Interceptor's Wish

by Masterdude21

What started as a young man's search for his abducted mother spirals out of control. Soon, he is fighting a desperate war for survival against greater odds than a more generous God would have allowed. The enemy is everywhere and allies are far too few. With the entire region at stake, who can prevail when fate itself seems set against you? - Novelization of Pokemon Rejuvenation.

34. To The Grave

AN: There we go, the actual finale to the climactic confrontation on Valor Mountain. Holy moly this one took me a long time to get right. This entire chapter is one big chain of events that, part for part, I needed to get just right. I won't get into the specifics, but know that this took some serious out-of-the-box thinking to get done.

Alright. People, let's rock.

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Chapter 8 – Those we Lose

To The Grave

Will and Venam were nearly at the summit and Team Xen had yet to throw their reserves at them. They had yet to send Giratina to deal with the incursion. The total lack of opposition as they headed up was puzzling…and more than a bit disturbing.

They headed through the entrance and into a temple of sorts. A massive door decorated with the sigil of the Garufa towered up ahead, though the final road to the summit snaked above and beyond it.

Melia stood in front of the door. Her arms hung by her side and she had clenched her hands into fists. She didn't hear them enter.

Seeing Melia standing around and not paying attention drove Will up the wall; what if they were Xen reinforcements? What if they were Sharon and Eli going in for a stealthy approach? What if -

"Melia!" Venam shouted.

Her voice startled Melia and she whipped around, her hand going for one of her Pokeballs. When the blonde saw who it was, though, her eyes widened in surprise. "Venam? Will?" She took a hesitant step back.

"Did you seriously come all this way by yourself?!" Venam demanded. "What about the plan?"

Which…yeah, Will didn't appreciate that Melia had so easily decided to go her own way, either. The plan was already going off-rails in so many ways, but if Melia had been there where he expected her to be, perhaps things would have been better.

"I couldn't find you guys when I entered the mountain," Melia said. "I tried looking, but I couldn't find anyone no matter what. Then I got to thinking…"

Venam groaned with frustration. She marched across the bridge towards the hesitant blonde and Will fell in step with her. "So what, you think you have to do this alone?" Venam demanded.

Looking hurt, Melia cast her eyes to the ground. "I'm tired of dragging other people into my problems," she whispered. "I've…" she turned away and took a deep, shuddering breath. Will could see the exact moment where she steeled herself and shoved her feelings away. He could see it, because he'd been doing the exact same thing himself, every thirty seconds for the past hour. The difference was, he seemed to be a bit of a natural at it, and he'd flooded his system with addictive combat stimulants to boot.

Even he hadn't been able to fool everyone, so Melia stood no chance.

"I've fought my way up to this point of the mountain," Melia said. "I can keep going."

"Oh yeah?" Venam challenged her. "Then why haven't you?"

Melia stiffened at her words.

"Eli and Sharon said you got past them a while ago. I'd imagine you'd already be up there at the Summit by now. WEIRD, huh?"

Silence. Then…

"I thought I could convince myself that I could do this if I made it all the way up here on my own," Melia whispered. She turned back to face them and Will saw the terror and guilt simmering in her eyes. "But I can't bring myself to take another step," she admitted. "Venam…Will, I'm scared."

It was a heart-wrenching thing to see, watching Melia come to that realization.

"I don't know what's going to happen, and I don't know what I'm supposed to do," Melia continued with a frantic undertone to her otherwise soft voice. "I'm afraid and I want this to end."

"Melia, you're an idiot!" Venam snapped before Will had the chance to think about what Melia needed right now. "You think we came up here just to bring you back down? Everyone who followed you up to this point has followed because they believe in you!" She continued furiously. "No, that's not even fuckin' true. They believe in US. Please put your pride aside for a moment and realize that we've decided to help you. If we go down, it's not your fault! We decided to scale this dumbass mountain. Do you have any idea how much amok we've caused getting to you? The kinds of hell Will raised in your absence? Holy fuck Melia!"

"You…you've all decided that you want to help me?" Melia said hoarsely.

Holy fuck Melia summed it up nicely, Will believed. He thought he'd made his stance on this clear with her, but it seemed she didn't quite get it yet. "We are going to do this together," he said. "And we'll all go home."

Sounding on the edge of tears, Melia said, "You guys…thank you for everything, and I'm sorry. Sorry that I was too prideful to even accept your help. You've worked so hard on planning this whole thing and I nearly threw that away."

"Right," Venam said approvingly. "Now that's all settled, what do we do? Should we head up there immediately?"

They couldn't afford to wait; Team Xen could start funneling reinforcements in at any moment.

"There's no point in waiting," Melia agreed. "We should confront them head-on. We've overcome so many obstacles to get here. I won't let things end badly for us. We're going to win, and we're going home together!"

"Hell yeah!" Venam whooped. "Team Xen is going down!"

They headed out together. While Will struggled to wrap his head around a way to get rid of Giratina, Venam brought Melia up to speed about some of the things she'd missed. " - which is where we found this creepy chamber where the Xen fuckheads imprisoned Amber and Tesla and - "

"You've found Tesla and Amber?" Melia said, her silver eyes wide with surprise. "Did you get them out? Are they safe?"

Venam rolled her eyes. "Yeah they're safe! I was just getting to that. This creepy room had some sort of sigil on the floor and a big mural with some cryptic-ass puzzle. It was all bullshit and then Will stepped into that sigil and freaking Kyogre appeared! Can you believe that?"

He saw the blonde do a double-take. "Kyogre? The Legendary Pokemon of the sea?"

"Heck yeah. And Will got it into his head that the Von Brandts were inside of that stupid thing and - "

Alarmed, Melia interrupted her. "Did Kyogre eat them? You said they were safe! Oh my god, did Will go inside - "

"Would you let me finish!" Venam snapped. "I'm trying to tell a badass story to get our blood pumping and our confidence high and shit."

"Sorry, sorry!"

"Right, so, Will realized that somehow, our hostages were stuck inside Kyogre so he had me keep the thing distracted while he and his team went on the offensive, like he does. So we throw everything we had and the kitchen sink at that thing to keep it in place while Blaziken and Nidoking start pulling its mouth open and Will reaches in - "

"He what?"

"And starts pulling people out of there! Living, unharmed, un-gooped people! Kyogre starts blasting and his Pokemon start blasting and Seviper had to keep him from falling in and getting eaten - "

"Oh my god - "

"But somehow, they managed to get Tesla and Amber and freaking Madelis out." Venam paused to take a breath. "We escorted them back to the exit. They're safe, yeah. And once we get your dad and Nim out, we'll have gotten everyone back."

Melia appeared thoughtful as she rolled a Pokeball in her hand. "You two fought a Kyogre to get our people out…I didn't even think that Team Xen had their hostages down there. I thought…everyone would be on the summit."

"You'll get your chance," Will told her. "They have Giratina, remember?"

"Yeah," Melia said, running a hand through her ponytail in a nervous manner. "And Geara, and Zetta…"

And whatever reserves they'd kept at the ready, but Will didn't think mentioning that would be good for Melia's nerves.'

"Do you…did you guys think of a plan, or something?"

"Plan?" Venam snorted. "I got a plan alright. We head up there and kick their asses between their ears. We whoop them into nothing. That's the plan!"

"Uh-huh," Melia hummed, not at all looking reassured by Venam's brilliant display of tactical cunning. She flicked her gaze to Will.

"For Giratina, yeah," he said. "For the rest…we'll have to see what the situation is like."

They didn't have time for any conversation after that. They made their way through the final tunnel and then finally, after all those days spent dreading this exact moment, reached Valor Summit.

"So this is the place?" Melia said as they stepped onto the edge of what looked disturbingly like an active volcano. Their battlefield was a massive, O-shaped section of rocks that surrounded a lake of fire and lava in its center. The southern part of that battlefield was another tactical nightmare; they would have to advance through scores of Xen grunts on their way up, fighting a literal uphill battle.

"Valor Summit huh?" Venam whistled. "Didn't think we'd see this place so soon. Where do we even begin?"

"With those two," Melia said. "There are two grunts guarding the staircase to the very top of the mountain."

Venam scowled heavily. "Dang, I was hoping we'd be able to just walk in and fight. It's kind of cheating to whittle down your opponent before they even arrive."

"Well, they are trying to kill us," Will said. "Did you expect a fair fight?"

She sighed. "I guess not. Our whole "overwhelming force at the weakest point" shtick wasn't exactly fair either."

"Hm…actually, I'm going to try out an old trick Emma taught me," Melia said thoughtfully.

Emma. Melia's ruthless, merciless alter-ego. In a way, Emma had excelled at the things Melia never would have. Deceit. Manipulation. A knife wielded with ruthless intent. Had hiding herself behind the mask of another personality made it easier to perform deeds she would have scoffed at herself?

Maybe he was overthinking it.

"Emma?" Venam asked, cocking a questioning eyebrow.

"Oh, she's not a real person - " Melia hurried to clarify. "Here, just take a look."

They did.

And it was brilliant.

They crept closer as Melia started doing her thing. Will could hear the two Xen grunts deep in conversation. Stupid and unaware. Just the way he liked them.

"And I was telling Geara that I didn't like mayonnaise because it was just too sour."

"Mm, yeah. I feel that. It's also hard to get out of your hair if - huh?"

They stopped and stared at the blond girl brazenly marching up the stairs.

"Wait a minute, that's Melia, isn't it?"

"Mm, no, I think that's Maybele from that magazine I was reading earlier."

"Oh, yeah, she kinda does look like her. Get out of here, Maybele…actually, on closer inspection, I think this is actually Melia!"

A gasp of shock. "Yeah, I knew that! Melia! We've been waiting for you! Zetta and Geara have been waiting up here for ages - Wait, what?"

Melia screeched wildly and knocked them both out with a sudden pulse of black energy. It swept them off their feet and flung them down the stairs, but Will was pretty sure they'd been unconscious before they hit the deck.

Seeing her victims down for the count, Melia started snarling and dancing in delight.

Watching her move like that was…interesting, to say the least.

"Wow, they fell for it!" Venam said as she, Will and the actual Melia walked up the stairs to catch up.

"Are you surprised?" Melia laughed. "Despite Zoroark's…interesting tendencies, he's usually really good at mimicking people."

Venam crossed her arms and gave Will a very pointed look. "Valor Mountain to Will? That's the real one."

