Chapter 39
Starlight Aurate
Ad Jesum per Mariam | pfp by kintsugi
- Location
- Route 123
- Partners
-
Thank you, everyone, for all the replies! I might not get to them until the Review Blitz is over, but I promise that I WILL respond to them. They mean so much to me! And thanks to everyone who's been sticking with this fic so far--a lot happens in this chapter, and it's the longest I've posted yet. Enjoy!
Chapter 39
“Crawdaunt, use bubblebeam!”
A burst of bubbles unleashed from the crustacean’s oversized pincers, overriding the Torkoal’s heat wave and sending her flying. Shelly looked behind her and saw Archie standing on a ledge far below her, the Blue Orb shining in his hand. He had paid no mind to the multitude of Pokemon fighting around him; his eyes were only for the battle that raged in the center of the crater.
It was unsettling to see him standing so still, not moving, not giving any commands. It was as if the life that once flowed through his veins now pulsed only within the Blue Orb.
“Altaria, now!”
Shelly whipped her head around and opened her eyes wide in surprise when she saw Winona, the Gym Leader they had captured, standing on a ledge near some grunts.
“Still fighting, are you?” Shelly called. “You should know when to quit! Crawdaunt, defend!”
Crawdaunt crossed his large pincers in front of him and formed a protective bubble around him. He waited like that for a few seconds, but nothing happened.
Shelly looked around but couldn’t see an Altaria anywhere. This wasn’t right. If Altaria was going after her, she would have been attacked by now. But if Altaria wasn’t attacking her, then the only other one she would go after would be—
“Archie!”
Shelly turned around just in time to see a flash of white light descend from the burning sky. She screamed his name, but it was too late—the blazing sun hid Altaria’s sky attack until she was on top of them. Archie didn’t even turn around to see the Flying-type collide with him, shooting him forward into the gravel and sending him toppling down several meters.
Shelly screamed—the fall was too much for any human to bear. She sprang forward, leaping down ledges, trying to keep her Leader in sight, trying to see him—she had to see him—she had to make sure he was okay, that he was still alive… She heard shouts, explosions, crashing streams of water, the scuffle of people and Pokemon running—but none of that mattered now. None of that mattered if Archie was out of commission.
As Archie tumbled onto a ledge, he fell flat on his stomach. There was a brief flash of blue as the Blue Orb flew out of Archie’s hand but the light died once it left his grip. The Aqua leader lay in the dust, unmoving.
“ARCHIE!”
Shelly didn’t slow down until she reached the still form of her leader. Kneeling down next to him, she hesitated to look carefully at him—the force of the fall had been so powerful—but she had to. With shaking hands, she gently lifted him and turned him over on to his back.
His face was scraped a little, but otherwise, he was completely unscathed. She couldn’t believe it. How could he be unhurt? The fall had been powerful enough to crush bones—even the sky attack alone should have caused severe bodily damage. But he lay in her arms, whole and unharmed.
He blinked a few times and groaned. His pale blue eyes looked up at her in mild confusion. “Shelly…?”
“Archie!” she breathed out in relief. “You’re all right!”
He groaned and put a hand to his face. “What happened? Where’s the Orb?” He and Shelly looked around, but the Orb wasn’t in sight.
Grunts were descending the ledges and circling around them. Some looked on in worry and confusion; others asked what help they could offer.
“All of you are to look for the Blue Orb!” Shelly announced. “Bring it back here once you find it.”
As the grunts followed orders, Archie stared ahead, thinking. “Shelly,” he finally said. “What happened? I know I had the Orb… But I think I was standing up there.” He weakly pointed to a ledge far above them.
“Yes, sir. You were attacked by the Pokemon League. We—we failed to defend you.”
Shelly’s gut twisted as she admitted her failure, but Archie didn’t respond. He turned his head to look at Kyogre and Groudon locked in a stalemate. The waters in the crater were relatively calm as the beasts pushed against each other, each trying to overpower the other.
