Lucario woke with a killer headache.
"Who poured hot sauce in my eyes when I was sleeping?" she groaned, shuffling around on the straw she was on. The distant sounds of sleep reached her ears and buried into her aching brain like more nails.
She pulled herself up and found herself in the medical wing sleeping next to Cara, the scizor still down and out from their little sparring bout. She felt a little bad about that, she considered how she might apologise to him without having to actually say the words.
It was still quite early, the sun had yet to rise, and she carefully and quietly extracted herself from the room. She may not ever get the mercy of a full night of sleep, Lucario guessed she'd slept for maybe five hours, which was longer than usual, but she didn't need to ruin Cara's beauty sleep.
He definitely needed it.
She wandered the guild for a short time, stepping into the sleeping areas and going to the end, finding an empt bedroom.
There was a brief wonder why she hadn't been dumped in this room, but she noticed signs of habitation. And cat fur.
"Ah… it's the kitties room." She left it well enough alone. After going through their stuff, of course. Finding nothing interesting, she wandered out with her head still pounding. She decided she needed something to drink, not alcohol, and with no coffee beans to roast, she substituted it with the mysterious fluid in the Swap Cauldron.
"Hoo, that's got pop!" Lucario said after dunking her head in it. She considered removing the fur that had been left in it, but she had a passing idea of how objects like this worked and decided someone would be happy to get lucario fur.
Even happier if they knew which lucario that fur belonged to, but no one needed to find out.
If Croagunk wanted to sell it himself, he was free to.
She considered going outside to run around but was stopped by a grumpy pokémon.
"What are you doing skulking around here at this time?" Armaldo demanded. It didn't matter that this was Lucario, she had already shown she didn't care for being praised and worshipped and treated like anyone special.
That really made him respect her more, but at the same time she was a complete clown and the circus that came with it, so it was hard to believe this was The Legendary Lucario at times. She was the pokémon who essentially started their entire world, he hadn't expected her to be like this.
She brought many things that paved how the world worked to this day. She had armed pokémon with the skills to adventure in dungeons and the safety of being rescued from them. It was thanks to her that he himself was an explorer, if just through the fact she made it possible in the first place.
Maybe by that logic, she was also the reason he had become an outlaw, but pokémon praising and blaming Lucario for things entirely unconnected to her was tiresome enough.
So, when he found her creeping around he knew how to respond. He barked at her like he barked at Bidoof when he returned back to the guild at weird hours of the night.
Lucario's ears flicked up, and he noticed that they were a little larger than the norm. She turned to face him, a momentary flash of paw-in-the-cookie-jar on her face before she noticed who it was.
"Oh, Armaldo. Nice to see you," Lucario said. "How's the weather?"
"It's extremely early," Armaldo said, voice as coarse as ever. "The weather is not good for a run." It was raining outside.
"Sure." She shrugged. "What are you doing up at this hour?"
"The guild needs a lot of work to run," Armaldo answered. "I ensure things are ready to move once the Guildmaster and his apprentices have awoken."
"Sounds boring," she yawned.
"If you are tired, you should sleep."
She yawned again and smacked her lips. "That sounds weird coming from someone centuries younger than me, whippersnapper."
"I need to be awake," Armaldo replied, not rising to her bait. "I hardly see why you need to be."
"Well if you must know." She rolled her eyes and cracked her neck, tassels flopping about. "Every morning, I lower the moon and raise the sun."
Armaldo gave her a flat look.
"I never get a full night of sleep," Lucario said, honestly. "Three to four hours is about as much as I normally get and I can't be bothered just lying in a heap waiting for the sun to rise, I might as well get moving."
A flicker of something went in Armaldo's eyes. Was that concern, Lucario wondered? She snorted at him.
"That is not healthy," Armaldo said.
Lucario scoffed. "I never said it was healthy, just reality. Trust me, big bug guy this is the best I get."
"Well, that explains some of your attitudes, then," he growled.
She smirked. "Nah, that's just because I'm a bastard coated bastard with bastard filling." She stretched and something cracked. "Well, I'm bored. Show me what the guild's number 2 does to start up."
"You do not want to bother Scizor?" Armaldo said, turning around to begin walking to the mess hall.
"Cara can get some more beauty sleep. Trust me, he needs it. Forty-four years of it was hardly enough to make him halfway good-looking."
"You make a lot of callous jokes."
"Call it some unhealthy coping technique."
"And treating that as a joke is more of an example."
She gave him the finger guns. "Now you're catching on."
Lucario metaphorically watched over Armaldo's shoulder as he counted out the rations of the day, discarded completed and out-of-date job requests, and got his notes in order for the morning address.
He didn't appreciate her biting commentary.
"This brand of paper is so excessive, why not just skin your enemies?"
"We stopped doing that a century go."
"Wow, things are going downhill."
"Must you?"
"I must."
She didn't solely watch and prattle on, however. She did help. With a broom that looked as ancient as she was, she swept the higher level. There was more debris left after yesterday, and she knew it was because of her.
Lucario was cleaning smudges off the window when her larger-than-normal ears picked up the sounds of activity down below. Tossing the rag to the side, she strutted down to the lower deck where the apprentices were up and rowdy.
They fell silent upon seeing her. "Bow," she said. A fair number of them actually did that. "For the love of-" Lucario held her nose. "You'd think I learn by this point."
The doors to Wigglytuff's chambers opened, and Armaldo and the Guildmaster came out. Armaldo frowned dangerously upon seeing the state of the guild. "Why are you all so quiet? And why are you bowing?"
He glanced to Lucario, as if this was her fault.
Well, it was. "I was joking," she insisted, crossing her arms. "Joking!"
Hesitantly some pokémon began to pull themselves up. Only Team Sunrise, Chimecho, and surprisingly enough Bidoof, hadn't done as she asked and bowed to her.
Wigglytuff gave an amused titter, and Armaldo started morning address with a little more contempt-for-life in his voice.
Most of everyone was given rather intense work for the day that didn't match what Lucario had witnessed him planning earlier.
The only team Armaldo didn't bark at was Team Sunrise. And it wasn't because they hadn't bowed. Armaldo grunted at Lucario, giving her some side-eye. "Are you babysitting them again today?"
