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Stave IV:
The Lightning With Its Rapid Wrath
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They needn't have worried about Lance and the Rocket-folk showing up. Giovanni, dour as ever, appeared at the camp, which had been the designated setting-out point for the battle frigates, with forty Dragonite, Dragonair, and Kingdra. Lance assured Bronze it would be enough to create a storm large enough to cover their advance, if it could indeed be sent though the vortex without being caught in its swirling ergosphere. The dragon trainer offered no words to Yellow or the other Pokedex Holders, but he kept tugging at his black cape, sometimes with both hands.
"Why does he do that, Yellow, do you know?" asked Tess. Giovanni and Bronze's troops were rolling into the holds of their frigates in a dozen hover-pallets. Behind these, drawn by a pair of albino Tauros with freakishly long ears and fiery pink eyes, was a two-wheeled cart completely covered in white cloth. Pryce rode upon this contraption alone, gloomily sitting restive in his wheelchair.
"I think it means he's embarrassed," said Yellow. "Of my presence, maybe all of ours."
"I don't see why. I'm surprised so many old fighters like Lance showed up, for the League and all."
"Not old," laughed Yellow. "He's going on forty, but he's got another three decades at least. And as far as Lance is concerned, he's still an evil man. Not just any aging terrorist, either, but one that failed and needed to seek help from God and his old enemies. He's lost face."
"If there's anyone whose lost face, it's my Grandpa Quentin for not showing his ugly one at the League," said Tess, kicking at a trailing cable with the tip of her boot. "I'd have given all of the new Emperor's crowns and titles to see him again, though I don't think Bronze would have felt the same way."
"Why would he not have come?" said Yellow. "And you understand, surely, that he is less likely to die by staying away from Seafarer's Island."
Red color came to Tess's face immediately. "Well, it's really my fault that he isn't here. He worked out a plan with Bronze to go down south till the war rolled over. The Alliance would have tapped all his phones, so I don't know how he's been doing, but he's down south like he said he'd be."
"Keeping away from the chaos?" said Yellow.
Tess nodded. "He knows about Bronze going to the League, and heard the light show a month ago, so that's something." To Yellow's surprise, Tess sketched out an Arcean ring in the air. "Arceus, Thy hand, Thy will. If he isn't going to be here, then Bronze would say it's for the best."
"Would you say that?" said Yellow.
"No," said Tess, "but I've also heard that God has a heart and mind of his own."
...
When Gold saw Silver, he sprang across the lawn and hugged him with a bellow. "Goddammit, it's Silver! Old compadre and pal!" He let go, gave an approving nod. "You were less banged up when we met last. Who teed you off?"
"Time and the desert," said Silver, smiling wanly and putting a hand on Gold's shoulder. "Let's not speak long here. I don't want to talk about what I've been doing, Gold. It's best you not even think about it. I have a feeling—I don't know if it's true or not, but it's strong—that something's trying to listen. If there is, it's better it not overhear us. And it could."
"Something?" Gold thought of spies, but then remembered how the Barons of Hell had appeared from the air itself at the skirmish in Flouruma.
Silver reached out and touched the kerchief Gold wore around his neck, Orreian cowboy-style. It was red with dark stripes. Then he put a hand briefly over his left eye. For a moment Gold didn't understand, and then he did. The eye. The Eye of the Djinn.
...
"Are there demons listening?" Bronze asked Cobalion.
"Not within a dozen miles."
"Good. How long till the storm is brewed?" said Bronze.
Lance turned away, consulted one of the Dragonite in an unknown language that sounded like a jumble of clicks and hisses, reminding Bronze of rough cloth passing between clasped hands. Presently, he returned, said: "Very soon, Tar-Tercano. Sooner than we expected, for we'd been working on the storm before your summons and my dragons are moving double-quick. It's truly a great-great-grandmother of a storm, perhaps even more than you wished. But do not ask me to consult with my Pokemon again. It is delicate work for them."
Moon didn't see how it could be, but she hoped Bronze would listen. Lance's Pokemon were standing around the lawn while the wind whooped around them. The feeling of live force coming from the Dragonite and Dragonair's horns was very strong now—she could feel it plucking at her skin, vibrating in her nose and eyes, teasing the hairs out from her scalp. The dragons were producing a shrill humming noise that seemed to slice through her head like a knife. It reminded her of the demon shrieks, and she wouldn't have been surprised to learn that it was neutral, though very cross, spirits that the Pokemon were channeling.
"It's my storm," said Bronze, and saw the silent awe on the faces of the death commandos who heard him. "Though it shook the entire world it could not be more than I wished. Will it strike the vortex full-on?"
"Close enough to make no difference," said Giovanni.
A courier crossed from the path that led to the table with the telemetry monitors, said, "The Eclipse drone patrols are pulling back in the Distortion World, Tar-Tercano."
"If they don't know about the storm, they're just being careless," said Lily. "If they know, then they expect the storm to spill too much rain into the plain for good visibility. They think we'll be in the same fix as them."
"Tell our gunners to set their sights well before visibility drops," said Bronze. "They must knock the nose off as many of those Eclipse ships as they can, soon as the storm has destroyed their sightline."
He looked up at the sky. The horsetail twistings of dark cloud could be seen against the dark of the sky. Thunderstorms seldom came to northern Roria out of monsoon season, but suddenly the sky was cleft by a fiery bolt, and the gloomy and quickly gathering clouds bore the power of its might. The crash of thunder was almost simultaneous. The sky had darkened from a humid blue to a sulfurous dimness. Flame flickered about the thunderheads and wreathed the stadium.
Bronze felt the first drops of heavy rain, said: "Start sending the frigates in position, Mohaim."
"Will you not go with us?" asked the general.
"I'll wait here a bit with the Pokedex Holders," said Bronze.
Antarah gave a knowing shrug toward Mohaim, and walked together till they were lost in the growing shadows. The rain was beating down by now and Bronze had a canopy made of camouflage cloth erected. Moon saw how the dragon's eyes were glowing, felt how the force in the atmosphere seemed to double and then treble. The hum was now vibrating in the very bones of her skull.
"The artillery barrage and the Pokemon attacks that will blast the storm's center aside, that I leave in your hands, Commander Rombur," said Bronze, seemingly unaffected by the bizarre manic buzzing that was pouring into everyone else's ears and brain. "You will do it?"
