Thread: The Surprising Adventures of a Glaceon in Unova (Finished!)

Sorry I'm late (again), I have to hand in a bookreport this week but I didn't finish reading the book yet.

Boreas and Aqua play chess together. And Aqua wins. That proves girls are smarter then boys.

I'm starting to understand Octa now. I wouldn't want to lose my family to something like that either. Wooh, Toxia and Octa sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g. Or on a bed...

I just love the way Black doesn't understand his pokemon. To bad he couldn't get his whole team to join him because Team Plasma was attacking them. At least they discovered where the Light Stone is.

Originally Posted by IVI

Sorry I'm late (again), I have to hand in a bookreport this week but I didn't finish reading the book yet.

Hey, no problem.

Boreas and Aqua play chess together. And Aqua wins. That proves girls are smarter then boys.

Boreas won, actually. :p

I'm starting to understand Octa now. I wouldn't want to lose my family to something like that either.

Precisely. It's not only about his opinion of Toxica, but also about his family's.

Incidentally, I now have an Author's Atlas thread, with a map of Unova and mediocrily-drawn pictures of my characters!

Chapter Fifty-Three: For Equinox and Honour

When Toxica returned to the main hall to leave Octa to talk to Boreas in private, she saw Aurora talking spiritedly to a Servine she hadn't met yet. He looked rather less noble and more scruffy than the others here. Perhaps it was the scars and slightly dirty scales, or maybe the uninhibited and unashamed anger on his face that made him seem less noble than the others, though oddly enough he also reminded her of Aurora. Toxica decided she had to introduce herself, went to him and made a respectful bow. “A good day to you, noble sir,” she greeted him in the way Octa had thought her. “My name is Toxica, houseless, and I am delighted to make your acquaintance.”

The Servine looked at her with surprise. “I'm Niernen,” he said with a surprising lack of protocol. “I didn't expect to see a Vileplume here; I didn't think ancestry-obsessed pokémon were all that keen on other species, especially if you're, as you say, houseless.”

“Be quiet, brother,” said Aurora with an oddly cracking voice. Toxica noticed only now that the gorgeous blue Servine was under great emotional anguish, though her perfect face only betrayed slight hints of it. “As you said, this is not the time for another argument. Toxica, I apologise, but I need to talk to my brother, for he has brought me most distressing news of the death of our parents in battle against Team Plasma.”

“Oh,” gasped Toxica. “I-I'm so sorry... I'll go talk to someone else, then...”

Feeling sad for Aurora and her brother, she decided to go to the big table where their strategy was being discussed to try and put her mind off it. The plan was to ambush Team Plasma between the high plants of the plains; according to Livia and Marcus, most of Team Plasma's pokémon were inside their pokéballs as they approached the mansion. If they could outflank them from three sides and suddenly attack them, it would be an easy victory, especially if they could knock out the humans before they could release more pokémon. Suggestions to quickly erect a wall around the breeding centre or just the mansion had been rejected as it would be a lot of work and would probably not be all that effective; the mansion just wasn't built with defensive capabilities in mind. It had a very large, welcoming entrance and was made more to impress than to defend. After the plans had been made and they all prepared to set out, Lord Publius Cornelius came to Toxica.

“Young Vileplume,” he said in his pleasant voice. “There is no need for you to accompany us. This battle is not yours to fight; go back to the nearby village and utilise a train to return to your trainer from there.”

While the powerful fire and poison types coming this way made that a very attractive idea, something in Toxica resisted. “My lord, with all due respect, I believe this is my battle to fight. Octa is my friend, and I'd like to think of your daughter as a friend as well. It wouldn't be right for me to leave them.”

“I understand. You are truly a brave Vileplume, yet I would prefer you to leave. You see, I have to be certain I can count on each and every one of those fighting for me if I am to command this battle well. Furthermore, if your life were to come into danger during the battle and a member of my house was able to prevent it, they would be honour-bound to defend you, risking their more valuable blood being spilt instead of your own lesser blood. You must understand, this is a risk I cannot take.”

“If you don't shut yer trap right now, this 'lesser-blooded' girl's gonna spill some of that oh-so valuable blood for you, you arrogant tosser!” was something Toxica nearly said as she ignited in anger. Fortunately, she managed to hold herself back from saying that and forced a smile onto her face instead.

“But,” she said, trying to keep her voice and face calm, “if I join you, I'll also be able to defend your family. In fact, my poison attacks would add some highly-needed variety into your force. I'm more than capable of handling myself in battle, just ask Octa.” When Lord Publius frowned, she added: “My lord.”

“Very well, I do not have time to argue about it any more. We leave now.”

–

Between the grass of Route 7, as high as a tall human, it was not that hard to ambush their enemy. All they needed was to let some of them scout ahead so they could find out the exact position of the enemy, and they could attack the enemy from three sides, leaving one side open so the enemy had a chance to flee. This seemed counter-intuitive to Toxica, but Marcus explained that if they surrounded the enemy completely, they would all fight to the bitter end, while if they surrounded them only partially, the more cowardly enemies would break and flee once things went bad. At least, that was the plan, because Livia came back with bad news:

“They know we're ambushing.”

“What?”

“How?”

“I do not understand either... We are quite certain they did not detect us whilst we scouted ahead, yet now they have released all their pokémon and are travelling in a spread out formation, with scouts of their own that will make an ambush impossible.”

“Perchance 'tis simply a precaution as they approach the mansion?”

“They are still kilometres away; they must somehow know we detected them and are planning a counter attack.”

“I believe I know how they knew we knew they were attacking,” said Galaxia. “Treason. There is a traitor amongst us, a mole if you will, who communicated our plans to the enemy. I also believe I know the identity of this mole. A lowly creature of befouled blood who has been attempting to wrench her way into our house by seducing Octavianus, the potential heir to the title of our leader, my nephew, the illustrious Lord Publius Cornelius, with her despicable wiles, in order to befoul our bloodline forever with her lowly blood.”

Toxica couldn't hold herself back and yelled: “You hideous old b-” she was cut off as Octa stepped forward, “accidentally” giving her a big push that shut her up as he stepped past her.

“That is a very serious accusation, great-aunt,” he said in firm tones. “To make an accusation of this scale directed at a guest to our house is a deep dishonour I hadn't considered you capable of.”

“He's right, great-aunt,” Livia agreed. “Without compelling evidence, you insult our house's honour by making such an accusation against our esteemed guest, regardless of her ancestral status.”

Galaxia was taken aback by the fact that both Octa and Toxica were arguing against her. “Be quiet, misguided younglings. Do not propose to lecture your elder on honour after associating with lower-born creatures. The only evidence I need is lowly descent, coupled with the fact that a mole is the only way this information could have reached Team Plasma's ears. The only contact we know of that any of us have had with others since discovering this attack was the X-transceiver conversation Octavianus conducted, and because of the short distance between host and recipient that could not have been intercepted, for this technology is based on direct transmission between apparati when used over relatively short ranges.”

“Your logic is highly faulty,” said Octa, “and I believe merely based upon your distrust of commoners; after travelling with Toxica for over a year, I have every reason to believe she is as trustworthy as any of us. In fact,” he drew a breath to give himself some courage to say this, “she is as admirable, honourable, and indeed noble as anyone of noble blood, as, as I have found, are others of plebeian descent. You are wrong to distrust her because she does not know her ancestry.”

Toxica basked in such great praise, coming from Octa, and to hear him defend her against his own family. His words sparked an immediate discussion, but it was quickly ended by Lord Publius:

“Silence! Silence, please. Aunt Galaxia, if my son vouches for her personality, that should be enough reason to trust Toxica for any of us. My son, these are some bold claims you put forth, and we shall have to discuss them at a later time. At the moment, we shall need to concentrate on defeating the attack before it reaches our ancestral home. Retreat is no option; we all know the mansion was not constructed for defensive purposes and that we have always responded to attacks by using these grasslands to ambush. While an attempt to ambush shall fail due to the enemy being alerted to our plans, we shall still have to make our stand here. Brittanicus, take one-third of our force and make a semi-circular movement around the enemy; we shall still endeavour to flank them.”

“My lord,” said Aunt Galaxia, bitterly, “with all due respect: aside from Team Plasma's previous attack, two months ago, neither Brittanicus nor yourself have ever had to defend our ancestral home; last time it was attacked was in the days when my esteemed mother led our house, shortly after you hatched. I believe I would make a better leader to either of our forces than you or Brittanicus.”

“I believe Brittanicus shall make a better leader of the flanking force and I shall lead our main force myself; however, your advice shall indeed be welcome and I shall endeavour to keep you by my side, aunt.”

Their discussion continued, but Toxica didn't listen any more and instead thanked Octa: “Octa, cheers for helpin' me out. Those things you said were very nice.”

Octa smiled and was about to say something when Brittanicus approached them: “Octa, Toxica, follow me. We're going to attack the enemy's flank.”

–

Toxica ran along with the twelve Servines and Serperiors. They had to move fast so the grunts and pokémon employed as scouts would only alert the enemy shortly before their flanking manoeuvre hit them in the back. The fact that she was having a hard time keeping up with the snakes, though her legs were longer than the Servines' and the Serperiors had no legs at all, annoyed her to no end. But not as much as the entire Equinox family's attitude. Galaxia might be the worst of all, but all of them really harboured the same sentiments. I'll show them who has 'lesser' blood here... Bunch of gits, at least Octa and Livia stood up for me. I'll show them they were right about me! I hope they were right about me...

Sounds of the battle began as the main force collided with Plasma, making enormous flames that were visible even above the high grass. It was a good thing May had been very rainy so the grasses were wet, or they could easily have a massive fire on their hands. Brittanicus gestured to charge and ran forward to the enemy, Leaf Blade drawn.

Team Plasma had been warned about the flank by their scouts, so the grunts at the rear of their force were not entirely unprepared, yet it still was very effective. Toxica enveloped herself in a whirlwind of sharp petals as she used a dance-like combat style, hitting her opponents with several attacks while (she hoped) elegantly dodging their attacks. She easily ploughed through the enemy force, knocking pokémon and humans alike out with the powerful Petal Dance as her allies did the same with Leaf Blade and Energy Ball to her sides.

A gust of wind blew the tall grass aside as a Charizard and a Crobat ascended into the air with a human each on their backs. A balding old man whose greying blond hair ineffectively covered his immense bald spot in a poor comb-over was on the Charizard's back. He wore long red robes matching his Charizard's scales. Riding the Crobat was another old man with greying brown hair and a goatee wearing purple robes, who Toxica recognised as Sage Zinzolin. At that moment, the battle immediately stopped, both sides recognising this was time to listen, not to fight.

“Pokémon of Crimshon Breedersh,” shouted the other old man from his Charizard's back in a Dutch accent. “We are Sagesh Rood and Zinzolin of Team Plashma! Our wor ishent wit you, but wit de youmansh who have cruwelly and shelfishly ushed you for generations, exploiting you for dair purshunnal profit. We are here to liberate you, not to fight you. Sho shtand ashide and join ush in our shwift and terrible vengeanshe upon your shelf-proclaimed mashtersh, broddersh and shishtersh!”

The voice of Lord Publius Cornelius, soaked with righteous indignation, sounded from the tall grass. “None who would kill innocents, who would wage war upon the valued bonds between human and pokémon, nay, on reason itself, who have destroyed ancient and valuable architecture and art, who have murdered members of the house of Quintillus, and who now seek to impose their will upon us and assault our ancestral home and our faithful human friends shall be considered brother or sister of the house of Equinox! Return now, you despicable fiends; return to whatever abyss you emerged from, and leave the noble house of Equinox, as well as all of Unova, in peace, or you shall regret the day you ever slighted us! We shall resist you, wherever you go, and none of you villains shall escape to tell others the foolishness of slighting the house of Equinox, nay, civilisation itself!”

The entire house of Equinox cheered after his speech, and Toxica cheered with them.

“Dat's a shame,” said Rood from the back of his Charizard. “I would have tought pokémon like you would be wiser dan to chooshe de pat of violenshe. Pleashe reconshider; I don't want to have to end your houshe'sh long hishtory today. Won't you take de pat of peace inshtead?”

“Never!” spoke Lord Publius. “The house of Equinox shall never betray its friends and allies to side with barbaric aggressors! Type advantage or no type advantage, the house of Equinox shall stand firm for centuries after your Team Plasma has crumbled to dust, no more than a footnote in the history books.”

“I see,” said Zinzolin from the back of his Crobat. “You 'ave chosen to side with our enemies, then. Then you are an enemy of Team Plasma as well, and we shall unfortunately 'ave to kill you. We do this with regret.”

“The house of Equinox shall never fall! Attack! Attack for Equinox and honour!”

At that moment the battle recommenced. Flames and poison and energy burst through the battlefield. Dozens of Leaf Blades were used expertly. Toxica fought her enemies with Petal Dance; the battle was going great until until a massive blast of flames engulfed a cousin of Octa's, who was fighting on Toxica's left. Toxica screeched in fear as the wave of heat hit her from that side. Charizard swooped over them, spitting an intense inferno downwards that incinerated another Serperior. Toxica's swift reaction allowed her to escape with just some slight scorches, but some cries of pain told her not everyone had been so lucky. She ducked under a blast of poison a Drapion shot at her and fought a Krokorok that was surprisingly fast. The tall grass the battlefield was covered with was rapidly withering away between the flames and the poison the enemy used, allowing everyone more overview of the battle. Toxica saw Lord Publius now, battling Rood's Chandelure and Zinzolin's Weezing at the same time, but she couldn't see Octa. Fear that he had been killed gripped her.

A blaze of fire withered a thick clump of grass to her side, and revealed Rood's Heatmor. She made eye-contact with the fiery anteater for a moment and jumped to the side immediately, avoiding the Flamethrower it immediately unleashed upon her. She quivered in terror as she felt its heat and imagined the agony if it would hit her. Her legs felt like jelly and she desperately wanted to flee from the mighty fire-type. But something in her resisted and decided she was going to stand her ground. She launched a thick cloud of toxic pollen from her flower.

Heatmor coughed and sneezed as it inhaled the pollen, unleashing flames from its snout, and Toxica followed up by launching a flood of acidic nectar from her flower, covering her opponent in the toxic, painful goo. She laughed at how easy this was going as she enveloped herself in a whirlwind of sharp leaves and began a dance-like physical combat style.

But she had underestimated her enemy: as she hit it with the Petal Dance, its claws burst in flame and it gave her a phenomenal, scorching punch that sent her flaming and screaming through the air, fortunately landing on her burning side so the flames were extinguished. She whimpered in pain from the bone-breaking impact and the flames, but tried to get up as soon as she could to prevent her enemy from incinerating her. But it took her so long she expected to be incinerated already. Instead, she heard sounds of fighting very close by. Looking up, she saw Aurora fighting Heatmor, dodging flames and attacking with unbelievable elegance and grace, stabbing the opponent with a blue Leaf Blade.

Toxica managed to stand up just as Heatmor managed to hit Aurora, punching her away with a Fire Punch. Toxica shot more Acid at her opponent as she dodged flames, but even with the toxic powder poisoning her enemy, it just wasn't that powerful an attack. She was in big trouble against a more powerful enemy that threatened to incinerate her.