Seeing the two Melia's side-by-side, Will did find it really hard to find any flaws in Zoroark's disguise. It was just…well, Zoroark was really enthusiastic about being Melia. "I know," he said somewhat sheepishly.

"Almost indistinguishable! Almost," Melia amended. "You've done well, Zoroark. Return!"

They headed up Team Xen's final fortress. Not one to walk onto a battlefield without any plans of himself, Will took a moment to put the final pieces of this assault into place. During the planning phase with Crawli, everybody had soon realized that rescuing hostages required a mind-boggling amount of speed, coordination and planning. The idea was to force the enemy onto the backfoot, force them to defend themselves while friendly forces seized the initiative.

Now more than ever, the plan called for aggression and pressure. Will believed he knew how to achieve that.

One final effort. It was time to give this last fight everything he had. He just needed to get a few things readied beforehand.

At the top of the mountain, none other than Zetta himself waited for them. The spiky-haired bastard stood a few meters away from the stairs, calmly regarding them as Will and Venam fanned out in a loose semi-circle. Venam to the left, Melia to the right, him in the middle.

"Zetta," Melia said with disdain.

Zetta scoffed. "Took you long enough. And by the looks of things, you aren't here to surrender yourself? Those poor grunts didn't even see it coming."

"No, and I never plan on surrendering myself," Melia bit at him. "I will go down fighting to the bitter end!"

Now that was a mentality Will could get into. He scanned his surroundings while Melia kept the bastard talking. He spotted the tallest point of Valor Mountain on the other side of the lake of fire. He spotted a lone figure standing on top of it. Geara, he'd assume. And to the right…

Nim. Wrapped up in chains and dangling from a metal hook like she was some sort of object. Like Team Xen didn't even see her as a human.

I'm going to get you, Nim.

"Hehe. But of course," Zetta grinned at Melia. "That's just in our nature, isn't it?"

Will slowly followed the chains along the metal railing Nim was suspended from. He saw the chains ending in some sort of contraption. wrapped around a wheel. If he could get someone over there, they could probably drag her to safety using that wheel.

Of course, since they had nobody guarding that particular spot, Will would assume it wasn't that simple. His gut told him that Xen had a trap waiting for him, but he just couldn't see it.

"Just like you, I won't give up until the bitter end either," Zetta continued. "Let's even up the playing field!"

A piercing shriek that came from everywhere around them. A shadow blurting across the battlefield was all the warning Will got before something massive slammed into him. He caught a glimpse of shadowy claws raking at his chest before Froslass exploded outwards from around his body, unleashing a blast of ghostly, shadowy energy that narrowly kept Giratina from disemboweling him.

His body tumbled through the sky but that lasted seconds before Pidgeot swept down from above and snatched him from the air. He hooked his great talons around Will's shoulders with incredible precision and pulled him up. His talons unhooked and Will felt the world swirl around before Pidgeot shoved his neck in-between his legs and picked up speed. Will wrapped his arms around the graceful flier's neck and before he knew it, the volcano plummeted away into the distance as Pidgeot shot into the sky.

Giratina soared after him with a spectral scream. The chase was on.

Just as he'd hoped.

Of course the bloodthirsty psychos wouldn't pass up the chance to get rid of him. They needed Melia alive and they hadn't clashed with Venam nearly as often before. No, of all three of them, Will was the biggest, easiest target.

The ranged offensive Giratina could bring to bear against him was immense. Its Ghost-type attacks wouldn't hurt Pidgeot, but since the damn thing was also part Dragon-type, he couldn't expect Pidgeot to be able to handle it.

Time to improvise, then.

"Froslass, give our guest a warm welcome!" Will yelled. "Stay close to Pidgeot and use Icy Wind on his wings!"

Froslass spread her arms and breathed frozen air as she clutched to Pidgeot's feathery coat. An arid location like right on top of the volcano wouldn't have much water in the air to freeze into projectiles - making this an excellent location to lure Angie to and beat her, he noted - but that did limit their own offensive capabilities. As it was, Froslass created several "road-blocks" of frigid air that forced Giratina to either risk subjecting himself to or veer around. Water or no water, temperatures far below zero were still dangerous to Pokemon if their biology wasn't adapted to them. Giratina, being part-Dragon, did not appreciate subzero temperature at all.

Will noticed that Giratina did just that; using its head as a battering ram of sorts, it accelerated and charged through the clouds of frigid air. It gathered Ghostly energy to itself and then spewed a trio of Shadow Balls after them. The spherical balls of destructive energy weren't limited by things like air drag and gravity and shot towards them with alarming velocity.

"Use Pidgeot as cover!" Will ordered.

Froslass immediately became immaterial and flickered from view. Pidgeot gave a cry of annoyance when one of the spheres washed across his right wing. Still, the energy that would have ripped Froslass to shreds seemed to ground itself around Pidgeot's wing, sloughing off of his form like droplets of water across a rainproof jacket.

"More Icy Wind! Keep hitting the bastard!" Will shouted. He ordered Pidgeot into an elliptical ascent and soon, Giratina was back on their trail, firing Dragon Pulses as he went.

But constantly charging through those pockets of freezing, sub-zero air was taking its toll. Slowly, he saw the Legendary Pokemon's movements becoming slower and more sluggish. It was still dead-set on biting their collective heads off though, as it kept up his pursuit.

Geara on the prowl, no doubt.

Two could play that game.

"Higher Pidgeot! Aim for that cloud above!" Will ordered. Pidgeot beat his wings faster. The temperature dropped like a rock around him as well and slowly, Will found that getting enough air into his lungs was starting to become a real pain. His breathing, which had been so steady before, slowly turned into a pitched gasping as they climbed into the sky.

Sunlight washed over Will's body as Pidgeot plunged through the clouds "Froslass, Blizzard," Will gasped. "Pidgeot…w-whirlwind!"

He felt the very air around him shudder as Froslass gathered her strength. Pidgeot pulled a turn that was so steep that it would have torn a passenger jet in half. As it was, he very nearly tore Will off his back as he pivoted in the air and readied himself to unleash a galestorm upon his foe.

Beating him to the punch, Froslass unleashed a frozen hell upon the devil chasing them. The resulting storm rushed through the sky like a shockwave. Her Blizzard snap-froze the clouds below them solid an instant before Giratina could plunge through it. Instead of parting through the cover of the clouds like Pidgeot had, it smashed itself against an entire plateau of falling ice.

The ice shattered with the sound of cannon and Giratina flew up through the resulting cloud of shards. At that precise moment, Pidgeot battered the Legendary with a Whirlwind that turned the falling cloud of ice into a hailstorm. An absolute storm of razor-sharp fragments caught Giratina by surprise.

And Froslass, having learned from the sole authority of killing things with ice, turned the cloud of frozen weapons against Giratina. Hundreds of deadly shards of ice pelted the cumbersome Legendary. Will wondered if the resulting rain of blood would have bothered Melia. He knew it would bother Venam, but he'd cross that bridge when he came to it. He was pretty Crescent had burned that bridge for him already, but that didn't matter either.

Giratina screamed and writhed and bled.

And then the fucking thing popped like soap bubble. No viscera, no gore, not even a hint of bloodshed.

Will knew that Fate wasn't kind enough to give him a victory without making him sacrifice more of himself. Giratina would be back.

But that would be a problem for future-Will. Present-Will had to get back down before he choked. Or froze. Or possibly both. "Get us down," he choked out, swiftly recalling Froslass with numb fingers.

Pidgeot dove.

Will wasn't sure how long the combat drugs would last. His head was starting to pound and a slight tremble had crept into his fingers. He knew that he'd picked up a few cuts and bruises in the fighting and he also knew that he hadn't noticed them. What other kinds of injuries had he sustained without noticing? Fuck, he'd taken a few tumbles. Was he bleeding inside? Surely a legal combat stimulant wouldn't be that powerful, to numb the effects of something like internal bleeding?

You're freaking out over nothing, he thought. Stop, Focus. Act. Freak out later.

Pidgeot brought him back to the spot where Giratina had ambushed him before. He hopped off and recalled the graceful flier, whispering a quick "thank you" as he did. He was unsteady for a moment, his knees shaking as a weird numbness came over him. It passed a few seconds later though and he hurried up the stairs where he'd last seen Melia and Venam confronting Zetta.

He sent out Kirlia next, although he did allow himself to sag in relief when he saw his friends were alive and kicking. The girls were still there. A pair of unconscious Xen grunts lay sprawled at their feet. They were panting, and Venam sported a new set of fresh cuts, but they were otherwise unharmed.

"Will!" Melia exclaimed upon seeing him emerge. "You're okay!"

"I told you!" Venam said with a grin. "I said Will would be alright. He's very hard to get rid of."

Not sure if that was a compliment or not, Will simply rolled his eyes and glanced at Kirlia. "How many of them are there?"

Kirlia closed her eyes. Her one intact horn began glowing red. Lines of purple static crackled across her damaged one. Her expression tightened, as if she was in pain, but she maintained her focus.

"Yeah, you're right," Melia quickly said. "But I couldn't help but worry…I mean, it is a Legendary Pokemon. Giratina's power is something else. Regardless! Will, we're all here and ready to continue forwards!"

"Too bad Zetta's a coward and left us here with these grunts," Venam spat, stepping aside to gesture at the unconscious bodies."He bolted."

"He wouldn't fight us all outright. That's why he's trying to whittle us down with these lower grunts," Melia explained. "But what he didn't count on was the ton of healing supplies I stocked up on just before this!"

As they sprayed the worst of their Pokemon's injuries, Kirlia finished etching the position of Zetta's hidden ambushes into an overlay on the ground. Will counted at least ten more of the bastards, including several he hadn't even seen himself. They weren't doing anything at the moment though, which meant he could safely ignore them for now.

"We gotta keep up the momentum! If we do, we may be able to rush them down!" Melia said. "Zetta and Geara's power is not to be taken lightly."

"Yeah, and also…don't forget that this is a hostage situation," Venam said, wincing. "I bet they can drop Nim in that pool of lava whenever they feel like it."

"That won't happen," Will sharply said. "Venam, you and I will keep them occupied. Melia, you get her out."

As one, they stormed forwards. Any and all doubt and fears that might have impeded him fell away into a haze as he sprinted. Behind him, Melia and Venam fell in line. He seized his Pokeball and called Blaziken and Fraxure to him as well. He glanced aside and saw that Melia did the same with Hapi and Meganium.