"Sure am!"
"Try to not stand by and watch them fail again."
"Oh, we're not going to be working today!" Lucario laughed, strolling over to the four nervous pokémon. "Well. It's going to be a workout, but you can get fucked over by another prostitute tomorrow."
Armaldo and Wigglytuff coughed violently.
"What?" Armaldo demanded.
Lucario turned with a gleam in her eye. "Oh?" she purred. "They didn't tell you?"
She felt hands grab her. "We can assure you," Guardian insisted as he began to drag Lucario off. "That Lucario is simply wording it for fun. Krokorok merely escaped after battling us."
"Although, he definitely had a thing for Striker," Saniya said. "I get it." She nodded. Striker covered his face.
Lucario gave a toothy grin at the guild's leadership and let Guardian drag her away.
"Must you?" he asked tiredly.
"I told EVERYONE at Spinda's Café," Lucario laughed. She felt his hands get tighter. "I'm sure the whole town knows by now."
They nearly reached the incline, so she mentioned. "You think it'll look good for Dusknoir to be manhandling the Legendary Lucario around my… lovely fans?"
He paused and reluctantly let go of her. She rolled her arms. "You've got a firm grip," she said positively. Now. I'll see you at the crossroads."
She dashed for the window and went right through it.
"Should we like… pick a job and then… I dunno, leave her behind?" Sean asked.
"Do you really think she won't be able to find us?" Striker asked.
"Fair point."
With Lucario's earlier words in mind, they just pushed forwards wondering what she had for them today.
Down at the crossroads, there she was. And Team Go-Getters.
"Oh, hi!" Chikorita said, waving with a vine.
"You're back!" Sean said, grinning as Wartortle gave them a salute in greeting.
"Heard this old bag of bones was in town," Wartortle said as Lucario snorted at him. "We were planning to head back to the Air Continent but she's hard enough to find at the best of times." He turned to her, raising an eye. "Where were you when time was falling apart anyway?"
"Shush," Lucario replied, forming a Bone Rush and tapping him on the head. "I'll fuck you up again."
Wartortle just laughed while Charizard glanced nervously to Chikorita.
"Did you guys fight Lucario?" Saniya asked loudly. "Because she's really asking to be punched in the face!" Equally as loud.
Lucario smirked as Team Go-Getters, legendary saviours of the world first, all glanced around not meeting anyone's eyes.
"I floored them," Lucario said.
"You did not floor us," Charizard corrected. "We held our own."
"You mean the second time?" she asked. He winced.
Guardian and Striker both looked interested. "You have any tips?" Striker asked.
"Yeah," Wartortle chuckled. "Don't let her hit you and you'll be fine." He rubbed his jaw. "Because your grandkids will be feeling it if she does."
"Stop it," Lucario said, although her grin had only broadened. "I can only take so many compliments."
"So, what are you up to today?" Chikorita asked curiously as the two teams began to mingle alongside Lucario. She was speaking to Sean, the two 'leaders' of their teams.
"I don't know," Sean replied, glancing to Lucario chatting with Saniya and Charizard and all three were speaking too fast to parse. "I think Lucario has something in mind."
"Probably a battle," Chikorita answered. "Since you haven't fought her yet. She rocked our world, though I hear Jessica actually did pretty well. Jess is Dewott of Paradise, in case you forgot."
Sean remembered, and he nodded.
"Hey, Lucario, what did Jess do when you fought her?" Chikorita called loudly, interrupting the rapid-fire conversation.
Lucario's left ear flicked and she hummed, "Well, I was going to go easier on her after you guys but she is a wicked dirty fighter so I dropped that idea after a minute."
Shaking her head, Chikorita turned back to Sean. "Well, we're actually got one last thing we wanted to do around here. Not just visiting Lucario. We wanna check out that Circh dungeon, have you heard the rumours?"
Sean almost recoiled. "Oh! Uhh…."
His tassels flicked a moment, sending a flash of Sean's emotions across everyone causing them all to pause and blink. Sean grasped his tassels and pulled them down. "Sorry, sorry!"
"It's okay," Chikorita assured him. "You, uh… know the rumours?"
Sean glanced guiltily to Team Sunrise.
He… hadn't gotten around to telling them about the ghost of Circh. It'd been a while since he had gone as well. There just wasn't as much time now that they could leave as they pleased and he was thrown so much into being with them again that it had just failed to occur to him.
And when it did, he remembered bringing Rai and Mane to Circh and Violet not appearing. They were nice about it, too nice. Pityingly nice, he knew they didn't believe him and while he couldn't say he knew what they were thinking of him, it couldn't have been anything too sane.
The idea of bringing Striker, Saniya, and Guardian around only for her to not appear again. He wasn't sure how he'd take that.
"Sean?" Striker asked, concerned. They knew Sean used to go to Circh, he said the dungeon was weirdly relaxing and he always had returned in a pleasant mood.
After he stopped going, he started getting moodier. For a moment all of Team Sunrise had the same guilty thought, had they been depriving Sean of that peace?
Lucario, feeling all the weird tension in the group opened her big mouth to talk very loudly. "Ookay. Riolu, better spill it before we go."
"Huh?" Sean jumped.
"We're going to Circh," Lucario declared. "It's a harmless place, well as harmless as a dungeon gets. I'm curious if it'll spawn anything since there aren't any ferals normally, so we might as well go as a group. So, you might as well tell us what that weird shock, guilt, fear, hope flash was because that was a complicated emotion for a single place."
Sean wanted to back away, as all eyes turned on him and his ears tilted down like a sad puppy.
"Nooo!" Saniya cried. "You're making him sad! Bad Lucario! Where's my paper, I'm gonna deck you on the snoz!"
"I'll roll you like a bowling ball."
"Jokes on you, I don't roll!"
"Jokes on you I don't bowl."
"Bowl is a weird word if you think about it? Bowl. Bowl. Bowl."
Saniya began to repeat bowl for the next ten minutes, fading into the background as Sean shrugged and said, "I'll… explain on the way I guess."
"Only if you want to," Striker said quietly.