"I'll do it."
Bronze gestured to an Aredian lieutenant, said: "Otheym, start moving the probes out of the striking area. They must be out of there before the storm strikes."
The man bowed, followed Mohaim and Antarah. Another hum had added to the dragonsong; frigate engines were spooling up and moving into striking distance of the vortex, ready to divert their fuel reserves for the quickest approach possible.
"Keep your attention on the enemy camps," Robert called at the diminishing forms of the generals. "They'll be completely undefended when we blow them."
"Dispatch a signal to the cruise liner captains that the Association fleet is leaving," said Bronze. "Send a skycopter to the S.S. Anne with a pod of projectile weapons, just in case."
In the abrupt silence, Bronze heard the wind devils playing overhead, drowning out the psychic humming: the swelling front of the storm. Drifting lashes of rain began to drift down into the canopy through gaps in the cloth roof. A burst of wind caught the cover and whipped it from side to side.
...
Another beat passed. Then, without acknowledging his parents or attendants, Bronze took Moon and Tess aside, in a compartment outside the sight and hearing of the others, and spoke slowly.
"I don't want either of you to fight," he said. "If I bring either of you to battle, the men will question my wisdom. But you have earned your place in the Army of Humanity. It's your right to choose whether either of you wish to fight. Do what God tells you."
"I won't say goodbye to you now, not after all this time," said Tess. "We're bound by Arceus, and I'm going. Are you happy?"
"No," said he, and she saw he truly was not. She believed she had never seen such sadness and such loneliness on a human face. "Never was I farther from happy, Tess of Rosecove. Will you change your mind and stay? Will you not come the last little while with me? That would make me happy."
For a wild moment she thought she would. That she would simply stay behind from the battle—which was one-sided and made no promises—and wait while Bronze went to his doom or salvation. Another day would do it; they would charge through now and be done with the battle tomorrow.
Then she remembered Diamond's tale and felt that she should take courage.
"No," she said softly. "I'll take my chance and go."
"I understand," said Bronze. "Will you leave us for now?"
Tess left without nodding or looking back.
"And I will go also," said Moon, "for I'm bound to you by Arceus as much as she."
For a moment she thought he would make it easy on her, just agree and let her go. Then his anger and his despair broke in a painful burst. "But you can't be sure! Moon, what if all your talk about binding is just folly? What if you come with me and roll right into the grave?"
"Then I'll go to God with the thoughts of those I love."
"And that might work," said he, speaking in the bitterest voice she had ever heard from him yet. "For the first ten years in Arceus's presence, or twenty, or even a hundred. And then? What about the rest of eternity? Think of Platinum! Or your mother and father! Do you think they want you to go? Never! Never! Never in your life! Never in theirs! I sense something wrong! Moon, don't. I beg you, don't go. I'll get on my knees, if that will help." And to her horror, he began to do exactly that.
"It won't," she said. "And if this is to be among the last memories I have of you, then don't let it be of you on your knees. You're not a kneeling man, Bronze, son of Robert. You never were or will be, and I don't want to be able to think about you that way. I want to see you on your feet, as you were in the stadium arena, or as you would be in the last stand."
He got up and came to her. For a moment she thought he meant to restrain her by force, and she was afraid. But he only put his hand on her arm for a moment, and then took it away. "Let me ask you again, Moon. Are you sure?"
She conned her heart and saw that she was. She understood the risks, but yes, she was. And why? Because it was all for the good, she did not doubt it, but also because she knew that Bronze's path was one of death. It was death for those who rose against him but also those who walked beside him. He would prove it again and again in his life. She might die in one world and he in another, but she knew the same fate would come to all who had ever lived, eventually, for Platinum, for poor Jake. Maybe their deaths would not be long in coming.
But if she would die, it would be bathed in the living breath of angels.
"I'm sure," said she.
"All right. Will you give me a kiss?"
She took him by the arm and pulled him down and put her lips on his. When she inhaled, she took in the breath of a thousand painful years to come and ten thousand miles to cross. And yes, she tasted death.
But not for you, Bronze, she thought. This I pray. For others, but may it never for you. May you escape your own curse, in the name of Arceus.
She was the one who broke their kiss. "May you lead me to your ship, when the time comes?"
"If you will, dear," said Bronze, flushing. Even in the low light she could see it. "And if I've been cold with thee, I say sorry. There is a part of me that loves leading my new followers more than loving you. I have my natural duties as successor to Elrosi and representative of Arceus on Earth. Do you see me as choosing between you and the kingship?"
"You mustn't think that," said Moon. "Reality is seldom a thing of black and white, I think, of is and isn't, be and not be. Don't misunderstand, of course. All roads lead either to God or away from him. I think that you will come to God, Bronze. But how long your road will be and what country it will go through, no one can tell."
"It is not my part or yours to command all of the world's future, Moon," said Bronze. "Other evils will come, that of which the Evil Djinn is only a prelude. Our duty is to destroy what evil faces us here and now. What weather we will have in the future should not be our concern."
...
Cobalion watched them walk away from the hutment, which already looked tired and unimportant. He would never enter it again. If he had the hands for it, no doubt he would have put his face in them. It occurred to him that if he had never loved Bronze, he would never have felt so alone as this. Yet of all his many regrets, the re-opening of his heart was not among them, even now.
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Bronze motioned his Aredians to join the frigates, and crossed to the men at the communications equipment. Robert stayed beside him while Bronze crouched over the signalmen.
One said: "A great-great-great-great grandmother of a storm, Tar-Tercano."
Bronze glanced up at the inky sky, said: "Have the orders for the frigates to move on the nexus. He had to repeat his order, shouting above the growing noise of the storm. The men turned to obey.
"We are getting no replies from the cruise liners," the signalman beside Robert said. "Much static."
Bronze nodded, kept his eye on the time-standard dial in front of the signalman. Presently, Bronze looked at Lance, raised a hand, returned his attention to the dial. The time counter crawled around its final circuit. He thought of the storm sweeping across the Plain of Discordia, the static charge within the wall of thunderclaps that would destroy every shield barrier in the enemy camp.
"Mohaim says they are in position," the signalman said.
We are committed to this mad plan, he thought. He put an arm around Robert's shoulder, said: "Get to the armored shuttles with me, and leave the equipment! There's more on the frigates."