A pair of Xen grunts sprang at them from a boulder in a classic ambush. Will had seen them on Kirlia's map before and he was about to direct Blaziken to engage their Pokemon when Venam suddenly yelled, "You guys go ahead, I'll hold them off!"

"B-But-!" Melia protested;

Already, Venam had Nidoqueen and Seviper out and ready to fight whatever these bastards would throw at her. "I'm the weakest of us three. You guys go get the hostages! Stick to the plan damnit!"

Will didn't need to be told twice. Up ahead, Geara's Dragonite appeared on the horizon, inbound at an incredible velocity. An attack run, no doubt. Pinpricks of light erupted from Dragonite's form as he unleashed some form of incredible violence at them.

Hapi lagged behind while Meganium came to a rough stop and braced herself. Hapi gathered a large amount of energy in the form of an orb of pink energy.

Fire and heat washed over them as Meganium's protective screens barely held back a multi-pronged stab of lightning from Dragonite.

Hapi fired. His Moonblast streaked into the sky, leaving a glimmering trail of Fairy-type energy. It splashed across Dragonite's chest right as it was about to smash through Meganium's shields with brute force. He tumbled and lost altitude, then recovered - but his hind leg scraped across the ground and he spun end over end.

An Absol leapt into the fight and carved several blades of dark energy through the sky. Blaziken leapt high in the air, vaulted over the Night Slash and punched several clouds of fire at Absol, but it avoided the incoming fire. Blaziken came down on the ground, rolled with the momentum and came up kicking. Her blazing leg swept over a Gengar's head as it quickly melted away into a shadow that darted across the battlefield.

Fraxure skidded to a halt, found Zetta and then unleashed an orb of Dragon Rage at the blond-haired bastard. Grimmsnarl leapt upwards and took the blast straight to his cheat. The resulting blast of draconic energy nearly flung his Marowak to the ground, but Grimmsnarl was completely untouched.

Damnit, so Xen already had their full teams out to support them?

"Huh…? Wow, I'm impressed," Zetta said, sounding and looking decidedly unimpressed. "Giratina couldn't handle William? What good is a Legendary Pokemon if it can't even keep some teens in line?"

"Everything about us is not of the ordinary!" Melia shouted back. "I'm sure you can agree."

"I suppose you're right," Zetta said with a shrug. "Extraordinary conditions attract extraordinary people."

Will couldn't muster a response. There was so much to keep track of, so much more important things that demanded his attention. The bend in Blaziken's legs as Krookodile emerged from the ground and swung a massive slab of rock at her. The way Zetta's Type:Null crashed into Fraxure's body, which the Dragon-type took without flinching. The way Melia's Meganium tanked through Gengar's Shadow Ball and Hapi struggled to avoid a blast of fire from his Clefable.

"Zetta, your banter is embarrassing!" Geara snapped. "Just let it go!"

"I'm not seeing you doing anything useful!" Zetta whipped back.

Geara's Minoir pelted Fraxure with clouds of rocky shards at high velocity and a Night Slash from his Weavile narrowly missed Hapi's face.

"You are not in a position to talk down to me! Melia, you are not getting away from us this time! We are playing to win!"

Typhlosion roared and the fire on his back erupted in a conflagration of fire. It washed across the battlefield and forced Blaziken to disengage to a safer distance.

"What are you talking about!" Melia demanded.

Despite the intensity of the ongoing battle, Geara grinned. "We've prepared a large amount of backup in secret. They are ordered to stand by unless Zetta and I happen to be defeated. So even if you win against us, there's no way you'll be able to take on everyone here. Your fate was set the moment you stepped foot onto this infernal mountain."

Blaziken threw herself into a spinning Blaze Kick that nearly took out Grimmsnarl. The hulking Fairy-type enveloped itself with its prehensile, sharpened hair and it would have perforated the limbs of any Fighting-type, but the flames that Blaziken called forth with her Blaze Kick were immense. Her feathery coat never made contact with the sharpened hairs and the explosion of fire flung Grimmsnarl off his feet.

Will felt a deviant laugh threatening to climb out his mouth. "We saw them! They won't help!"

"Keep telling yourself that, you fuck! You're not leaving this mountain alive William! I'm going to kick you down into that lava if it's the last thing I do!"

Will didn't respond to that. He needed to focus, and what would the point be anyway? Nim was right there, right there. She was all that mattered.

"Even still! With the odds stacked against us, we won't give up!" Melia said defiantly.

As they fought, Will noticed something strange. A red dot flickered across Zetta's body, circling around his chest before finally resting somewhere where his heart wound be.

Was that a -

A yellow blast of energy split the air and struck the Xen Admin head-on.

- targeting laser?

Zetta stumbled back, his reaction far too slow and delayed for someone who'd just been nailed with a powerful pulse of electricity. He clutched his chest and collapsed with a scream, prompting Geara to look up in alarm.

A second targeting laser appeared, this time on Geara's chest.

"A reticle?" Geara cried out. "But - Giratina, Shadow Force, now!"

A shadow engulfed Geara a split-second before a second lance of energy blasted the air he'd just occupied. The bastard had teleported away, but he would be close, Will knew that. As it was, all of the opposing Pokemon scattered, either diving for cover or disengaging to get to safety.

"Who - ?" Melia yelled. She looked up. Will followed her gaze.

"Such a shame, I should have been faster," Professor freaking Jenner whooped as he rode Klinklang into battle. Where the hell had he come from? Oh, it didn't even matter, they had reinforcements!

"Geara, Geara, Geara," Jenner chastised his unseen enemy. "If you're not going to play fair, then all bets are off. I refuse to sit idly by and continue to let you ruin lives! This is my final stand too!'

Jenner went nuts. Klinklang took to the air and started emitting lightning like he was a freaking thundercloud. Bolts of supercharged Zap Cannons lashed out across the entire volcano. It bought Venam the time she needed to disengage and she came hurrying up the mountain, yelling, "Guys, are you seeing this?! Professor Jenner is going haywire!'

"He is!" Melia said, as if she couldn't quite believe it herself. "He's incredible!"

"Will, Melia, Venam! Take this opportunity to save your friend! Nim, was it?" Jenner shouted at them. "My Lock On and Zap Cannon may be slow, but - "

"Dad! Thank you!" Melia shouted. "For everything!"

Jenner smiled, and it was the right smile, the way a father ought to smile at his daughter. "Don't thank me just yet. We still have jobs to do. Let's talk afterwards, okay?"

"O-Okay!"

Will couldn't believe this was happening. He felt hyper and giddy at the sheer dump of hope and relief that suddenly mixed with the swirling mess of adrenaline, stimulants and emotions that swept through his body. They were going to do it, they were going to get Nim and Jenner out!

Will recalled every Pokemon but Kirlia to ward off any surprise attacks and Froslass to keep suppressing the enemy. They hurried towards the locking mechanism on the far end of the crater, fighting a staggered fallback as Froslass and Kirlia blasted everything and anything that wasn't directly related to Melia by blood. Hapi and Seviper joined them and the resulting crossfire of Shadow Balls, Psybeam, Aura Sphere and Flamethrowers was absolutely hellish. They scorched the stones, blasted apart cover and generally caused an absolute spectacle.

Which ensured that nobody could get close enough to stop them from getting Nim back.

Maximum aggression. Will loved it when a plan got together.

"Hurry up, hurry up!" Venam antsily said, nervously wringing her hands as Melia tugged at the wheel connected to Nim's chain. "We're running out of time!"

Froslass and Kirlia rotated like the needles on a compass, firing Shadow Balls and Psybeams at transient targets Will didn't even see. Either Giratina was trying to manifest into reality again, or it was Geara's freaking Gengar. Will kept his head on a swivel, constantly scanning his surroundings while Jenner kept an overwatch.

Melia groaned in exertion as she pulled at the heavy wheel. Sweat dripped down her forehead as she struggled to get it moving. "I'm going as fast as I can! This thing is heavy!"

Clunk.

The chains stopped moving. Nim's petrified body came to a sudden halt, just out of reach.

"H-Huh?" Melia gasped. "Wait a minute…This thing won't budge anymore…I think it's stuck!"

"W-Wait! Up there!" Venam shouted.

Will looked up. As Kirlia and Froslass fought to keep the other Pokemon at bay, Giratina melted back into existence right behind Jenner. He heard Geara shout a curse of sorts at the Professor. Alarmed, Will yelled at the man to get out of the way and was ordering Kirlia to open fire on Geara when Giratina blew a hole the size of a dinner plate through Jenner's chest.

Jenner had the time to look down at himself in shock, fumble at the glowing remnants of his ribs and burning entrails before a second attack sent Klinklang and him plummeting.

He heard Melia screaming and he roared at his Pokemon to nail the bastard, but Giratina flickered out of existence again.

Will hadn't thought Jenner could have lived through an injury like that. It didn't matter in the end, as his lifeless body plummeted into the lake of fire in the center of the volcano anyway. They disappeared from view. By the time Melia dropped to her knees at the lake's edge, screaming her father's name in agony and horror, Jenner and Klinklang would be gone.

"This can't be happening…" Venam said in shock. She stared at the volcano, her eyes wide and dazed. "The Professor…Geara!"

Will's body moved before his mind had even processed the shock of losing Jenner. He was halfway through the third meter towards Zetta's body when Geara leapt down from some sort of shadowy pocket-dimension. Even as Zetta groggily rose, Geara plucked a remote from his pocket and pressed it.

The chain that kept Nim suspended over the volcano snapped. She fell.

Everything turned quiet.

Explosions could be loud. The screams of certain Pokemon and the impact of their attacks could be downright painful to hear.

But the soft splash of Nim's body falling into the lava was deafening. Pieces of the swinging chain dropped into the lake of fire as well. Half of Will's heart went with them.

A scream of anguish clawed its way up his throat. It got stuck there. Unable to fully escape.

It felt unreal. Disjointed. He couldn't believe it. Geara…Geara just murdered Jenner and Nim in the span of seconds. All of his planning. All of his tactics and the countless hours spent refining the three phases and now their loved ones were just…gone. Like dust in the wind.

Two lives gone. Just like that.

"This isn't happening," Venam choked out. "This isn't happening…this isn't happening…"

"I can't believe it…" Melia muttered in shock. "This wasn't supposed to happen…"

"Geara! Have you gone insane! What are you doing?!" Zetta screamed.