Sean flashed him a smile. "It's fine, I meant to do it earlier. Did Shinx or Litleo mention what I go to Circh for?"
Striker shook his head.
"May I ask?" Wartortle said, coming up next to Sean who nodded. "So, the reason we're interested is, you know, the whole ghost rumour."
Sean nodded.
"You saw the ghost?"
Sean nodded. "Talked to her, actually. She's… a human."
He received a surprised look from Team Sunrise, even Guardian who had heard the rumour but hadn't really paid it much mind. Lucario seemed as usual, poking at Saniya who was still saying bowl.
Sean sighed, "But, I brought Shinx and Litleo to meet her but she didn't show up. And so I looked crazy."
"We wouldn't think you were crazy," Guardian assured him. "And I am sure neither Shinx nor Litleo would think that of you either."
Sean shrugged. "I mean, I looked crazy. It's one thing to say you saw the ghost, another to say you've spent a couple days talking to her. She's really nice, her name is Violet and-" It all started coming out.
Why he went looking in the first place.
Meeting Violet.
How she looked and how she acted.
How she was extremely nice, but sometimes not always entirely in the present.
He spent most of the time travelling just letting it all come out. Everyone listened, even Saniya stopped saying bowl, and no one judged him.
It was unbelievable, but rumours existed for a reason.
Circh.
Circh was a strange place filled with strange sights and strange sounds.
There was an ever-present echo undercutting the silence. Faint enough to fade into the back of your mind, but present enough that it was always playing. Whatever the echo was, it couldn't be worked out. Just a hollow, ringing, sound that never faded entirely.
To Lucario's interest, the dungeon did not begin to warp around them as the eight of them entered it. There was no corrupting of the space around them as whatever fuelled these maddening labyrinths reared up to try and tear them apart.
There was no howling of monsters unspeakable or breaking of things that should remain unbroken.
There was nothing except the echo.
It felt longer to Sean, walking through the initial corridors filled with nothing. He had come through here enough times to have a feel for the size, but it seemed bigger on the way to the broken town.
Right as he was getting concerned there was some distortion going on, they found it.
To Sean's relief, the broken place looked as it always had. The sky was red and roiling above, red clouds surging across the sky wildly. Despite the red sky, the place was not bathed in red. No one knew exactly why a sky in a dungeon looked like that, nor why it didn't stain the area in red either. It simply was.
Sean stepped forwards first, asking them to slow down for him to go ahead. "Violet?" he called, stepping onto the broken cobblestone. "Violet? It's Sean. I brought my friends, are you here?"
He looked around, left and right and forwards.
There was no sign of her.
He sighed, shaking his head as he turned around. "She's always here straight away. I don't know if she can show up for more than one person."
There was disappointment on Team Go-Getters face, mixed with exporative curiosity of the place they were in.
"Human ruins though," Chikorita murmured, picking up a piece of brick with a vine.
"Really old human ruins," Wartortle added. "The place I came from, much more advanced than this." He glanced to Sean. "You're from the future, aren't you?"
"Uh. Yeah, I guess so."
"Do you remember the year you left?"
Sean considered a moment before saying it.
"Interesting, just a couple of decades after me. How's the pokemon league in Sinnoh?"
"We have the coolest champion!" Sean blurted out. "Cynthia visited Solaceon Town once and I got to see her battle a friend's riolu!"
There was a shift in the air and Sean glanced around, as did everyone else, feeling it. All eyes fell on Lucario who was staring at Sean.
"...what?" he asked, glancing nervously behind him.
"Say that again," she said with an intensity that had Sean almost backing up.
From the look in her eyes he did and-
"Oof." He bumped into something.
Gasps rang out and Sean glanced up, seeing Violet smiling down at him. "Sean, you're here."
Sean's expressions brightened like the sunrise and he spun around. "Oh my gosh! Violet! You're here!" He laughed and threw his arms up in the air in celebration. "I told you I wasn't crazy!"
"We… didn't think you were," Guardian managed to respond, eye wide and locked on the human in front of them. He remembered what Sean looked like, a female human was a little different but he could tell they were the same species.
Chikorita and Charizard were staring with jaws open while Wartortle was rubbing his eyes. "I haven't another human in so long," he muttered.
"You used to look like that?" Chikorita asked numbly.
"Well. I didn't have boobs."
Violet looked up and over to them with a perplexed expression and Wartortle went vermillion. "Sorry, ma'am," he managed and Violet laughed at him.
Lucario was still staring at Sean and not the human but she decided to reserve that for later and pulled her eyes up to the apparition before them. "Well, I'll be," she said, rubbing her chin. "It's been hundreds of years, I almost forgot what a human looks like."
Saniya floated up and then circled Violet, eyes wide and taking in everything she could see. "Wow, you look so much prettier than Sean did!"
Violet's perplexed smile returned.
"I haven't seen so many people in a long time," Violet said before curtseying. "However, Sean has told me much about many of you. I'm afraid I have no tea to offer you."
Sean clicked his tongue. "Damn, I meant to bring some. Sorry, it slipped my mind."
Violet smiled at him. "It is more than fine. How have you been?"
The only one not staring at Violet was Striker, watching Sean instead. He seemed happy and relieved and slowly, Striker relaxed around the spooky newcomer.
"Excuse me, miss," Chikorita said, as Sean filled her in on how he was. "I never expected to actually meet a human in the… uh."
Violet's smile turned demure. "Flesh?"
Chikorita chuckled awkwardly. "You are… know you're a…?"
Violet tilted her head back and forth and gave a non-commital hum. "So, is this Team Go-Getters?" Sean nodded. "A pleasure to make your acquaintance, I have heard good things."
Wartortle grinned and nudged Charizard. "We have fans in the spirit realm too."
Charizard had a similarly perplexed smile as what Violet had been wearing. He was writing things down in a notepad rapidly.
"And this is Striker, Saniya, and Guardian!" Sean said happily, introducing Violet to his friends one by one.
She smiled and welcomed each one individually. "I've heard so much about you three, I am very glad you and Sean are together again."
"She IS nice," Saniya declared, floating back to Guardian. "Be careful of the big guy though, he's gonna burst with questions."