“It was Kyogre,” he mused. “It wasn’t me. I didn’t know where I was—I didn’t know who I was, or what I was doing…” He looked up at Shelly. His eyes were wide, as if he came to some realization. “Don’t you see? At first, I controlled Kyogre. But I wasn’t strong enough. Instead, it was using me—to power the Orb.”
“Power the Orb? Sir, what are you… What are you saying?”
Archie took his time to answer. He sat up and slowly, with Shelly’s help, struggled to a standing position. As he gazed at Kyogre, he voiced his thoughts.
“Those Orbs—they were created by humans, from humans, for humans, and they use humans to keep Groudon and Kyogre fighting. The first people who made them thought that they had control over the ancient Pokemon—but as it turns out, we’re just food for gods.”
Shelly’s heart clenched as he explained this.
“Sir, if the Orb is really that dangerous, do you really want to keep using it?”
Archie glanced at her and then swept his gaze over the grunts looking for the Orb. They overturned rocks, crawled into crevices, and combed the ground.
“No. You’re right. It’s too dangerous for me—for any Team Aqua member—to keep using.” His eyes lifted and he looked across the crater, where Team Magma’s helicopters could be seen. “I wouldn’t put it past Maxie to have willingly given his life for the Orb… He’s probably a goner by now. But Kyogre does need an energy source.”
As he spoke, he glanced to the Pokemon League members hovering near them.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Maressa sat with Derek while Steven stood before them, holding the stone slab tightly in his hands. She watched as Claydol used his psychic powers to bind Derek’s injuries. Steven had agreed to give the two of them a break while Winona and Drake took off to recover the Blue Orb from Team Aqua.
Glancing over, Maressa watched, for the first time, the battle taking place in the crater. She had always wanted to come to Sootopolis—the natural wonder and the city were always highlighted in her oceanography classes in school. The phenomenon of a dormant volcano crater filling with rainwater and holding all sorts of unique marine life was fantastic enough on its own. But Sootopolis also held a reputation as a cultural center of Hoenn—the Cave of Origin was renowned in Hoenn myths as where not just the world, but life itself, began. The gym, contest hall, and art museums that graced the city attracted tourists and natives alike. Like the rest of Hoenn, the weather didn’t change much throughout the year but maintained a warm, subtropical temperatures.
And now, the first several layers of houses had disappeared into the crater’s depths. Plants and gardens that once adorned the cliffsides were ripped up and washed away. All houses were abandoned, sitting as empty spectators to the chaos engulfing the city. The crater wasn’t even that anymore—part of it had been shorn away when Kyogre tackled Groudon, and close to it was a large hole from where Groudon first broke through to challenge its foe. As Maressa watched, she Groudon saw fling its arms forward as if to punch Kyogre, but instead of making physical contact, columns of earth shot up from the water and smacked into Kyogre, forming odd spits of land.
Sootopolis could not be any more different from the picturesque city she had seen in books.
Since the golems’ shield had broken, Steven had tried to have the golems remake it, but for whatever reason—whether they were too tired, or Steven didn’t have the strength—the shield couldn’t be remade. The golems instead hovered near the Pokemon League members, deflecting any incoming attacks from the ancients battling in the crater.
Phoebe sat with her Ghost Pokemon. Several of them were injured in one way or another; one of her Dusclops’ had been the victim of pretty nasty assaults and had several bite marks mottling him. Smoke-like substance curled out of the bite marks and diffused into the air.
Derek’s Golbat let out several squeaks.
“What is it?” he asked.
Golbat gestured with a wing—another Golbat was flying towards them. Far behind them, Maressa saw—to her utter bewilderment—Tabitha riding on a Flygon.
Steven glanced at the incoming Golbat.
“It’s probably a messenger. We’ll hear what they have to say.”
At his words, Derek’s Golbat took off. The two Golbat met in the air, and after a moment, Derek’s Golbat returned and let out several more squeaks.
Derek furrowed his eyebrows and cast his eyes down.