"You've all lost," Geara scoffed at them. "That's the price you pay. I'm tired of the games. Tired of my goals being delayed by brats. If you are all in the way, then there's only one option for you."

They talked. They spoke, but the words didn't register within Will's mind. Everything inside of him started screaming in red, raw agony, in hate, in sorrow. He was pretty sure their chances of getting out of this situation alive had just plummeted. He didn't care about that. He didn't care about anything anymore. The world was skewed. Blurry. It had gone wrong. All wrong. Will watched his future with Nim die before his eyes. It burned. Like she had. Like Jenner had.

His Pokemon weren't at their best anymore. Geara still had Giratina. Zetta still had his own Pokemon. Madelis was out there, somewhere. There would be Xen reinforcements coming up soon.

None of that mattered anymore. The only thing that mattered was the coldness of death and making sure he'd feed Geara's body to its abyss.

He moved forwards. Melia joined him. Venam cried for them to wait.

"There's no point anymore," Melia said with a trembling voice. Silent tears ran down her cheeks. "We should just defeat them once and for all. That, at least, will save a lot of people in the long run. So let's hurry up and just do this."

The battle erupted in earnest. The screams and the orders and the discharges of attacks and screams of fury and pain it…all became noise.

"I'll kick their fuckin' heads off for what they did to Nim and Jenner!" Venam seethed. She sent out her own Pokemon to join the fray.

The volcano became a nightmarish warzone. A dozen Pokemon fought each other in all-out combat, with the deaths of their trainers being the prize for failure.

Will knew it. Geara and Zetta knew it. But he would make them feel it.

"Not so energetic anymore?" Geara taunted. "Did you actually think saving Nim was a possi - "

Fraxure raged like a dam had burst within its head. He threw himself at Geara's Dragonite with a fury that bordered on insanity. The rage in his eyes…it was like gazing into a mirror. Watching a reflection of his own desires wading into the battlefield, ploughing into his enemies with berserk rage. Draconic energy enveloped Fraxure's body as he slashed wildly at the Dragonite. The shimmering after-images of burning claws trailed his movements.

"I designed the cable to become stuck at that point - you felt it, right? Felt it jam? If anyone tried to force it to move…a device I set up would snap the cable right in half!" Geara said.

Will tuned him out. He guided his Pokemon through the opposition like scythes through weed. As Typloshian nailed Venam's Venusaur with a immense wave of flames, Nidoking struck an Earth Powder and turned half the battlefield into a graveyard of spikes of blades. Down went Typhlosion. It could consider itself lucky; the burning spikes of rock that had slammed into its skull and throat simply knocked it out. Houndoom hadn't had that luck.

"You didn't tell me about that part!" Zetta cried out. "This isn't what we agreed upon - "

No more holding back. If Fate had wanted Nim so badly that Jenner had to die a gruesome death as well for her to be satisfied…she could have Geara.

Pidgeot buffeted Dragonite with a galestorm of wind, preventing the hostile Dragon from wreaking havoc from above. It kept Dragonite pinned - not a good place to be with a bloodlusted Fraxure on a rampage.

"What we agreed upon was to get Melia back to HQ. You won't complain when that happens, yes? You'll get what you've fought so hard for. Isn't that what you want?"

The heat of the mountain worked against them. Froslass was too slow, too sluggish to avoid a Shadow Ball from Gengar. At the same time, Venam's Toxtricity clashed with Zetta's Silvally. It exploded in a burst of electricity, but somehow Silvally just took the thunder without stopping. His bulk crashed into the Toxtricity and it crashed to the ground. It tried to get up, but a Stone Edge from Minoir put a halt to that.

"You…you've completely gone out of control."

Blaziken engaged Krookodile in a furious close quarters fight, but that damn Grimmsnarl kept intervening and Venam's Seviper wasn't able to get close enough. Gengar kept throwing Shadow Balls at it.

"Wrong, actually! I'm in complete control!"

Fraxure howled with pure, animalistic fury as he lashed out in blind rage. Attack after attack struck his armored hide. Bloody cuts and scrapes started appearing on his body. Fraxure didn't care. As he howled, he doubled-over, spasmed, and then vomited a wide, pulsating beam of draconic energy that carved a glowing fissure into the ground as he swept it upwards. Dragonite threw up his arms to protect himself and the impact of the Dragon Pulse splashing across its thick, armored scales was every bit as violent as Kyogre's Hydro Pump had been. It plummeted to the ground, burning.

"That's how it's been from the start. It's why I find Jenner's little act to be so amusing."

Blaziken slammed into Krookodile. Both Pokemon were big and strong and fought to kill the other. She crowded him against a boulder and drove her knee up into its belly, twice, hard enough to shatter the boulder behind it. Krookodile rammed its thick skull against her forehead and then wrapped its arms around her waist, driving her back.

With incredible reflexes, Blaziken hooked her arm around Krookodile's neck, dug her heels into the ground and brought the Ground-type to a rough halt. Krookodile rammed its fists into her sternum and Blaziken slammed her elbow down on its neck twice, before dropping into a low crouch and lifting the reptilian Pokemon into the air, still keeping its head and neck locked against her waist. She threw herself to the ground and suplexed Krookodile against the rocks with enough force to shatter rocks. As quick as lightning, she vaulted on top of his body and delivered a quick one-two combination of heavy punches at his face.

A second later, a Moonblast from Clefable threw her to the ground.

"To think he could turn the tide like that," Geara continued to laugh. "It's so incomprehensible that it's just so funny!"

"Geara…I have no words to express my extreme hatred towards you," Melia said in the quietest, coldest tone Will had ever heard out of her. "You are just absolutely…disgusting. For my dad…for Nim…we will defeat you here and now!"

Her Snorlax seized Typloshian in a punishing bearhug and began squeezing. Typloshian erupted in flames and the resulting explosion of fire consumed both Pokemon, shrouding them from view.

"Tch. If that's what you believe, then I greatly welcome the challenge!"

Will recalled Nidoking and sent out Kirlia instead. He didn't need a battering ram. He needed precision. A scalpel guided with lethal intent and psychic knowledge. "Kirlia, find Gengar. Burn it."

Melia's - Jenner's - own Noivern battered the opposing Absol with razor-sharp blades of wind. Absol sprinted across the battlefield, ducking and weaving through attacks while constantly flinging bursts of dark energy back. It struck Seviper when the Poison-type wasn't looking and the blast of scorching dark energy sent it careening into one of Nidoking's earth spikes.

A flash of motion, a dark shape blurring into existence right on top of him. Gengar morphed back into existence several meters away. Its grotesque face was a manic grin as it clawed at Will, a shadowy limb cutting through the air -

A blast of energy flung Will sideways and Gengar's surprise attack carved clean through the satchel he kept his Pokeballs in. They clattered to the ground together with Will.

Frantic, Will scrambled back to his feet as Gengar readied a lethal Shadow Ball -

And Kirlia did…something. It wasn't something he could follow with his senses. Not the normal, human senses anyway. Her horns glowed with such intensity that the light they gave off almost washed off of her like liquid. Purple energy crackled from the broken one and her scars were more pronounced than ever. Her eyes were wide and the look in her eyes wasn't so much hatred or murderous intent as it was something else, something Will's mind struggled to put into human concepts. Words and images flashed through his head; a carefully-crafted tone, every syllable put together with great thought and intent. A cutthroat razor dragged across an exposed eyeball.

She did something to Gengar, that much was certain. What she actually did was not. Gengar reached for its face and it began screaming in agony. It felt something or…or saw something and it set his mind on fire. It howled, rolled across the floor and clawed at its eyes.

With a graceful dignity and impossible calmness, Kirlia stepped towards Gengar. It had pressed its hands against its eyes as if trying to ward off something only it could see. It didn't even look at the Kirlia as it wordlessly screamed in agony.

Kirlia drew back a hand, a swirling mass of purple energy coalescing into her fist. Her eyes glowed eerily as she drove the maelstrom of wild, unrelenting Psychic energy into Gengar's face.

And the Ghostly assassin went slack.

Snorlax flung the Typhlosion's limp body towards Weavile before the slippery Ice-type could throw a Night Slash at the concentrating Kirlia. It deftly avoided the Fire-type, but it wasn't quite fast enough to dodge the second Fire-type that came bearing down on it.

Supernatural instincts made it realize that something was off and it leapt back before Blaziken could kick it down the damn mountain. The Blaze Kick missed it by a hair's breadth and then Grimmsnarl came charging in from the side. It tried to spear Blaziken with its prehensile hair and Blaziken quickly side-stepped the attack, Weavile came down from above with a Poison Jab, but Blaziken made use of her larger body and longer limbs by simply snatching Weavile by the throat. She slung Weavile overhead to the ground then whipped her elbow out to sweep aside a Sucker Punch from Grimmsnarl. The resulting opening allowed her to leap in the air and deliver a quick Jump Kick at the hulking Fairy-Type's chest, driving it back.

The fury that had driven Nidoking and Fraxure to a frenzy was different with Blaziken. The anger didn't use her like it did Nidoking. It didn't give her strength like it did Fraxure. Will believed that this was the first time he saw her be cold. She calmly strode after Grimmsnarl and then drove her elbow into its ribs with enough force to shatter some.

"Behind you!" Will yelled.

Weavile slammed its claws together into a Fake-out and the orange pulse of energy struck Blaziken in the curve of her back, sending her stumbling right as she was about to break something else in Grimmsnarl's body. Her cry could have been pain or outrage. It could have been surprise or frustration.

Whatever the emotion, it earned Weavile her undivided attention. Blaziken took three large steps towards Weavile, moving like a blur as she landed a quick jab at Weavile's throat, a second, more violent punch at the exact same spot and then a downwards punch towards the back of Weavile's head. The Ice-type staggered and Blaziken drove her knee into its sternum hard enough to send the Pokemon several feet into the air. One last hook to the skull ensured Weavile wouldn't be getting up for a long time.

Slowly, the enemy was running out of Pokemon. It was only Clefable and that Silvally left. Venam hadn't fared well during the fight, as her holding off the other Xen members had really taken its toll on her. Will started to lose focus. The headache intensified and he struggled to keep track of things. He recalled his Pokemon, but kept Kirlia on the field, just in case.

"It's over Geara!" Melia shouted. "We…we have won! Give it up!"

The corners of Geara's mouth rose in a smile.

