Chapter 81: Chasing Down Necrozma
The Darkrai was too late, by the time he returned from meeting Cresselia, Team Rocket had descended upon Aether Paradise. He only just caught a glimpse of them returning to their ship, with several people and pokemon. He only recognized a few. The primary issue being, Ashachu was with them, he didn't come this far just to let Team Rocket prevent him from helping them.
Just as he made to pursue something, froze him in place, not fear, but a sense of apprehension. Glancing down, he saw a creature reveal itself. It had a lionesque shape, with a brilliant white and gold mane, but its body was covered in black crystalline growths.
Shadow couldn't explain it, but he felt something familiar within the creature, as if he'd seen it before, though he wasn't sure if that was his memories, or those of that other Shadow he'd seen.
Despite his lack of memory, he felt a name grace his tongue. "Necrozma." In only a few moments darkness consumed the land, practically draining the light from the surrounding area. For most pokemon and likely all humans, the absence of light would have been frightening and blinding. But Shadow was all too accustomed to the dark, he could see where others could not.
Looking down, the lionesque parts of Necrozma seemed to be more visible than the rest. And on top of that its eyes and nose were aglow with a cerulean light.
Despite the darkness a bright flash of light erupted from the massive vessels under Team Rocket's control. The beam that fired from the ship's cannon had lit the building ablaze. In what could've been considered a panic Shadow rushed toward the building, uncertain if Pyre had escaped yet. However his actions only meant being caught at the end of the massive beam and plummeting into the building below, the flames engulfed and surrounded him only momentarily as the other vessel fired off a beam as well which nearly completely froze the building and put out the fires.
The Darkrai sat suspended for a moment, the ice around him holding him in place. He was doing his best to push the pain exploding through his body out of his mind. As it turned out, going from being on fire to completely frozen was extremely painful. Even so he felt an incredible heat upon his back. The ice around him seemed to be melting, but it wasn't his own doing. Once it melted enough to give way Shadow fell through and hit the ground inside Aether Paradise.
Glancing around to see get his bearings again he found himself face to face with Pyre. The charmander illuminated by the brilliant sapphire flame of his tail.
"What the hell just happened up there?"
"Team Rocket opened fire, I believe I see what they were after." Shadow sat up, a low sizzling sound coming from his body. "I seem to have been burned quite badly. In more than one way as well." He looked himself over seeing steam coming off of his body. Despite his pain he lifted himself off the ground. "It warms my heart to know you are safe Pyre, however I expected you to have already escaped."
"I was going too, but then I saw those humans and their pokemon get captured. I was going to help, but they took em too quickly. So I decided to wait for you. We can go together to help them. But Shadow, I felt something when they were taken…it was.."
"I know Pyre. I knew he was here long before you did. We are linked after all." The Darkrai allowed himself a concealed smile. "So now I have even more reason to board that ship."
"Then what's the plan?"
"I am afraid, I do not have one." Shadow thought for a moment. "Knowing Team Rocket they likely have some form of pokemon control device on board, so unless it's deactivated the only way I could help would be overpowering their control."
"Well, if anyone can." Pyre didn't finish his sentence, he simply smiled at the steaming darkrai.
A few moments later, light began to return and two of the vessels above Aether's building seemed to turn and fly away.
"Then they are pursuing Necrozma." Shadow held out his hand. "Care to be a hero again Pyre? Like your memories show?"
"Helping others is what I do, so yeah!" Pyre took his hand without hesitation and was lifted into the air.
"Then hold on, we're pursuing them as well." And with his words Shadow burst into the air breaking through the melted ice. Glancing around he caught sight of the two ships chasing down Necrozma over the ocean.
*Meanwhile*
Blade felt odd, though saying he felt wasn't quite accurate. His captors had brought him aboard Team Rockets vessel. But they still hid in the shadows of the ship's corridors. One of them, the girl called Misty, had been using some device that all but stripped him of his own functionality. It was similar to what Shadow would occasionally do when they mated.