“What is it?” Maressa asked him.
“Apparently Tabitha wants to work with us. He says that the Red Orb has taken control of Maxie, so Team Magma is now disbanded and he wants to help us stop Groudon and Kyogre.”
“What?”
Maressa looked over in disbelief to see Flygon gliding in circles while he awaited their answer. Tabitha wanted to help them? After everything he had told Maressa about the Pokemon League—he was throwing it all away?
“As if!” Phoebe scoffed. Her Dusclops looked up curiously. Her eyebrows came down in a sharp V and there was an upset frown on her face. “It’s his fault that all of this happened! Steven, he’s probably just trying to get near you so that he can smash the tablet!”
Maressa frowned as she watched Flygon circle. Tabitha wanting to leave Team Magma was something she found hard to believe—but would he fake becoming friendly? Did stopping the golems really matter that much? With the Red Orb and Groudon, Team Magma had all they could want. Was Golbat’s message true, and Maxie was no longer able to lead his team? If Maxie was out of commission, then maybe Tabitha no longer saw reason to continue Team Magma’s work…
“I don’t know,” Maressa said out loud. She looked at Derek. “What do you think of this? We want all the help we can get, right?”
Derek looked up at her. He looked slightly annoyed and gestured to the bandages Claydol was winding around his arm.
“Really?”
Steven pulled a Pokeball out of his pocket and his Metagross appeared beside him in a flash of white light.
“We’ll listen to what he has to say. If it doesn’t satisfy me, then Metagross will take care of him.”
Derek sighed and reluctantly gave Golbat the message to relay. As Golbat flew away, Maressa noted Derek’s sour look.
“You don’t feel good about this, do you?”
“Maressa, he threw me around like a rag doll and smashed me into walls, injuring me badly and probably breaking my ribs. Twice. He held you in captivity and would have done so again until you crawled over my broken body. No, I don’t feel good about this.” He paused, staring hard at the incoming Flygon. “Tabitha… used to be a good friend of mine. We got along really well when we both worked on Team Magma. But Team Magma always came first for him. The first time he saw me after I deserted, he attacked me and landed me in the hospital. And before that, when I told him I released you and Tate, his Mightyena attacked me—you were there. And while I don’t know what’s going on with him now—I don’t know if Maxie really has lost his mind—I don’t feel too keen on overlooking everything he’s done and just accepting him.”
Maressa pondered Derek’s words as the Flygon steadily flew closer. Her patience with Tabitha had run thin long ago—she bore a grudge that he returned her to Team Aqua and she had no sympathy for him at the Sky Pillar. She still remembered the cold horror gripping her heart when she saw him almost kill Matt… And then he almost did the same to Derek. But something in her still believed that what Tabitha ultimately wanted was good—he just had a bad way of going about it. And at this point, weren’t they desperate enough to try whatever worked?
As Flygon landed lightly on the rock, several Pokemon leapt to their feet. Golduck and Claydol took a stance protectively in front of Maressa and Derek. Phoebe’s Ghost Pokemon rose out of the shadows, glaring at Tabitha with their blood-red eyes. Metagross let out a low rumble that reverberated through the earth. But if Tabitha was scared by any of this, he didn’t show it. He smoothly dismounted Flygon, glanced at each of the humans, and looked straight at Steven. The Champion’s cold grey eyes met those of the Magma commander.
“Well?” Steven asked. “What brought on this little change of heart? Just because your Leader is out, you suddenly want to abandon your team’s mission?”
“Team Magma’s mission was never meant to be like this. Maxie never intended to sacrifice his mind. But the Red Orb has powers that even he didn’t know of, and it’s consuming him.” He said all of this matter-of-factly, staring at Steven unblinkingly.