"Are the women coming?" asked Robert.
"You bet, babe," said Lily darkly.
He felt himself being pulled away, Aredians pressed around him to protect him from the storm and the lightning it might hurl. They ran through the roaring downpour to a gravity shuttle, and for an instant Bronze was reminded of Kyogre's wrath, and the storm that had washed the Alliance's mercenaries away. All of that was in another climate, another latitude, another life. The old glories of the world had brought some ways, he knew, but it had moved on within his heart in ways that could never be turned back.
They squeezed out of the rain and through the shuttle's magnetic door. Outside, Lance yelled that all was ready. Bronze and Moon sat down together, and he put his seatbelt on, feeling the craft's comparative silence, a chamber with glowglobes overhead and another tunnel opening beyond to the pilot's room. Another signalman sat there at his equipment.
"Much static," the man said.
A swirl of rain filled the air around them as the wind pushed into the cabin. "Seal off this tunnel!" shouted Bronze. A sudden pressure of stillness showed that his command had been obeyed. "Is the way down to Mohaim's ship still open?"
"The storm will make our ascent shaky, but we should still get through," said a death commando, just as the signalmen from outside opened the door again, carrying their equipment inside.
"I told those men to leave their equipment!" said Bronze.
"Good soldiers and good Aredians do not like to abandon equipment, Tar-Tercano," one of his Aredians chided.
"Men are more important than equipment now," said Bronze. "We'll have more equipment than we can use soon or have no need for any equipment."
Robert sat on his other side, said, "I heard them say the Pokedex Holders are in another shuttle like this, out in the open. We're very close to the vortex here, should the Alliance try to retaliate in kind."
"They're in no position to retaliate," said Bronze. "They're just now finding out that they'll soon have no shields and unable to see their enemies."
"The new command post is all prepared on the frigate, m'Lord," said the signalman.
"They've no need of me in the command post yet," said Bronze. "The plan would go ahead without me. We must wait for the storm."
...
Later (for there is always a later) Bronze entered his imperial chamber. Voices sounded from his left and right as he entered, echoing in the high room, "Make way! Make way for the Royal Person!"
With covert glances, he had studied the metal-walled room and its occupants; the generals, the pages, the guards, the troops of Logaria drawn up around the walls, standing at ease there beneath the bloody and tattered captured battle flags that were the room's only decoration. Mohaim stood poised, waiting, a slim, elegant figure in a black Rorian uniform with silver and gold trim, leaning slightly to stabilize himself against the floor's crooked angle. The ship's electrostatic field would keep its occupants from tumbling like a shower of rocks when the nose of the frigate staged upward, but they would need to hold on when the initial thrust rocked its way through the walls.
Bronze sat down in a rotating chair that was brought, ignoring the Pokedex Holders, seemingly ignoring every person in the room. Mohaim found that he could not ignore the Royal Person, and studied the Emperor for a sign, any clue to the purpose of this audience. The boy's hard face and cold eyes reminded the general of the dead Chairman. There was that same look of the predatory bird. But the boy's hair was dark, not balding, and none of that hair was concealed by the Chairman's ceremonial ebon helmet or any gold imperial crown.
"General Mohaim," said Bronze. The Emperor had deigned to notice him. The voice was steady and with exquisite control. It managed to dismiss him while greeting him.
Mohaim bowed low and advanced to a respectful position ten paces from the chair. "I am at your summons, Tar-Emperor."
"Summons!" Crystal cackled.
"Now, Pokedex Holder," Bronze chided, "good officers give respect to their leaders. General, can you tell me where Cypress's chief minions will be, Emrett and Admin Harry Dearth?"
Mohaim darted his gaze left and right, reviled himself for approaching the Emperor without his own guards, not that they'd be much use against the Aredians. How strong would Tercano's guarantee on his life be when the battle was over? And how strong was the cultural consensus that this young man in his second decade should rule all of the South? But still...
"They were sighted at the Eclipse camps, sir, to begin what we have identified as a comprehensive survey of the morale and fighting condition of the Alliance's manpower. I wish to warn the Emperor that they were sighted among several other Eclipse personnel of similar rank and training, who may individually pose threats equal to or greater than Emrett or Admin Dearth."
"Hear all!" said Bronze over the fleet's radio. "Whosoever should bring me the heads of the Eclipse Alliance's leaders will receive a talent of gold and honor forevermore, on Earth and in the Kingdom of Heaven!"
After waiting for the echoing roar to die out, he said, "And if any man should kill the boy I call my friend, Jake Albans, then he will be hung from a tree and buried in a field for criminals."
"Are you not worried about our men's difficulty in identifying this boy, my Emperor?" radioed Rombur.
"I am not worried," replied Bronze. "The storm comes, commander. When we attack under cover I do not think Cypress will have sent him to fight on their perimeter. He is being reserved for some purpose. I vow to have all their heads to stick atop my battle standards and I think I shall."
"Perimeter," said Robert. The word came out as though it puckered his mouth. "There won't be much of one, save a few skirmishers. Cypress won't believe we'll attack while he's secure with ten legions of men."
"Surely not, Tar-Chief," said Mohaim to Robert. "But any error on the side of caution cannot be censured, no matter how confident our enemies appear to be."
The general then lowered his gaze. The delicacy of his position here, alone and dependent upon the boy's vow not to challenge him and the various other power brokers at play who Tercano did not want to upset, fretted him. Does the boy mean to kill me and be left with the fanatic Aredians? thought Mohaim. He couldn't! Not with the other generals waiting with us, aching for any excuse to gain from this stunning upset at the League. He's held them together, yes, but for how long?
"We will not take any hostages, and we will not go out of our way to retrieve our own," declared Bronze. "Surrendering enemies are to be executed on the charge of crimes against God. We will hold a burial ceremony for every unrecovered captive and act as though such a one were already dead."
"But you would recover the important kinds of hostages, I understand," said Ryan.
"So?" said Bronze. "All here, including my own person, are expendable. There are over three billion humans in the world today and we are among them. Cold-hearted as it may be, given the choice between the two, the collective empire must win out every time. Before anything else, you must come to terms with this fact: not only for yourself, but for your friends, family, and loved ones. If the time should come that you are asked to make the ultimate sacrifice, you must do so swiftly, resolutely, and without hesitation. A moment's delay could be disastrous."