Octa, with several burns and some very oddly-coloured, painful wounds, ran at her enemy, rolled over the ground to dodge under the wave of flame the Heatmor sent his way, jumped up and stabbed his opponent with his Leaf Blade. Heatmor's fiery claw reached to punch Octa, but at that moment the warm, high June-Sun broke through the cover of clouds. Toxica felt great energy as the Sun shone on her chlorophyl-containing flower and skin. She used that energy by focussing it all into a single point, her flower's centre, aimed it at the Heatmor, and fired a powerful SolarBeam directly into its face. It roared in pain as it was at the same time blinded by the intense light and burnt by its energy.

Toxica took the sunlight in for another Solar Beam as Octa stabbed their blinded enemy several times. With another great beam of intense light, their enemy fell down to the ground, defeated.

Octa, burnt and wounded, turned to her with admiration and walked at her. “I have made my choice. I hope you can forgive me,” he said, infuriating Toxica for a moment, “for not choosing for you earlier. I am quite willing to endure my family's wrath for you.”

He embraced her and their lips found each other amidst the fires and sounds of battle. Toxica was overwhelmed with love as she firmly snogged with Octa. While not their first kiss, this fifth kiss felt far more important than their first kiss as there was no mistaking it's meaning.

–

The battle was not going well. Though they outflanked the enemy and had defeated quite a lot of them, even more of Octa's relatives had fallen. The type advantage the Sages' pokémon had over almost all of them was just very hard to overcome. The fire easily burnt plants and the poison withered them. As Toxica and Octa fought together, the fact that they were losing became increasingly clear. As they beat a Wormadam together, Toxica began feeling desperate. “Octa, we're losing the battle! We should retreat!”

“That is impossible,” replied Octa. “This is our best opportunity to stop them, for my ancestral home is quite a poor defensive position, nor should we seek to engage the enemy there, for even victory would come at great cost of heirlooms there. However, I do agree we should endeavour to find a better manner of defeating them than through sheer military force. I do wish Boreas had accompanied me...”

Toxica felt oddly jealous, considering she had just kissed Octa, and said: “We'll just have to do it without him. I guess we should attack the Sages?”

They had to dodge a spray of toxic slime from Zinzolin's Muk. “A good suggestion, but I fail to see how we could do so. The Charizard and Crobat they are flying upon are both highly resistant to both Energy Ball and SolarBeam. There is little opportunity to hit the humans on their backs. Then again... I think I do have an idea. You could poison them.”

“Not at this range, I couldn't. There's no way I could hit them with-” she used Petal Dance on an enemy Raticate, “-any poison attacks from so far away while they fly.”

“No, you couldn't; but I could throw you using my vines. When nearby, you could unleash your strongest poisons, then I could catch you again.”

Toxica looked at him like he was insane, then remembered the carnage around them. “It's worth a shot. Throw me at Zinzolin; I don't fancy that Charizard's flames.”

“I'm afraid it would be more effective to throw you at Rood; as a poison-master, Zinzolin would likely be carrying antidotes for many toxins.”

“Okay, I guess. Then I'll have to attack Rood...”

Octa grabbed her in his vines, but she gave him a quick kiss before he threw her. “For good luck.”

As Rood flew over, Toxica was launched high into the air by Octa, tumbling above the battle in the scorched, withered battlefield amidst the sea of tall grass. She quickly charged up a powerful dose of her nastiest poisons as she reached the top of her parabolic flight. Rood and his Charizard saw her before she reached them, but it was already too late: she gave him a face full of poisonous powders, slimes, and acids. But as she fell past the Charizard, she hit its wing and was knocked away from her trajectory. She was now falling sideways; Octa was nowhere near the place she'd land to catch her. She yelped in fear as she realised she was falling upside-down and would probably break her neck even with her flower cushioning the impact.

Just as she was about to hit the ground, Zinzolin's Skuntank, which was fighting Brittanicus, jumped aside to dodge its enemy's attack, jumping right under Toxica whose fall was cushioned by the soft, furry body. The Skuntank roared loudly in pain as she landed on it, threw her off to the ground, and opened its mouth to show its impressive set of teeth. Toxica tried to struggle away under it as it was about to bite her throat in anger, but it was too heavy and its claws had grabbed her flower firmly.

With a phenomenal lunge, Brittanicus' Leaf Blade stabbed right through the Skuntank's throat, now that it was preoccupied with Toxica, entering on the left and exiting on the right side. It jumped at Brittanicus in a pained reflex, and Toxica felt a cutting pain as its claws, which still held on to her flower, tore two of the large petals from her head. Blood and molasses leaked down her face as the Skuntank collapsed.

–

The battle was a victory, albeit a costly one. When Toxica had poisoned Rood, he had had no choice but to retreat, his face covered in dreadfully colourful wounds and ulcers. While Zinzolin had tried to keep himself and the grunts fighting, the death of one of his own pokémon at the hands of Brittanicus and the retreat of Rood had severely undermined the morale of the grunts, who had quickly begun fleeing the battle. Seeing his remaining pokémon surrounded and outnumbered, Zinzolin had wisely returned them to their pokéballs and fled to wherever it was Team Plasma hid on his Crobat.

But Octa had lost many a relative today. Uncle Vergillius, first cousins Tertia and Marcus Ulpius, his second cousin once removed, Gitaxias, his fourth cousin Marcia, and others he knew less well were all other names he'd have to miss. Their loss was a bitter pill to swallow to the entire family, but in the end the famed valour of the house of Equinox had triumphed. Every single one of them had proved their descendance from the great Equinox today. Including Toxica.

Yet Octa felt guilty for what he was about to tell his father. Toxica had conducted herself very admirably in battle; surely that would help convince him. A voice of doubt in his mind told him he could still back out, not tell his family, and tell Toxica he chose for Aurora anyway. But not only did he refuse to do so cowardly a deed, but he also recognised that was an impossibility; they had kissed in the middle of the battle, after all, probably with several relatives watching, so it was only a matter of time before all of them knew. Presumably the only reason the news hadn't spread yet was that the family had been too busy returning the remains of their fallen to the mansion so they could be given the farewell they deserved.

He took a deep breath. “Father, I have decided not to marry Aurora Invicta.”

His father looked up to meet his gaze. “It highly saddens me to hear that, my son. What are your objections to her? Is she not a most honourable lady and a truly great potential wife?”

“Yes, she is all that and more, father. But I have decided to forego marrying her, for she is not the one I love. For the one I love is Toxica.”

His father glowered at his son. “You know this is an impossibility. If you do not wish to marry Aurora, another mate can be found for you, but Toxica is neither a Snivy nor of noble blood.”

“That does not matter, father. What matters is that I truly love her. You have undoubtedly observed her in battle today; did she not display at least as much honour and valour as any of us? I am certain our descendants shan't be ashamed to have her as their ancestor any less than they would be ashamed to have any other member of the house of Equinox as their ancestor.”

“They would be Oddishes, my son! Bastard children with a broken ancestry and befouled blood! Is a son of mine really as selfish as to take the great gift of noble ancestry away from his descendants?”

“No, father, 'tis not selfishness. Toxica is as admirable a person as any descendant of the great Equinox.”

“Perhaps she is, but that does not change the fact that her ancestry is obscure and low. That I would see the day a son of the house of Equinox would waste his great potential by mingling with something that has crawled out of the gutter...”

“'Tis neither her ancestors nor mine who are important here, father! She and I are the only ones that matter. You sound like great-aunt Galaxia now; small-minded and stuck in the past!”

“You dare take the name of a member of your house as an insult? Your behaviour is unacceptable!”

“I do not take it as an insult, I merely point out you are exhibiting similar flawed reasoning. Great-aunt Galaxia believes we should not mingle with those of lower blood, much like our ancestors of old did, yet you and I both know this is archaic and wrong; those without noble blood in their veins are just as capable of achieving greatness, they merely aren't born with it. That is what you thought me. Did Toxica not achieve greatness today worthy of a descendant of Equinox? I postulate we would not have achieved victory without her; most of us would be dead now, rather than just a few, and our ancestral home would lie in ruins, our human friends slaughtered. It was this same lowly-bred lady who brought us victory whom I also wish to marry. Yes, she does not know her ancestry and is likely of lower blood, but was the same not true of the great Equinox? We don't even know what his parents' names were.”

This gave his father pause. “You are right. We do owe our victory to her. But please, I implore you to think about this choice; even if she may have honour worthy of the house of Equinox, do you really want your descendants to be born as Oddishes?”

“Yes, I do. I see no harm in that.”

Lord Publius sighed. “I do not agree with your choice, my son. Yet, you are correct that Toxica had exhibited valour worthy of you. If you really want to, I shall endeavour to convince the family it should be allowed as I discuss it with them. But at least try to reconsider...”

Octa hugged him. “Thank you so much, father...”

–

“Cruel oppressor!”

“How can you do this to them?!”

“Liberate your pokémon, don't you see it's evil to keep them?!”

“Team Plasma will get you, trainer!”

“Selfish bastard!”

These were just some of the insults Black had had thrown at him since they had arrived in Castelia. When they had finally arrived in Nacrene, Lenora had told them she believed the Light Stone had to be in the Relic Castle, which was in the route 4 desert between Castelia and Nimbasa. So they had taken the train to Castelia immediately, only to find the city's people were firmly in Team Plasma's grip. Yet they couldn't set out immediately and leave the unwelcoming city, as Octa had called to say he and Toxica were on their way after a victorious battle.

Boreas remembered the city as big and busy, but basically fun with many people and pokémon from when they were there last year. The Castelia of eleven months later was barely recognisable. The buildings were all the same, but the pokémon were almost all gone. You could find more cheer in a graveyard; the people were grim and sad, and hostile towards Black. Big symbols of Team Plasma had been painted on buildings, and several buildings were closed off, ransacked and their inhabitants disappeared or murdered. The entire city was baking in the heat of early summer, which felt even hotter to Boreas than it would do by itself as he had just spent a long time in the mountains, where it was much cooler.

Black was looking for supplies to make the trek to the Relic Castle, but when he got to a store, the guard at the entrance told him they were closed, even though it was mid-afternoon and there were clearly customers inside. Black was about to make a scene when he was suddenly pulled away by a human. But Boreas, nor his other pokémon, defended him as they saw it was White. She hadn't changed much in the half year since they'd last seen her.

“Hey, what are you- Oh, it's you, White!” Black said as White dragged him away by his arm. “Great to see you again, but what are you doing? I need stuff from that store and the guy at the entrance wouldn't let me in.”

“Follow me,” said White curtly. “Don't struggle, just come with me quickly.”

“Wh-where are you taking me?”

“To my apartment.”

Black arched an eyebrow and followed her a lot more willingly. “Oh?”

“Get your mind out of the gutter, or I'll leave you out here to be lynched! I'm just protecting you from your own stupidity!”

“I-I don't understand...” stammered Black.

“Just shut up and follow me quickly, I'll explain when we get to my apartment.”

Black and his pokémon followed White through Castelia. At one point, Boreas heard a screech and a crash and a groan of pain, looked around in shock, but only saw Zeph and Selene lying on the ground.

“You flew right into me, you ftupid bird!” Zeph snarled angrily.

“S-sorry,” Selene stammered, standing up again, “I was trying to land on your shoulder.”

“You crashed right into it! And besides, I don't like people touching me, and that includes sitting on my shoulder!”

“I really thought I was still above you...”

“Well, you thought wrong. Please don't try to sit on my shoulder again.”

“Are you blind as well as crazy?” asked Lucius. “Just get on my shoulder instead if you can do it without crashing into me too, you crazy bird.”

Boreas followed Black and White as they went to her apartment on the fifth floor of a tall building. It was a small, messy apartment, and all White's pokémon were in there. Boreas smiled immediately as he saw Febby. She had grown more beautiful since last time he had seen her, a very handsome Umbreon, yet she was rather plain compared to Aqua, Boreas thought. He felt a momentary flicker of nervousness, which he dismissed right away. “Hey, Febby, long time no see!”

Febby smiled shyly. “Oh, Boreas, I didn't expect to see you.”

Then Esper the Espeon greeted him too: “Hey, dude. Good to see you again, it's been a while.”

Boreas looked at Esper and forced a smile, though he thought the guy was an annoying idiot with a stupid name and a stupid personality. “Yeah, it has. What was your name again?”

“Esper,” he said with a giggle as he nuzzled Febby's side, making Boreas feel very annoyed.

“Right, Edwin, now I remember you,” Boreas said coldly.

Esper was so caught up in nuzzling Febby he didn't notice Boreas intentionally using the wrong name.

“Excuse the mess,” said White to Black. “Anyway, what were you thinking, going over street with your pokémon in plain view? Don't you know there's a war going on?”

“Well, yeah, but I didn't figure it would be any problem...”

“No problem?! Team Plasma has publicly announced they're going to kill everyone with pokémon, and made true on that promise quite a few times, and you didn't think it was a problem? And that's after they spent a whole year telling everyone how bad it is to keep pokémon. You're lucky I found you.”

“But... The war didn't seem nearly this bad in Icirrus, I mean, there were still trainers, and people didn't insult or threaten you for having pokémon...”

“Icirrus is small and remote; you're in Castelia now. This city has been Team Plasma's main target, and they've done a damn good job at it. For a while, I really considered liberating my pokémon too, but I just couldn't... They haven't been outside since the war started, it's just too dangerous...”

“I'm sorry to hear that, I didn't realise things were so bad... But hey, I've got an idea: why don't you come with me to the Relic Castle? I'm going there to find a legendary pokémon to use against Team Plasma, and I could use both the company and the help a lot.”

Looks like things are getting heated even more up now! It's sad Octa has lost several relatives, but I have a feeling they would be proud for those who manage to defend their home and live on.

One question though: what is the police or the international police doing? I know Team Plasma now has a lot of power and influence, but the police/international police wouldn't turn the blind eyes, or will this be untouched in this story?

Hey, have you also been ice-skating? I have, but I really fail at it. (Waarom geen Elf steden tocht :C)

I'm biginning to wonder if Aurora really is of a house. And I think her brother is the traitor.

Its very sad Octa lost a lot of relatives. At least they won.

Good job Octa. You finally realized Your heart is what matters. Now Octa and Toxica are going to get babies together :).

Team Plasma did a very good job in Castelia city. Its nice to see White back trough.

So, lets get on the ice, now it's still there. Don't rush yourself now. (Did you know Glaceon can't learn ice beam? At least mine couldn't learn it...)

Congrats on your award:)

Originally Posted by Dragoneye

Looks like things are getting heated even more up now! It's sad Octa has lost several relatives, but I have a feeling they would be proud for those who manage to defend their home and live on.

Yeah, they probably would. Whether they'd be as pleased with his choice of mate is another question.

One question though: what is the police or the international police doing? I know Team Plasma now has a lot of power and influence, but the police/international police wouldn't turn the blind eyes, or will this be untouched in this story?

