full herd of fifty eight Tauros," the mysterious woman answered. "The chains did not have a single scratch."
"Very well, attach them to Fenriar's legs."
Seeing the woman approaching cautiously, Fenriar growled at her, causing the woman to step back.
"Have you perhaps change your mind?" the man from before spoke up. "Surely your desire to reunite with your siblings must not be strong enough, if you are no willing to do the simplest of tests…"
Fenriar sat back down at the man's words, not wanting to lose the opportunity to see them both again.
"Proceed," the man ordered the woman before redirecting his attention to Fenriar. "You don't have to do anything really. This is only a test of strength. If you are not able to break from these bonds, then it will put our minds at ease about you. You'll be able to go free then."
Fenriar, somewhat reluctant, allowed the woman to tie the chain around its legs and tested it by pulling them slightly.
"Fenriar! Are you here, bud?" the voice coming from the trees, caused several of the humans to freeze in apprehension.
"Tyrus returned a lot earlier than anticipated," one of the men reproached.
"Start it now, witch!" the leader ordered.
The woman conceded, pulling out a dark red crystal from within her robes and called Aomatisse forward just as Tyrus reached the clearing. "Use your magical Fairy Wind to cover the beast!"
"What's going on here?!"
Fenriar's sudden roar got their attention to the beast, which had hit the ground staggering in pain.
"What are you doing!?" Tyrus ran forward and hit the woman's hand, making her drop the crystal. Taking a better look at it, he turned to the men in disbelief. "That is a sealing crystal…"
"Don't interfere, Tyrus. This beast is dangerous. It is best if we seal it away before it decides to go against us."
"Decides to go against you?! You are the ones who are betraying its trust!"
The cracking sound of bending metal got their attention back to the Dark beast in time to see the chains breaking into pieces that went flying all around it.
"It is loose! What are you doing, woman?"
"The beast is too strong; it needs to be weakened first!"
"Then weaken it!" the man cried. "The fairies' disarming voices worked on its sister, I have no doubt Fenriar will be even more affected."
At the mention of its sister, Fenriar saw red. Forgetting all about self-restraint, it started building up energy in between its shoulder blades…
"Fenriar, stop!"
As the memory started to vanish, Ash was still able to hear loose pieces of conversation that were no doubt the result of the events he had just witnessed.
"Don't you see what we were against all this time?! We should have disposed of this beast when we had the chance!"
"If there is anyone to blame for Fenriar's anger, it's your own stupidity!" Tyrus voice exclaimed in outrage. "You were so engrossed in a supposed prophecy that in your desperate attempt at preventing it, you caused your council's own downfall!"
"Don't you dare talk down to us like that!" the man yelled back "You exist to serve us! Now do your duty as an Aura Guardian and dispose of that monster!"
"Fenriar! Listen to me!" Tyrus was heard again. "You have to calm down!"
A roar was his only answer and Ash could practically feel the overwhelming thoughts of anger and betrayal trying to consume his mind again.
"I'm sorry, friend… This is the only thing I can do…"
.:oOo:.
As he opened his eyes again, Ash knew he was in another memory. But this one was different. He was standing in a dark room, right in front of a girl dressed all in black. He couldn't see her face, having her head bowed to the floor.
"Are you Haidee?" he felt himself talk. But the voice that came out of his lips was not his own.
There was a reaction from the girl, who finally looked up towards him, and Ash shivered. Her face was pale and her eyes were unfocused as if her thoughts were in a faraway place.
"Haidee… My name is Tyrus," Ash's mouth continued. "Do you remember Fenriar?"
"Fen… riar…" the girl finally spoke; her voice cracking as if in disuse.
"That's right!"
She stared for a second before shaking her head and turning away from him and back to the ground. "You are… You are not the one…"
Ash blinked in confusion as the images in front of him dissolved into the same mountains he had seen in the first memory.
"That was Fenriar's sister…" a voice behind him made him jump and turn around, finding the now familiar face of Tyrus looking straight at him.
"That girl?"
The man nodded in affirmation. "She was in Kalos as the rumors said… but… she was already…" Tyrus bowed his head in regret. "I never got to tell Fenriar any of this…"
"Was she… hurt by the council?" Ash asked with hesitation.
Tyrus regarded the question before giving him a sad smile. "You are young… but you have live through a lot yourself… surely you understand that there are really bad people out there."
Ash didn't answer, but he understood. "Fenriar thinks you betrayed it…" he said instead. "All you were trying to do was protect it from those people, weren't you? So why…?"
"When I met Haidee… I knew the council was not going to change their minds about the siblings. They were so afraid of the prophecy, that they were willing to break the siblings apart starting with the younger to get the oldest to do as they said… when that didn't seem to work, they contacted a witch to help them seal Fenriar."
"But you sealed it instead," Ash pointed out.