"I will not burst," Guardian protested. "But, well, there are a few questions that come to mind but I feel… that I should not ask them."
"Do not worry of offending me," Violet assured.
"It's not… offence. It's maybe just not the time and place," Guardian said, visibly straining to hold himself in check. "Although, where have you… come from? When you were… back before this?" He gestured around them, breaking under one question at least.
"This is Circhester," Violet said pleasantly. "Of the Galar region, although, I was born in Kalos and lived a few years in the courts."
"Courts?" Sean asked, he had never gotten much out of Violet when he asked her about her past.
"Oh," she said, a little faintly as her eyes slipped slightly off focus. Sean began to gesture to cut back on the questions. "Once upon a time, with dear uncle Az…."
"How about that tea?" Sean said loudly, causing Violet to blink slowly.
"Oh. Oh! Of course, there is none I am afraid. Bad tea season."
"Do you mind if we take a look around?" Wartortle asked as Charizard's wings flapped anxiously. "It's an interesting place."
"Of course, go ahead." Violet nodded. "Don't less Miss Mariam chase you off though, she's more bark then bite."
They nodded. "Have fun," Chikorita added, glancing at Lucario.
Team Go-Getters made themselves scarce for the time being, leaving the six remaining people.
Eyes turned to Lucario, who was stretching. "Just getting my fighting muscles ready," she said before popping her back. "Actually, they're always ready I just want to remind you I'm going to fight you."
"A battle?" Violet asked in surprise. "It's been a long time since I have witnessed such! Oh, you should have seen how Nelia and Kanerudo would fight." Her eyes turned distant again. "Such times…."
"A battle? Here?" Sean asked.
Lucario clapped her paws together. "Yep, and it tracks into what I wanted to help you guys with. After all, you stopped being so moody after these three beat the stuffing out of you." Violet covered her mouth in shock.
"You going to explain that?" Saniya asked challengingly.
"Maybe, but you gotta fight me first."
Team Sunrise all exchanged some looks. Team Go-Getters had given them some friendly ribbing advice on the way in while Lucario had just looked amused at it all.
Things like: "Don't let her knock you out." And. "Fighting back is usually a good strategy."
They clearly didn't think they stood a chance, which sparked something in Team Sunrise. The pokemon who had not only fought against the dead timeline but battled Primal Dialga into submission and fought through multiple spans of time.
They were strong.
Team Go-Getters had gotten Rayquaza to look up.
They could take on Lucario.
"Questions can be saved until after," Lucario decided, putting space between them. Violet stepped aside herself, eyeing from the sidelines as Team Sunrise gathered to whisper a quick confirmation with each other.
"Do you want to do the honours?" Lucario asked Violet, looking to the human with inscrutable expression.
"What are the terms?"
"Defeat or surrender. Or common sense."
Violet nodded. "Lucario, Team Sunrise. This battle will continue until defeat or surrender or if I deem the risk of harm too great to continue. Do you understand?"
Five pokemon nodded. Charizard could be seen flying up and he shot a column of flame into the air in support.
"Bring it on, Lucario!" Sean called.
Sean's tassels rose, Striker's arms burned green, Guardian's belly mouth spilled some dark mist, and Saniya glowed with Power.
Lucario smirked and took a half step back, raising her arms and generating a simple Bone Rush. "Come at me then."
"Begin!"
And then Lucario moved.
Team Sunrise had seen her fighting her student and thought she was going way too hard.
They realised that moment that she had been holding back.
One moment she was forming her glowing Bone Rush, the next moment she had cleared the meters she had put between them and was swinging it.
With one end of it, she struck Sean on the shoulder, while the other end smacked Saniya out of the air. Going further before Striker and Guardian could even react, she had swung it again, clobbering Striker in the chest and bashing Guardian in the top of his head.
In just a moment she had sent Team Sunrise each flying in a different direction, splitting them up.
"Come on, now," Lucario said, grinning widely as she waited for them all to hit the ground and stop rolling. "Keep up."
Targeting Guardian first, Lucario spun her Bone Rush in her paws a few times and gave him time to recover, walking sedately towards him as Guardian clutched at his head.
His eye focused on her and burned with baleful fire. Lucario's shadow, twisting from the light show above, turned against her and snared her legs. Guardian's eye continued to glow, and he formed a Shadow Ball.
He threw it with all his might, and it was easily defeated by her Bone Rush. The Shadow Ball wasn't the attack, however, but the distraction. Saniya came for the back of Lucario's head as she was caught by the shadows and distracted by the attack.
Yet Lucario's smirk never ceased, and she cracked her neck at the exact moment Saniya tried to strike it. Saniya's eyes widened. As a Psychic-type, she could push herself to react to things faster than a normal pokémon. She could only watch as Lucario glanced at her and shifted her grip on the Bone Rush.
It smacked Saniya in the face and knocked her back before Lucario leapt up, twisting over Striker who tried to come at her from underground. She swung the Bone Rush and struck him in the back of the head.
"You're making it too easy for me," Lucario laughed, winking at Guardian. She rushed him, sprinting rather than stepping faster than they could keep up with. He was not agile, but he was tough.
She was only using her Bone Rush, striking in in the back, against his chest, in the joints of his arms before a bash across the side of the head knocked him down.
Guardian toppled. Then a shadow zipped from the ground to grab her leg. Lucario raised an eye as it pulled her back down, jarring her leg against the ground. Guardian, not as downed as he seemed, swung at her with a fist covered in flame.
She caught his wrist and stopped him cold.
Guardian grunted, trying to force it, and tried a Fire Punch with the other arm. She caught that one too. She squeezed, and he gasped, flames sputtering out. Lucario pulled him over her shoulder and slammed him right onto Sean, who was coming for her back.
She casually stepped back from the pile, clapping her ashy paws. "Come on. Everyone tries to fight me from behind. You think I do not immediately know what you're trying?" She gestured a 'come at me' twist of her paw. "If you want to actually have a chance, fight me from the front.
"Very well," Striker said, sliding into view. His arms glowed, and he yelled out, pumping even more Power into his Leaf Blades until they extended into sabres of green light.