They are officially trying to stop Team Plasma, but doing a really lousy job at it. By all odds, they have been heavily infiltrated. Team Plasma has had more than twenty years to prepare this war, while trainers only vaguely became aware of Team Plasma two years ago.

Originally Posted by IVI

Hey, have you also been ice-skating? I have, but I really fail at it. (Waarom geen Elf steden tocht :C)

Nah, I don't like ice-skating. I have enjoyed the snow, though.

I'm biginning to wonder if Aurora really is of a house. And I think her brother is the traitor.

Yesm she is; the house of Quintillus. Her parents and her brother were in a bit of a family feud with the rest of the family (including her) when they died.

Its very sad Octa lost a lot of relatives. At least they won.

Good job Octa. You finally realized Your heart is what matters. Now Octa and Toxica are going to get babies together :).

Seedlings, considering they're both grass types. Though they'll probably wait with it until after the war.

Team Plasma did a very good job in Castelia city. Its nice to see White back trough.

Castelia isn't the only city that's like that either; more and more cities are becoming like that.

Did you know Glaceon can't learn ice beam? At least mine couldn't learn it...

That's right, it learns Ice Beam by TM.

Originally Posted by IVI

Congrats on your award:)

Thanks, I was really happy and surprised by it.

Chapter Fifty-Four: Ashes and Dust

Toxica and Octa were really beginning to annoy Boreas. When they had returned from Octa's family with the news that they were now together, Boreas had been very happy, of course. Octa had managed to look past his family's traditions, and even managed to convince a few of his relatives, though not remotely all of them, that things should be changed. In short, Boreas had been delighted to hear his friends were now more than friends for each other.

But it was getting ridiculous; they only had eyes for each other. Octa would spend almost all his time with Toxica. He would talk to her, always walk with her, hold her hand, and occasionally they kissed. Boreas had tried just talking along with them, of course, but when they talked it was quite clear the conversation was mainly between the two of them and Boreas was more or less a bystander. It made him feel uncomfortable, especially when they would kiss and he didn't know where to look or what to do. So he had barely spoken with Octa in the past few days, and that, coupled with the desert heat and the blazing Sun, was really annoying him. He thought it was very inconsiderate of his friend to do this to him. Sure, Boreas had also spent almost all his time with Aqua whenever he could, but that was different.

Last time they had crossed the desert, Boreas had been inside his pokéball for most of the journey. But he had been just a young, barely evolved Glaceon then. He had a lot more experience and was a lot stronger this time, so he preferred walking to being inside his pokéball for the whole journey. While it wasn't anywhere near comfortable, making a continuous Icy Wind blow around him at least made the desert bearable. In fact, the cold zone he created around him was welcomed happily by everyone else except for Lucius and White's Darmanitan, who walked outside it, gladly taking in the desert heat. Though Selene usually either flew or sat on Lucius' shoulder, she mostly sat on either Boreas' or Black's shoulders during their journey through the desert, preferring to stay in the colder zone around Boreas.

In all, Boreas had quite a troupe around him. There were Black and White, Toxica and Octa, Febby and Esper (all four of whom seemed to have their lips glued to their respective partners at times, highly annoying Boreas. He wished they'd keep the kissing in private, it frustrated him to no end to see them smooch all the time. Obviously, it was different when he and Aqua did that), Selene, Zeph, and White's other pokémon: Braviary, Mandibuzz, and Simipour.

He watched Esper and Febby laugh and play around. “I don't know what she sees in that idiot,” he said to Zeph.

“Mhuh?” said Zeph indistinctly. “Oh. Him. Yeah, it's her loss, brother. But then, if she'd,” he yawned lengthily. “if fhe'd returned your love, you wouldn't be with your foxy Vaporeon now.”

“Yeah, you're right there,” grinned Boreas. “How did you know I used to be in love with Febby anyway? I don't think I ever told you that.”

Zeph grinned. “It's not hard to guess.”

Boreas chuckled. “I'll try to hide it better, then. I'm not actually in love with her any more, certainly not since I've met Aqua. Speaking of hiding things, you do quite a good job of looking awake. It wasn't until you opened your mouth that I noticed how tired you are. Are you not sleeping well?”

Zeph yawned. “Sand fleas. They've been keeping me up all night for days...”

Boreas shrugged. “I guess I got lucky with my sleeping spots; they haven't bothered me yet.”

“Lucky you,” Zeph yawned. “They're devouring me every night. I wonder what they eat when they can't get Flareon?”

“Well, if they keep bothering you just wake me and I'll swap places with you.”

“Nah, that won't work. I tried lying in different spots when they bothered me too much, but I think they just follow me. Must be this large, furry collar. If I'd just been a Jolteon, I bet they wouldn't bother me so much...”

–

“I just wish I could see your pretty face, my love,” said Boreas into the X-transceiver. Unfortunately, he could only use the audio because if he used the video option, the desert behind him would be obvious. While he knew Aqua could be trusted not to relay that information to Plasma, even if she did intend on rejoining them, there was always the possibility that Team Plasma would intercept the call. He couldn't even tell her about the stifling desert heat or how tiring it was to walk through sand for a whole day. “Seeing you again would really break the monotony. Octa is really spending far too much time with Toxica now. And Zeph still hasn't been getting any sleep, so he's grumpy and he keeps dragging his feet really irritatingly. And I think Selene's mind is affected by circumstances here. Though it is hard to tell with her. But today she told me her Uncle Istvan one day showed up with an orange for a head, and so people asked him why he had an orange for a head. So he explained that he had met a Jirachi who told him it'd grant his three wishes. So for his first wish he said: “I would like more food than I could ever eat.” And an enormous heap of food appeared. Then, for his second wish he said: “I want an intelligent, beautiful female to spend the rest of my life with.” So the loveliest Honchkrow he had ever seen appeared. “What is your final wish?” asked Jirachi. So he said: “I'd like an orange for a head.” Sometimes that crow really makes me wonder...”

He heard Aqua chuckle. “Well, things have been going a lot better on my end. I actually managed to move my toes today, can you believe that?! I'm really recovering!”

“That's excellent, love! I'm so glad to hear that. I hope you'll recover completely soon.”

“So do I,” sniggered Aqua. “Because I've felt like Tantalus all this time with you by my side while I was too weak to move. Let me tell you what I'm going to do to you when I fully recover...”

As Aqua lowered her voice to a whisper, Boreas brought the X-transceiver close to his ear to hear what she said and whispered back so no-one else would hear him. After they had their whispered conversation for a while, making Boreas blush very deeply and really feel the desert's heat around him, he saw the Relic Castle ahead.

“Listen, my love, I have to hang up, because we'll soon get to where we need to be. I promise I'll return to you as soon as we find the stone.”

“I can't wait. I'm getting my final operation tomorrow, you know. But I wish instead of the human doctor, you were here to play doctor.”

“Heh, so do I, love. But I've really got to go now. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

Only the topmost tower of the castle was visible, as the rest was all buried deep underground, though Lenora had said much of the underground portions were decently excavated on the inside. She had really wanted to come with Black, but because her presence was needed in Nacrene now more than ever, she couldn't.

The tower didn't reach very high above the sand, but looked rather foreboding. There was something very sinister about it. A small hole stood as the tower's entrance, leading down to the dark insides of the castle.

“Well, we're here,” said Black with an edge of fear in his voice. “It looks a bit uncanny... Let's get in there and find the stone quickly.”

“Fine by me,” said White as she and Black got torches from their backpacks. “That place gives me the shivers, but the White Stone's the best chance we have at stopping Team Plasma. I wonder if Reshiram will come out immediately when we find the stone?”

“When N summoned Zekrom, it took him a while to get it out of the stone. Quite a long while, actually. I think he talked to it with his thoughts or something, it was weird. I guess I'll have to do something similar when we find it.”

Boreas followed the trainers into the murky tower. An intense darkness hung inside and it was incredibly dusty. The air was ancient and stale. With every step, clouds of dust would fly around, getting into everyone's noses and throats and making them cough and sneeze. But through the dust in his nose and the smell of the castle itself and the stinging, smoky smell of Zeph, he detected another smell, one which he thought he'd smelt before. In fact, he had been smelling it for a while, come to think of it, though it was hard to pin down since when. He tried to remember whose smell it was, but couldn't quite put his paw on it.

The Relic Castle's architecture was very angular. There were very few curves; it was all triangles, squares, and hexagons. Even the sculptures were angular. Boreas followed Black and White over the ancient stairs leading down, as Lenora had instructed them to look in the treasure chambers, which were probably a maze of various chambers deep down in the castle. As they walked down the stairs there was less sand and more of the stone the castle was originally built of.

They reached the bottom of the stairs and walked though magnificent halls and corridors, looking for stairs leading even deeper into the Earth. A deathly silence hung in the ancient ruins, the only sounds the steps of thirty feet of various sizes and the dragging of Zeph's four feet. “Lift. Up. Your. Feet,” hissed Boreas to his brother.

“Huh?” asked Zeph sleepily. “Why?”

“Because the sound is even more grating in this deathly silence! Everything in the castle will hear that noise!”

“It's not louder than the noise of all your feet, and I'm tired, and there's no-one else here anyway. I don't feel like lifting up my feet, so don't bother me about it.”

Boreas let out a frustrated sigh and tried not to focus on the sound of Zeph's feet in the silence. Instead he looked at the many halls in the castle as they descended. The castle truly felt incredibly ancient, as if he could feel the weight of millennia of time pressing down on him. It was awe-inspiring and scary.

–

After hours of searching, they had finally reached the treasure chambers, which were an extensive maze of tunnels and chambers deep down under the ground. While there was barely any of the gold and silver and gems you'd expect in treasure rooms, there were some gorgeous statues and frescos. The corridors between the rooms were mostly just plain, sandy stone corridors without much to differentiate them, but each room was a bit different. Some rooms had collapsed and were inaccessible, but most of them contained at least something. Many of the rooms were on a single level, though there were a few very high rooms with a steep staircase hugging the wall tightly so someone could descend or ascend a level.

At last, they entered a large room with five exits. There were gorgeous frescos displaying Reshiram all over the walls, and in the middle of the room the room rose up with stairs, culminating in a top with a short pillar on it. The top of the pillar wasn't visible from their current position, but it was obvious the Light Stone would be there.

“Well, Black,” said White, “it must be on top of that. Looks like we're finally there! Go and get it!”

As Black climbed up the stairs, Boreas had a look around in the room. He had the nagging feeling something wasn't right. Trying to think of what was wrong about the room, he stared at the gorgeous frescos, which gleamed in the light of the torches... Gleam? How can they gleam if everything has been covered by two millennia of dust?

“Someone's been here before us!” he said. “They erased their tracks, but the floors and wall are still free of dust!”

At that moment, Black had reached the pillar. “I-it's not here!” he said in shock. “It's gone! Who took it?”

“We were about to ask-ah you the same theeng,” said an Italian-accented voice. In one of the corridors stood the massively fat Giallo in his yellow robes, sweating heavily in the desert heat, as well as four grunts, who were all very dirty and dusty. Giallo's team of steel-types was there too: Klinklang, Magnezone, Scizor, Lucario, and Bastiodon.

“Giallo,” said Black angrily as his and White's pokémon got in more defensive positions on the stairs. “How did you find out the stone was here and what did you do with it?”

“How we knew were the stone-ah was ees not eemportant. What concerns you ees: where ees eet now? Deed Alder come here-ah before us and where you only a deestraction? Answer me!”

Boreas laughed. “We haven't got a clue! Looks like you're out of luck!”

“No,” said Giallo. “You are. Because-ah eet seems to me you really don't know. Because, eef Alder or someone else had taken it, we would've seen their tracks when we arrived here two days ago. Eet must've been taken by someone a long time ago, a grave-robber or an adventurer of some kind. Eet could be anywhere by now. But, if N ees correct, you are the only one who can-ah resurrect Reshiram from that stone. So, eef I just eliminate you here, the stone will do you no good, whoever has eet now. You, however, girl-ah, don't need to die. Surrender.”

“Darmanitan,” said White, “use Flamethrower to burn that stupid moustache off his face.”

The entire cave lit up as a bolt of lighting jumped from Magnezone to Darmanitan, electrocuting it to prevent it from attacking Giallo.

“That was a very bad meestake. Eef you want to die beside him, I weel grant your weesh. Attack!”

The five enemy steel-types attacked, sinking fear into Boreas' heart. The steel-types he had battled and seen so far all told him it was a very powerful, dangerous type. The only way to hit them seemed to be to heat their armour up with fire attacks until they were baked on its conductive inside. Though, Boreas thought, using their own weight against them with a ground-attack might work too. But he had access to neither of those types of attacks, so when Scizor ran at him, its pincers ready to snap him in two, it was a problem to say the least.

He Ice Beamed the ground before its feet to make it slip and fall, but the dry, sandy stones hadn't seen water in centuries, so there was simply nothing to freeze. An Ice Beam to the Scizor didn't do anything either, even to its face. So Boreas did the only thing he could and ran for his life into a tunnel. The heavy, metallic footsteps of his enemy were close behind him as he ran, trying to think of some way to beat it. He entered a room full of stone statues and ran between them, throwing some of the statues in his pursuer's path to block it, but it snapped them in two easily with its steel pincers and continued mercilessly along its way.

Boreas saw the statues were no good at holding the Scizor back, and it was also a shame to see them destroyed, so he stopped throwing them and kept running, anxious to put more distance between him and Scizor, running into another tunnel. He saw one of the high rooms leading to a lower level ahead and had an idea. He stopped, turned around, and unleashed his most powerful Icy Wind yet to blow from him to the enemy. The stale, dusty air inside the tunnel didn't want to move. It was incredibly ancient air, which had been down here for centuries and hadn't blown freely through the sky since then, nor had it been inhaled by any living thing. It did not want to move, but with the desperate knowledge that he'd be cut in two like a sausage at dinner if he didn't get it to move, he used much energy to cool the air down and get wind going. The air felt much younger at once, like a seventy-year-old discovering his childhood hobby is still great fun. Now it was easy to make it blow harder and harder, though the tunnel, halting Scizor's progress as the gale turned into an icy storm. As the fierce wind could disperse nowhere in the tight tunnel, it was easy to make it very powerful.

Scizor was disturbingly close, but the icy storm finally halted it. While it was heavy and strong, helping it fight the wind, it was also very large and had wings that caught lots of air, making it almost impossible to progress to Boreas. The wind carried powerful blasts of sand and ice with it. Though Scizor didn't manage to take another step forward, much though it struggled against the wind, it wasn't blown back either. Boreas wasn't counting on that, though. While this would be a good moment to run away, he instead dug his claws into the ground and pressed himself as flat as possible, knowing what would happen next.

He stopped making the wind. Scizor took three steps forward and stood in front of Boreas, its pincer ready to grab him when it happened: the lower rooms behind Boreas, where he had blown so much air away from had very low pressure, while the statue room behind Scizor, where the wind blew towards, now had very high air-pressure. As Boreas expected, the result was rather violent: another howling stormwind of sand blasted back, except this time Scizor wasn't prepared for it and had its back towards it. The hurricane of wind blew the metal monstrosity over Boreas' head, through the tunnel, and with great speed into the staircase-room, where the crash as the heavy metallic creature hit the floor, its wings useless, was phenomenal. Meanwhile, Boreas, who was prepared for the wind, just got a face full of a painfully hard sand blast and was blown back a bit.