But this felt wrong, unnatural, more so than what Shadow did at least. Blade could normally see himself when Shadow had taken control of him, but he couldn't now. He couldn't feel much of anything. His body moved and responded to commands, but he never heard them.
"I don't understand, neither of us can get control of your body."
"Noooo really?! I'd never have fucking guessed!?" Blade snapped at his mirror counterpart.
"I can't even see either. It's like everything is being blocked. Thought, feeling, everything." Xiphos spoke.
"No, not everything." Blade couldn't explain it, but he could still feel that pulling sensation. "I can still feel that pull. Can you?"
"Now that you mention it, yeah I can."
"Maybe we can use that to get control again."
"And how do you plan on doing that?"
The two sat silent for a few minutes. Then Blade spoke again. "I dunno, feel it really hard?" Blade watched as his counterpart simply blinked for a few moments.
"We're certain Shadow didn't just keep you around because you were a good lay?" The mirrored Sneasel joked.
"Not funny. Shadow loved me…at least I think he did." Blade looked sad. But felt that pulling sensation more.
"Hey, I…I didn't mean it, it was just a joke, I'm sorry. I won't make those kinds of jokes anym…"
"Shush, I…I felt it, thinking of Shadow, I…I felt that pull more!" Blade was starting to see himself again, looking over his body from the outside. However only his body was visible, nothing more. "Well at least we know I'm moving now."
*With Shadow*
The Darkrai was flying as fast as he could, but given his more injured state, that was barely fast enough to keep pace with the large flying vessels. Glancing down he caught sight of Necrozma dashing across the water at high speed, occasionally diving down under to avoid the barrage of cannon fire coming from the pursuing vessels.
"Hey, I'm all for fighting against insurmountable odds, but" Pyre spoke up. "We may be in over our heads here."
"Be that as it may, I have to do this. I have to atone." Shadow replied abruptly.
"Well, then I'm with you. And I'm not going anywhere." The charmander had a determined look on his face. "Let's go be heroes!"
Both pokemon were rather happy not yet catching up to the two ships, as they seemed to be firing off a barrage of laser and plasma based projectiles at each other.
During the chase the pirate ship looking vessel dipped close to the water, and Shadow watched as Necrozma took a dive under the water at that motion and only resurfaced when Team Rockets vessel managed to nearly hit the ship, which forced them back into the air for better maneuverability.
Within a few minutes they came up on a vast canyon and the frigate-like ship seemed to block Necrozma from Team Rocket's sight by blocking the canyon opening.
Shadow dipped lower into the canyon, keeping himself hidden from the two ships.
The pursuit was short lived as Necrozma seemed to ascend a staircase toward an ancient looking altar. Before it could reach the top, the frigate-like vessel coated the stairs in ice, causing Necrozma to slip. Before it could move again it was blasted with ice. The lionesque creature thrashed in a vain attempt to break free of the ice encasing its body.
Shadow watched in slight horror as Necrozma's body was seemingly teleported somewhere that he couldn't see. But just above them, Team Rocket's vessel moved in position to trap their competitors in the canyon below.
Within a few minutes the frigate repositioned itself and began to ascend. It was immediately met with a rain of cannon fire from Team Rocket's vessel. Only momentarily at least as a new beam burst from the frigate, before its main cannon fired a bright blue beam, but now it was a combined blinding yellow and blue torrent of energy that slammed Team Rocket's ship. And the frigate rose above it and began flying off into the distance.
After the last shot from the frigate the larger ship seemed to plummet toward the ground. Just before it impacted the ground it managed to pull up, crushing and clipping parts of the ancient altar they had been above. And the vessel immediately took up its pursuit again.
"This is going to be harder than I thought."
*With Blade*
The sneasel wasn't certain what was happening, for the past few minutes he'd been watching himself shake and struggle to walk, presumably because whatever he was walking on was shaking.
After all that time he'd finally been able to get a bit more feeling, he could make out some words again.
"Ahahahaha. Even when you try to use your brain and not rush in foolishly Ash. You still make stupid decisions." That sounded like Misty. If he hadn't disliked her before, having his free will stripped away finished the job.
"Misty," another familiar voice spoke.