"That's better," Lucario said, forming her Bone Rush again. "Entertain me."
Striker sprinted for her. He WAS fast, that couldn't be denied. Fast enough to even impress her.
Striker slashed back and forth, but she blocked them with deflective strikes from her Bone Rush. He tried to break it, his attack should slice right through the Ground-type energy of the Bone Rush, but any marks he left in it melted away into nothing. She was pumping too much Power into them, repairing the damage his attacks dealt before he could break them.
Striker put both arms together and slashed out a brutal X. Lucario met it with her Bone Rush, but it broke.
She was knocked back, lines of fur falling from her arms and chest as the X of green burned through her fur.
"Impressive," Lucario said, nodding. But her smirk only deepened. "Guess that means I shouldn't just fuck with you all, then."
She moved again. Just as fast as the first time. She didn't even form the Bone Rush this time, meeting Striker in Close Combat and using her whole body to beat him black and blue.
A chop to the neck, and blow to the joint of his arm, a kick to the leg. She grabbed him by the tail and swung him around, tossing him into the air before forming something black and spirally in her paw.
"Ever wonder what a Dark Pulse is?" Lucario asked the falling Striker, her shadow beginning to curl around her. "It's pain. And I have a lot of it to share."
She pointed and fired a stream of curling, burning, hoops of blackness to blow him out of the air.
Or that was the idea.
Saniya teleported onto Lucario's arm and pulled it down, sending most of her Dark Pulse into the ground at Lucario's feet.
It tore the dungeon's floor up wherever it touched, sending dirt and stones flying. The initial beginning of the attack still hit Striker, and he was sent into the distant wall.
Lucario was thrown from teh shockwave but raised her knee up as Saniya pulled her arm down and clobbered Saniya in the nose with it, probably breaking something. "Not bad, Pink," she said, flipping in the air as Saniya was sent sprawling.
Saniya caught herself with Psychic, righted herself, and then slammed all her Power into Lucario to hold her in place in the air.
"I…" Saniya gasped, feeling immense pressure from grabbing Lucario with everything she had. "I held Dialga down with this. I held time together with this. You will NOT breakthrough me!"
Even with Lucario in the air with no physical vantage, she was somehow pushing back against it. Her tassels floated up as if untouched by the Psychic and, to Saniya's horrified realisation, her Psychic was dissolving around the tassels. She had to continue feeding a massive amount of energy into the attack to maintain it against the resistance and with it seeming to be consumed by Lucario's aura.
With a telekinetic burst, she pulled the groaning Sean and Guardian up and yelled. "ATTACK NOW!"
Saniya talked a big game. She lacked the same depth of Power to pull from as she had against Dialga, and Lucario felt like an ocean being held back by a dam.
A single crack and it'd overwhelm her. "Ahh, ow-ow-OW!" Saniya's nose began to bleed from the strain of holding the ancient pokémon in place. "Hurry!" Saniya shrieked.
Guardian and Sean came in Fire Punch and Force Palm to crash against Lucario's chest, avoiding the blunted spike.
Saniya sagged in the air as her grip was broken from the sheer smack to her captive and Lucario was knocked flying like she'd done to them at the beginning.
Guardian caught Saniya as Sean pulled a quick oran berry out to smush into her mouth.
"Oh buddies, oh pals, oh friends of mine," Saniya slurred through a mouthful of oran. "That was actually as tough as holding time together."
Sean looked back to the wall. "I'll get Striker up," he said and raced off, leaving the two of them to hold Lucario off.
She was getting up. Admittedly slowly, but surely Lucario was standing. She cracked her neck again. "I'm impressed," Lucario said, not really any worse for wear. "You four DO make a decent team. I'd rate you… probably an eight altogether. Unfortunately, however-"
She moved again and grabbed the two pokémon standing between her and Sean. "You're sevens on your own."
She slammed Saniya into Guardian's head, knocking their lights out for a moment and forming a Bone Rush. "Oh, Seaaaan~?"
Sean glanced back in horror. He skidded to a stop and desperately pulled on mimicry. She was upon him, but he blocked her strike with his own Bone Rush.
The strike shattered it, but he'd avoided damage to his actual bones.
Sean leapt between her legs before she could bash his head in, digging into the bag. She spun on him, and he flicked a seed into the air before punching it with a Force Palm.
The blast seed exploded, knocking both of them back. Sadly, Lucario was now between him and Striker who was… not there anymore.
Just a hole.
Sean resigned himself to holding Lucario off himself until Striker could reach her and copied her Bone Rush again, several times. It broke every time he blocked, but he was fast enough to form another one to continue blocking.
His arms were aching and shaking from every blow jarring his whole body and Lucario kept a shit-eating smirk on her face the whole time.
"Come on, are you even trying?" she laughed. The ground below her shifted, and he leapt for her, trying to press the advantage with a Force Palm. His sudden attack caught her off guard and Striker was able to blast out from underground without being clubbed again.
Lucario blocked Sean's hit, but Striker's scored a nasty uppercut to her stomach. Striker caught Sean as the riolu said. "Boost me!"
Sean had boosted Striker enough times that Striker was happy to repay the favour, throwing Sean at Lucario. A metal-rattling bang echoed out, and Sean and Lucario were knocked flying, Force Palm exploding them apart.
Sean landed near Guardian while Lucario did a flip and landed on her feet. Striker dove back underground and so Lucario sprinted for the hole and dropped a present in it.
A Dragon Pulse.
Something deep exploded, and a muffled cry reached their ears.
"Are you ready to give in, yet?" Lucario asked. Sean finished dropping a sitrus berry in Guardian's belly mouth, and they both rose up. "No? Good."
She began to dramatically slow-walk towards them. Striker burst out from behind her, Leaf Blades shining. She ducked underneath him and formed a Bone Rush and extended it straight up, hitting his jaw with a considerably bony blow.
She grabbed his leg before he could begin flying away and tossed him at Guardian.
Being so nice and gracious, Lucario waited for Saniya to also join them and for Sean to feed them all that good, good, healing items.