He didn't know whether the ten metres fall had killed Scizor, and didn't plan to find out either. He ran back through the statue-room and the tunnels to the room they had been ambushed in. Most of the fighters had dispersed through the tunnels and were no longer in the room. He saw Selene and Simipour fighting Bastiodon, but didn't have time to make out more than that in the darkness as the spiky collection of living gears that was the enemy Klinklang came at him.

It advanced rapidly on its big gear, making an infernal metallic noise as its gears ground towards Boreas faster and faster, trying to catch him and grind him down. He backed away and Ice Beamed the enemy, but it didn't even feel the beam of icy cold, even when Boreas aimed at the axes of the gears. The Klinklang went incredibly fast, he could not outrun it. He looked around quickly, but all his allies were caught up fighting the other enemies. Except for Zeph, who was not in any battle at the moment and looking at it all with sleepy shock.

“Zeph, you idiot!” Boreas yelled as the tunnel he backed into turned out to be a dead end, and was faced with the rapidly approaching gears. “Help me!”

Zeph looked at him in surprise, hesitated, and then rushed for Boreas. As the Klinklang reached him, it trapped him between its grinding gears, but kept spinning, sending a terrible pain through him. But he was fortunate: before the gears could keep spinning and grind his spine to paste, Zeph managed to stop them with his phenomenal strength.

“Stay away from him!” ordered Zeph as he spit a wave of flame at the Klinklang. The torrent of intense fire blazed over Klinklang, so it was fortunate for Boreas he was behind it so its body shielded him from Zeph's flames. He felt a wave of heat from the fire, yet it didn't feel as hot as he expected, nor did the flames enlighten the dark tunnel as much as he thought they would. Fortunately it seemed enough to convince Klinklang to leave him, for it fled. Zeph spit one more flame after it before it turned the corner.

“Thanks, Zeph,” said Boreas gratefully. “That was just in the nick of time.”

“That's two you owe me,” grinned Zeph. “Try to stay safe, okay? I'm going back to fight them.”

“Stay safe? What do you mean? I'm not going to cower while my friends fight for their lives!”

“These are highly-trained steel-types. Fire is pretty much the only way to hurt them. You can't freeze them, you can't bite them, pretty much nothing works against them. What are you going to do against them?”

“I dunno, I expect I'll come up with something. I usually do.”

“Do it away from me, then, because I intend to use Fire Blast and Lava Plume and don't want to accidentally catch you in them.” And he ran back.

Boreas muttered in annoyance, but realised Zeph was right in that there was little he could do against the enemy. While their metal armours would of course conduct cold just as well as heat, he also realised there was a big difference between having a baking hot metal plate pressed against you or a freezing cold one; one hurt and burned you, while the other was just really unpleasant. Cold just seemed to work better if you could really get it deep into your opponent, not with simple touch. He had to think of some way to get the cold through that armour effectively if he wanted to be useful in this fight.

Fortunately, he thought of a way that might just work. Using the pulses of cold he used for his Frost Concussion offensively instead of defensively might be enough to get the cold all the way through the steel armour. He rushed after Zeph, and soon came into the chamber where Zeph, Selene, Octa and Simipour where still fighting enemies while several others lay on the ground defeated. Zeph was spitting impressive flames at Klinklang, barely missing it, though the deep darkness of the ancient tunnels somehow seemed to absorb the light of the flames. With a tremendous beam of energy to its face, Boreas saw Lucario defeat Simipour. He ran at Lucario, planning to use his plan of attack against it, but it saw him coming, extended a front paw, and an invisible wave of psychic energy, like a giant's hand slapping his face hit his face, knocking it back with such force that Boreas made a half-flip and landed on his back.

“No!” he heard Zeph yell. “Don't you dare attack him! Attack me instead!”

Boreas crawled back to his feet and saw the Lucario was indeed firing its aura attacks at Zeph, who was also in battle with Bastiodon, fortunately missing him. “Shut up, Zeph, I can take care of myself!”

Boreas jumped at Lucario and managed to grab its stomach with his front paws. He immediately unleashed pulses of cold, prompting a howl of pain as his enemy folded over. A tremendous kick knocked Boreas off his enemy, but it was clearly hurt by the attack.

“If you kill him,” snarled Zeph threateningly at the Lucario, “you'll have me to answer to!”

Boreas pounced his opponent again, but its large legs left it very agile despite its metallic exterior, and it easily dodged him. As Boreas came down next to it, he realised he had made a terrible blunder as he was now for a moment incredibly vulnerable, next to his opponent with his back more or less exposed; a single powerful kick from the fighting type could probably break his neck now. As he tried desperately to recover he just waited for the horrible pain he expected to begin, but to his surprise the Lucario missed its opportunity to strike. He turned on it instead, but it managed to dodge him again. Then he made a feint to the left as he actually jumped to the right, and managed to catch Lucario. Before it had a chance to throw him off, he had pumped another pulse of cold through it, this time through its upper chest. Then, as his opponent writhed in pain, he managed to grab its head and sent a pulse of cold through it. It collapsed to the ground.

Boreas laughed. “See, what'd I tell you, Zeph?”

Zeph gave him an arrogant grin. “Alright, you've got skill, I already knew that.”

At that moment, an immense rumble sounded as the wall collapsed when a gigantic iron head broke through. Boreas couldn't believe he had forgotten about Steelix, Giallo's final and most impressive team member. Its gigantic metal body rolled into the cave at great speed, right at Boreas as it heaved its huge head up. The noise was enormous, but not as great as Boreas' terror.

“Don't kill him, or I'll kill you!” yelled Zeph at the monstrous metal snake.

Boreas tried to get out of its path, but it was too large and too fast and it immediately coiled around him, trapping him between three huge metal sections as it slithered into a tunnel. Boreas screamed in pain as the Steelix's iron grip nearly crushed him and the sharp metal edges dug into his flesh. He was very sure the edges like knives were giving him big wounds and he was probably bleeding from them. As the Steelix dragged him through tunnels and chambers like this, he put his front paws on two of the different sections holding him, and unleashed the most powerful pulses of cold he could muster into them. Steelix roared in pain, a piercing metallic roar, and Boreas screamed in pain as well as it tightened the coil around him for a moment, immediately forcing all air out of his lungs as he felt the now familiar pain of ribs breaking from the Steelix's mighty force crushing his chest.

But he couldn't relent, despite the pain. He unleashed as many pulses of cold into his enemy's serpentine body as he could, piercing its metallic armour with them. It uncoiled, dropping him to the ground where he more or less managed to remain standing. They were in another large room with a very beautifully made high ceiling, which gave Steelix enough room to heave its head up above him. Boreas aimed for its eyes and Ice Beamed them, hitting his enemy's weakest points successfully. It roared in pain and anger and its huge head came at him rapidly, its mouth open showing row upon row of sharp metal teeth the size and shape of daggers. Boreas Ice Beamed into its throat, but realised it would not save him from being devoured by this monstrosity.

But then the most curious thing happened: it stopped and slithered away into a tunnel more rapidly than Boreas could follow. For some reason, it had fled from him, a Glaceon not a tenth its size. At that moment, the pain of his injuries really reached him and he collapsed. He was rapidly losing blood from several huge cuts his enemy's sharp edges had made, he had several broken ribs and he could see his skin turn a bruised purple under his fur on various places. He realised he would never survive this much blood loss unless he was treated quickly, so he had to get back to Black or White immediately and really hope they'd win the battle.

He struggled back to four legs and walked back as fast as he could manage. One of his front legs was horribly bruised and hurt so much he had to walk with a clumsy three-legged gait, occasionally collapsing completely from pain and blood loss. His breath wheezed. Steelix's path back was easy to follow by the deep trails of damage the metal snake had left to every room and corridor it had passed through. At last, Boreas managed to reach the chamber the battle had started in as he just couldn't go on. He couldn't even walk any more, so weakened was he by all the blood pouring out of his wounds. The room was only lit by a few small fires now; clearly the battle here had ended. There were several shapes lying on the ground, but it was too dark to see who they were unless he was close by. He dragged himself past Lucario, past Lucius lying on the floor - whether dead or alive Boreas couldn't determine in his own state - past Bastiodon, and past Simipour and Selene. Then, to his great horror, he passed a slender, green, serpentine form just as he couldn't even drag himself on. Octa was bleeding even worse than Boreas was from immense wounds; was horribly maimed, missing his tail-leaves and an arm, and had several large burns. Boreas grabbed his friend's still form with his last strength.

“N-no! Octa... Not you, you can't die!” he desperately whispered.

Octa opened his eyes. Or, rather, eye, as what was left of the other one amidst a horrible wound to the entire left side of his face didn't qualify as an eye any more. “My... dear fellow...” Octa whispered hoarsely as blood dripped out of his mouth. “It seems... I can.”

“No... No... Please, Octa... Don't leave me...” he whispered as he embraced Octa tightly. “It's not too late. Black or White can just treat your wounds and give you potions and-”

“No,” Octa whispered weakly into his ear. “'Tis too late for that... I... I am happy to at least die in your presence... my dear fellow... You have been... and always shall be... my friend.”

Boreas felt tears streaming on his cheeks, but then he realised he was hearing the best sound in the world behind him: the heavy steps of a large, bipedal creature. He knew it was Black, and Octa might still stand a chance if he would return him to his pokéball immediately and only let him out once they were at the pokécenter.

He gratefully turned to look at the feet behind him, but to his surprise and horror they weren't wearing shoes. In fact, they were not human at all: furry and clawed. Boreas looked up slowly across a large, bipedal form covered in dark grey fur that was rather thin at some partially-healed burns. A huge, dark red ponytail with a purple band holding it together hung from a snouted face. Bloodshot eyes with dark purple irises looked down at him above a malicious grin that missed two teeth.

“No... Not you...” Boreas gasped.

“Hello, Boreas,” grinned Diego.

Forgot this the past few chapters, but: @Gotpika

Chapter Fifty-Five: Fight or Flight?

Boreas tried to put himself between Diego and Octa's still form, determined not to let the cruel Zoroark any closer to his dying friend. "Stay away from him, you monster!" he commanded furiously. "I won't let you hurt him again! Harm one more scale on his body, and I'll make you regret it!"

Diego laughed coldly. "Don't worry, Boreas, I won't hurt him any more. After all, what's the use of hurting someone who has a minute left at best?"

Boreas wanted nothing more than to tear Diego's limbs off for killing Octa, but he couldn't even stand, so weakened was he. Even sitting was hard; he was half-lying over Octa to protect him. "Why did you do this to him?!" he shouted, powerless. "He did not deserve to die. Do you have any idea what an amazing person it was that you killed?!"

Diego reached down. With a final outpouring of strength to protect Octa, like a small animal defending its wounded mate from a much larger predator, Boreas bit Diego's paw and fired an Ice Beam at him. Diego fell as the Ice Beam hit his stomach, so Boreas pounced him with furious determination. He tried to pump pulses of cold through his enemy's body, but at that moment the energy his determination to save Octa had given him had simply run out. His vision became dotted with black spots that soon filled his field of view, his heartbeat sounded like a loud drum in his ears, and a splitting headache and dizziness clouded his mind as he collapsed on top of Diego.

He felt the Zoroark's powerful grip around his neck and was in even more pain than he already was as he was lifted up by it again. Diego lifted him all the way up to his face's height. Diego looked into Boreas' eyes, a bloodshot purple with dark circles under them. "I didn't do that to him," his voice sounded very far away as Boreas drifted at the edge of consciousness. "Or at least, I didn't do most of it. I just contributed a small bit. Giallo's pokémon did most of the work."

"You... You will all pay for this," Boreas said through his throat being clenched as he returned to full consciousness. "I will do things so horrible to you even your twisted mind can't even imagine them. Because Octa was the best friend I've ever had! He was kind, smart, noble, wise, and so much more! I loved him like he was my brother; more than that even! I swear, Diego, my revenge will be horrible!"

Diego grinned. "Touching. I'm very curious to see how you're going to rain this horrible vengeance down on my head, as it seems to me that I'm here in pretty good condition, holding you up by your throat once more, while you're at Death's door. And it will be my pleasure to open it for you. Because your use to Team Plasma has ended."

Diego threw Boreas to the ground hard, making him groan in pain. He tried to get up, but could do nothing but lie there and pant. Dark spots danced before his eyes, his vision went unfocussed, and then a bright light spot appeared before his eyes as he lay on his side. He felt something on the upper side of his head, and realised it was Diego's foot, fortunately with no weight on it at the moment. Though it was hard to detect amidst the stinging smell of smoke that hung in the chamber, he now realised he had been smelling Diego when he entered the Relic Castle. "Ba... Bastard..."

"It's over, Boreas," whispered Diego. "But before I kill you, you need to know one last thing. I want you to understand before the end, see the horror at the revelation in your eyes as your live ebbs away. I- Argh!" The foot was suddenly taken off Boreas' head, but his mind and eyes were too clouded to realise what was happening.

"If you ever touch him again, you shall die the most horrifying of deaths, you malicious Mephistophelean monstrosity!" said a deep, noble voice angrily.

Boreas thought he heard sounds of combat. "How stupid of me. I should've killed you completely when I had the chance."

"Indeed, that would have been the wiser course of action," the noble voice said between sounds of fighting. "For now I shall protect Boreas from you, or die trying! You shall hurt him nevermore! This I swear upon the name of Equinox the great!"

Boreas had to indulge his curiosity, despite how his mind drifted on the edge of unconsciousness and the pain he felt. He managed to turn to his other side and saw Diego fighting a Serperior. He laughed weakly, but happily as he realised Octa had evolved to save them both. Boreas closed his eyes, feeling safe and reassured that Octa was alive and would protect him.

-

Octa had no time to revel in the bizarre feeling of having a new body. Diego was a mighty opponent, so he had to keep his mind on the battle. That he had managed to induce his evolutionary metamorphosis had come as quite a surprise to Octa. He had tried to evolve before, but no amount of thought to that end had made him evolve any more than it had given him wings or turned him orange.

When Bastiodon and Klinklang had together wounded him so terribly, even to the point where one of his arms had got stuck in Klinklang's machinery and had been torn off by the grinding gears, he had realised evolution was his only hope. As his blood had flowed out of his body, he had tried and tried and wished to evolve, but nothing had happened and he got weaker and weaker.

By the time the battle in the room had ended and Boreas had found him, he had been more or less resigned to die. At least he was dying in a manner worthy of a descendant of Equinox, and despite the recent arguments about his choice of mate, his family would likely remember him fondly and honour his memory like those of his illustrious ancestors.

But then, as he felt his final breath near, Diego had come in, and Boreas had defended him, a dying Servine, with such valour. It had warmed Octa's heart, but he also realised Boreas was about to die himself. It had given him such determination, he had managed to evolve in his weakened state, fortunately while Diego wasn't looking at him.