“Without Maxie… we don’t have a mission anymore.” His eyes were downcast and the pitch of his voice dropped slightly. “And this whole operation works differently than he had expected. The Red Orb can only be used to control Groudon for a small period of time. But humans are too weak to withstand Groudon’s strength, and the Orb eventually takes over their mind and eats their soul. Maxie didn’t know this. And now he’s gone.” He looked back up at Steven with a piercing, cold gaze. “I don’t like the Pokemon League. I never have. But unless Groudon and Kyogre are stopped and the Red and Blue Orbs are destroyed, then they’ll keep fighting and turn this planet into a wasteland.”
Steven stared at him for a moment.
“What do you suggest we do, then? I’ve tried using the golems to contain the chaos, but that’s quickly failing. We’ve had no luck retrieving the Orbs. If Maxie’s soul is gone, why didn’t you bring the Red Orb with you?”
“Maxie’s body absorbed the Orb. He’s a mindless, raging monster right now. But I know how to get it back—I know how to stop the Orbs.”
“We already know,” Phoebe said impatiently. “Mt. Pyre nullifies their power, but we can’t exactly get them there without getting them first.”
“You don’t need Mt. Pyre. The Orbs are powered by the magic in the Cave of Origin—if we deface the Cave and destroy the magic, the Orbs can be stopped.”
“No!”
Everyone looked at Phoebe as she stared at Tabitha in horror. “You can’t destroy the Cave! It’s the beginning of Hoenn—the beginning of life itself! If we destroy the Cave, we destroy everything!”
“I’m not saying we should destroy it, just get rid of the magic that created and powers those Orbs.”
“But nobody knows what exactly that magic is, it’s been lost for millennia.”
Tabitha glared at Phoebe and pointed to a spot across them in the broken crater.
“I just came out of the Cave of Origin. There’s a woman there who’s native to Sootopolis and whose family has carried on the magic and history of the creation of those Orbs. Maxie’s last order to her was to guard the Cave because he knew that if the Cave was damaged, then the Orbs could become breakable objects.”
Phoebe’s eyes widened. “A native Sootopolan? Why would she ever let us destroy that magic—her family created those Orbs!”
“Her family was used to create the Orbs—"
“No, the official Hoenn legend says that Sootopolans sacrificed themselves to savage gods for the power to control Groudon and Kyogre.”
Tabitha said nothing but stared blankly at Phoebe for a moment. He then turned back to Steven.
“I’ll go in to deface the Cave—and possibly fight my old teammate, if I have to. Then it’s just a matter of getting the Orbs. Maxie’s body will have to expel the Red Orb at some point. I can’t say about the Blue Orb. I can try to see if any Team Magma grunts left will help try to retrieve it.”
He and Steven stared at each other for a few moments. Steven eventually turned back to the legendaries fighting and said, “Very well. I’ll make sure to have someone near Maxie for when his body expels the Red Orb, and we’ll keep trying to retrieve the Blue Orb, too. If you need to fight the other Team Magma admin, maybe you’d want to take someone along, too. Maressa?” Steven glanced over his shoulder.
“You and your Pokemon look to be in better shape than anyone else here. If you want to help, join Tabitha and get going.”
Both Phoebe and Derek protested.
“Steven, this is a bad idea!”
“Maressa, no! You can’t trust him!”
“If we destroy the Cave, we destroy life—"
“We have to try, Phoebe!” Steven roared. In an instant, his calmness was gone. Veins stuck out on his clammy, white hands as he gripped the slab. Fire burned behind his eyes, reflecting the smoldering sky. “Look around you! Soon, we won’t have anything more to lose! And do I need to remind you where your judgement got us in the past? So, please, hold your tongue and let me lead!”
Phoebe stared at Steven as though she had been slapped. After a moment, she turned away. Maressa thought she saw tears appear on her cheeks.
“Maressa?”
She looked up to see Tabitha standing over her, looking down at her expectantly.
“Coming with?”
Maressa didn’t know how to feel about this—but what was there for her to feel? All this time, she hadn’t been able to fully process everything happening around her. And at this point, it was just accepting another order—almost like being a Team Aqua grunt again. All she could do was comply. As she got to her feet, she felt felt someone take her hand.