"It is my understanding, Bronze Tercano, that you are willing to sacrifice whatever and whomever you want," said Blue, and Mohaim was for a moment frightened of the possibility of Imperial anger.
"No. We do not have limitless reserves. Our numbers here are small enough, and the threats we face terrible enough, that we cannot afford to lose a single man to accident or stupidity. Your life is a vital resource to be nurtured and husbanded, and if it must be spent, it must be used to maximum effectiveness before it is lost. Our Golden Rule is that we never work alone."
This empire isn't purposeless, not at its creation, thought Lily, glancing left and right at the metal walls of the command deck, thinking of the monstrous metal machine around her. Such unlimited wealth it represented. He'll bring pages and officers, she thought, and they will come. First the useless court lackeys, their women and their companions, hair-dressers, designers, everything...all the fringe parasites of any court. All beside my son, fawning, slyly plotting, "roughing it" with the Emperor. They'll saw they were here to watch him put an end to this affair, to make epigrams over the battles and idolize the wounded and dead. Unless the gods intervene, (as they so often do) we'll have arrived at what we so hated. Or not, if Bronze burns it all to the ground.
...
Bronze did not sit down in his chair but rather knelt on one knee beside Mohaim. The general felt a stone of fear grow in his stomach as the Emperor whispered, "Before you saw me, who did you think I was?"
"One of the Logarians, surely," Mohaim whispered back. "A Rorian fanatic, a religious adventurer. They crop up regularly on the fringes of civilization. Your Majesty knows this."
"Did you hear that I had allied the Aredians?"
"The Association knew so, yes. We considered you a madman, for all Aredians are a little mad."
"Mad?"
"They scream your name as they leap into battle. I've seen reports of how their women throw their babies at their enemies and hurl themselves into hostile fire to open a wedge for their men to attack. They have no...no...decency!"
"As bad as that is, I appreciate your honesty," said Bronze, returning to his seat. "My last declaration is for the frigate captains to use the attitudinal jets and fire hoses on their carrier as flame-throwers and spread weapons, if they have the chance. The demon swarms fear fire, and the bots fear water."
"More demons than bots," muttered Yellow.
...
Lance radioed in with a single line. "Get ready."
They saw a black form illuminated by white flashes of lightning float up to the observation viewshield, the mass of a Dragonite flying with Lance's elongated form standing on its back, battered by the storm but surrounded by his billowing, ragged cape in an image that was at once terrible and exalted. The black-purplish eye of the rift glared like the eye of the Djinn himself. Twenty humming ships waited for the command to move up.
"Behold!" cried Lance in a furious voice, his arms upraised to the wind and thunder. "Behold, the lighting with its rapid wrath! Over-sam kammen! Ya can-ka no rey Arceus! Can-tah, can-kavar kammen! Overcan-tah!"
"Go, go, go!" roared Mohaim. "Go with the storm!"
Bronze felt yanked forward rather than pushed back. Something in his head bolted forward, and for a moment he was at the mercy of an acceleration that might have moved a thousand, thousand worlds, flung millions of doors wide, generating a draft so great it could almost have blown out the sun. The glowing horns of Lance's flying behemoths were issuing a hurricane draft of a cyclone that flung the rolling clouds into the vortex. The lighting tripled in strength and size, blinding him. His teeth were rattling. Sweat ran into his eyes, blurring his damaged sight. His back was hurting from a half-dozen old wounds.
"Stauros Nika!" cried Roderick in Hisuian. "Kyrie elesion!"
There was the heavy crump of rain colliding with the ship's hull. The clouds were being drawn into the vortex like a black hole devouring stellar matter. Then his back burst into immediate, enormous agony, the pain so intense it seemed to tear him apart. Then the draining sensation began. It was hideous, like having someone pull his guts out a loop at a time.
He tried to cry out and couldn't. No, stop, let go, it's too much! He tried to scream and heard it, but only inside his head. God, he was caught. Caught in the ergosphere of the vortex and being ripped in two.
Concentrate, boy!
That was Cobalion's voice, so strong in his head that it almost seemed to slosh his brains. The intolerable twisting in his lower back dulled. He raised his head and saw the heavy bulk of the storm obscure the rift for a moment, then collapse like a torn veil, revealing the furious gap again. Flying ahead of them, Lance appeared to be a godlike black speck against the lighting, his head and limbs loosed and thrown back in glory before vanishing into the greasy void, the first to die or live to breathe the foul air of the Dark Otherworld.
Then they were right the rift's maw, and Bronze knew they were hurtling toward their deaths. He saw the center of the vortex, no longer overwhelmed by the tenebrous clouds, crouching in his horrified sight like the slick eye of a monster that grew outside God's shadow. And he began to shake at the sight of it, with only seconds to turn back, for he sensed its endless power: it may fling him anywhere or to the farthest blind alley of nowhere. It might lead him to the Distortion World or only an illusion in the qlippoth darkness, where he would spend eternity till one of the crazed beings that lived there came across him.
Never get out! he thought. That's it. Of course. We shall never get out. What a fool I was to have thought they would let me go as easily as that. No, no, we shall never get out.
And the vortex was regarding them. It moved like an actual eye in an invisible socket. Tess thought, It's alive, it's the stolen eye of some awful monster from beyond the world, and oh Arceus, oh dear Arceus, it is seeing me.
Deep down in the black eye, a violet speck forms, glowing and growing. Three seconds till impact. Bronze's horror swelled, filling his throat, threatening to stop his heart with its chill.
It's the Djinn, he thinks. It's the Eye of the Evil Djinn as he looks down from his place in the Temple of Evil, and he is seeing me.
But then they entered, and by then he was not standing alone.
.
.
.
Ten minutes earlier and unknown to Bronze, Cobalion entered the Distortion World as an emissary to the Court of the Evil Djinn, representing Arceus and the White.
Cloaked by oppressive spiritual darkness and silent as a cloud, Cobalion stayed close to the contour of the bowl-shaped mountains that surrounded the Plain of Discordia, maneuvering on a course that weaved this way and that among the dead snags and rocky crags. The canopy of demons followed him like a cast shadow, like a tiny circle of day surrounded by night upon the landscape; a faint streak of silver vapor emitted from his nostrils and trailed behind him in a slow, settling ribbon.