And now he was fighting Diego. Having recently evolved to a Serperior was both a blessing and a curse: on the one hand his new form was very powerful and agile, on the other he was not used to fighting with it and made a few grave errors. The lack of rear legs especially took getting used to.

He had to hurry and defeat Diego as soon as possible. Boreas was gravely injured, though not nearly as gravely as Octa had been moments ago, and would need medical aid as soon as possible.

-

"My dear fellow! My dear fellow, please, I implore you to reawaken!" the voice returned Boreas from his sleep.

"Whuh?" he said as he opened his eyes the little bit he could manage. He was in pain all over, but didn't care as he saw Octa's face before him. It had changed: his friend's yellow skin had turned white, the single yellow extension behind his head had split into three purple extensions, and the patterns on his head were different. He looked nobler and more aloof, yet he was still, unmistakably, Octa. Especially his warm brown eyes were clearly Octa's. Boreas managed to put a paw around his neck and hugged his friend. "Octa... You bastard, you had me thinking you were dead! Oh, who am I kidding, I'm so happy to see you... You've evolved to such a good-looking Serperior..."

Octa smiled warmly as he hugged back, using both the long, Snivy-like arms which were shared in his family even when they evolved to Serperior, and his now very lengthy body to wrap Boreas up in a tight hug. "Thank you, my dear fellow," he said. Octa's voice had become deeper, more melodic and noble now that he had evolved. "But 'tis yourself whom you must thank for the survival of us both. Your brave defence of me even as you were grievously wounded gave me the motivation to make myself evolve. But now, you cannot allow yourself to fall back asleep; I need you to stay awake. You are losing a lot of blood, but I shall take care of you and rescue you. Do not be afraid."

"Th... thank you... But I'm not afraid... I'm with you..."

Octa smiled warmly. "Thank you, my dear fellow. We shall have to wait for Black to find us for real medical aid, but for now I can at least prevent as much blood as possible from escaping through your wounds by holding you this tightly."

"Where's Diego? Did you get him?"

"I'm afraid I did not. I battled him for a while until your brother entered the chamber and joined the fight against him. Diego fled, your brother pursued, but I stayed here to care for you."

"Hope Zeph gets that bastard..." mumbled Boreas.

"So do I, my dear fellow," Octa smiled, "although I am merely happy we are both alive, and shall make sure you'll remain living."

"Thanks... What about the others? Did they survive the battle? And did we win?"

"The battle is not over yet, my dear fellow; 'tis merely ended in this particular chamber. Our enemy's Magnezone and Steelix both remain fighting in a different chamber and shall be very difficult for our allies to defeat."

"The battle's still going on? Then what're you wasting your time for with me, go help using your great new Serperior-powers!"

"No, my dear fellow; you require care and I'm not willing to risk your demise."

"But what about Toxica? Don't you think she might need my help? I mean, Steelix did this to me pretty much on its own."

"Toxica is capable of caring for herself; you are not in your present condition. I shall remain here until Black finds us and returns you to your pokéball."

That, fortunately, happened to be only moments later. Black was wounded and bleeding from his arm and his leg, but he ran in carrying an unconscious Toxica and took up care for Boreas as Octa went to fight Giallo's remaining pokémon.

-

Octa slithered through the tunnels as fast as he could, looking for Zephyrus. Now that Boreas was safely in Black's hands, he needed to use his considerable prowess in battle to defeat their enemies.

Suddenly the horrific visage of Steelix appeared ahead in the tunnel, rapidly coming into his direction, as fast, heavy and unstoppable like a high-speed train. Octa immediately shot an Energy Ball, but it was harmlessly absorbed by the creature's steel armour. Octa pressed himself against the wall to prevent the much larger snake from running him over, and fortunately managed to just avoid being crushed between the wall and the mighty metal creature as it passed by. Octa caught a quick glimpse of Giallo, the corpulent, yellow-clothed Sage on Steelix's back, covered between two sections of the serpent.

Octa endeavoured to stab his Leaf Blade between two sections of the Steelix as it passed, but it harmlessly bounced off. When the gigantic thing had finally passed him Octa cursed and followed it, realising it was returning to the chamber where his dear Boreas, Toxica, and Black still were. A mighty wave of flame hit Steelix from behind, though Octa found the amount of heat and light said flames created, especially considering his proximity to them, somewhat disappointing. Zeph was also pursuing Steelix.

"Sorry 'bout that, Octa!" he said as they ran after the Steelix. Unfortunately it seemed to be faster than both of them, as they were falling behind.

"'Tis no problem; you did not hit me with it. Where is Diego?"

"Escaped! I lost the bastard when he ran through the battle in that room, so I juft joined
the battle and beat Magnezone, and then Steelix and Giallo fled! How's Boreas?"

"Black is taking care of him presently, but if we do not catch up, Steelix may kill them yet!"

-

By the time Boreas was released from the bizarre world inside his pokéball, he was in the Castelia pokécenter. While his wounds were pretty serious, they were quite easy to heal with the technology in the pokécenter. He wasn't the only one who had made the return journey in their pokéball either: Lucius and Selene had both been nearly crushed to death by their enemies, but where fortunately still alive. Toxica had a severe concussion and her skull had been cracked by Bastiodon. All of White's pokémon had been dangerously wounded as well. Fortunately, the pokécenter had been able to save everyone except Simipour.

Octa and Zeph had been the only ones without dangerous wounds (in Octa's case that solely was due to evolution, of course), and Boreas immediately wanted to hear the whole story of the battle from Octa, while Zeph was insisting to Nurse War's Audino that he was not hurt in any way and didn't want to be checked up. After Octa had told him the entire story, he wanted to hear it from Zeph as well. Apparently, Zeph had managed to follow Diego until he came into the room where Magnezone and Steelix were fighting Febby, Esper, and Simipour. By the time he was there, Zeph was already quite far behind Diego (He lamented once again that he hadn't evolved to a Jolteon), and Zeph had lost him in the crossfire.

So he had joined the battle instead, but unfortunately Simipour, Febby, and Esper all fell to their enemies soon after. Zeph had managed to knock out Magnezone on his own, and was about to try and defeat Steelix, when Giallo had ordered his pokémon to retreat. Zeph had followed them, of course, but, cursing his slower Flareon shape once again, regretted to say he couldn't keep up with them, and neither could Octa when he joined in the chase. For some reason, though, Giallo hadn't made his Steelix kill Black, who was in that room alone, but the monster had carefully avoided even slithering over Black and Giallo had just retrieved all of his pokémon without fighting any more.

Then Steelix had burrowed rapidly into the ground with its trainer still on its back, at an incredible speed. Zeph and Octa had tried to follow them into the tunnel, but it collapsed soon after Steelix had passed through it. Fortunately, White had not been injured too badly and could walk after Black gave her some treatment. They had walked back through the desert slowly, until finally reaching the Castelia pokécenter where everyone had been healed.

A sad exception was Simipour, who had been shocked so much by Magnezone there was no more saving him. Boreas was sorry to hear Simipour was dead. He didn't know him well, but he had seemed like a pleasant, cheerful sort of guy on the journey to the Castle. He felt he really had to offer Febby his condolences.

"I'm sorry for your loss, Febby," he said sadly as he reached her and Esper. "Yours too, Edward."

Febby's eyes were red with tears. "Th-thank you, Boreas... He's the second friend I've lost to Team Plasma... First Thomas and now..."

"Team Plasma will pay for it," said Boreas determinedly. "For them, for Capella, and for all the other pokémon and people they've killed."

"Really?" asked Febby with a small voice.

"Yes, if I have anything to say about it, they will. They may claim they're doing good, but it's nothing more than evil with a nice mask on."

-

Boreas walked through the Icirrus pokécenter's corridors. He was happy he would see Aqua again in a moment, but mainly preoccupied. Many things bothered him about the battle in the Relic Castle. He was happy to have won with only one casualty, but it was so strange for Giallo to have retreated when he had basically won. Zeph and Octa had been the only ones of their side still capable of fighting at the end, while Giallo had Diego and the incredibly mighty Steelix. Yet, instead of destroying them all with the near-invincible metal monster that was that Steelix, Giallo had chosen to instead use it to retrieve his knocked-out pokémon and burrow a way out of the castle.

But that was not even the weirdest thing. By all rights, Giallo shouldn't have been there. It had taken a lifetime archaeologist like Lenora a long time to discover the Light Stone should be in the Relic Castle. It seemed unlikely Plasma would've just happened to have made the same discovery at almost the same moment, particularly because when Octa's family had been attacked, Team Plasma had also had knowledge of their plans. Somehow, Plasma knew everything they did.

And where was the Light Stone anyway? Lenora had had no idea when Black reported it was missing, and had promised to find out. But had also warned it would take a long time; so now the plan was to just continue the journey and travel to Opelucid to battle Drayden, the final Gym Leader they had to beat to be allowed to challenge the Pokémon League.

Boreas tried to put these thoughts out of his mind as he entered Aqua's room. "Guess who's back, my love?" he saw the room was empty; no Aqua on the bed. "My love?"

He was pounced suddenly and roughly from the side, thrown over to his back, and something blue jumped on top of him in an instant, then kissed him passionately. "Oh, Boreas, how I've missed you," said Aqua once the kiss ended.

"Y-yeah," Boreas stammered, overwhelmed by being suddenly pounced and the kiss. "I missed you too, my love. I take it your back's better, then?"

"Mm- Much better!" said Aqua happily as she covered his face in kisses. "I've been- mm- recovering much better and faster than-mm- expected, and I've been able to walk and run and swim and do all other kinds of things perfectly for days now! Though... Some things I haven't tried to do yet..."

Boreas winked. "I'll be happy to help you try those things."

"Oh good," grinned Aqua as she kissed him again and again. "Because I've been waiting for you, longing for you, my sexy Glaceon."

Boreas' mind was swimming in desire as they kissed with more and more fire, so he really had to force his mind to stay focussed. "Not- mm- here, my lovely- mm- Aqua. We're- mm- in a public room in a- mm- pokécenter."

"I don't- mm- care; I want you- mm- right now."

With a titanic effort of will, Boreas managed to softly push Aqua away from him. "So do I, but just wait a few more minutes. We'll go outside to a better place, and then... I'm all yours."

"Okay..." said Aqua as they stood up. "But be warned: I'm jumping you the moment we're out of sight."

Boreas laughed. "Then let's find some privacy as fast as we can."

-

Boreas panted in exhaustion. He felt like he could easily fall asleep, though the Sun hadn't even set yet. Aqua was snuggling up to him, her body feeling warm against his. She was breathing rapidly and he could feel her heartbeat racing.

"That was delightful," she panted. "The best fun I've had since... Well, since last time, really. So, you're the best judge of this, my amazing Boreas: did I recover fully?"

Boreas was about to say yes, but caught himself. "Hmm, I'm not sure. I think I'll need to run more tests tonight. And tomorrow. And many other times; after all I have to be sure, and for that I need lots of data. Lots and lots of data."

"Of course," said Aqua, innocently. "I'll be happy to give you all the data you require. But I think tonight could be a bit of a problem. I don't think the real doctor will take kindly to you playing doctor with me in the middle of the night. After all, I haven't been discharged yet, and they say I need rest. And after this, I couldn't agree more, to be honest. But in two days, if all goes well, I'm free to leave."

"I look forward to it." Then he remembered her plans and felt a lot less elated. "On second thought... Since you're going to rejoin Team Plasma, I guess we won't have much time to spend together after that..."

"Actually..." said Aqua with a little smile, "we may yet. I'm not going back to Team Plasma."

Boreas beamed widely. "My love, that's amazing news! But why?"

"Well, there's several reasons, really. I think humans may not as bad as I originally thought they were. Nurse Ebola really took very good care of me and was really friendly... And I've seen other humans whose pokémon were in the pokécenter, and they really cared for them a lot... I can't forgive them for what they did, but maybe separating pokémon from them completely is too much. It would do as much harm as good. Secondly, I think Team Plasma is not good. The things they've done and continue to do are wrong, even is their cause is right. N is a good man, but his underlings, especially the Sages... They aren't. Their war is an evil thing, and I refuse to fight it."

Boreas gave Aqua a soft, loving kiss. "I'm so happy to hear that, my love."

"But wait, there's more: In fact, I think I may travel with you to Opelucid. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to join Black's team, and I am strictly neutral in this war, but wouldn't it be great if I accompanied you on the journey? I feel a lot less bad about being with humans now, thanks to you and N and Nurse Ebola."

"Really?" stammered Boreas happily.

"Yeah," Aqua giggled as she nuzzled him. "Is it everything you had ever hoped for?"

"Well, not everything," teased Boreas.

They kept lying there, cuddling happily as neither of them wanted to get up to return to the pokécenter yet. Boreas knew he should be happy, yet his mind couldn't help but return to the battle in the Relic castle. He tried to find an explanation for it all; there had to be one.

"My love," asked Aqua, "are you alright?"

"Hmm?" Boreas startled and returned a smile to his face. "I'm fine, don't worry."

"You're not fine, love, you're troubled by something."

Boreas sighed. "Very strange things have happened in the Relic Castle; even before then. Plasma seems to know our every move, yet retreats when it's close to a complete victory. I'm trying to think of an explanation to that and others things. It's quite maddening; I'm almost beginning to think it was all just a big coincidence... Aqua, did you ever hear anything about a mole Team Plasma might have while you were with N?"

Aqua frowned. "I am neutral in this war, so I don't want you to ask me things like that. But, just for this one time: no, I never heard anything about moles, but that doesn't mean there are none."

Boreas sighed. "Well, I guess I should just try to forget about it; it's getting me nowhere. But that's hard; especially at night when I'm trying to sleep I keep thinking about it."

"Well, fortunately you now have me to distract you at night instead. And believe me when I tell you I won't give you the time to think about these riddles."

So Octa has evolved into Serperior, and managed to save Boreas in the last second! Too bad about Simipour, though, the victory must feel hollow to them because of his death.
Anyway, the plot continues to become thicker and thicker for each chapter, so much that it feels like I'm swimming in concrete that hasn't solified, and I can't swim to begin with!

On a side note, Boreas gettting annoyed by Octa and Toxica's relationship seems like hypocrisy to me. Look at him and Aqua, they're pratically glued to each other (haha)!

@Gotpika

Originally Posted by Dragoneye

So Octa has evolved into Serperior, and managed to save Boreas in the last second! Too bad about Simipour, though, the victory must feel hollow to them because of his death.
Anyway, the plot continues to become thicker and thicker for each chapter, so much that it feels like I'm swimming in concrete that hasn't solified, and I can't swim to begin with!

On a side note, Boreas gettting annoyed by Octa and Toxica's relationship seems like hypocrisy to me. Look at him and Aqua, they're pratically glued to each other (haha)!

You're absolutely right, of course, he's being very hypocritical. He and Aqua are much worse offenders on this point.