"Isn't that your trainer's voice?" Xiphos asked quietly.
"Cameron, yeah I think it is. Maybe he finally came to rescue me." Blade wasn't being optimistic with that thought, more like half sarcastic.
"What the hell are you doing here," He recognized that one, he'd heard Ash's voice enough times when spying on them to recognize him. "As if we didn't have enough to deal with at the moment."
"Careful Ash," another voice whispered, that was one Blade didn't recognize.
"Oh, what's this," Misty spoke again. "A new catch. I've never seen that Pokémon before. Pity it won't be around much longer." Blade felt odd because her threat didn't feel, well, threatening though that was likely because she was a human, and he wasn't particularly scared of them. "You see Ashy-boy your edgy friend here has a point. You don't know what will happen if Groudon here is set free. But I do. Like the Centurion, the Halberd is powered by aura. It's draining the aura from Groudon to power itself, just like the ultimate weapon. And I suppose you remember what happened to the ultimate weapon when the power was cut? Now Blade!"
Blade could feel his body again as he leapt from the shadows.
"Whao!"
"What the…"
In one swift motion he leapt over their heads and landed atop the large red pokemon known as Groudon. And from there he jumped at the walls.
"What the hell is that!"
"What have you done?"
Blade felt his claws cut through four human arm sized cables, one by one, which seemed to connect to the platform below him. There was a platform, he could see more of it now.
The effect was almost instant. Groudon's eyes snapped open filled with fury. The legendary ground type raised its large head and made a deafening roar, before lumbering forward.
"Oh fuck!" cried Cameron. "This is not good." Blade was hearing them more and more, but he wasn't sure why, was the device not working? That must have been it.
"I thought this was your plan," another unrecognized human bellowed. "You wanted to free it. What the fuck were you expecting to happen."
"HEY GROUDON," Ash seemed to call out.
"WAIT…COME BACK GROUDON."
Blade felt a strange sense of Pride having accomplished his tasks. He looked toward Xiphos. "Yea haw. Take those cables. You've just been Snea-calped. Teh-he. Get it. Scalped but with a snea in front of it, because I'm a Sneasel…Wait who am I talking to." Blade shook his head, he felt silly making that pun for nobody in particular. He held his arms over his head and grinned wide. "Hmmm come to think of it, Snea-lacking would have been more fitting." He frowned momentarily before rubbing his head with his claws. "Or Snea-laugher." He shrugged it off and resumed his pose. "Meh, I'll use them some other time….Wait. Where the fuck am I." His grin wore off again as he looked around the room. He remembered his captors saying something about boarding team rockets vessel, but was that really where he was.
"Wait, Blade," said Cameron. "What are you doing here? I thought you'd run off."
"Huh." Blade looked down and counted four trainers and a red bipedal dragon like creature.. He was mildly surprised to see them, having been uncertain of his own hearing. "Well, actually I was kidnapped. Thanks for the rescue effort, training. Heck, even noticing would have been nice. What is this place, what are we all doing here!" He was upset his trainer hadn't made any effort to find him, but pushed it aside for the moment.
"It's a very long story," Cameron replied. "How did you get here?"
Blade gave a roll of his eyes, not wanting to give a straight answer, but also not being certain himself. "Likewise, a long story."
"The short version is, this is a Team Rocket spaceship," said Ash. "They're trying to capture Necrozma. Our Pokémon are somewhere else being controlled by a Pokémon control machine."
Blade gaped at him. To say he was surprised was an understatement. "Fuck, seriously. How did I ever get myself involved with you lot." He sighed disappointedly.
"Guys, we're wasting valuable time," said one of the other humans, Jimmy, if he remembered from spying on them, urgently, before anyone else could say another word. "If Misty was telling the truth, then this ship could be coming down. We need to find our Pokémon and fast. Team Rocket said something about habitation."
"I'll help you look," said Blade jumping down from the platform he was on. "I can sniff out chu scent from a mile away." Blade turned his nose up and started sniffing around. "I've got it, come on, this way!" And he didn't wait for their affirmations, he simply started running toward a corridor.