Chapter 75: Moving Forward

Author's Note: I wanted to try something, perhaps random people might recognize lyrics to a song that were reworded and changed, I just really like the song.

Poor Blade was still completely unconscious from his self inflicted pain, the sun had long since fallen away, and was replaced by the moon.

"Blade." The Darkrai spoke, as he gently lifted his beloved into his arms. "I'm sorry. I cannot come back to you yet, but I cannot simply let you die." Shadow gently scratched the Sneasel behind his ear in an affectionate way.

The Darkrai may not have been an aura user like Pyre, but he'd felt the Charmander using it dozens of times, and he held a small bit of his DNA within himself. It was a desperate move, but Shadow pulled Blade close, trying to force his own aura into Blade to keep the Sneasel alive. He could feel the blood leaking from Blade's wounds.

But it wasn't working, and Shadow simply clutched the Sneasel closer. "Oh how cruel fate is, and life so unkind. How can I have left you behind? The blame, my own, and the punishment yours. The darkness grows silent this day." Tears began leaking from the darkrai's eye falling upon the Sneasel. "But into this darkness, I'll sing you a song. And I will your company keep. Till your mending light, and my reformed sight have carried you back here to me."

Shadow's tears dropped faster as the Sneasel began to fall cold. "Once did a Darkrai, who gleamed in the dark, look over this world with spite. He scowled and said surely there is no pokè so cruel and so full of cruelty as I." Shadow held Blade close, the Sneasel still slipping away. "So great was his pain, and so ruthless his cruelty that deep was the shadow he cast. Which fell dark upon the young Sneasel he loved, and grew only darker as time would then pass."

The Darkrai pressed his head against Blade's trying desperately to force life into the Sneasel. "Soon did that Darkrai, realize that others despised the Sneasel he knew" he refused to let go "And neither had he shown the love he deserved. He watched as his sneasel's pain only grew."

As he silently cried into the Sneasel he cursed himself. "But such is the way of the darkness it gently corrupts the mind of it's host. And that foolish Darkrai did little to stop the destruction of one who needed him most." Shadow felt his tears flow like a river from his eye. "Lullay dear prince, Goodnight Sneasel mine, rest now darkness' embrace. Bear now this lullaby wind of the earth, through cloud, and through sky, and through fate." He gently kissed his beloved Sneasel. "Bring him this peace in the coolness of night, but save him this sorrow in kind. Blade you are loved so much more than you know. May suffering leave your mind. And forgive me for being so blind."

Shadow held the Sneasel close still weeping on the smaller pokemon. And after a moment he noticed a difference, the blood had stopped. The Darkrai looked down, seeing the sneasel's wounds had closed. And yet his tears persisted, Blade shook, his body filling with life once more. Shadow was overjoyed, his tears no longer being of sadness, but joy at seeing his beloved alive. But as all good things must, Shadow's joy came to an end. "I'm sorry, I can't stay…not yet…I don't yet deserve to have your love." Shadow gave a sorrowful bow as he leaned down, giving Blade one last kiss. "Please, don't give up yet my love." He moved Blade under a tree. While he didn't want to leave Blade, he believed that Blade needed to have a better life, and Shadow still couldn't give that to him, not yet at least. He had to be a better person first.

*Later*

Blade found himself awake suddenly. His memory was foggy, but a short glance down reminded him. He'd hurt himself, though the wounds had almost miraculously closed in the night, the blood was still on him, and he felt more tired than he had before. His own claws had left small, but noticeable scars in his right leg and stomach. And the claw he used was caked in dried blood.

He stood up slowly looking down at his body. "Still alive huh? Well shit." With a staggered pace Blade started moving forward. His body still felt the pain from when Charizard hit him.

He looked to the sky, seeing the sun shining down on him. "Is it really morning already?" The sun had barely been going down when everything happened, had he really knocked himself out that badly.

After a moment he shrugged it off and started walking. "Damn that Charizard," Blade muttered angrily as he walked down the path.

The road led up a cliff face that formed most of the northern shore of the Island. A narrow ledge with sheer rock face on one side, and the sea on the other far below.

"Why did you have to do that to Hunter!" He spoke angrily cursing both Charizard and himself.

Then he noticed something shining on the ground, near the path's edge, shimmering in the morning sun. After stopping to look at it, he realized it was some sort of bottle. After lifting it up and examining it closer he noticed a nozzle of sorts on it. Most likely a potion dropped by a trainer.

He considered using it to heal his body the rest of the way, but came to the apparent realization that his claws couldn't operate the nozzle. So he dropped it and kicked it across the ground envisioning it as Charizard's face.

"SNEA…Take that you ugly reptile." He sighed. "Fuck kid. Why in the distortion world did you want to mate with that!" He remembered how he had come to be with Shadow. "Charizard's your Shadow alright." He felt a pain in his heart at the thought.

Forcing his mind away from the painful memories, Blade thought of what to do now. "I guess I should try and find my, trainer." He put a dark emphasis on trainer. "He'll be coming to find me, I'm sure. And when Lucario finds out." He shuddered, not wanting to think of it.

He looked to the sky. "I could just run. Find a place the humans can't get to. I saw snow up the top of the mountain, there must be Ice types there right. Other Sneasel…but then." He looked back at the road, gritting his teeth. "No, I can't run away. I can't leave the poor kid…there! Inside that…beast. I've got to help him. Man, I'd like to slay that Charizard. If only Shadow was here."

His mind filled with the memory of Shadow driving his clawed hand into Charizard and yanking the egg from the fire type's belly.

His mind wandered to what he would do to Charizard. Or more specifically what he wanted Shadow to do.

How he wanted the zard split open once more, freeing Hunter, then having his arrogant head slammed into a pillar of ice, his wings torn away. Blade quietly muttered empty threats about the flame pokemon. As he strolled further along the path, it forked in two different directions. The northern path heading up a curve on the cliff, the southern path simply heading up.

He didn't notice or care that the road split, he simply let his body move, and so he travelled up the southern path. He soon found a large formation of rocks in the middle of the road. He heard several flying types moving around the formation. Spearow, Cutiefly, and at least one Delibird.

Blade had an idea "Alright," he licked his lips in anticipation "If I can catch one of them, I can use them to get me…" he wasn't sure where, probably back to Cameron. He closed the distance between himself and the rock, gripping it tight enough to cut it, then summoning up the energy. "And…ICE BEAM!"

He hit the nearest Spearow, freezing one wing, and making it fall from the sky. "Gotcha," cried Blade in triumph, pumping a claw in the air.

Unfortunately for Blade, the other Spearow in the flock didn't take kindly to any of them being attacked. And though he'd planned to threaten them to make them flee, it became overly apparent that wasn't going to happen. And suddenly Blade was under attack by a dozen angry Tiny Bird Pokémon.

"Ahhhh get off." He extended his claws trying to shoo them away, but they were relentless. When one went down, more simply took their place. He felt as though he were being torn apart, like he was in a storm of knives. "Ahhhh…fuck off…fuck off…FUCK…"

And then from somewhere nearby. "Use Shock Wave!"

He thought he was in pain before, but the sudden massive surge of arcing electricity rocked him to his very core, and he felt as though every part of him was engulfed in fire. He was in such pain he hadn't noticed he'd started to fall over.

"Ahhhh." He blinked away the pained tears in his eyes. As his vision cleared he saw a tall figure approach. "Wh-Whaa!" Once his vision was finally completely cleared, he saw a red-haired girl with a wicked grin on her face.

*Meanwhile*

The Darkrai followed what seemed to be a train heading for a stadium, if he had seen right, Ash was on that train, speeding toward the station. And the Darkrai had to warm him.