Chapter Fifty-Six: The Spartan Mayor

The journey over Route 8 was a relatively uneventful one. The road slowly descended from the high Icirrus into the forested vales between the mountains, past rivers and the occasional lake. Then they travelled north-east through the vales, and the mountains around them slowly became lower as they continued. Then they were between hills and then they entered the wide plains between the White and Black mountain ranges. Here the route became a small path through marshland dotted with small lakes. Boreas later remembered little of it, aside from the joy of travelling with Aqua. Being around her every day and night was delightful and made the war and the problems that had worried him so much before seem distant and unimportant.

The swamp didn't bother Boreas much, though he got quite dirty and wet from the soft mud. The grass-types and Selene didn't mind either, and Aqua even enjoyed the wet landscape. But not everyone felt like that.

“Stupid, buggering, blasted, bloody swamp!” Zeph cursed behind Boreas. He was stuck deep in the mud, swearing angrily as he tried to pull himself out and walk on.

Boreas laughed at the view of his brother stuck in mud that reached almost to his shoulders. “Need some help, Zeph?”

Zeph managed to drag himself out before Boreas could help him. “Ftinking bog, I hope the humans will drain it and build an actual road here!”

Boreas giggled at his brother, who was covered in mud. “You know, I walked over that mud myself just now and only sank to my ankles. If you sank into it that far, you only have yourself to blame.”

“Shut up, Black and Lucius also sink deep into the swamp all the time.”

“Yeah, but they're both much heavier than us. It's only normal they would sink deep, but if that happens to you, it's your own fault for being clumsy.”

“Hmpf,” groaned Zeph as he dragged himself on. “Whatever. I don't see why we couldn't just take the train. We wouldn't have to travel through this ugly bog and get all wet if we did; we'd have been in Opelucid days ago!”

“Because we'd get little training like that and would probably lose to Drayden. Besides, this is fun, seeing all these places . Where's your sense of adventure?”

“Somewhere warm and dry,” grumbled Zeph as he sunk into the mud once again.

–

After the swamps of Route 8 they crossed the old Tubeline Bridge, a metallic bridge from the industrial age over the train tracks. When they had crossed it, all that stood between them and Opelucid was the simple, forested road of Route 9. It was on the last night before reaching Opelucid that Boreas had a terrifying epiphany. He had lain awake all night, while Aqua was sleeping obliviously in his arms. Normally her soft breathing on him and the slow beat of her heart against his would take his mind off of things, but not tonight.

He had been thinking all night, and finally reached a conclusion. It seemed ridiculous at first, and he had almost dismissed it immediately, but then he realised there was more to it than it seemed. It explained a great many things. It had to be a coincidence, though; it couldn't be true. But even the small details matched up. Tiny little things Boreas had never paid much thought suddenly were clues to a sinister truth.

Boreas trembled in fury and fear when he realised it really was true, horrible though it was. He could punch himself for such stupidity and naivety. How could he have fallen for it? He had half a mind of getting up and killing the mole while sleeping, but he realised if he was right, the mole wouldn't actually be sleeping. Attacking that person now would probably end up in disaster, as Boreas' friends would of course have no idea what was going on and think Boreas had gone mental; they would try to stop him, and that could be the death of someone with the mole in their midst. No, Boreas needed to confront his friends with the evidence one-by-one and in secret, and only then attack. Until all his friends knew what was going on, he had to pretend he knew nothing.

Boreas breathed a bit easier. At least he was now the one with an advantage, as only he knew he knew this, not his enemy. Though he would have to wait with his revenge, Boreas could at least keep an eye on the mole meanwhile. Aside from the anger and fear, Boreas now realised he felt paradoxical admiration and respect as well: it was all a very impressive trick, and a role well-played, as no-one had suspected the mole, not even Boreas before this moment. Boreas could only imagine how hard it had been and how much work. But that admiration wouldn't stop Boreas from killing the mole once he had the chance.

–

Opelucid was a strange city. Its outer parts were ancient, with old buildings of wood and stone and very pretty architecture and monuments. But at the city's centre, it abruptly changed to a futuristic city of plastic, glass, and metal. The inhabitants were all using the latest gadgets here, while there had barely been any in the outer parts. An information leaflet explained the city's centre had been destroyed during the last war Unova had been in. Instead of rebuilding it as it had been, it had been rebuilt in contemporary style, and at that point the new centre had begun attracting an entirely different kind of person than the old city.

The city's centre had been in continuous renewal since then to remain modern. Many inhabitants of the outer parts of the city considered the centre an ugly tumour ruining their city, wile many people in the centre considered the outer parts useless old ruins that were in the way of the expansion of the centre and full of nostalgic old buffoons.

At least the Opelucidians seemed more interested in arguing about which part of the city was best than in arguing about pokémon. While there were few trainers or pokémon on the streets and Black got a few unpleasant remarks thrown at him, the situation wasn't as bad as in Castelia.

Black was marvelling so much at Opelucid's futuristic centre that he nearly bumped into Alder before recognising him. “Cha-champion Alder? You here?” he stammered.

The Champion's long yellow poncho looked comically out of place between the red, yellow, or blue with black spandex suits most inhabitants of the centre wore. “Yes, Black, I'm here. And so are you. And although our purposes are slightly different, we are both here to meet Drayden. You want to challenge him, I want to use his personal library to try and find information about the Light Stone.”

Black walked along with Alder. “Then Lenora hasn't made any progress finding it?”

Alder shook his head. “Nothing. But I'm sure we'll find it eventually. If it's in any museum or collection in the world, there should be records of it. Even if some treasure hunter found it and sold it somewhere, we might still find it. I can only hope we can find the stone before it's too late... We are losing this war. But that's enough about this; let's talk about my future challenger. We barely had time to speak last time we met, but the time before that, I asked you what you were going to do when you were Champion. You didn't know, but agreed with me that there was more than just becoming stronger. But becoming Champion was no more than a distant hope then; now you are on the eve of claiming your eighth badge. I want to ask you the same question once more.”

Black pondered it for a moment. “A few months ago, Capella - my Dratini - died in battle against Team Plasma. It lowered my wish to be Champion and made me want to stop my quest. But I continued to stop Team Plasma. It's what this is about, much more than being Champion. And stopping them is exactly what I'll do when I'm Champion. I want to use my power for good.”

Alder nodded. “The death of a pokémon can make us think about our friendship with them and what it means better. I pursued power for its own sake madly, until my oldest friend, my starter pokémon, died. It changed my outlook on life.”

They had reached a square, where a crowd was listening to a skeleton-like old bearded man in a green robe talk. Boreas frowned and charged up an Ice Beam as Black began to order his pokémon to attack, but...

“Don't,” said Alder. “It would force him to take the crowd hostage. And even if he didn't, a battle between three trainers as powerful as us would cause too much collateral damage in a densely populated city like this. Let's listen to what he has to say instead.”

They joined the crowd, but Boreas' mind quickly began to wander instead of listening to Ryoku blather on about how glorious Team Plasma was and how great N and the legendary Zekrom were. Boreas was taken back to the very first time he had met Team Plasma, back in Accumula. They had seemed so reasonable to the little Eevee he had been then; he had had no idea yet of the surprising adventures that were awaiting him. He felt a certain nostalgia to those days. Things had been so simple and calm, and he had been young and small. Plasma were just some people in weird suits, Diego was just a Zorua disguised as a Purrloin, and he just a little Eevee cub who had recently lost his family but got two great friends in exchange.

He had almost been given away for adoption that day. Boreas wondered how different his life would've been if he hadn't chosen to stay with Black. He couldn't begin to imagine. He would never have met Aqua, or Capella, Selene, Toxica, Lucius, Febby, or any other person he'd met on his journey. He might've kept some contact with Octa, but even that would probably wane. On the other hand, he would never have been in the war and never had to see friends die. He realised that was completely worth it as he gave Aqua a kiss on her cheek.

“What was that for?” she asked with a surprised smile.

“I'm just happy to be in love with the loveliest girl in the world.”

Aqua raised an eyebrow. “Don't worry, my love, I'm not about to go back to Team Plasma, despite this speech. I agree with most of what he is saying, but Team Plasma's way of enforcing their will is wrong.”

“Glad to hear it, but I wasn't worried about that.”

Next to them, two humans - a young dark-skinned girl with long hair and an athletic old man with a big white beard that hid his mouth completely - were also watching.

“What is this all about?” the girl asked. “He talks about liberating pokémon like he's friendly, yet he's also threatening to kill people who don't listen? That's off-the-charts strange!”

The old man nodded. “The cooperation of people and pokémon is how Unova came to exist to begin with. If a pokémon really didn't want anything to do with humans, it would simply leave... Capturing a pokémon in a pokéball doesn't mean you've captured its heart.”

“It's been a while, Iris and Drayden,” Alder greeted them.

“Oh, hello, mr. Alder,” said Iris.

“What's wrong?” asked Drayden. “What does the wandering Champion who left the Pokémon League need from us?” It was weird to see him talk, as his mouth was completely hidden behind his beard, making it look like he had none and his beard was just moving up and down when he spoke.

“I'm sure you've heard by now that Team Plasma's king has reawoken Zekrom from the Dark Stone. Black and I need to awake Reshiram from the Light Stone to stop Team Plasma, but first we'll need to find it.”

Drayden nodded. “Come with me to my house, then. I'll tell you as much about the legendary dragons as I can, and you might find something in my library.”

They followed Drayden and Iris to Drayden's house, while explaining to them how the Light Stone hadn't been in the Relic Castle, though Lenora had thought it would be there. The futuristic door slid open after checking Drayden's fingerprint. Yet the house was quite old-fashioned on the inside. There were large, full bookcases. “I'm sure you'll find what you're looking for here. But before you search, let me tell you more about Reshiram and Zekrom. You see, a long time ago, they were a single pokémon named Kyurem.”

“Yeah,” piped Iris, “and Kyurem worked with the twin heroes to unite Unova and bring about an era of peace and happiness!”

“Sadly, the twin heroes began to argue. The arguments between the older brother, who sought the truth, and the younger brother who sought ideals, became worse and worse. Arguments became fights, and fights became a war. Kyurem had a powerful mental connection with each of them; it was torn apart by their war. The minds of each of them tore the qualities they sought most from Kyurem, and so created two new dragons, Reshiram and Zekrom. The leftover remains of the near-dead Kyurem, wretched, weak, and without the qualities of either Reshiram or Zekrom, fled into the Black Mountains, never to be seen again. But the brothers had no eyes for what remained of their friend, only for their new creations.”

Iris added: “Reshiram bonded with the older hero, trying to usher in a new and better world of truth; while Zekrom bonded with the younger hero, trying to usher in an ideal world of hope. Poor Kyurem was left without either, a terrible creature of lies and despair, but also very weak and on the edge of death.”

Drayden nodded. “The battle between Reshiram and Zekrom destroyed Unova with fire and lightning. But the two were once the same, so neither could win. Eventually the heroes realised this and declared peace. And Unova was once again united, though damaged. But the heroes' new unity couldn't reunite Reshiram and Zekrom, as the damage that had been done could not be undone. The heroes worked together once again, but their brotherhood had been damaged forever, as had the dragon, for the heroes had left behind the traits neither of them valued in the remaining creature. Without Kyurem, Reshiram and Zekrom could not be one again.”

“The heroes died of old age in the end. Reshiram and Zekrom were only parts of a dragon, they couldn't stay in existence without their connection to the heroes. So they died too. But not really; they became the Light and the Dark Stones. Just like Kyurem, they didn't really die, but they didn't really live either. They simply waited for another hero to make a new connection with.”

“Since N bonded with Zekrom and resurrected it, he must the hero Zekrom has waited for. But I cannot say the same for the rest of Team Plasma. N has clearly been manipulated by these evil people. I believe you may be right to think only Reshiram can stop Zekrom now. But unfortunately, I don't know where the Light stone is. My best guess would be Dragonspiral Tower or Relic Castle, but of course we know it's in neither. There may be more information in my books, though. Iris, will you help Alder try to find it while I battle Black? Because that's the other reason you're here, isn't it?”

Black nodded and followed him. Boreas understood it all better now. “Did you know about all this?” he asked Octa.

“Most of it,” boasted Octa.

“No, you didn't. Just like me, you knew some of it, but not nearly everything.”

They bickered about it until they reached the Gym. “Our final Gym Leader, team,” said Black. “Let's make this a great battle!”

“Looks like you'll finally get to see me battle a Gym Leader, love,” said Boreas to Aqua.

Aqua simply winked and smiled at him at they entered the Gym. It was a large, wide open space inside with a thin bridge decorated with snake-like black and white dragons spanning the gap. Drayden stood on the other side of the Gym, across the bridge.

“Drayden!” called Black. “I have come to challenge you for the Legend Badge!”

“And I accept,” Drayden's deep voice sounded. “As the city's mayor, I've given everything to development. But the newest things are not always the best. Trust is vitally important. Therefore, this will be a double battle, between our first two pokémon! Show me how your oldest friends trust you and each other!” He threw two pokéballs, releasing a Druddigon and a Haxorus.

Boreas and Octa walked forward onto the bridge, approaching their enemies. “Good luck, my dear fellow,” said Octa as he drew his blade.

“You too, Octa,” said Boreas. As the battle begun, he immediately fired an Ice Beam to the Haxorus' head, but it dropped flat on the ground, dodging the beam, and skittered rapidly towards Octa and Boreas on all fours. Boreas aimed Ice Beams at it to stop it in its track, but it dodged them with incredible agility. The dragon reached Boreas and pounced him, its massive tusks ready to strike. Boreas waved his paw rapidly and managed to hit his opponent with a Frost Concussion, disturbing its pounce. Still, the impact was immense, like a train hitting him. Boreas was launched into the air by the impact and nearly didn't land on the bridge.

Octa had his hands full with Druddigon as well, as it seemed to know Flamethrower. But Boreas had no time to help Octa, as Haxorus had already reached him and swung its tough, heavy tail at Boreas. It hit Boreas with near bone-breaking impact and knocked him down once again. Boreas Ice Beamed his opponent's belly, making it roar in pain, but that didn't stop its claws from leaving deep wounds in Boreas' side. Boreas realised that despite his type advantage, the battle wasn't going well. He tried to get up and fight his enemy, but then he was hit ferociously hard by the Haxorus' though tail, which nearly knocked him off the side of the bridge.

Boreas realised neither Ice Beam nor Frost Concussion was going to win him this battle, his opponent was just to fast and powerful for that. There was one move that could make him stand a chance, but he was scared of it. After all, the last time he had used it he had nearly killed himself. I had only just evolved then, though. I'll be able to handle it this time.

His body cooled down to two-hundred degrees below zero and he unleashed that cold into the air, which immediately blasted through the Gym in a ferocious and ice-cold stormwind. The Gym's windows shattered and everything creaked with cold as the howling Blizzard blew through the Gym. It was raining; not with water but with liquid air that froze anything it touched. It was very cold even to Boreas, but it was nothing compared to what his opponents were going through. Haxorus was writhing in pain, its mouth and eyes frozen over already.

The same was happening to Druddigon, and unfortunately to Octa. Boreas tried to keep the worst of the storm away from his friend, but he could barely keep the Blizzard from going out of control again; there was no way he could control it enough to make it spare Octa. Fortunately, Boreas saw him disappear as Black returned him to his pokéball.