"You know, I don't use items myself," Lucario said, restarting her walk. "It's arrogance, I can assure you. I don't know Protect either, more arrogance. I haven't had a challenge in decades, even Cara I have to intentionally limit myself to have some fun. He's about equal to me in skill, which is nice, but I outclass him in Power so much it's not fun to really go all out."
She paused at about twenty meters from them. "You're doing quite well, Team Sunrise. Most pokémon go down after a couple hits from me. I tip Tyson's fedora for you. But we're approaching the point where stubbornness will get you hurt. I'm going to take you down now."
She said this so matter-of-factly that it was terrifying.
Lucario moved.
Sean tried to rush out to stop her, but he couldn't hold back a tsunami of a pokémon with his paws. She gave him a gentle thwack on the head with her Bone Rush, knocking him sprawling, and went for the others.
Saniya tried to stop her with Psychic, but she was still weakened from doing it earlier, and Lucario disabled her attempt with a single ring of Dark Pulse.
She entered Team Sunrise's space, and then it has begun.
Guardian's hands both burned with fire, and he began trading dukes with her, Lucario caught one wrist, but Striker slashed at her. The two together were a powerful team.
She took a crack at Guardian, but Striker's Leaf Blade cut right through the Bone Rush. He was burning with green, and she realised something.
Overgrow.
Aiming at Striker to take him down was thwarted as Guardian caught her limbs with spreading, solid, shadows, diverting her strikes and slowing her steps.
They danced around her, a pair of pokémon that had fought together, and each other, for years.
Guardian punched; Striker slashed. Striker kicked; Guardian restrained. Saniya joined the slobber knocker herself, impairing Lucario's sight with leaves and battering her with stones. Not just Ancient Power, but stones she ripped from the ground to smack her over the head with.
Lucario swiped at Saniya, Guardian caught her arm and squeezed with a flaming palm.
Striker slashed an X into her back, she drove materialising Bone Rush's that weren't in her paws at him, but Saniya diverted them back at her with Psychic.
Team Sunrise were powerful on their own, but they always won due to their teamwork. Even Lucario was finding it difficult to break this chain.
She formed a Dark Pulse to blast Guardian away, Striker met it with an Overgrowth-boosted Energy Ball and detonated it before it could fully form.
That, however, was what she was waiting for. The detonation hurt for sure. Her own Dark Pulse was a powerful attack indeed, but the eruption knocked everyone flying, not just herself.
A united front was Team Sunrise's biggest strength and Lucario was having trouble overcoming it without doing some serious damage to them.
So, explosion.
Flipping in the air and onto her feet, Lucario moved back first. She punched Saniya with enough force to crash her against the wall far behind Sean and then leapt after her.
Saniya struck a building with a cry, beginning to bounce off it. Before she could even fall off the wall, Lucario landed next to her, channelling Dark Energy through her feet. She leapt off, leaving a wave of Dark Pulse behind and blasting Saniya again when the wave enveloped her. Saniya dropped.
With the propelled force of the Dark Pulse, she literally flew. Forming the Bone Rush one more time, Lucario knocked the recovering Sean back down before reaching Striker.
She twisted and cracked it over his head. The burning energy of Overgrow flickered out. Striker dropped.
She reached Guardian, breathing a Dragon Pulse into existence, and blasted it into his belly mouth, sending a muffled explosion through the room. Guardian dropped.
Lucario exhaled softly and straightened up, turning back to the last one standing.
Sean was facing her, quivering slightly. She winked. "Now that they're out of the way." She cracked her neck again and shook her limbs to get some more blood going. "Let's actually do this."
"What?" Sean breathed, but Lucario was on him already.
She hit his nose with the end of her Bone Rush, and he recoiled with a shout of pain. "Come on then," she said and hit him again in the same spot. "Come on. Get mad at me."
She hit him again.
And again.
And again.
In the same spot.
Sean felt a surge of fury blind him. It wasn't as intense as the one he had fought the others with, that unknown, outsider force that just drove him mad for a minute and had to be beaten out of him.
It wasn't as strong, but he still felt it.
He attacked Lucario in a blind rage. Several Force Palms jarred her legs before she began to swipe her Bone Rush around, blocking the thundering blows.
The bone shattered from every hit, but she too could form one lightning-quick, and she deflected his Force Palms, stepping back as he tried to rampage against her.
The pain of the recoil began to creep into his wrists, and with one huge strike, he knocked Lucario flying, carving right through the Bone Rush as if it were butter.
She hit the wall, cracking her head against it, and he froze. "A-Ah," he whispered.
Lucario groaned and pulled herself up, rubbing the back of her head. "That's going to be a bump," she complained.
"Lu-Lucario, I'm-"
She stepped up to him and hit him in the nose. Again. "What was that?" she asked, that shit-eating grin back as Sean went ramrod still.
His eye twitched. She hit him in the nose, again.
Lucario whistled as Sean went wild on her again.
This continued for a while until, after calming down, she hit him in the nose and he just groaned and fell back.
"Hm," Lucario hummed, poking the downed riolu a few times.
"That's enough," Violet's voice cut through sharply and Lucario looked up and considered before nodding.
She stole the Treasure Bag from him and Violet took it and began administering berries until they were all conscious again.
"That was fun! You're actually quite strong, definitely the strongest of the teams I've faced so far. Although, I should fight the Go-Getters again because it's been a few years." Lucario said, clapping and sitting down. "What did we learn?"
"That Team Go-Getters were not kidding?" Guardian asked weakly.
"Hahaha."
There was silence. Lucario waited expectantly. When no answer came, she turned to Sean. "How do you feel?"
"Pain."
"I mean emotionally. Mentally. On the inside."
"Like…." Sean opened his mouth to tell her how much he disliked her now, but oddly enough that wasn't true. "Huh."
"Oh?" Lucario smirked again. That was a little annoying.
Sean frowned. "I… huh."
"What is it?" Saniya demanded. Lucario had also torn up some fabric for them to press against bleeding spots, Sean and Saniya had nosebleeds, and their voices were a little muffled.
"I've been feeling back to normal since we had our battle, but… I guess I feel normal still?"
Lucario nodded and leaned back, satisfied. She had assembled them all into a little circle to sit down and talk about important shit. "I thought so. Nothing like some percussive maintenance."