Giratina swept in out of nowhere. A hammer-blow struck Will across his body and he crashed to the rocky ground, hard. His body tumbled across the rocks until suddenly, there were no more rocks. There was no more ground. His stomach lurched sickeningly as he rolled right over the edge of the lava pit. By some miracle he managed to wedge his right foot into a crevice of sorts and that stopped his downwards momentum. He snarled in pain when the full weight of his body came to bear on his ankle and something in the joint tore.

But it held. Barely.

"Will!" Melia shouted. She dropped into a slide after him. He saw her pale face appear over the edge. "Take my hand!"

He heard Geara snarl something at Venam. Her body crashed to the ground. He didn't hear her getting up again. Giratina soared overhead again. Flames and blasts of psychic energy pelted its draconic hide, to no avail.

Will grit his teeth as the pain in his ankle intensified. He reached up to take Melia's hand, but then fucking Geara appeared behind her. The bastard flung himself at Melia and wrapped his arms around her waist. "You may have won the fight, but do you have enough strength left to fight Giratina and help your friends?" He hissed in her ear. "I don't think so. So come compliantly."

His foot slipped out of the crevice. He started slipping down.

"Are you going to stand there, or are you going to help?" Geara snarled, presumably at Zetta.

"Will!" Melia howled, kicking and writhing in Geara's hold. "No, no! At least save Will! I give up, I surrender! Please, save Will!"

"Why should I?" Geara sneered. "If I let Will burn here, then that's an annoying obstacle gone, too."

"I'm sorry," Zetta said. They began pulling Melia away, towards the teleporter pad.

Panic exploded in his gut and his head all at once when he realized what was happening. Venam was down, his Pokemon were fighting for their own lives and Melia couldn't help him. He was alone, he was alone and he was still falling.

It blossomed through his body like a wildfire, constricting his chest and sending hysteria pulsing widely through his limbs. He clawed at the rocks with his hands, frantically searching for an outcropping or a ledge or something - anything - that could help him. He heard Melia screaming, howling his name. The lake of fire stretched out beneath him, yawning, yearning.

Oh God. Oh God, ohgod he was losing his grip. He was going to fall.

He probed the steer cliffside for anything that would stop him from falling but his feet couldn't find purchase. He choked on the searing ash and boiling air. A panicked whimper escaped his throat as he dug his fingers into shallow crevices, but he couldn't slow himself down, he couldn' t -

Heat swept over him, blistering his skin and making his clothes smoke. Desperation howled in his throat and his brain as he clawed hysterically at the walls. He slipped. His fingers bled as he tore them open against the burning rocks. His body started falling and it tore nails straight out of his fingers as he clawed and fought -

He slipped loose.

He fell.

His world became light and pain. It consumed him from inside and out. Scorching smoke seared his lungs. Light set his nerves ablaze. It consumed his sight, his hearing, his everything. Everything he had and was. His world narrowed until there was nothing left. There was nothing else, nothing at all. The light, too viscous and heavy to sink into. His nerves set ablaze. The light burning him, burning him alive -

Light.

So much light.

There was a clearing.

There was a sky that was a brilliant, aching blue. A soothing, cool wind. It carried silence with it. A faint smell and taste of salt. The familiar sensation of something solid beneath his back.

There was a memory of fire and light consuming his body, of black smoke setting fire to his lungs, of flames eating his limbs.

Slowly, he raised his hands to the sky. He stared at them. Ten nails, he realized belatedly. That seemed important somehow. I have ten nails.

He reached for his shirt and pulled it up. That scar…ropey and red, but old. He didn't see anything resembling blackened flesh or charred bones. He just saw himself.

His head…did not hurt. Gone was the clarity. Gone was the disconnect between his thoughts and everything else. He didn't immediately feel the tidal wave of emotions he'd been holding off . Oh, it was there alright. It was all there. Just out of reach.

Will didn't reach for it. He busied himself with the floor, and how solid it felt. Were his senses supposed to work if he was dead? And…if so, why?

Had he just imagined that? The fighting, the steel, Nim -

He…started to realize that something was off. It was all wrong. The train behind him that had arrived without passengers was wrong. The view of the sea, showing Jenner's mutilated body, his Klinklang and Nim in the process of burning up, frozen as if suspended in time, was all wrong. The lighthouse ahead, so familiar yet so alien, was all wrong.

Something shuddered in his head, hard, and he braced himself against the railing to steady himself. He squinted his eyes shut. When he opened them again, he realized that his body was calm. It felt no trace of the adrenaline burning in his veins or the combat stimulants keeping him going far beyond his limits. It made him feel naked and exposed.

Vulnerable.

And yet…he didn't feel pain. He'd ripped his hands and fingers apart on the rocks. He'd snapped his ankle in that crevice. He'd torn his muscles and bruised his ligaments and probably cracked a rib during the assault and yet…he didn't feel pain.

He couldn't remember a time when he hadn't been in pain. From the bleeding hole in his chest to the one in his head, from being beaten near-death to nearly dying to impalement, from the many injuries he either hadn't noticed or simply deemed unimportant to…well, dying.

And that was just the physical part.

Slowly, Will dragged himself along the railing. He tore his gaze from Jenner and Nim, frozen mid-death, and looked ahead.

Venam stared right at him. Her expression was…it wasn't the Venam he knew. It was tired and defeated and just…broken. "We traveled really far, and we tried to do the right thing, but damnit we weren't strong enough…you killed all those people and I wasn't strong enough." She turned her back to him. "I'm sorry for being useless."

Nim, Jenner and Klinklang disappeared below the surface. They melted.

Venam dropped like a puppet with its strings cut.

"There's the pain," Will whispered. He wasn't sure what he'd been expecting, but it hadn't been this. Venam, defeated. Venam, without hope.

Venam, broken.

He'd rather she screamed and raged at him. But this? It was agony. He didn't want it. He didn't want it!

With tired resignation, Will continued onwards. He moved mechanically, like he'd been told to walk but given no directions. At that point, he felt like one, too. A robotic corpse shuffling along.

His heart skipped a beat when he raised his weary head and saw Aelita standing in his way, blocking the only staircase up a hill.

"Aelita?" He whispered. Something inside of him clenched painfully and he reached out to touch her -

Aelita stepped out of his reach. She looked…lost. In pain. "I just wanted people to have faith in me," she told him. "I'm always treated like a child. I feel like I'm a burden on everyone…"

"That's not true," Will muttered.

"I just want to be helpful," Aelita sighed. She didn't even cry. Just like Venam, it was as if she'd accepted this horrible idea long ago, and was just reinforcing it for herself. "I wanna be there for someone…I guess that's impossible now."

Impossible.

He'd died.

And Aelita hadn't been there.

"Oh God, Aelita," he cried out. He staggered up the stairs -

"I'm sorry."

Aelita dropped as well.

He had nothing to shield him. Nothing to latch on to for protection. No focus. No clarity. No disconnect. He watched Aelita drop like a ragdoll and it was like Angie had driven another frozen spike into his chest. It hurt. He couldn't do this.

Will grit his teeth, felt the tears burn in his eyes, and dragged himself along.

A house stood atop the cliffs up ahead. Alone, but not lonely. It looked out over the sea. It wasn't anything Will had ever seen before -

· "Dude, go tell her!"

"Tell her what?"

"That it's going to stop raining in like, half an hour! She's always wanted to try surfing, right? Tell her that we're gonna fucking surf!"

Will stumbled forwards, his vision getting blurry for a moment. When he looked up again he saw Melia. She stood with her back to him, gazing out over the sea. When she spoke, the sheer resignation and despair in her voice filled him with horror. "I brought all this misfortune upon everyone…it's all my fault."

"Melia," Will muttered.

"I didn't want people to die."

"That's not - "

"I wanted to fix everything…"

"Please - !"

"I don't want my friends to fight for me."

Her words came down on him like an anvil. They stole the breath from his lungs, shoved the ground out from underneath his feet.

"I wanted to fight for them and keep them safe..," Melia continued wearily. "My feelings got in the way of my thinking. I let everyone suffer more this way."

Suffer.

"It's all…" She sighed. "Just a blurry dream at this point. I'm sorry."

Warm tears rolled down his cheek as he watched her slump to the ground. He wanted nothing more than to drop to his knees, lie down alongside her and close his eyes.

But he couldn't.

Because someone else was waiting for him.

"Mom…?" He whispered.

His mother, too, stood with her back to him. Her pink hair billowed gently in the wind. "Nothing in this world mattered to me more than Will," she said. "It's strange isn't it…to think that I could be a mother."

"What"

"It's so amusing. I must look like a giant fool. Still, though. I don't regret it. Perhaps this end means that we can be reunited again, if possible."

"Wait, wait - !"

"I love you, Will, and I'm sorry."

Blood burst from her spine and she dropped to her knees. She clutched her chest and gasped, a horrible, wheezing sound that Will because he'd been like that, he'd made those same noises. When she dropped, he dropped as well. Fresh tears dripped to the ground as he clutched his mother's dead, ruined frame. He would have screamed had he any energy left in him.

She was cold. Unmoving. She'd been dead for a long time. She'd died before she reached the end of their journey. She'd died never having seen the destination.

She'd died but the road was still to be walked.

It was such a fucking waste. And what for? Really, what for? To postpone his death just a few weeks? He'd died too, hadn't he? Yes, he had. He'd burned. First, he'd burned through everything he had to get where he was now…and then he'd just burned.

"I'm sorry too," he whispered. "I didn't mean to join you. Not yet."

They'd knocked Venam out. He was pretty sure she was still alive. And Melia…Melia was all alone now. They'd drag her into that teleporter. They'd take her to their base. Throw her into a deep, dark hole. A prisoner for the remainder of her life, no matter how long or miserable that would be.

It wasn't right.

"I'm sorry you had to stay behind," he continued. "I'm sorry you never got to see our destination."

It wasn't right. He was tired. He was out of ideas, out of tactics, out of tricks.

Out of everything.

"I didn't reach our destination either," Will continued. He gazed out over the sea. A familiar form waited for him there. It should have surprised him but somehow, it fit.

He was tired. He was out of tricks. The road had miles to go.

But.

He had arrived too early.

It was stupid and useless and delusional and a bunch of other words that wouldn't adequately describe how he felt. But as long as he still had something in his head to spin his thoughts and something in his body to shove him forwards, then he couldn't stop.

Because the road had miles to go.