Below the demons had established their horde's unity, scuttling and swirling in a dome around the Temple's perimeter, brandishing swords, cautiously awaiting the arrival of their enemies. The defeat over the stadium had thinned their numbers but not by much. They had lost a feint of advance but were now on the defense. Deep within their layers, the strongest spirits surrounded a stone hutment on the outer edges of the castle, miring it to near invisibility.
The Djinn is there, he thought, and banked his course.
The outer sentinels saw him approaching and gave an eerie, sirenlike wail. Immediately the defenders radiated toward Cobalion's flight path, making another layer of defense. Cobalion swooped skillfully around the gap as demons on all sides cursed at him with upheld swords, their glowing eyes like thousands of paired yellow stars on black velvet. He ignored them and battered quickly through. The channel closed again behind his celestial contrail like a living gate.
He floated slowly down through the roof of the stone hut, through the attic filled with jars of decaying heads, past moldy rafters, walls, new durasteel posts, through an upstairs bedroom covered in rusty beartraps, through a thick, beam-supported floor and down into a spacious throne room below.
The evil in the room was thick and confining, the darkness like black liquid that swirled about with any motion of the limbs. The room was crowded.
"Hail, Cobalion, errandmaster of the sheep-god of Beulah!" a demon announced from somewhere, and monstrous creatures all around the perimeter of the room laughed.
He looked over the pillared throne room and saw only a few dozen humans among the hundreds of demons, Cyress's personal guards and admins. Candles burned in black iron braziers. A soft beating came from the other end of the room. Seated on a throne that seemed carved out of amethyst crystal, a giant, gaudy translucence of violet, bound to the throne by thin, gold chains, was a human corpse. Emrett stood with one witch-like claw on the corpse's frayed shirt, a single finger stroking one of its cufflinks. It was in the very last stages of decay, its hair hanging on to a nearly skinless scalp in tufts, but Cobalion recognized the clothing as that of Jonathan Rowell Cypress.
Around the throne were bodies, the corpses of those who had final misgivings, Cobalion thought. They seemed to have died while convulsing, their limbs tangled in odd sprawls, uniforms torn and covered in vomit. No doubt the Djinn could have willed them to die, if they had pledged to him before, but Cobalion guessed that he had made them take poison, dying before his puppet while it sat on its throne. It seemed to have been a thirsting poison; many of the people had their hands rigidly clasped together, as if they had died begging for water. The Djinn had finished the job of running mad.
Inside the translucent sheen of the amethyst throne Cobalion saw thousands of bloodied faces mashed together in a long scream of supreme agony, every bone in their faces broken a frozen howl of pain. Jellied eyes spun about in crumpled sockets; crushed jaws mouth a torment without sound. His eyes turned away from the throne.
Cobalion opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted by a sound. It was like a stale rattle—a horrid, empty noise. It filled the room like a chorus, echoing off the walls. It was mocking laughter. Hollow, rotted sockets were all that remained of its eyes. Despite this, it stared at him with a fierce intensity. Cobalion felt the familiar demonic chill again; suddenly, the beating coming from the throne stopped.
"The Djinn is not here to entertain guests," said the Un-Cypress. Its mouth did not move, but nonetheless its voice creaked out like a draft through a gutted house. "He so seldom receives them."
From somewhere behind him came a stunning blow on the back of his neck. His fur legs buckled and he toppled forward. He burned out to cherub shape, wings shooting out to steady him, but an incredible weight came down on his back like a pile driver and pinned him down on his side. The wings flickered out and he was held down by iron-scaled arms that rippiled with power.
He could see their feet, like the clawed feet of hideous reptiles, and the red flicker of their blades; he could hear their sulfurous hissing. He looked up. At least a dozen demonic warriors surrounded him. They were towering, fierce, with glowing yellow eyes and dripping fangs, and they were sneering and gargling with laughter. Fuming anger arose. He daren't fight back, daren't spoil the plan. From a corner of the chamber, Jake was watching him with a startled awe that the boy was obviously trying to suppress.
Mayhap he knows my purpose.
"Here is the great donkey," the corpse said, the wretched laugh spilling out again. "The Djinn is away a-working, and I am left. What have you to say?"
"I come in the name of Arceus to consider your demands," said Cobalion. He appeared completely unafraid and there was a look to his sideways stare that made the Un-Emrett feel uneasy for no reason it could explain. "And here I am, and here you are. Djinn, your puppet doesn't appear much, does he? One frightened decaying man too weak to support his flesh without the help of chains."
"My dear," said the Un-Emrett, "become acquainted with the insolence of Cobalion."
"I understand!" roared the Un-Cypress. "Do not abuse my intelligence any longer. You stand there in your foolish innocence and prattle!"
"I come to discuss a treaty," said Cobalion, still forced on his side. "You don't know about the espionage we've done, nor the fighting qualities of our superb Aredians! We destroyed one of your feinting parties and killed Admin Eric while only losing a single man!"
"Make him afraid some more, Cobalion," called Jake. "I shouldn't enjoy this, but I find the pleasure impossible to suppress."
"Quiet, child," the Un-Cypress said. "Is it possible, Emrett? Could we be as simpleminded as this foolish emissary suggests? Does Arceus realize that He had allowed a boy to lead his armies?"
"Bronze Tercano is no longer a boy," said Cobalion. "Your men and demons were killed or scattered, and you, you old conniving beast, have no tricks we haven't seen before."
"Don't I?" said the Un-Cypress. The candles flickered once.
"You might," said Cobalion. His sweat was evaporating off his flanks in glowing threads. "I am curious about how you manage this puppet of yours, o great Djinn. Humor this poor messenger. What keeps it a coherent and suitable host for the grandest of the grand?"
"Be hush with your sarcasm," said the Djinn, the empty eye sockets of the body glowing faintly violet. "Yet no harm in humoring the soon-to-be-dead. Messenger! What a fine sacrifice your lord has given me. But I have separated him from the hand of fate and brought him into life everlasting."
At that moment Bronze's fear and need sparked in Cobalion's mind. With all his power he sent out a message between the worlds (concentrate, boy) and knew that his time was short before the storm came.
"So he lives with you?"