"What is the reason behind it?" Sean asked. "I haven't felt this good in months. I mean, I feel like a tractor ran over me at the current moment, but it's not like the last couple months."
"Well, sit down, pull up a cuppa, and get ready because I'm about to teach you all some history!" Lucario proclaimed happily. They were already sitting down. There were no cups to speak of. And she wasn't going to wait for them to get ready.
"It was fascinating watching that type of battle," Violet added, having settled herself quietly and they almost forgot she was there.
Lucario gestured back and forth with her paw. "We'll get there."
She took a breath and glanced up at the smouldering sky for a while. "Sean. Have you thought about what's different about this world compared to your own?"
Sean blinked. "Uh… yeah?"
"What?"
He frowned. "There's humans where I come from?"
"Tcheh," she scoffed, but seemed amused. "That's one, what do you think the other difference is?"
Sean stared at her a little dumbly. She gave him a lot of minor gestures, flicking her eyes about until it finally dawned on him. "Mystery Dungeons?"
Lucario beamed at him. "There you go."
She looked to the sky again, and they looked with her. "There's more than two worlds. There's at least four dimensions I think, plus those mirror world dimensions. Don't mess around with those. But of the four I know of, this is the only world with dungeons. And also the only world without humans. I've been able to glance into other worlds. Seen some shit that I." She shuddered. "Did NOT want to see. But some stuff that's just curious. This world has no humans. This world has dungeons. I feel like those things are connected."
"You feel?" Guardian asked. He was probably the least injured, as he was the toughest. Still, he'd eaten several Dragon Pulse's and felt a little sick.
She shrugged. "I can't say for certain, sorry. I know a lot, stuff I'm about to share with you, but much of it is conjecture and theory."
"You think humans and dungeons are connected?" Sean asked.
She nodded. "I do. And while it may seem just like a guess to start with, I do know for sure a few important things." She leaned back. "I was brought to this world in a different way to you… how did you come over, actually?"
"I can answer that!" Saniya said, bouncing up. "My Giratina was able to contact a Giratina from another world, and that one was able to pull Sean into their Reverse World and send him along into our Reverse World and out into the Dark Future by way of thin barriers in reality! That's what Giratina said, at least. He told me he was getting a Gabriel and I looked STUPID when that wasn't Sean's name."
Lucario was staring at him.
"Yeah! Like that face exactly!"
There was something on Lucario's face. It was like an expression she had forgotten how to make. "Huh. Okay. We're going to need to talk about some stuff soon but, first of all." She gave Sean a lingering frown before shaking it off. "I was brought here by Arceus."
"Truly?" Guardian and Saniya gasped.
Lucario nodded. "And they were 'kind' enough to explain a little of the shitstorm I was heading into to fix. Apparently, this world has the same beginning as the one I am from but an event about… I'd think around three thousand years ago now caused a timeline split."
Violet and Sean wore a nearly identical frown.
"If you've heard of alternate universes," she added, nodding to Sean. "Forget what you think. A timeline split requires something obscenely, cataclysmically, large that it literally breaks reality apart. And even then, to my knowledge, part of what Arceus DOES up in that higher dimension is pruning these splits out to not unbalance shit. I dunno, that part is just a guess from me."
"Three thousand years ago?" Violet repeated.
Lucario glanced at her. "Yeah?"
"Three thousand years…?" Sean hummed, still frowning.
"Does that sound familiar then?" she asked and he nodded. "Guess you paid attention in class. It was the firing of some superweapon by a king of Kalos that created this." Sean's eyes widened.
"AZ," he whispered. "The Ultimate Weapon!"
Violet flinched. Hard.
Lucario turned to her, she had gone as pale as, well, a ghost.
"Are you okay?" she asked, a drip of concern entering her voice.
"You speak of-" Violet began before standing. "Oh dear, oh my, oh Xerneas." She made a faithful gesture to Xerneas. "Nelia, where are you?" she cried out and began looking around, her eyes simply gone from this place and time. "Nelia? Nelia please! NELIA!?"
Sean looked to her in disturbed sadness. He hadn't seen Violet get this bad before, nor this quickly. Violet began to wander off, calling out for her partner.
Everyone's eyes followed her.
"She mentioned an uncle, didn't she?" Lucario asked lowly. "Sounded like she was going to say Azzy, but… that might be a kid's nickname for a guy called AZ. That's what the king was called?" Sean nodded as Lucario continued staring after Violet and then to Sean. "You're an interesting one, aren't you?"
"Neat. In one reality, in mine and what actually does seem like to be yours too, the damage was minimal. I don't know why. Maybe 'AZ' got cold feet at the last moment, or someone managed to do something just in time." She looked back to Violet again. "Either way, it was a failure. However… maybe it took some other kind of intervention to stop?"
"You're saying that… the Ultimate Weapon did this?" Sean asked, distracted by Violet. "Destroyed humanity?"
Lucario nodded. "Right. Not all at once, I doubt. Humans are not easy to kill. I can attest to that." She had a somewhat bitter smile. "But it did enough damage that they all died out eventually. We've just got relics of them left here, like Aegis Cave, or this place."
She glanced up at the sky again. "To be clear, Arceus did not tell me much. Some of that is just my connecting of dots. One thing it told me before dumping me here was that this world was permitted to remain out of curiosity. How would a world with no humans work?"
She frowned. "That tells me that you guys have got some type of importance. I can hardly guess what. There is no history I know of what the world was like before humans, and I never really bothered to ask any Legendary who might know. Hard enough to find as it is, my first thought is usually to challenge them, not what was the world like a fuck-tonne of years ago."
"Well that's… enlightening," Sean said, not really sure what to do with this knowledge now. Guardian was enraptured, he loved history, but the others also were unsure.
"Why are you telling us this?" Striker asked.
Lucario shrugged. "That amount of detail? Because I like you. But it is important to the next part of this."
"There's more?" Guardian was thrilled.
"Easy there, this is less history and more specifics. But I do have an answer, and a solution, for Sean's crankiness." She turned to him. "Kenji was the same. Dimitri was the same. Jessica was the same. Happy human-turned-pokémon that slowly grew moodier and moodier."