"She's all alone now," he said. He didn't bother fighting the tears. He reached down and gently caressed his mother's hair. "I want to see you again, too." He climbed back to his feet and locked eyes with the Pokemon at the edge of the cliff.

Gothitelle had turned around again, opting to gaze out over the sea as well. She hadn't interrupted him. Hadn't urged him to get a move on. He could barely believe that thing was treating him with dignity. Then again, stranger things had happened.

"But I can't join you yet, mom," Will said. With a heavy heart, he started walking forwards, towards the last person who waited for him. After that…who knew. This place was wrong. And that was all he needed to know. "I want to be with her, too. If we can solve this whole mess, if she will still have me after all of this…I want to stay with her."

He had miles to go.

Better start walking.

The cliff was the end of the line for the moment, it seemed. Will stopped next to Gothitelle. Her eyes were locked on something he couldn't see, something beyond the edge of the ocean.

Wordlessly, he glanced to the right. There, sitting atop a wooden bench, sheltered by the shadows of an old tree, sat Crescent.

She looked at him. There was no judgment in that crimson gaze of hers. All he saw was empathy, and sorrow. "Please, join me," she offered.

He did.

A moment of silence stretched on, but it wasn't uncomfortable. Crescent, too, stared at something he couldn't see.

"I still come here often to remember the days of old," she said. "The breeze and the waves crashing against the rocks beneath us…somehow this place has always given me the strength to continue doing what I do."

Will looked at her. Crescent hadn't changed much since he first laid eyes on her. So confident. So reassured. She was a silent guardian who had been looking out for him since day one. And yet…the look in her ruby eyes told him that she, too, was aware that it hadn't been enough.

"Yet, that strength isn't enough when I look at what you've been doing, Will," she calmly continued. Gently, even, as if she were afraid her words further open the wounds he'd suffered already. "No matter how many times I tell you something you seem to do the exact opposite."

Maybe she was right. Maybe all of this could have been avoided. After all, she had known, hadn't she? She'd known that Melia wasn't truly gone. She'd tried to warn them in her own way. That was all Crescent had wanted. To spare him pain.

That…hadn't exactly worked out.

Nevertheless…

"You keep fighting," Will told her. He felt small. Vulnerable. Tired. Something about Crescent's presence comforted him. It was a part familiarity, a part security and a part that he had no name for. It was just…Crescent was there. And when Crescent was there, things would be okay.

Until Crescent hadn't been there.

And now things weren't okay. He didn't think they would ever be okay again.

"You keep fighting," Will said again. "What if someone tells you to stop? What if someone tells you to ignore what makes you you. Could you?"

"No people remain to tell me that," Crescent admitted. She did it so flippantly, so matter-of-factly that it made him ache even more. "Is that what makes you you now, then? Fighting?"

"...I don't know," he admitted. What made him who he was, at this point, would probably be determined by the people he had left.

"That is another difference between you and me, it seems. The other…do you even remember what happened to you, Will? I wouldn't be surprised if you forgot again. You've died, Will. There's no other way to look at it."

And there it was.

Hearing that hurt, even though he'd put it together himself. It was always like that. Figuring something out himself wasn't real, wasn't set in stone until someone else told that it was.

"You and all your friends thought you were invincible because you were together. Reality doesn't care about your bond of friendship, or the amount of strength you have. Reality doesn't care how much determination you pour into your body, or how much pain you think you can sustain. If you're not on the right side of the coin when it flips, then you're done for."

"...who are you, Crescent?" He asked. "Who are you really? Why do you care about me so much?"

His words hurt her, he saw that, even though she cried to mask that. A split-second of agony before she wiped her emotions from her face. He imagined it had looked the same when he did that, too. "You don't remember," she said. A statement, not a question. "And that's fine. It will come. You've seen them, correct? The people set out on the way here? Those we lose…those we loved…they've led you right to this spot. As if they were guiding you. Perhaps this place isn't real. Maybe this place is just a reflection of your soul. That would make sense, wouldn't it?"

Yes. No. "My soul…something's missing, then."

Crescent looked at him. She arced a slender eyebrow.

"There's others, too," Will continued. "Others I've lost. Mightyena…Houndoom…they should be here. Those I've lost…those I love. Where are they?"

Crescent sighed. "The people you see reflected here are those you held in your heart when it happened."

That made sense. He hadn't been thinking about those he lost, just about those he could still protect. "I can't stay here, Crescent."

She eyed him, searching for something. "No?"

Will walked to the edge of the cliff. He couldn't see what Gothitelle saw. He didn't see what Crescent saw. The sight was beautiful, he had to admit that, but it wasn't for him. "Can you send me back?"

She blinked. Her eyelashes were long and dark. Her expression was so clear, yet he couldn't make sense of her. "Me? Perhaps. Is that truly what you need?"

Her words thrummed within his chest.

What he needed…

Will knew what he needed. He needed Nim and Jenner to be safe and sound. He needed them in his life, smiling, happy, offering stability and family to those who cared about them. He needed Melia to have her father. He needed Nim to have friends.

Fate had decided differently.

Fate had decided that he had to watch them die horrible deaths, before Fate had burned him.

Crescent was here now. Somehow, a part of him had remained. He moved. He thought. He had miles to go.

He had to keep walking. "I need…I need another chance to live," he said, firmly.

Crescent exhaled a sigh. This one was different. He sensed approval. "Your job isn't over yet, Will. There are still many great things for you to experience. One thing I've learned while on my own journey is…the future isn't set in stone. No matter how many times we try to carve our destinies…life has its way of being quite strange. So…wake up, Will. It's time to reclaim those we lost."

Wake up.

Her voice echoed around his thoughts even as the cliff collapsed around him. The world fell apart like a puzzle, all pieces crumbling away into nothingness and leaving behind a brilliant, white light. Soon, everything had turned into that piercing whiteness, and Will found himself falling through a great void. Crescent's words moved on. He no longer heard them, but he felt them. Transfixed and floating, he could not speak.

Make your way up the mountain and gather your lost fragments.

Reality snapped back together around him in a flash. Valor Mountain. Unconscious Xen Grunts. His body was already responding.

The only way to make a difference in this world is to be whole again.

Valor Mountain. Unconscious Grunts. A lone figure standing amidst a pair of unmoving bodies. Their features were a blur.

Good luck.

He moved forwards and caught a flash of a stern look, of snow-colored hair and black clothes -

One

- and he thought he experienced another voice in his head, but it wasn't him. He felt its knowledge brushing against his thoughts, touching his mind. He felt, with no clear reason as to why, that it belonged to another. Very far away.

Time felt frozen as he explored the greyscale abyss. His stumbling efforts to move onwards produced scattered impressions of darkness, brilliance, a rolling sun, shades of crimson and -

Two

- laughter and grief, but all of it complete chaos. Onwards, onwards. The confusion influx of irrational anger far beyond what Team Xen had caused here today - though there would be time to allow that shadow in once this was over - and the sudden smile imprinted on his mind could have been Nim, should have been Nim -

Three

- but it was impossible. The world spun around him as he started moving faster, with more purpose, more force. Up ahead he saw Geara and Zetta. They clutched Melia in-between them. They appeared unmoving, as frozen as the others. He plunged through the whispery shadow of what could have been a person, saw a flash of a bright hallway and heard with surprising clearness a gentle laugh -

Four

Something asserted itself in his vision and the center of his mind: a clear and jarring image of himself, as he had been when he rode in on the S.S. Oceana. He felt something, something important that threatened to snag his thoughts to he battered it away and -

Five

- until finally, he came to a stop at the place where he had lost Nim and Professor Jenner. He saw a great, gaping pit of fire. He turned his back to it. He thought he saw a girl standing there, clearer than the shadows of the others he'd passed, who had been like oily shadows flitting around the corners of his eyes. But then he turned to face her -

Six

The pounding in Will's head brought him violently to consciousness. He smelled burnt metal and sulfur and blinked open his eyes. He lay face-down on the floor in the bottom right of the battlefield, just several meters away from where he'd lost Nim.

As his vision adjusted to the desolate surface of the volcano, he saw a purple-haired figure lying up ahead. Beyond her, three people. Geara, Zetta and Melia.

Seeing Geara and Zetaa physically restraining her on that teleportation platform set his soul on fire. He bit back the ravenous fury and shoved it into the dark storm that was gathering in the back of his mind, howling at the increasingly-unstable gates.

They had yet to escape, he noticed.

Which meant he still had a chance to set things right.

"Hurry up Zetta! We don't have all day!" Geara snarled at his companion.

And Melia…Melia wasn't even struggling anymore. That look in her eyes…she didn't even see him. That gleeful glint she always carried with her…it was gone now. Tears continued rolling down her cheeks as she silently wept.

WIll crept closer, unseen and unheard.

"Yeah yeah, I'm configuring the teleport coordinates," Zetta snapped back. "This has to be perfect or something may go terribly wrong - "

Terribly wrong.

Fury and anguish coalesced into something volatile, akin to a frenzied madness. Something that had been simmering dangerously close beneath his skin throughout the entire rush for the summit now. The numbness and confusion that had gripped him in the other realm was gone now.

"I already gave you a lecture on this so why - "

"Just get it done!"

He blinked a couple of times. He saw Venam lying on the ground, unmoving. He took a moment to try and shake her awake.

"Venam!" He hissed.

Groggily, she pulled her head up from the floor. She had a nasty and bloody mark on the left side of her face. It hadn't been a clean knockout blow.

Will brought a trembling finger to his lips. They had one shot to set this right. He was not wasting that.

She frowned at him, before blinking confusedly. Her gaze sharpened a second later and she nodded along.

"Ger your Pokemon out," he whispered. "On my signal."

Her expression hardened. She nodded again.

Will put himself into position. He felt every sense of control slipping away. He had seconds left to do something worthwhile before things would fall apart.

Somewhere during the fight, he'd lost his Pokeballs. They were scattered around. That was fine.

He signaled.

Venam sent Seviper and Nidoqueen out. They were battered and hurt and not in any position to fight a protracted battle, but that was fine too.

"Hey assholes!" Venam shouted.

Groaning, Geara turned on the spot, making a show of rolling his entire head instead of just his eyes when he did. "Looks like the purple bitch woke up too soon. Fine, I'll handle…"

His words died somewhere in his throat. His eyes locked on Will's. He stared, his mouth agape and his eyes wide in shock.

"Aww, what's wrong? Looks like you saw a ghost!" Venam taunted.