“Maressa, no.”
She looked back to see Derek sitting up, staring at her with drooping eyes. He looked so tired; he was still very pale, and the heat was making him sweat. Her heart panged when she saw how distraught he looked.
“Derek, I’ll be fine. I have Golduck with me!” She looked over to Golduck, expecting him to give a reaffirming quack. But her companion just stood there, looking sadly at Derek.
Golduck’s lack of enthusiasm hit Maressa, and she realized just how distressing this looked for Derek.
“But I promise—I’ll be okay. I’ll come back soon.”
Derek gazed at her with his soft brown eyes—it was so different from the way he looked at her during their conversations aboard Team Magma’s ship. Before, he had been bright-eyed, curious, gentle, and always willing to stand up for anyone he believed in. Now, one of his eyes still had remnants of a bruise encircling it, and his gaze was dark, broken, and distraught—pleading her to listen to him, to not throw herself into further danger. Even their positions were reversed. And Maressa was reminded of the great lengths he went to ensure her safety—risking his life and his Pokemon’s—just to make sure that she would be okay. And she was leaving it all behind again.
The thought made Maressa want to cry. But she couldn’t cry—she had work to do. Relinquishing Derek’s hand, she turned away. She couldn’t look at him anymore—not if she still wanted to control her emotions. Recalling Golduck into his Pokeball, she and Tabitha walked over to Flygon and mounted him.
As Flygon took off, Maressa’s stomach reeled. She clenched her eyes shut and gripped the Dragon-type as hard as she could. The air was so cold that her fingers soon went numb. The wind slapped her face, sending burning shards of ice through her skin. She thought she would freeze.
And all she could see behind closed eyes was the distress on Derek’s face as she left him behind. Tears came to her eyes, but they were quickly lost in the gusts that whipped her eyes.
I’m sorry, Derek.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
As Phoebe watched them go, she stole a glance at Steven. His gaze was locked on the golems. She was antsy—she could not sit there while two people who knew nothing of Hoenn mythology were about to destroy the Cave!
Steven was turning pale. His face was still and expressionless, but Phoebe knew his strength was fading. If she left, she might not get a chance to see him again. With that thought, she truly felt sad. She and Steven had disagreements, but he was always kind to her and was always a capable leader.
She gazed at him for a moment, taking in what might be her last look. She didn’t want to leave, but she knew she had to. She had already taken a decent break—if anything else, she at least had to get back to fighting.
Just a different type of fighting than before.
“Go, Dusclops!”
She released Dusclops in a burst of white light. Taking her hand, Dusclops made her intangible and the two of them sank into the rocks.
“Dusclops, I need you to take me to the Cave of Origin.”
Dusclops didn’t question her. Obliging, the two flitted through rocks and to the Cave, keeping the Flygon and two former team members in sight.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Flygon flapped his great wings, sending up clouds of dust and dirt as his large feet lightly touched the ground. Tabitha slid off his back immediately. Maressa slowly peeled her arms and legs off of the Dragon-type; her muscles were clenched in fear and her stomach churned with nausea. Tabitha held a hand out to steady her as she tottered on the ground, taking in great gulps of air.
As her queasiness settled, she looked up. The mouth of the Cave was not very large, but it loomed oppressively over them. The interior was quickly consumed by darkness and swallowed up the light; Maressa could see no more than a few feet ahead of her. Standing just outside the Cave mouth, she could feel the sweat on her skin cool as a flow of chilly air expired from the entrance.
Even though her nausea subsided, she didn’t feel better. Something was not right. As she stared into the imperceptible darkness, the dreaded feeling only intensified.
Tabitha’s Mightyena appeared in a flash of white light. Once out of his Pokeball, the canine flattened his ears and stared wide-eyed at the Cave. His red eyes looked sadly up at Tabitha and he tucked his tail between his legs.