She frowned. "Kenji's a dick and also been around the longest which explains a bit of that. Dimitri's around the same age as you… how old are you?"
"Uh." He was thrown by the switch back to him. "Around… sixteen, I think?"
"And you were how old when you came here?"
"Twelve."
"Hm." She stared at him again, eye twitching just briefly, before shrugging it off. "You and Dimitri could be explained by puberty, and Kenji is just an edgy bastard. But Jessica was an adult. A well-adjusted adult." She rubbed her lip. "With a hell of a right hook."
She looked at Sean again, eyes piercing through him. "With Kenji? He's a dick, so who cares about him being human?"
She frowned. "Dimitri becoming a little surly too, is odd, but he had to save the world. That's stressful, and people manage stress oddly after things relax."
She shook her head. "But Jessica too? Three humans-turned-pokémon. They all became moody, angry, and emotionally unstable, the longer it went on. That's three for three. And now you. Four. Four humans-turned-pokémon, each following a similar path."
She cracked her knuckles. "Odd. Isn't it?"
Sean glanced around at his friends, worried. They all shared his concern. "Is something happening to me?" he asked.
"I don't know, to be entirely honest," Lucario said, shrugging. "I have my guesses, but they are just guesses. But. It's another thing there, isn't it? No humans. Dungeons. And humans that appear inevitably become moody. Is it just homesickness? Is it frustration at how pokémon can be? Is it the response after trauma since you only seem to appear when the world is in danger? Maybe."
"But you think it's something to do with dungeons?" Sean asked, staring her down. "Right?"
She shrugged yet again. "I can't say for sure, and I don't feel like concerning anyone over pointless guesses."
No one knew what to say.
"Look, I'm dumping enough on you without getting to the point. I don't know if this moodiness is anything besides angst, but something has proven to work for it." She waved at their surroundings. "Working out allllll your frustration in a dungeon has proven to work. Helped Dimitri. Helped Jessica. Kenji's still a contrarian, but I hear was a lot nicer afterwards."
"That's why you wanted to fight us?" Sean asked. She nodded. "Oh… did you have to hit me in the nose that many times?"
"Yes," Lucario said, probably lying. "It's more than just working out, and it NEEDS to also go down in a dungeon. You need to really push yourself, work out that tension and let it just… bleed out. Maybe not literally, and it isn't like you need to do this every day. Just… think of it as your 'time of the month' heh." She winked, and Sean flushed.
She grinned at him, and he managed a small, but real, grin back. "You'll be fine, Sean. It is weird that this keeps going on with humans, but it's easily fixed. And heck, if you do some real rough training, you might not drag the others down so much!"
His grin faded to a flat look. She poked her tongue out at him.
"Alrighty then! Looking forward to the walk back to town? I sure am!"
They all groaned. They had just fought the Legendary Lucario. Walking anywhere was not on their list of priorities.
"Carry me," Saniya pleaded. Guardian, kind as he was, obliged.
"Me too." Sean reached up with grabby hands. Lucario stared at him again, almost looking unsettled. Guardian did as he was asked.
"Say… Guardian?" Striker began.
"No. If the citizens see me carrying you, they'll judge me as much as they judge you."
"Hey! You're the one being judged!"
"I overheard some pokémon referring to you as Scumiker the other day. For the first time, I am not the least respected in town."
Striker growled.
"Oh yeah," Lucario bursting out into laughter. "People really liked the Killer story, I might have embellished it a little."
Striker gave her a very dangerous look. "Careful," she laughed. "I could tell them even more!"
He glanced away, grumbling under his breath.
"OI! GO-GETTERS!" Lucario called loudly, Charizard flying up to look at her. "WE'RE GETTING READY TO LEAVE!"
"I want to talk to Violet first," Sean said, still unsettled by her behaviour. "I've never seen her get like this so fast."
"Well, she can't be hard to find as long as she's still calling out. Who's Nelia?" Lucario asked.
Sean shrugged. "I don't really know, actually. She's never answered me much, I know it's a pokemon and seems like she raised her? I don't really know more than that."
"Hm."
"Please don't press her about the weapon," Sean added. Lucario raised an eye at him. "Look at what she did!"
Lucario sighed. "Fine. She obviously knows something and this place looks old enough to be three thousand years old."
"Have you encountered many ghosts like this?" Guardian asked. "I cannot say that I have, and, well." He gestured at himself.
True Ghosts were a strange fixture of the world. Little more than rumour and legend was known about them.
"A couple, maaany years ago," Lucario answered. "Back in the old world, fucking Ash pulling Felix and I into hell." Sean jolted.
Lucario sighed. "Fucking hell. Can we talk about THIS later?" she growled and he nodded his head rapidly, looking terrified.
Striker looked between them, suspicion on his face. "What is going on?" he asked.
Team Go-Getters weren't far when they caught up to Violet.
"Violet?" Sean called softly.
"It'll be fine," Violet was murmuring, petting a rock. "One last fight, he has to be stopped. I know it. I won't forget he's not the same as he once was. The shadows have stolen him away and left a puppet in its place. I know, Nelia. I know."
Violet turned to him and smiled. She began to speak but no words came out of her mouth, there was no sound at all. Suddenly, the lack of the echo was louder than any noise and their ears popped.
Even Lucario was rubbing her ears and they all looked to each other, and around.
When they looked back, Violet was gone.
"What was that?" Wartortle asked, coming into range. "Everything went all staticky."
"We couldn't hear anything!" Saniya gasped. "And where did she go? Oooh! That's spooky!"
Sean frowned, looking at where Violet was. There was not so much as a footprint to suggest she had ever been standing there.
Keira the Legendary Lucario placed a paw on Sean's head. "Come on, kiddo," she said with a seriousness unusual. "I think that means we should go."
She glanced up, the sky seemed different and she couldn't tell why.
There were eight of them in here, and two humans weren't enough. Circh was not a dungeon of ferals, but was a dungeon nonetheless.
As they left, the skein grew thinner.
Thinner.
And thinner.
Until an unlikelihood occurred.