"Witches in my times had a particular method of sealing that could harm whoever they targeted permanently… the council of course didn't care. Had they fail to do it the first time, they would have try again," Tyrus explained. "The only thing I could think of was to seal Fenriar myself using my Aura to protect it. I thought that I could at least keep it safe until I figured out another solution… but I didn't anticipate its true strength and I ended up using all of my Aura…"
Ash's eyes went wide. "Then Fenriar should know! It has been so lonely all this time, thinking his friend had done something horrible to him without reason!"
Tyrus looked back at him in slight surprise before smiling again. "You speak truth. Could you help me explain?"
Ash smiled back and nodded. "Sure thing!"
.:oOo:.
Serena was the first to run into the chamber at Lysadre's words. By then the battles were about over and she didn't have troubles finding Clemont kneeling at the center of the room with several others. She ran towards him, intending to ask where Ash was, but she found the answer as she got nearer.
"Clemont! Wh-What happened?! Is he okay?"
"We don't know… Mewtwo, Pikachu and Greninja went into his mind to try and help…"
Serena looked startled by the unknown Pokémon beside them. "Mew… two?"
"Ash! Don't give up!" Bonnie yelled having come from behind Serena and threw herself at the older boy, embracing him in a tight hug around the torso.
"Bonnie! Don't-!" Clemont started to reprimand.
"But you saw Greninja!" he did a double take when noticing his little sister was now crying. "Ash must have been in a lot of pain for Greninja to react that way!"
Clemont tensed at her words, but said nothing. He was somehow relief none of the girls arrived when he did. He didn't know how they would have reacted have they seen the real extend of their friend's pain. Clemont had never heard Ash scream like that. After seeing him enduring head-on Pokémon attacks or getting hurt without receiving much of a complaint from him, he couldn't even begin to imagine the level of pain Ash must have gotten through inside that machine. And honestly, he was scared out of his mind for him. He really hoped Mewtwo had calculated Ash's probabilities of survival wrong...
.:oOo:.
Ash woke up back in the void with another painful gasp. Feeling a sharp pull inside his chest, his knees gave away and he collapsed to the ground. He was a lot weaker than he thought… Being barely aware of others' presence around him, their panic voices sounded muffled to his ears unable to understand their meaning. When he finally looked up, it was to see a confrontation between the three Pokémon that had come to help him and Fenriar.
The wolf-like Pokémon's roars were loud and angry, but none of the three battlers flinched away, throwing their own trademarked attacks simultaneously.
"W-Wait," Ash voice came broken and low. He tried to call them again, but found he had no strength left to move.
"This is bad…"
Ash looked up to find a translucent figure beside him, watching the battle with a worried expression. "T-Tyrus? W-Why can't I-?"
"We were inside my own mind for a while, there you didn't feel the fatigue. But here is a different story."
Ash tried to stand back up but failed. Growling in both frustration and stubbornness he tried again just managing to support his weight on his arms.
Tyrus smiled beside him. "I'll lend you a hand…"
.:oOo:.
Mewtwo avoided another dark attack and frowned. He had been trying to connect with Fenriar since the battle started, but it's angst feelings were so strong, Mewtwo had been pushed back every time he attempt at a mental link; the fact that it was a Dark type just making the situation more difficult. There was no choice. If he wanted to keep Ash alive, Fenriar had to be defeated…
Letting the other two Pokémon know as much, he stood back as Pikachu and Greninja combined their attacks into one.
"Stop!"
The sudden appearance of the young trainer in front of them caused the Pokémon to pause in their attack.
"Ash, step back! It's dangerous!" Mewtwo yelled.
"Pi! Pika Pikachu pi!"
"Ni-ninja Gren!"
"Fenriar is not dangerous! It's just sad!" Ash yelled back, without turning away from the dark beast. He held Fenriar glare with his own; his determination shining brightly in his eyes, before a gentle smile graced his lips, puzzling the beast further. "Please listen…"
As he said his request, a translucent figure manifested itself from within his own, freezing the dark beast in sudden recognition.
"Please calm down Fenriar. I'm sorry that I had to seal you, but it was the only way to stop the council from hurting you further. I don't expect you to forgive me, but at least try to understand…"
Seeing Fenriar's sudden hesitation, Ash stepped up an extended a hand towards it. "I know you are sad… but I promise you, things will be better," with a resolute frown, he pushed energy into his hand. "You didn't deserve what happened to you, so I'll get you out of here."
"Don't! You won't survive if you give up the last of your energy like that," Mewtwo warned him.
Ash turned around at the expectant faces of the three Pokémon behind him and smiled. "It's fine," he reassured them. "Once out of here... Can you make sure Fenriar doesn't get into trouble for me?"
As his words registered in their heads, the blue energy in his hand expanded all around them, dissolving their forms into the blinding light.
"PIKAPI!"