“I know, boy,” Tabitha said as he ruffled Mightyena’s fur. “And I’m sorry. Hopefully this’ll be the last time. Okay?” He turned to Maressa. “You should have your Golduck out of his Pokeball. To be ready—if nothing else.”
Maressa reluctantly took Golduck’s Pokeball and released him. She didn’t want to subject her friend to this creeping feeling that the Cave was setting in to her. But she understood the need to have at least one of her Pokemon out—and she did feel much safer with him.
Golduck rubbed his arms and quacked. The Cave gave him chills—physical and mental ones.
“Me too,” Maressa muttered. “Hopefully we only have to do this once. Let’s get it over with.”
Tabitha turned to her. “Once we’re inside the Cave, we can’t talk about what we intend to do.”
She said nothing; for some reason, she didn’t feel like talking at all. Maressa wished she could just turn around and walk away—she would rather watch Groudon and Kyogre fight, or sit with Derek and see to his wounds (not that she knew anything about emergency medicine), or watch Steven’s strength fade as he commanded the golems, or listen to Phoebe criticize her and her Pokemon for being ‘low-class criminals,’ or sit with her parents and Betty while they gave her a hard time for betraying them, our go out in the ocean and look for Sharpedo and Lanturn—
Anything other than going into that Cave.
But she couldn’t. Not if she didn’t want all of her sacrifices to be wasted; not if the Hoenn region had any chance of returning to normalcy. Pushing back her rising anxiety, she took Golduck’s webbed hand and followed Tabitha and Mightyena into the darkness.
The blackness of the Cave only grew, and soon she could see nothing at all. She stumbled over rocks and bumped into Cave walls.
“Here,” she heard Tabitha say, and she felt his hand take hold of hers. “Follow me and Mightyena.”
She obliged, trying to control her nerves so that Tabitha wouldn’t know how scared she was. She clenched Golduck’s hand in terror—it was okay for him to be aware of her fear—but she tried to avoid anything more than a loose hold with Tabitha’s.
Her heart jumped as she noticed a blue light ahead—gradual at first, it grew as their group continued their walk. She didn’t know whether to be more scared or not. As they grew closer, she saw tiny crystals peeking out from the walls of the Cave. Her heart clenched as she saw the carvings they illuminated: grotesque figures hacking away at each other with weapons and outlines of Pokemon ripping each other to shreds. There were jagged letters of some ancient writing lining the domed walls, but it was a language she didn’t understand.
In the blue light, Maressa didn’t need to hold on Tabitha anymore, but she was scared to let go. Every fiber in her being was telling her to go back, to leave the Cave and never return. Her body protested against every step she took forward. And she knew the others felt the same. Golduck barely plodded along with her, keeping his head low and his eyes down. Mightyena’s tail was perpetually tucked between his legs and his feet dragged with each step.
“Tabitha, we can’t be here,” Maressa said in a hushed whisper.
“I know,” was all he said. He didn’t let go of her hand.
Eventually, the hall opened into a circular room. Maressa saw indented troughs on the ground run to two recesses in the center of the floor. The walls and ceilings were adorned with crude carvings but Maressa didn’t take time to examine them. Her eyes immediately fell on the woman and Ninetales standing in the center of the floor.
“I thought I told you not to come back,” Courtney said coldly.
Tabitha gazed at her impassively.
“This fighting needs to end, Courtney. And whether or not you’ll help us, we have to stop the power of the Orbs.”
Courtney’s eyes locked on to something to their right.
“And you brought a Pokemon League member here? I didn’t think you would stoop that low, Tabitha.”
Maressa looked over and saw Phoebe and her Dusclops materialize from the Cave walls. When did she get there? Why was she there? She might ruin everything!
Tabitha, apparently, felt the same way.
“What are you doing here?” he demanded.
She glared at them. “Whether you believe it or not, the Cave of Origin is the source of all life. I can’t let you come in here and destroy it.”
“You.”
Courtney stared at Phoebe with her mouth partially open. Her dark eyebrows were furrowed, dark storm clouds churning behind her eyes with rage.