Melia's head snapped up. She saw Will, and if there was a word for the mix you got when hope clashed with disbelief, Melia's face was it. "Will! You're…alive!"

"That's impossible!" Zetta shouted. "You fell into the lava, you died!"

And then Geara. Stepped. Forwards. His expression - his expression/? - was murderous. "Fine! This time I'll blow your fucking head off, see you come back from that! Zetta! We're going to fight back one last time!"

Hearing that filth's voice blew a fuse in his head. Everything fell away. Everything. The pain was not at the forefront of the storm that raged at the gates of his mind. Something else was. Something warm and pure. Something serene. Finally, after holding it back for so long, Will allowed the gate to fall away too. He let the storm of conflicting emotions and agony burn away everything nonessential in the universe except for the image of Nim's body plunging into the lava. That, he held on to. He wrapped the image around himself.

He looked up at Geara. The bastard saw what was happening. He reached into his pocket. "Come get me then, you fucker!"

Distantly, he heard Melia shouting his name. Distantly, he saw Zetta yell something at Geara. He didn't really hear them. He didn't really see them. They didn't matter anymore.

He didn't care anymore. He began running. Hell broke loose around him but nothing else mattered but getting his hands on Geara.

Geara whipped his knife out. Several inches of stainless steel emerged from his hand. Will didn't care about that, either. He lunged for Geara and the bastard drove his knife as chest in a stabbing motion. Will broke his movement off and went for the knife instead, stepping inside of Geara's reach. Steel flashed through his sleeve as he clutched Geara's wrist with both hands. The bastard was quick, he had to give him that. Instantly, Geara's free hand shot towards his face, hooking his thumb towards his right eye to gouge it out.

Will let go of Geara's wrist with his right hand and struck a backhanded blow even as he spun away, out of the bastard's stabbing range.

Geara instantly pressed his advantage. He slashed at Will's face, missed by a hair's breadth and Will took that moment to whip his left elbow out and sweep Geara's knife-arm aside. He lashed out with his right fist and struck a jab underneath Geara's exposed ribs. Aeltia had taught him to aim for the kidneys. He didn't quite manage. He struck Geara's ribs instead.

Geara threw a blind haymaker at him with his free arm. Surely he couldn't be that stupid?

But the punk wasn't. It was a feint, and when Will blocked it with his elbow and landed a low kick on Geara's knee, he saw the knife swooping in at an upwards angle and he was a fraction of a second too late in grabbing his arm.

The blade sliced through his shirt and into his abdomen. Will felt it cleave through skin and flesh, dragging a long, diagonal line of fire upwards across his chest. Blood started seeping into his shirt even as he spun away to create more distance. It hurt. It hurt a lot. The pain might not stop him, but the blood loss would.

He didn't care about that, either. All that mattered was disarming Geara and then killing him.

"Fuck you!" Geara snarled as he shifted his weight to his other leg, clearly not comfortable with putting any weight on the knee Will had just kicked. The first solid blow. It was far, far from the last.

Geara lashed out in blind fury, drawing several arcs with his knife as he tried to cut into Will's face and neck. Again, Will managed to grab onto the bastard's arm and brought his frenzied assault to a halt. Geara drove a fist at his throat, but Will stepped closer and brought his knee up and rammed it into Geara's sternum. He let go with his right hand and shoved Geatra's free fist aside and landed a straight jab at his eye.

They grappled and fought for control over Geara's knife. Will snapped his head forwards into Geara's face and the bastard's control over the knife slackened. Again, Will kicked at his knee and jumped up to drive his knee into Geara's groin.

At the last moment, Geara twisted his hips sideways and Will struck his boney hip instead. The knife dropped from his one hand and Geara instantly snatched it out of the air with his other one. Geara moved with serpentine speed and Will's face suddenly caught on fire. That he felt, and the sudden agony that exploded across his senses was too much to even make him scream. He doubled over and clutched his hands to the left side of his face, his teeth grinding together as he fought to throw off the paralyzing shock of the pain. Blood seeped through his fingers.

"Fucking die already!" Geara howled. He lunged towards Will in a forward stabbing motion, intent on shanking him through his throat or something.

Will thrust his left hand towards the knife to block it.. Its blade pierced cleanly through his palm and came out somewhere between his ring and middle fingers. A searing heat exploded through his hand. He couldn't see anything with his left eye and he hardly felt anything but pain, but as Geara's weight carried him forwards, he realized things had fallen in place.

Yeah, Geara got him.

But more importantly.

He had the bastard now.

Will tightened his hand around Geara's hand, pulling it up while simultaneously shoving down, hard. Geara's wrist bent backwards in a way it couldn't sustain, and he was unable to wrench the knife free.

Will clenched his right hand into a fist and struck Geara across his jaw. Geara tried to push back, gain leverage to rip his knife free, but he couldn't get his wrist back in an angle to exert force.. Will kept his fingers pinned.

Geara struggled heavily though. His free hand went to Will's throat, seizing it in a tight grip. Will let the idiot. He struck him in the face again, harder. Soft skin and muscle bruised underneath his knuckles. As Geara reeled, Will followed up by stomping down as hard as he could on one of Geara's feet.

Staggering, Geara spat a mouthful of blood. He took a shuddering gasp and jerked his arm back to protect his face. Will took note of how frantic that motion seemed. Realization must have been setting in now. He was losing.

Geara believed himself to be a killer. Maybe he was right. He'd murdered Nim. He was more monstrous than any of them. But he hadn't been training with people who knew their stuff like Will had. He hadn't been fighting for his life every day like Will had. Whatever the reason, Will was stronger. He felt it in every motion. He saw it in Geara's face, the realization that slowly, he was being overpowered. Slowly, he getting closer and closer to death.

He shoved Geara's knife-arm down and slammed his elbow across Geara's face. For a second, everything within the bastard's limbs seemed to grow slack. Next, Will hooked his right leg behind Geara's legs. He snarled and threw his weight forwards, not intent on stopping.

Geara stumbled backwards and tripped. They both crashed to the ground in a heap. The knife clattered to the ground just beyond the Admin's reach. He felt the impact drive the air from Geara's lungs.

They'd slammed against the hard in a mess of tangled limbs and blood. Geara made a short, low-pitched gasp of pain when his back slammed against the rocky ground. He dragged air into his lungs. "No!" He choked.

He felt Geara getting desperate now. The scum went for his eyes. Will jerked his head aside, just out of reach of Geara's clawing fingers and then put pressure on his overstretched elbow, easily shoving it aside. He pinned it with his own left arm, taking note of how useless his hand was, and then started hitting Geara in his face, screaming as he did. Nothing coherent. It sounded animalistic even to his ears. A rock might have been good, but he struggled to keep the monster pinned between his legs and he couldn't reach around. Doing it with his own hands might be better.

"Stop!" Geara screamed. He'd pulled his own right arm across his head, trying to protect his face in the crook of his elbow. "You can't!"

His eyes were wide and panicked, now. He didn't look like a monster anymore. Looks were deceiving. Nim had been his friend. Nim had saved his life. Nim had been there for him. All she wanted was a friend. Just a friend.

But no, Geara decided that Nim couldn't have that. He'd killed her.

Enough. Enough.

Geara curled up into a ball, wrapping his arms around his head in an attempt to protect himself. Will snarled in frustration when he realized that, with his wrecked left hand, he couldn't get the angle, and with his bleeding chest, he couldn't exert the force.

Fine.

Geara didn't see Will fumble for the fallen knife, but he sure felt it. Will rammed it home against Geara's ribs and the bastard shrieked when the blade sliced across his flank, coming to a frustrating stop against his ribs.

The second time, his aim was better; the knife slipped between Geara's lips and the punk screamed. Will saw the panic and the terror in Geara's eyes when he realized what was about to happen, when he realized that nobody would be coming for him this time

.Geara gasped in agony as he clutched the knife in his ribs. He left his face wide open.

Screams surrounded them, maybe. Will didn't know. He thought of Nim, and then of Melia's dad, and then he thought about his mom and everyone else that the monsters had taken from them. Aelita, in a coma. Mightyena, dead and possibly rotting in front of an abandoned aquarium. Houndoom, crippled for life.

Feel what I feel, you monster.

His teeth were bared. He felt hollow. He felt sick. His lungs were on fire. Blood poured down his face. Everything was red. Red. Red.

Will screamed a wordless howl as he started hitting again and again. His heart hammered away in his throat. Blood coated his knuckles. Slowly, Geara's weak attempt to protect himself faltered. Then his arms dropped altogether.

He wanted to keep hitting. He pictured bone splinters across the rocks. Clumps of hair matting his knuckles. Certainty that this one time, the monster wouldn't run and hide. Enough. Enough.

A pair of strong, warm arms wrapped themselves around his chest, pinning his arms to his waist and pulling him away, away from Geara's unmoving, bloodied form. Will didn't stop screaming, didn't stop howling as he fought and kicked and thrashed to get free. They couldn't - they couldn't!

Those steel-banded arms, red and covered with hair-like feathers from the elbow up, ended in razor-sharp claws. He writhed in her grip like a wounded animal as the maddening fury and agony battered his thoughts. A howl of pure pain came out of him and it hardly sounded human. Something inside of his mind tore, he felt it as clearly as any physical injury. Something tore and he knew, he knew that he wouldn't ever be able to put it back together again. He screamed until his throat gave out, which didn't take long.

Blaziken clutched him tightly. He didn't know why, he didn't know why. Something bled all over his thoughts and across his face and onto those warm arms. He could just barely hear Melia's anguished voice now. "Will - Will, Will! Stop struggling please, please you're hurting yourself - "

He tried to speak and couldn't. Every injury, every hurt, every bruise, it all came crashing down on him at once. The rage and fury and sorrow bled out of his trembling, shaky frame. It spilled across Blaziken's feathery body and onto the ground. He felt terrified and confused and deeply, painfully wounded. He'd screamed his throat bloody and the strength just completely sapped from his limbs, leaving him unable to even move -

"But…Giratina…" He heard Zetta mutter in defeat.

"Don't you fucking dare!" Venam screamed.

"Not necessary. I'll take care of things from here."

Her voice…

Will craned his neck up. His vision swam with blood and tears and gather your parts, gather your parts -

He saw Giratina. It was there…right there…

Through that haze of tears and blood, he saw Crescent and Gothitelle hopping into existence like a pair of synchronized dancers. They landed between the teleporter pad and him.