"In a way," said the Djinn. "His life was insured, as part of the agreement of possession. They gave me his body and my freedom. He lingers on the edge of death eternally; his mind is given to the sublime ecstasy of near-death."
Cobalion doubted if the brain of Cypress considered his current state to be any form of pleasure. "He's not dead?"
"No," the Djinn scoffed, "though he's been to my House Below. Does Bronze Tercano know you are here?"
"Yes," lied Cobalion.
The violet glow from its sockets ebbed, and then vanished. "Can you tell him to surrender at the price of your existence and the life of Moon Berlitz?"
Cobalion smiled up at the corpse with clear innocence. "I shall not do that," he said.
The Un-Emrett stumbled forward to stand beside the restrained Cobalion. "My lord," he pleaded, "I knew nothing of the False One's—"
"Interrupt me once more, Emrett," the Un-Cypress said, "and you will lose the powers of interruption forever." It kept its attention focused on Cobalion, studying him through decayed lids. "You will not, eh? Can you read in my mind what I'll do if you disobey me?"
"I cannot read your dark mind," said Cobalion, "but I don't need telepathy to see intentions. No doubt my annihilation will be exquisitely agonizing. In the end my exsanguinated body will lie shriveled among the pile of corpses that so decorates the foot of your throne."
The corpse growled. "Sheep-follower, your cause is hopeless. I have but to rally my forces and push back Tercano, and this universe will be reduced to—"
"It's not that simple," said Cobalion. He looked at Jake. "Ask him. Did he not free the mother and father of Bronze Tercano? Have you grown even lazier?"
"It is not wise to go against my desires," said the Un-Cypress. "You should not deny me the least thing."
"We come in thunder now," said Cobalion. "Even an Eclipse Lord may tremble before the Emperor of Logaria, for he has the strength of righteousness and heaven smiles upon him."
The rotted voice laughed again. "This play has gone far enough. I will take Tercano, his miserable mate and friends, this planet, and grind them to—"
The room rumbled and shook around them. There came a sudden cascade of dust behind the throne where the hutment was coupled by a walkway to the Temple. The abrupt flicker-tightening of skin pressure told of a wide-area shield being activated. Demons hissed out choking breath and moved to flank the decaying body.
"I told you," said Cobalion, his eyes meeting Jake's. "The Emperor comes."
...
Something dark and purple began to seep out of the corpse's eyes, nose, and mouth. It was like smoke, but thicker. It shimmered in the air above him like a cloud. The change was immediate. Color rushed back into the corpse's face; blood surged through its body. Fresh pink tissue filled the gaps where its skin had flaked away. Glistening knobs of white swelled up into its sockets. The emaciated torso spasmed, then expanded; the corpse lurched upward as it took in a gasping, choked breath. A violent, painful paroxysm of coughing forced collected dust to evacuate its lungs. Its arms lunged down to grab its throne and the chains snapped away.
So stood the Un-Cypress in front of his throne, right hand pressed to right ear, the servo-receiver there chattering its report on the situation. The Un-Emrett moved two steps behind its master. Demons were leaping to positions at the doors.
"We will fall back and reform," the Un-Cypress said. "Emrett, my apologies. These madmen are attacking under cover of a psychokinetic storm. We will show them a Djinn's wrath, then." He pointed at Cobalion. "We've no time to savor his flesh. Kill him and give his body to the storm."
As it spoke, Cobalion pushed his hooves off the floor and spun out of the demon's grasp, feigning terror: "Let the storm have what it can take!" he screamed. As he twisted to right himself he shoved his left flank into Darkrai's arms.
"I have him, my lord!" called Darkrai, his face still oozing red squibs of smoke from his duel with Cresselia. "Shall I dispatch him now—yaaaaaaah!"
He hurled Cobalion to the floor, clutched his left arm. His eyes shifted from blue to red as he stared at the smoking stump where his claw had been. Like a rolling orb of ball lighting Cobalion cut three demons lengthwise and then skewered Darkrai through the torso. The demon fell back with a gasp as the sacred sword withdrew from the slit-like hole it had made.
"You...you..." Darkrai collapsed and rolled sideways, a sagging mass of black energy head lolling and mess of white hair falling down. Before the other berserker-demons could move to intercept the god, Cobalion buried another sword-stroke in Darkrai's temple and another on his other arm, severing it completely. Darkrai's essence burned out and the demon blew into a cloud of rancid red smoke.
"These people are insane," the Un-Cypress snarled. "Quick! Emrett! Albans! Admin Harry! Into the shuttle. We'll purge this universe of every..."
"Hail, Jake Albans!" cried Cobalion, swiping his sword every way, that ancient murder-machine glowing strong as ever. "Hail, kill them all! For Logaria, for Tess, for the Original One, for your friends! Hear me, hear me! Leave not one of them standing! KILL THEM ALL!"
And so he did, the lost boy out of Mitis made by fire into a swordmaster, he who had now embraced, fully and with no regrets, the way of the gun and pulsesword. Springing with a yell from his place to cover behind a pillar, Jake picked off three laggard human guards and one demon that jumped into flesh-form at just the wrong moment. Another demon had a hellfire-rifle slung over one shoulder but never tried for it. Instead he raised his mottled, scale-covered arms—his head was vaguely doglike—and cried for quarter and parole. Mindful of all that had gone on here, not in the least how these demons had subsisted off the suffering of the collective human race, Jake gave him neither, although neither did he give the demon cause to suffer or time to fear his fate. Red smoke.
Cobalion swung his sword down on another wave of demons. A big, mocking face with amber saliva drooling from its mouth split in half like a vision of sheer horror. Jake steadied his chandler pistol, aimed with two hands, and fired a blast at the Un-Emrett and Cypress's heads. Both left a bloody red hole on their forehead like a gaping eye, but already they were in tidal motion, screaming as they fled down a passage, closing and jamming the doors behind them.
"We make our stand here, Jake!" shouted Cobalion when he saw that the boy meant to follow the Eclipse Lords. "I come in the name of Heaven to rescue you!"
"Did Bronze send you?" Jake shouted back as something sparkled to his left. A clump of blue energy bounced away from the space at the corner of the amythest throne and crackled as it touched the metal floor. The smell of burned insulation swept through the court.
"The shield!" one of the stunned officers shouted. "The outer shield is down! They..."