It was down to only Boreas now, but the Blizzard was getting harder and harder to control. It drained his energy to keep it under control. He saw his enemies, though hurt and freezing, weren't defeated yet, and he knew he would probably just collapse in exhaustion soon. He gave the Blizzard his final bit of energy, and fortunately saw Drayden return his pokémon to their pokéballs. He calmed the Blizzard down and everything went black as he collapsed.

–

Boreas was awoken by a potion being poured down his throat, giving him the energy to stand up again. He felt his energy rapidly return as Black thanked and congratulated him for the victory and he hugged Aqua. Boreas saw Octa look at him haughtily and smiled apologetically: “Sorry, Octa, I didn't realise I'd hit you too.”

At that moment, Iris and Alder ran into the Gym. “Drayden, Drayden,” Iris piped happily. “We know where it is! We've found the Light Stone!”

Boreas felt a sudden rush of terror as he realised she would tell them in a moment. This was all wrong; he had had no time at all to inform his friends! He realised if he didn't do something, it would be a disaster.

“Really?” asked Black. “That's great!”

Alder smiled. “Yes, the information we needed was indeed in the books.”

Boreas cooled his body down once again so he could strike immediately. There was no time to feel bad about things not going as he had planned; he had to make sure Plasma didn't find out where the stone was.

“Yeah,” chirped Iris. “It's actually in the-”

Having sneaked up behind the mole, Boreas put a paw to each side of that person's head and unleashed two ferocious pulses of cold into the brain, hopefully killing or at least severely handicapping his enemy.

That's not funny. That is SO NOT FUNNY.
Cliffhanger. It was a great chapter, as usual, but still..CLIFFHANGER. My money's on Black or maybe Toxica. Selene's too...clueless. It can't be Lucius or Zeph, since they're fire types and he wouldn't use an ice type move. I'm just throwing something out there, but still...maybe Toxica's a tad bitter? Or maybe she was promised something? Whatever it is, I needs more chappies. ;)

A CLIFFHANGER, ARGHHHHHH--

Oh, hi there.
I'm one of those dedicated readers of yours that can never remember to tell you how wonderful your fic is. And so, in continuation of this brilliantly awful cliffhanger you threw upon everyone... I'm placing my bet that Selene is the mole. The line '...it was all a very impressive trick, and a role well-played..." piqued my interest. I'm begging you for the next chapter nooooooow. But I personally think it is Selene, though I do love that bird, so I hope she survives a sub-zero pulse of frost to the brain.

Edit::::: Actually, after reading IVI's post, I think that's a really likely outcome. I wish I had thought of that, since Diego could have simply replicated Zeph. But then again, I don't think Zoroark can replicate their illusions' voices...hmm... I'm over-analyzing this a tad bit. o:

So... I haven't commented in a while. I did read the chapters but just was to lazy to comment.

Oke, Diego almost killed Octa. Octa evolved. That was about time, the other starters already evolved. At least he didn't die. I would have hated you if that had happend.

They won the battle but Simipour died. I feel sorry for it's friends. The light stone wasn't even there so it died for nothing.

I'm going to guess who the mole is. I think it's Zeph. He sunk away in the mud while he isn't supposed to be that heavy. But Zoroark are. Diego probably disguised himself as Zeph and traveled with them (who knowes what he did to Zeph). If that's true, I hope Boreas kils him. If it isn't, I wonder who the mole is then...

Good chapters, I wil try to comment on each chapter from now on. I want the next chapter!

@Gotpika

Originally Posted by Thundagere

That's not funny. That is SO NOT FUNNY.
Cliffhanger. It was a great chapter, as usual, but still..CLIFFHANGER. My money's on Black or maybe Toxica. Selene's too...clueless. It can't be Lucius or Zeph, since they're fire types and he wouldn't use an ice type move. I'm just throwing something out there, but still...maybe Toxica's a tad bitter? Or maybe she was promised something? Whatever it is, I needs more chappies. ;)

Well, it might yet be someone you didn't expect.

Originally Posted by Aerospacer

A CLIFFHANGER, ARGHHHHHH--

Oh, hi there.
I'm one of those dedicated readers of yours that can never remember to tell you how wonderful your fic is.

Well, thanks for telling me now, then.

And so, in continuation of this brilliantly awful cliffhanger you threw upon everyone... I'm placing my bet that Selene is the mole. The line '...it was all a very impressive trick, and a role well-played..." piqued my interest. I'm begging you for the next chapter nooooooow. But I personally think it is Selene, though I do love that bird, so I hope she survives a sub-zero pulse of frost to the brain.

Edit::::: Actually, after reading IVI's post, I think that's a really likely outcome. I wish I had thought of that, since Diego could have simply replicated Zeph. But then again, I don't think Zoroark can replicate their illusions' voices...hmm... I'm over-analyzing this a tad bit. o:

You'll find out in a moment, when the chapter starts.

Originally Posted by IVI

So... I haven't commented in a while. I did read the chapters but just was to lazy to comment.

Oke, Diego almost killed Octa. Octa evolved. That was about time, the other starters already evolved. At least he didn't die. I would have hated you if that had happend.

Yeah, it would've been mean if I'd killed Octa off there, and I would probably hate myself a bit for it too. But I could live with that when I killed Capella off, and I can do it again.

They won the battle but Simipour died. I feel sorry for it's friends. The light stone wasn't even there so it died for nothing.

I'm going to guess who the mole is. I think it's Zeph. He sunk away in the mud while he isn't supposed to be that heavy. But Zoroark are. Diego probably disguised himself as Zeph and traveled with them (who knowes what he did to Zeph). If that's true, I hope Boreas kils him. If it isn't, I wonder who the mole is then...

Good chapters, I wil try to comment on each chapter from now on. I want the next chapter!

Well, here is the chapter. Enjoy.

Part Nine: The Road to Victory

Chapter Fifty-Seven: The Exposed Rook

Zeph roared in pain, drowning out wherever Iris said the Light Stone was, but didn't collapse. Boreas immediately Ice Beamed him to the face, realising the die had been cast and he had to defeat him right now, or he might escape, kill someone, or find out where the Light Stone was. But before he could do more, he was tackled away by the much greater strength and weight of Lucius.

“What the hell do you think you're doing, pup?!” he yelled angrily as he pinned the smaller Glaceon down to the ground.

Boreas struggled to escape. “Let me go, you idiot! He'll hear it! He'll hear it, and Team Plasma will too!”

“Don't hurt him, Lucius!” pleaded Zeph. “He probably just hit his head too hard in the battle! I'm sure he didn't mean it!”

“Shut up, traitor!” Boreas snapped. “Don't try to act as if you're innocent!”

Boreas tried to aim another Ice Beam at Zeph, despite Lucius pressing him to the ground, but Octa got in the way. “Calm down, my dear fellow. Everything shall be well once we take you to the pokécenter.”

“Listen to me!” Boreas rambled in panic. “Let me go! Let me go! This is important!”

While the rest of the team was focussed on Boreas, Zeph made eye contact with him for a single moment. In that single moment a malevolent grin that Boreas knew all too well flashed over his face. Boreas kept struggling and trying to escape from Lucius to attack Zeph again.

“Stop struggling, my love,” said Aqua worriedly. “You're confused and attacked your brother just now.”

“No, you don't understand! It's not my brother, it's Diego! It's Diego, you can't let him hear where the stone is!”

“My poor brother,” said Zeph, “you don't know what you're saying. Don't worry, everything will be alright once you go to the pokécenter.”

“Listen to me!” Boreas roared. “We have to stop him! He's the reason Team Plasma knows our every move!”

“My dear fellow,” said Octa, “you can't expect us to believe Zephyrus is the mole without any evidence.”

The humans too were staring at the situation, baffled. But then Drayden said: “I'm sorry, I didn't catch where the stone was with that sudden roar.”

Boreas saw that confronting everyone with the evidence would take too long; it was up to him. Fortunately, Lucius wasn't exactly the brightest light on the team. He stopped struggling. “Alright, I guess you're right. Maybe I was too – Wh-what's that doing up there?!” he suddenly blurted out.

As Lucius looked up, Boreas kicked him as hard as he could, Ice Beamed his face, and threw the surprised and hurt Houndoom off him. He jumped up and tried to pounce Zeph, but was caught by a long, green, serpentine body, and wrapped up in its coils. “My dear fellow, stop this!” Octa said angrily.

Boreas struggled against Octa's coils. “Please, Octa!” he pleaded as he looked desperately into his friend's brown eyes. “I'm not mad, Zeph is Diego! Just make sure he doesn't hear it, I'll prove it to you when I have the time!”

Boreas must've somehow convinced Octa, as he nodded and turned to Zeph. “Zephyrus, methinks you should leave at this moment.”

But then Iris said: “It's in the Nacrene Museum.”

Zeph burst out into laughter. Not his normal, jovial laughter, but a cold, malevolent laugh in an entirely different voice than Zeph's. The laughing Flareon disappeared and revealed a large Zoroark standing in the same spot, with icy white spots on his hips – Boreas felt like an idiot for attacking where the illusion's head was instead of Diego's, which was obviously much higher up - and a small transmitter on his left ear. “Too late,” laughed Diego.

Several curses and startled exclamations sounded. “What did you do to Zeph?!” snarled Toxica. “You'd better not have hurt him!”

“Zeph's been dead for over a year,” explained Boreas angrily as Octa let him go. “It was Diego all the time. I was going to warn you all before confronting him, but didn't have the time.”

The pokémon all approached Diego threateningly. But he just kept laughing. “Oh, you don't have time to waste on me. You had better get to Nacrene, because Team Plasma will be there very soon.”

“Damn,” said Alder. “He's right, we can't waste time! We have to get to Nacrene right now! Come with me, all of you!”

“You're right,” said Black. “C'mon, we have to run!”

“Yes,” laughed Diego, “go on! Hurry, see what good it'll do you!”

But Boreas didn't want to let Diego go. “Go on,” he said. “I'm staying here to deal with him. He'll pay for what he did.”

“And I'm staying too,” said Aqua, determinedly. “We'll take him down together.”

“Good luck, my dear fellow!” said Octa as the others hurried out of the Gym. “I apologise for holding you back.”

“Good luck to you too,” said Boreas before turning to Diego.

“Tell me,” smiled Diego, “what made you realise it was me?”

“The first time I had thoughts pointing to that direction was after the battle in Relic Castle,” explained Boreas. “To be precise, I wondered why you were still missing two teeth and why your burns were only partially healed. Even if Team Plasma wouldn't have any healing technology, you could just visit a pokécenter. There's no way the people there would know you were with Team Plasma, after all. So after much thought, I realised it meant you had either been somewhere without pokécenters, or somewhere with a pokécenter, but where there were people who'd recognise you if you visited it. At first, I thought it'd be the first; maybe N had been in the wilderness since the war started? And that was another strange thing: you were in the castle, but there was no sign of N.

I wondered where you could've been in the month since our battle. And then I realised something funny about that battle: despite Zoroarks being famous for using their illusions, you never used any illusion. Even though it would've been useful at several points. You could hardly have forgotten you could make illusions, and it seemed unlikely you had lost the ability either. So you were deliberately foregoing their use. Why would you do that? At one point I realised it could be to prevent me from remembering you could make illusions. Perhaps so you could surprise me by using them as a secret weapon? That explanation wasn't very satisfying.

It wasn't until last night that I finally connected the dots. I realised Zeph lisped on occasion. Not often, but it is a bit odd, because he never used to lisp when he was young, and it's not like he had any injuries to his mouth either. That was the moment I realised you were missing two teeth, something that could easily cause a lisp. At first, I dismissed the thought as ludicrous, even though I realised with your illusions creating an illusionary Zeph to “save” me from you so that you could then infiltrate the team would be easy, especially with me in a battered-up state. But Zeph couldn't be you, as illusions could only make you look like Zeph; you'd sound, smell, and feel different.

But of course, Zeph said he didn't like to be touched, and as far as I knew we had only touched him twice: once when I hugged him in the pokécenter, an event which you could've anticipated so you could hunch to the right height and wrap your ponytail around your neck to make it feel like a Flareon's fluffy collar; the other time was when Selene tried to land on your shoulder and collided with you. That time she thought she was still above you when she collided; of course, it could've been her clumsy flying, but it could also be because you were actually a Zoroark, and thus much taller than the Flareon you seemed.

The smell puzzled me for a bit. But I realised you mainly smell of smoke, and the nasty, stinging smell of it makes it hard to smell anything else; it masks whatever other scent there might be. I had a look in Black's pokédex: Zoroarks can learn Flamethrower. It's how you made that smoky smell, as well as how you used fire-attacks. Of course, not being a fire-type, your flames'd be rather underwhelming, so you just boosted their appearance with more illusions. Which explains why they felt less hot and provided less light than you'd expect.

Finally, there's the sound: dragging your feet would be a great way to prevent people from hearing your steps sounded like a heavy, two-legged creature. The voice could just be a good impersonation, helped by the fact that Zeph's voice would've changed a lot if he was still alive after all this time.

But then I remembered you had told me things I'd never told anyone, and was calmed down by that thought for a bit, as I realised it was all just a coincidence. Of course, it wasn't: when we fought Ryoku in Chargestone Cave, his Exeggutor read my mind. It copied my memories into your mind, didn't it? That's why your story fitted perfectly with my memories before the battle with Ryoku, but was slightly at edge with Octa's memories and my memories from after that day. For example, you mentioned seeing a gravestone with “Capella of the house of Draco” on it, but Capella's grave actually just said “Capella”. It always was an odd coincidence you would happen to have evolved in exactly that save place.

My last argument against the truth was that you couldn't keep up the illusion while sleeping; surely someone would've seen a Zoroark sleep amongst us. But then I recalled your habit of disappearing most of the day and solved it: you lay awake at night to keep your illusion up and found a place to regain your lost sleep at day. But while we were travelling, you had to travel at day, of course, which meant you weren't getting any sleep. And indeed, you became very tired at these times. Finally, it also explains that an Audino managed to heal your cut throat and keep you alive, which would truly be a medical miracle if it really happened, and it explains why you sank into the bog like a much heavier creature. It explains why none of the enemies in Dragonspiral Tower really seemed to want to kill me: they wanted me to proceed so you could put on your one-man show. And those threats you issued to Giallo's pokémon in Relic Castle sound an awful lot like commands in hindsight.”

It was silent as Boreas finished his explanation. The impressed looks Aqua and Diego gave him made him feel a lot better.

Diego slowly and sarcastically applauded Boreas. “Very good. I'm honestly impressed with your skills of reasoning. But it didn't matter in the end. If you had been a day faster, things would've gone differently.”

“I just have one question: what was going on in Relic Castle? Why did Giallo retreat?”