"C-Crescent?" Melia cried out.

"You know her?" Venam shouted.

Blood continued seeping into his clothes, dripping over Blaziken's arms as she struggled to keep him from writhing around and further tearing the wounds open. His left hand throbbed and ached and his left eye felt ruined and useless, but he needed to see, he needed to know -

Crescent stepped towards him - why isn't Giratina attacking? Why aren't we fighting? - and she bowed down in front of him. He'd never seen anything like sympathy on her face before, but now…

He felt Blaziken tense up. Tenderly, Crescent brought her fingers to his bleeding face. She swept them across his hazy eye and he flinched.

But Zetta and Geara were right there, they were right there!

"They have to pay…" he mumbled, spitting blood from his mouth. His face hadn't stopped hurting. "They have to pay for…"

Vaguely, he saw the familiar form of Kirlia resolving itself behind Crescent. She stared up at him, her eyes large and vaguely glowing with power.

"I know," Melia whispered from his left. He turned his head to look at her, but he couldn't see. "But not like this. Not at the cost of you."

"They will pay," Crescent's voice rang out. It wasn't a threat. It wasn't a promise. She spoke like it was a fact, like it was about to happen simply because she willed it so. "You can still see me? Good. Be still, Will. You may rest now."

"Rguh? It's you again…" Zetta said with fear. "I won't be taken back to that world again!"

Crescent's features hardened into a mask of cold, passive fury. "I don't remember allowing you to leave in the first place," she said. "I was going to let you out early if you were on your best behavior, but it seems that thought process was a mistake. I'm going to have to do something I really don't want to do, but c'est la vie. Gothitelle, would you?"

"Gothite!"

A film of purple energy surrounded Zetta as his body began levitating in the air. "Let go of me! Giratina! Help me!"

Kirlia put herself in front of Will. Slowly, he felt Blaziken release him. He slumped back, but Blaziken hadn't actually moved. His back touched her knee and she put a heavy, blood-tipped claw against his neck, keeping him from falling over.

Kirlia nestled herself in-between Will's outstretched legs, sitting down between his knees. Without seeing her face, he knew that she'd turned her gaze to the helpless Zetta instead.

"Don't worry," Crescent said. "I brought a friend to deal with you too. Dranna, please teach this filth a lesson."

When Mewtwo materialized beside Giratina, Will felt like he'd lost his already untenable grip on reality.

"Mewtwo…" Zetta gasped.

"Does she not look familiar to you?" Crescent said.

(My name is Dranna,) a furious, female voice echoed within Will's mind. He thought it was just him, but when he heard it, he saw Melia and Zetta flinch, too. (I am no one's Mewtwo. I was a prisoner, but no longer. I am forever in Lady Crescent's debt for saving me at Carotos Mountain. I shall serve her until my final breath.)

Crescent turned her ruby eyes towards the motionless Giratina.

Mewtwo - Dranna - followed her gaze. (Giratina, your master lies broken and defeated. There is no point in fighting us. You are a slave no more. Escape this wretched mountain and live out the rest of your days.)

Did he imagine things, or did Giratina actually lower its head? Its body faded from view, but the rest of the mountain remained so it couldn't be him. It was gone, then. Giratina had disappeared.

If he never saw that thing again, it would be too soon.

"Now, let's continue with this, shall we?" Crescent said pleasantly.

"What…what are you doing to me!" Zetta yelled, frantic and scared.

"You've been roaming this planet for far too long," Crescent said as if that made any kind of sense. "You've forgotten your original purpose. So don't worry. I'll make you remember your true form. That will humble you." Her words sounded like they were meant to reassure Zetta. Will didn't think a single word of that was actually intended to reassure him.

"I don't understand, what are you…" Zetta's eyes widened and the realization on his face was much like Geara's. Resigned panic, the sudden awareness of impending death. "No…how do you know? No…no, please no!"

He thrashed and twisted. He cried and screamed and writhed around. "Don't let her do it! I don't want to go back to that!" Another wordless scream. This one was like a bucket of cold water.

Will tried looking to his left again. He still couldn't see through the haze of blood and darkness, but he believed he saw the tips of Venam's purple hair when the wind picked up behind them.

That's good, isn't it? He thought in a daze. She's alive…she's alive…

"I've fought too hard to go back! I refuse! I refuse - Don't let her do it!"

Will wondered if Jenner had thought something along those words before Giratina blew apart his chest cavity in front of his own daughter. He looked down at Kirlia. She was bobbing her head from the left to the right, as if listening to a tune only she could hear.

"Look closely, children," Crescent said and Will actually heard the amusement in her voice. "Crescent is going to perform a magic trick. This man's form is going to change before your very eyes."

"Crescent, please!" Zetta pleaded. Tears flowed down his face. His eyes were set in sheer, abject terror. "I'm begging you! Just let me off this once!"

He wondered if Nim had howled those words inside of her head before Geara condemned her helpless body to the lava, sentencing her to the worst kind of death imaginable.

"This is…disturbing," He heard Venam mutter.

It wasn't disturbing. If Zetta's expression was anything to go by, then this…this was justice.

"This isn't disturbing," Crescent said calmly. "This is reality."

A scream clawed its way through Zetta's throat. "Noooooooo!"

The purple sheen of energy collapsed in on him and his body imploded. Where Zetta had once been, now hovered a tiny, translucent, spherical Pokemon with a green, gelatinous body.

Silently, Kirlia started applauding.

It was around that moment that Will's mind stopped trying to make sense of anything. Confusion turned to apathy. Agony turned to numbness. A vast roaring noise started drowning out everything and Will had to struggle to even hear the words that the people around them uttered next.

"Zetta…was a Solosis?!"

"Unreal…"

"Yes, my dear friends," Crescent said. Her voice betrayed the barest hint of glee. "This is the true form of Zetta. When Melia was young, she was unfit for Madame X's plan…as an alternative, and many years of experiments, Zetta was born from Melia's DNA."

That meant something, he knew it did, but his thoughts and his pain had stopped making any sound in his head. Things started to go disturbingly quiet.

"Obviously, not everything Zetta was ended up being the same. In fact, not even Zetta was compatible with their plans. Instead of destroying him, as he was a failure, they decided to let him join as a member of the Xen Initiative. But of course, once a failure, always a failure. There's no saving grace here."

"This is what Zetta meant when he said he "Knew where got it from"!" Melia gasped. "Those words have bothered me for so long…and finally I understand."

"But of course," Crescent's voice continued. Will felt everything around him turning deadly quiet too, but he didn't slip away. It felt like he ought to. The glass inside of his head tumbled around, but when Crescent talked it was…as if she didn't permit him to slip away. As if she had her delicate fingers wrapped around something inside of his mind and didn't allow him to lose himself before she was finished with him. "You two were brother and sister, practically. Same blood, same DNA, different origins. That's all"

"Zetta…I wish…I wish you would've just talked to me…" Melia said wearily.

Crescent harrumphed. "Be it as it may, Zetta may try to reform eventually if left like this. I think I'll take him with me. As a little souvenir."

Venam made a sound of disgust. Will heard something like a Pokemon suddenly being recalled.

"You'll make a great asset to my team, Zetta," Crescent said. She chuckled. The sound made Will remember waves crashing against rocks, the smell of salt water and hot sand…and he didn't know why.

Tears rolled down his cheeks, turning crimson before they dropped. He was too exhausted to stop them.

"What about Geara?" Melia asked.

"Tch. I do not know how you can muster that endless well of empathy of yours, Melia. It would have been your well-deserved right to sit back and watch the spectacle until it became a form of art on the floor. But you stopped it."

Melia stared back defiantly.

"You're sick," Venam said with a small voice.

The sight of Crescent's lips pulling up into a little smirk was oddly familiar to him. "A matter of perspective. One you'll come around to, if you wish to be at all useful in the future."

Somehow, for some reason, that was the moment Geara decided to claw his way back to consciousness. He was gasping in pain, uttering soft, high-pitched curses as he curled inwards again.

"I had a moment of peace when I forgot about his existence, but here we are again…" Crescent sighed. "Let Fate deliver him a message to Madame X. Something I've always wanted to say to her. And I believe a lot of us have the same sentiments, so…" she squatted down next to the bloodied form of Geara and brought her lips to his ear. "Would you please pass on this message if you somehow find your way back? I believe the phrase goes somewhere along the lines of…Fuck off."

With surprising ferocity, she seized two fistfuls of his uniform and flung his bleeding body atop the teleporter pad. "Teleporter, activate. Destination, Team Xen HQ."

"REQUEST ACCEPTED," a mechanical voice droned.

A flash of brilliant, achingly bright light, and the bastard was gone, leaving only a small puddle of blood on the clear, blue glass of the machine.

Dranna came down on the teleporter pad the second it had sent Geara away and she shattered it with a burst of psychic energy. (And stay gone!)

Gone. Geara, gone. Zetta, gone. Both of them alive. They'd been here before. They'd done this before…hadn't they? What had changed? So many people had died, but what had changed?

Just…had they made it? Had they won? It didn't feel like they had won, but he didn't know, didn't know anymore.

Everything stopped making noise then. It all just went quiet. Will had time to wonder, was there even a point to this all?

Then nothing.

~~~~~~~(0)~~~~~~~

---

AN: Okay. So. Here is where the written format simply cannot compare to the visual effects representing what happened during our Interceptor's return after his chat with Crescent. I didn't have a clue where to even begin trying to put that to words. I have a very clear picture of how I will tackle these things in the future, but this particular scene was the one I knew I wouldn't be able to get right. It might be rough, but it is what it is.

That leaves me with the Big One. Our Interceptor falling. I didn't want to make it too graphic, considering we're not entirely sure what even happens between a "death" and a "return", but I also hate to keep things vague when the entire point of a novelization is to explore them. So, I had to reach a compromise. It is my professional duty and, should I say, personal mission to torment Will as much as I can, so even kicking Geara's ass couldn't be a simple cathartic moment.

There will be time to explore the ramifications of everything that's happened during the Battle of Valor Mountain in the next chapter. The game uses a time-skip of a week to get straight to the funeral rites. I plan to fill that week up to the best of my capabilities.

But that is then. For now, I can safely say that I wrote my ass off for this chapter. I'm really, REALLY looking forward to seeing what you guys think about my interpretation of events and the big emotional moments. Thank you all for sticking with me for so long. Until the next update!