Jake leveled his gun on the officer's head, pulled the trigger, and watched as blood and hair flew. The trooper's hands shot out, the fingers spread against the gloomy ceiling, and he collapsed among the pile of victims at the throne's base.
"You waited mighty long..." said Jake, feeling a worrying ennui at the prospect of being rescued here and now, but his words were drowned in a metallic roaring as a frigate floating above them trembled and rocked.
"They've shot the nose off a ship!" someone called.
The beginnings of rain boiled through the room's high windows. Under its cover and at Cobalion's signal, Jake leaped on the god's unsaddled back, and held on as they charged for the outer door. He had never shot or stabbed while riding a mount before, but Cobalion's gallop was steady and Jake's hand sure.
All this in a few seconds. A demon-chief whirled at the sight of the charging duo and motioned his thralls. They jumped out of the rainy haze to attack. Jake fires with one hands and swings his sword with the other. Bones vaporized. Cobalion's sword ripped off four heads as the demon dukes threw themselves at him. At the end of the shuddering hall Cobalion reared up and smashed open the doors onto the teeming street outside. Grimacing, Jake turned and fired back at the dozens of demons pursuing them. The chandler pistol roared several times, razors of white fire licking from the end of its barrel, and red smoke mixed with the rain. A human guard died as a laser bolt went through the space above his eye. A lock of hair flipped on the back of his cap-covered head as the energy slug exited.
Cobalion burst out to the Distortion World's dubious daylight as another crash shook the throne hutment. The double doors he had banged open behind him were swaying wide, admitting wind-blown rain and the sound of demons shouting. The sight outside made Jake blanch: rain was falling in steady sheets from a range of clouds that were only the forerunners to a billowing wall of black. The heart of the storm was racing across the Plain of Discordia, its core wracked by internal flashes of light, sweeping aside picket drones and causing blue frigate shields to flicker and then go out. Artillery fire was being exchanged but Jake couldn't tell who was firing or exactly where.
He breathed in the air, coughed. There was too much nitrogen in the Distortion's World's atmosphere, but now it felt somehow purged, as if the storm was coming to wash away all the primeval defilement between the vortex and the Temple. A sudden swelling of his heart came when he remembered that it was the first rain he could remember feeling in a long while.
An observer would have momentarily seen a uniformed figure against the failing light, striking out with his pulsesword, as befitted his bloodthirsty training, to kill Alliance human and robot wounded. Then Cobalion took off to the sky, charging through a greenish-grey haze of falling water and dust toward the eastern arc of the storm, blade shining, Jake ready to cover their retreat.
...
"Why didn't they stop us?" said Jake, seeing demons emerge from Otherworld all around them, looking some eye to eye. They were newcomers to the war effort. He had never seen such size, strength, and brazenness in the usual rank-and-file imps, but for now both Cobalion and the demons were staying apart, swerving around thunderclaps that Cobalion saw charging up. Jake's eyes were blinded by the force of the almond-sized raindrops that would soon be strong enough to knock him off Cobalion's back. He hugged the god's torso with both hands, staying low, his face in the nape of Cobalion's neck.
"They tried," said Cobalion, but his heart was doubtful. The command to be the false envoy had come from Arceus Himself, one of the few direct commands he had received, and he had fought with all the power of heaven. Yet it should not have been enough against millions of demons, nor even the Un-Emrett, which had many hexes that would lay even an eloha low. Against the will of the Djinn they flew through the sky like the horse-lords of old Hisui, and Cobalion wondered why they were free.
Another second later and he saw that they weren't. One huge, warty demon pounded his iron fist into Cobalion's torso and sent him spinning into the air where another demon intercepted him with a swat of his sword, carving a deep gash in his back. Jake shot wildly. Cobalion fluttered and tumbled in a daze, into the clutches of two more demons with iron-gauntleted fists. Jake shot them both and they jerked back in the air like boys caught stealing from a candy jar, then dissolved. Cobalion grunted and then made up the time he had lost with a sudden burst of speed.
Delayed pursuit, then.
"We're going into the heart of the storm," said Cobalion. "Hold on and you won't die."
Jake looked back and what he saw through the rain made his eyes go wide. The camps at the end of the Plain before the temple hill were in violent chaos. Dark orange artillery blasts and Hyper Beams launched from behind the advancing storm had swung through tents and rickety barracks. Some huts were being blown away in the wind. Twenty Eclipse frigates were tipping forward with heavy damage to their nose cones. He saw a volley of missiles strike the glowing streak that was the observation deck of another Alliance craft. The front of its hull ripped itself apart, sending hunks of metal and burning shrapnel everywhere. People ran for cover as the ruined gunships started to plow nose first into the gatherings of hutments.
Cobalion swooped left to avoid a laser pulse from the storm ahead. The blast went streaking by with a hissing crackle as the rain evaporated in its path. Jake gasped for breath as they flew through streams of ion-energized air, dodging flaming debris and burning wreaths of fuel. The black bulks of oncoming Association frigates appeared in snippets as the lightning showed made contrast between them and the roiling clouds. A cloud hung low over the outside world blowing from the vortex's unknown distance.
Below them on the plain, static lightning crackled from the cloud and the spark flashes of shields being shorted out by the storm's charge could be seen through the haze. The plain surged with figures in combat: Eclipse mercenaries and leaping, gyrating robed men who seemed to come down out of the storm. To Jake's shock and everlasting joy, out of the rain haze came an orderly mass of flashing shapes: great rising curves with crystal spokes that resolved into the gaping mouths of a Steelix, one Steelix, another, a massed wall of them, each with troops of Aredians and Rorians riding to the attack. They came at the camps in a hissing wedge, robes whipping in the wind as they cut through the melee on the plain.
All this was a frame for his frantic ride through the greatest typhoon the world had yet seen.
"They're through!" laughed Jake. "This storm is Bronze's doing, or I'm a grunt. Tercano, you clever man!"
"He's grown as you have grown," said Cobalion. "Uglier and uglier—"
"Shut up, you beloved flying bastard," said Jake. "Eyes on the storm, or you'll be a blue splat on some fast-flyer's windshield."