“The plan at Relic Castle was originally just to get the Light Stone and leave before you even showed up. But when Giallo found it gone, he kept searching for it, and decided to question your trainer in case I had missed anything and someone had already retrieved the stone. When he realised Black didn't know either, he decided to get rid of him instead. I didn't want him to eliminate you before you'd found the Light Stone, but I could hardly tell him not to with you all watching, though I at least managed to mask orders not to kill you as threats. Still, I figured it wasn't so bad after a while. It would've been better to leave you alive so we could find the Light Stone too, but we were winning the war anyway, with or without Reshiram.

When I walked in on you and Octa dying, I figured I might as well kill you myself if you were going to die either way. Unfortunately, just before telling you who your brother really was and killing you, Octa attacked me. I tried to defeat him, but he was quite powerful after evolving, so I decided not to bother and used my illusion to make it appear Zeph chased me off. Then I walked to the other room with my Zeph illusion, and there I saw Giallo beat White's remaining pokémon. We had a nice talk together and decided together it was worth keeping you alive after all to get the Light Stone and make our victory even more crushing. So I reactivated my illusion and pretended to chase him away as he returned his pokémon to their pokéballs and fled. And seeing as the Nacrene museum is about to be attacked and the stone retrieved by Team Plasma, our decision was the right one.”

With all spoken out like this, Boreas was going to attack Diego soon, and was on guard for an attack from the Zoroark as well. One side of him was feeling horribly betrayed and very sad, the wounds of his brother's death having been reopened. He was furious at Diego for it, and especially for trying to kill Aqua in the tower. Yet another side of Boreas couldn't help but be impressed with, almost admire, the cunning and skill it had required to fool everyone for nearly two months. “Not for you,” said Boreas, “because now I'm going to kill you. For everything you've done, now including dishonouring the memory of my poor brother.”

Aqua, who had been silently listening for a while, added: “And so am I. I thought you were my friend, but you betrayed me and tried to kill me. But at least it began to show me what bastards Team Plasma really are.”

Diego laughed. “You are going to kill me? Neither of you has any clue of what you're getting into. Boreas, do you actually think I've ever used my full power against you? I didn't want to kill you at the tower, because I needed you to infiltrate your team. And I didn't use half my abilities to prevent you from guessing what was really going on when “Zeph” showed up. I could extinguish both of you like-”

Boreas struck with an Ice Beam to his face at that moment. “Shut up and fight us!”

Diego roared in pain and dropped prone on the bridge. Realising the fight had started, Aqua shot a powerful blast of water at the Zoroark while Boreas tried to Ice Beam him. But at that moment something bizarre happened to the light in the room. It was as if a brief explosion of darkness occurred right around Diego, making that part of the room go black for a moment while all the light bent and looked broken, like a shattered wall of glass. The two beams were harmlessly deflected by the sudden pulse of darkness.

The light returned to normal, but Diego was gone. Boreas and Aqua stammered in surprise and looked everywhere to find him, but the Gym was empty, aside from the two Eevees. “M-maybe he used an illusion to make himself invisible?” whispered Boreas.

“I don't think that's possible... But he could have used it to make himself look like any object here. Try to find anything out of place.”

But there weren't many objects in the Gym, and none of them seemed out of place to Boreas. Cautiously, they moved onto the bridge to see if they could find Diego from there. Suddenly Boreas realised Diego was under them, hanging from the underside of the bridge. “Look o-”

A powerful impact knocked the words out of Boreas' mouth and smote him to the ground, knocking him off the side of the bridge. He tried to hold on to it, but he fell off and plummeted down into the black depths screaming. Just when he expected a crushing impact, he landed on thick cushions, only his pride wounded. He could see the beams where Diego had to have been holding himself on the underside of the bridge, and heard sounds of battle on the upper side of the bridge. He raced to the stairs and up them, his heart breaking a bit every time he heard a yelp of pain from Aqua.

As he reached the top of the stairs, it was clear the battle on the bridge wasn't going well for Aqua. She was bruised and battered up, while Diego was mostly unharmed. Boreas changed that as he hit Diego in the loins with an Ice Beam. He doubled over in pain, and Aqua used that moment to Scald him, hitting him with a blast of the boiling water. Boreas continued his Ice Beam, hitting the Zoroark several times as Aqua kept Scalding him. Suddenly Diego got up, took a massive jump over Aqua, and ran at Boreas. He was hit by horribly painful boiling hot water as he Ice Beamed their enemy, who was now between him and Aqua.

The Zoroark disappeared just before reaching Boreas, and after a moment's disorientation Boreas understood it had been an illusion used by the real Diego to stop the Eevees from attacking him, so he could attack Aqua. Before Boreas could do anything about it, Diego had given Aqua a powerful kick that sent her flying into the wall as she crashed down into the pit. Boreas heard her groan down there, so at least she was still alive.

“You'll pay for that, Diego!” he roared furiously. “I'm going to kill you for it.”

“You keep saying that,” Diego said with a smile that clearly hid his pain. “But by now, you've already got three to five different things you swore to kill me for. There's the nice view I gave you at the Ferris wheel, getting your sweet little darling to join the winning side, my failed attempt to end her life at the tower, my impersonation of your poor late brother, and now this. Yet you can only kill me once, and even that is unlikely to succeed.”

“Then I'll have to enjoy that one time all the more!” roared Boreas as he tried to hit Diego's loins with an Ice Beam once again. But, with a single wave of his paw, a flash of darkness consumed the Ice Beam, harmlessly parrying it. Diego breathed a beam of fire that Boreas couldn't dodge on the thin bridge. Boreas screamed in agony as the fire washed over him, so terribly hot, and left his fur smouldering. He quickly rolled over the ground to extinguish it, and stood face-to-face with his brother. No, not his brother: Diego.

“Diego! I won't let you wear my brother's face like a mask any more, you bastard!”

“But it's not your brother's face. He never did evolve to a Flareon. This is your brother's face.” The Flareon was gone, and now there stood Zeph as Boreas remembered the real one; a fluffy little Eevee-cub. “So if you don't want me to look like this, make me.”

“I will,” said Boreas determinedly. He tried not to show it to Diego, but even though he knew the Zeph he had known for the past two months - bizarrely enough about as long as he had ever known the real Zeph - was really Diego, he had still got quite attached to him before he realised the truth. Now it felt almost like Zeph had died all over again, and Diego using his illusions to look like him only made the grief feel worse. Diego had to pay for it. Boreas unleashed all the cold he could make from his body, turning the Gym's atmosphere into a howling Blizzard for the second time that day.

From what little he could see of Diego across the Blizzard, he was really in pain this time. He dropped the illusion almost instantly. The water Aqua had soaked him with froze in his fur, as did the saliva in his mouth and the moisture on his eyes. Much though Boreas enjoyed this, Blizzard was incredibly exhausting. A marathon was like picking up a pen by comparison. And he couldn't let himself black out this time, not with Diego fighting him. He had to end the attack.

As he stopped the Blizzard, he wanted to attack Diego with other moves, but all the energy had been drained from his body. He couldn't even remain standing as the world began spinning. But he had to stay awake... He tried to focus on his paw, which was in front of his face, and manage to remain conscious. He felt Diego's claw around his neck and was lifted up by it. He looked in an evil, but half-frozen face.

“That was a nice move, Boreas. Let me counter that:” He opened his mouth and spit a ray of fire right in Boreas' face. Boreas screamed and struggled, but the fire kept hitting his face. Boreas thought he was going to die of pain when Diego dropped him and stopped spitting the fire into his face. But what was left of his fur kept smouldering, at least until Diego stamped out the fire.

“It's been fun fighting you again,” said Diego as Boreas couldn't fight him any more in agony, “but I think I will have mercy on you both today. If you are wise, you'll leave your trainer and go somewhere I will never see you again, because I won't be so nice next time.”

“I'm not letting you get away!” yelled Aqua furiously as she got into Diego's way. “Not after what you did to Boreas!”

“Sorry, gorgeous, but I'm leaving, whether you want it or not,” said Diego. Suddenly four illusionary Diegos appeared, all running off in different directions. Aqua tried to stop them, but evidently failed as most of the Diegos managed to reach the exit, one of them the real one. Aqua didn't pursue them, but instead returned to Boreas. “I'm sorry I let him get away, dearest, but I've got to get you to the pokécenter.”

The cool, pleasant water of an Aqua Ring enveloped Boreas and soothed his wounds. “Thank you...” said Boreas, though the water oddly deformed his voice, though he was somehow able to breathe it.

The Aqua Ring ended after a while, when Boreas' pain was soothed greatly. “That feels much better. I suppose it doesn't look good?”

Aqua shrugged. “It could be much worse. You've lost a lot of fur, but the skin underneath doesn't look too bad. You'll be fine once we get to the pokécenter.”

Boreas cautiously managed to get up and began walking to the pokécenter with Aqua.

“I just wish we had killed Diego...” she said Aqua sadly. “He should've paid for all he did to us.”

Boreas nodded. “I wish we'd killed him too. But at least he killed neither of us. We'll get another chance.”

“And you managed to find out about that bastard. I never suspected it; it was amazing how cleverly you found him out.”

Boreas smiled nervously at the compliment. “Thanks, but it really wasn't that amazing. It was practically coincidence that I realised what Zeph's lisp meant.”

“Coincidence or not, it was very smart of you. You sounded so brilliant when you explained it all. It was very sexy.”

Boreas felt as if he was blushing, but it probably wasn't visible with his reddened skin. “Thanks. It didn't have much effect in the end, though. I hope after we go to the pokécenter I can still get to Nacrene on time...”

–

Diego was annoyed he hadn't killed Boreas. He could've easily done it. When he held the Glaceon by his throat, Diego should've kept going with his Flamethrower. He should have burned his fur off, incinerated his skin and melted his eyes, he should've kept blazing until flesh turned to ashes and a dangerous enemy of Team Plasma was dead. It had been his plan, but something had held him back. Some idiotic part of him hadn't wanted to kill Boreas. So he had burned Boreas' face only briefly before throwing him aside and escaping. The stupid side of him that didn't want to kill Boreas actually felt some bizarre comradeship with the Glaceon. Apparently two months of pretending to be his brother had somehow made Diego feel bad about killing Boreas. There were the memories too: Diego had all Boreas' earliest memories in his head now, as well as some relevant later ones, and it made him feel some understanding for Boreas, which he should've drowned out.

Diego tried to get his mind off his failure by thinking about the fact that he was about to be reunited with N. He was looking forward to seeing N again by a surprising amount. It was strange to think he had actually gotten attached to the boy, who was after all no more than a tool in the plan. Of course, it was easy to get attached to someone after spending most of your life with him. And N was Ghetsis' son, despite everything else, so it was only to be expected he would have inherited some of the qualities that made Diego view Ghetsis as his friend. Still, such attachment could be dangerous. Diego knew what his task would be if N ever decided to betray Team Plasma, and it would not be an easy task if the friendship he pretended to feel for N actually became a real thing.

Diego felt very annoyed by idiotic feelings like these. He would be useless to Team Plasma if he didn't know who his friends were. Neither Boreas nor N was his friend; Ghetsis was! Ghetsis had saved him as a young Zorua cub and raised him with friendship, Ghetsis had promised him power and freedom, Ghetsis had made him an important part of Team Plasma, Ghetsis had even placed him in charge of the most critical part of the plan, N's education. Diego would have been dead for years without Ghetsis. To even think about betraying his plans or feeling friendly to an enemy of the Sage was treason. He had to extinguish these unneeded feelings; they would only interfere. They were just illusions anyway, brought on by other people's memories in his head and spending a lot of time with them. One of them was his enemy, the other no more than a brainwashed tool.

But then he saw N at the rendezvous point, talking to his other pokémon, and was overwhelmed with happiness at seeing his friend again. He ran to them, only managing to restrain himself at the final moment as he entered the small circle of pokémon and N saw him.

“Hello, N,” he said with a happy smile.

“Diego!” N greeted him happily. “Ghetsis said you'd be back from your mission soon! I'm so happy to see you!” N gave Diego a hug, surprising the Zoroark for a moment, before he threw his arms around N's shoulders as well.

“I'm happy to see you too, N,” he said truthfully.

Ouch ouch ouch! My jaw hurts from dropping way down when I read the last part about Diego! Definently unexpected when you think about his personality in the past. then again, I suppose many villains will be affected by traveling with the heroes for some time.

On a side note, I'm happy Selene wasn't the culprit. When I thought about it today, she sort of reminds me of a dog I know. Not 100%, but close. I guess that's why I really like her.

That was a great chapter, it was really clever the plan, the cunning, the slyness of it all and the twist made me wanna continue reading and reading more and more, and your pacing is done very well. I realized Boreas said Diego was masquerading as a Flareon under Illusion, but part of my wonders if it's possible that Boreas's bro could have evolved in a Jolteon, I mean the part about Diego turning into Zeph as an Eevee makes me think it's possible Zeph did survive and did indeed evolve into a Jolteon.

It seems Diego is turning over a new leaf.

Anyway for the review.

Characterization 9/10
Once again spot on characterization really really good. I really like the personalities of the Pokemon, humans, and many other characters in the story. You have some of the best characterization I've seen since I started writing fanfic, your group characterization is done very well and each character bounces off each other well without it feeling forced or awkward.

I mean look it like this.

Lucius, the bad ass. Boreas, the lovable leader type. Selene, the nut job comedy. Zeph, the brother and he seems to be Australian if I'm not mistaken by his accent, Toxica the sassy nice girl, Aqua the cool girlfriend, and Octa the best friend and voice of reason.

You've taken these characters and personalities and written them in such a fantastic way where it isn't "overly done" or forced, in so many fanfics have I seen characters having those typical ways and them being drastically overdone to the point of flanderization. But, you do a good job of being very good and nicely vague at times with the characters personalities that leave me wanting to see more of them. Zeph, Boreas, Lucius, and Toxica are just some of my favorites.

Your characterization with Diego is very commendable because no one is truly evil, and by making Diego show more of a softer side you've shown the humanity in his character which makes me care for him since he isn't just the straight up jerk ass with no redeeming qualities. You've given a bit of light to his character in the same aspect N in the games isn't a evil human being.

Even the part about Drayden words, "As the city's mayor, I've given everything to development. But the newest things are not always the best." I really really liked this line, because it truly symbolizes and gives enriching characterization to Drayden. Plus it's a cool line also :P

Plot 8.5/10

This chapters plot and story was really great. The overall plot of the story is fantastic so far, but the individual plots like these really are fantastic and feel gueninely hard worked on and not rushed messes which is nice. Diego supposedly masquerading as a member of Black's team until now really explains things how Team Plasma has been getting their info. Your Foreshadowing is just fantastic, I mean simple things like Zeph soaking into the mud, his fur's smoky smell, and Selene's landing on him really are things I've had on my mind but, I did not expect that to be Diego in disguise. Now, things look to be heating up even more with Team Plasma finding out hthe location of the Light Stone, Diego, N, Ghetsis, and Boreas fighting Diego, and Diego showing his more light side.

Words & Description 7.5/10

Nice job, you do great on your word choices and descriptions. You truly choose your words great and really give me a feel for being there in the situation right alongside the Pokemon and people. It really brings up things well. Your variation on your words is awesome, "variety is the spice of life" you bring nice various vivid words into this story that compels me and keeps me reading.