Onward toward the outer rim of the Temple, they came, while the Eclipse soldiers stood awed for the first time in their history by an onslaught their minds found difficult to accept. But the figures leaping from the Steelix backs were men and Pokemon, and the blades flashing in that ominous dark grey light were a thing their Great Djinn had trained them to face. They threw themselves into combat. And it was man to man on the Plain of Discordia in the heart of the storm, while the Great Era drew to a close and the story drew near its end.
All while a picked force of operatives drew the Un-Cypress and Emrett into the heart of the Djinn's Fast, preparing to die as part of their shields. All while the Djinn spun his threads that were slowly eating at the walls of reality.
...
A swarm of demons was beginning to trail them. They were making good time, but looking back Jake could see an oncoming legion of demons in hot pursuit, the glimmer of their fangs and the red flicker of their blades filling the sky. Behind them was the ebbing purple thrum of the Djinn's Forge; beyond even that was the bellowing form of Giratina lashing at another creature, his black, clawed tendrils tearing gaps in the haze of clouds before twisting around the other being's green, sinuous body. Jake saw through gaps in a screen of white ozone a tripartite claw, a fanged mouth with a tongue the color of lozenge, and orange dragon's eyes that burned with the light of Arceus.
"Rayquaza is fighting Giratina beyond the Temple," said Cobalion. "He won't win against the Great Demon Lord, but he'll delay, give Bronze more time to advance."
In Cobalion's eyes, the orb of demons had kept staunch around the Temple. It remained where it was, covering the Djinn. Only a small contingent of demonic warriors had been sent to chase after Cobalion or any other angel fighting with the Rorians. Demons dove down from all sides, shifting from enfleshed to unseen, their red swords gleaming, and engaged the heavenly warriors in fierce dogfights, the blades singing, droning, and clashing metallically with bursts of sparks. Individual duels were separated from each other as the rain and cloud blocked sight.
The god made a sharp left turn, his sword flashing, hacking his way through demon interceptors until he could work his way to Bronze's frigate. But the heavenly warriors trying to keep the demons from reaching Cobalion were being cut away. Jake looked just in time to see one huge spirit pounce with bared talons on top of a warrior like a hawk on a sparrow, knocking the angel senseless, making it flutter down into the swirling melee below. Another skirmish high above and to the left ended in a cry of pain from another warrior who went into a crazy spin, one ichor-stained wing shredded, and was launched into the side of a mountain. The ringing clashes of blades echoed all around, Cobalion slashing and Jake shooting. There went a demon, disappearing in a trail of ghastly smog. Another angel fell toward the plain floor, still holding his sword but listless and stunned, his demon pursuer right behind him.
The warriors of Hell finally began to break through and reach them. One reached the invisible warrior right behind Cobalion and knocked him away. Jake didn't have time to think another thought before his own pulsesword went up to fend off the powerful blow of a spirit at least equal to himself in strength. Jake swung at its slobbering face, screaming in terror and rage, returned the blow, their swords locked for a moment, arm against arm, and then Jake made good use of his pulsesword's shock function. His massive charge went into the demon's ratlike face and set the space behind its eyes on fire. He gasped as the charge went backward from the pulsesword's tip and entered his rain-soaked arm. The demon went trembling down, its face caved in.
Cobalion lurched in a swooping dive again and Jake saw that a cluster of demons were harrying him from the left. He looked around for help and saw more fangs and yellow eyes than friends. A huge blade swept downward over his shoulder, and he parried it off but nearly lost his hold on the water-slick grip of his blade. Another one thrust toward his midsection, and he shot a round that shattered the weapon into pieces and went straight through its lizardlike wielder, creating a wound that wheezed out crimson steam. The creature spun away.
A fragment of the shot-up sword flew toward his cheek and hacked the flesh open in a red trail. His hand clasped to his face in shock, losing part of his precarious hold on Cobalion. For a moment he looked like a man who had just forgotten something important, then the pain arrived, a pain like his entire cheek had been flayed. His eyes were overcome with tears and rain. Another jerk in their flight. The glowing red shard of the sword fell out but the wound remained, a winding gap like a vine that bled fiercely.
Scar, he thought dumbly.
A blow! He didn't see it coming and had no idea who had struck it, but it stunned him. He lost his grip on Cobalion, saw the battlefield spinning far below, saw the earth, the sky, the earth, the sky. He was falling. Cobalion dove and glided downward like a sleek leaf on the wind. From up above Jake heard a bloodcurdling howl. He looked up through the stinging rain. This must be the one who had struck him, a huge, bulb-eyed nightmare with reptilian skin and serrated wings.
Cobalion caught him by biting his side, and Jake yelled as the white teeth tore away the sodden uniform cloth and went into flesh. Another half-barrel spin made his position change and he heaved a leg over the god's flanks, slamming himself back on Cobalion with a force that felt like a frozen sledgehammer to his crotch. Suddenly he was furious at his own agony, a four-part blaze in his hip and shoulder and cheek and balls.
"There's nothing left of me!" he gasped. The delirium was so thick that he felt he ought to play the part of a desperate, frightened boy with the wind knocked out of him. "I'll have nothing left!"
"Come, come," muttered Cobalion, waiting for the floating demon to pounce.
It dove straight at him, its jaws gaping, its fangs glimmering, a wide, flat blade with a keen edge flashing. Cobalion waited to move. The thing raised its sword high and brought it down with a force that cleaved through the rain. Cobalion was suddenly three feet away from where he had been, and the blade continued on its way without their having met, the demon somersaulting wildly after it. Cobalion made a blinding sweep with his own sword and dewinged the demon, then finished it.
The boiling trail of red smoke cleared away from Jake's eyes just in time for him to see the demon's disintegrating body crash onto the hull of a ship that emerged from the gloom. Cobalion weaved toward, cutting down three streaks of red-accented black, ducking under half a dozen missiles that launched from a turret on the frigate's rain-slick hull. Now it was Jake's own blood that poured into his eyes, making them sting, the wounded side of his face a carved-up mask of water and red.
Bronze. Tess. Arceus. Cypress. The Steelix. Bronze. Tess. Arceus. Cypress.
The thoughts went around and around as he saw the distance to the frigate ebb. Demons were foaming and frothing, wailing and hissing. Cobalion was breathing as fast as he could, giving every last shred of strength, his own wounds bleeding shining silver blood that stained the rest of his body. And then Jake saw the service hatch.
"I think we're going to make it!" he said.