Phoebe took a good look at the female Team Magma commander and exclaimed, “Courtney? Y—You’re a Team Magma commander?”
She quickly shook away her shock and steeled herself.
“So, this is where you slunk to after my sister died, huh? Abandoned my parents without a word and joined a criminal gang?”
“It was better than staying with all of you and letting your damned Shuppet eat my feelings!” Courtney screeched. She was on her feet, her face twisted into an ugly snarl. “Mom and Dad told you to get those things away from me, but you didn’t, and they always kept bringing back my misery, my childhood—all of this!” She punctuated the end of the phrase with a sweeping gesture to the room at large.
“They aren’t your parents,” Phoebe said bitterly. “They took you in when you wandered to Mt. Pyre and had nothing but that Vulpix. If you actually cared about them, you wouldn’t have broken their hearts! Did you realize how they felt when they found you and Tara washed up on the rocks?”
“That wasn’t my—”
“DID YOU?” Phoebe shrieked. She was breathing heavily, her face turning splotches of angry red. “Your body was whole and intact, but my baby sister was dead!”
“THAT WASN’T MY FAULT!” Courtney shouted. She breathed heavily as well, and a chill shot up Maressa’s spine as she saw the markings along Courtney’s body twist and turn, seemingly of their own accord.
“You were supposed to watch her—”
“Your Shuppet chased me off that cliff—”
“Left without even thanking my parents—”
“I couldn’t stay where your Pokemon kept eating away at me—”
“Leaving me alone to pick up the pieces—”
“I don’t care about you—”
“And joining a criminal gang—”
“The first person who treated me like a human being—”
“And now you’ll cause the destruction of the whole world!”
“This isn’t my fault!” Courtney shouted, a fire burning behind her eyes—Maressa jumped as she realized that Courtney’s eyes were literally glowing. The marks on Courtney’s body and those along the Cave walls began shedding their own eerie, off-color light.
But Phoebe was undeterred and kept shouting at her long-lost sister.
“This is all your fault! It was your people who chose to sacrifice yourselves to heathen gods for selfish control over Kyogre and Groudon!”
Courtney’s eyes, markings, and the walls of the Cave glowed more brightly. Her hair stood up on end. She spoke, but it sounded as if multitudes of others spoke as well.
“The Pyrites sacrificed the people of Sootopolis to satisfy their hunger for power. This is what your people did to us!”
Courtney lunged for Phoebe and grabbed her head. Phoebe’s jaw dropped and her eyes started glowing with the same light as Courtney’s.
All around them, the markings on the Cave not only glowed, but flowed and moved as they recreated the sacrificial scene from three-thousand years ago.
Maressa watched with horror as the simplistic figures moved on their own, depicting the gruesome ritual. She hugged Golduck. Tabitha stood between her and the inner part of the Cave so she was closer to the tunnel leading to the entrance.
Once the carvings lingered on the depiction of a human outline holding the Orbs, they stopped moving. Courtney let go of Phoebe’s face. The glow left Phoebe’s eyes and she reeled, clutching her head. Her eyes darted around and she breathed heavily.
Courtney looked up at Tabitha.
“Now you’ve seen what happened. The invading conquerors of Mt. Pyre sacrificed the natives of Sootopolis to feed Kyogre and Groudon to gain control over them. Now get out.”
“Not until we finished what we came for,” Tabitha said definitively.
“And you really think I’ll sit here and let that happen? Ninetales—”
“Why are you so defensive about all of this?” Tabitha cut across. “You just wanted the Hoenn region to return to a more natural state, and that’s not what’s happening outside. Why are you afraid of the Orbs losing their power?”
“It’s not that!” Courtney cried. “Look at these walls! And look at me!” She gestured to the markings in her body which mirrored that on the walls. “My life is connected to this Cave—if you destroy the magic in it, I don’t know what will happen to me!”
“Courtney, if we do nothing, then everyone is going to die.”
“That’s just their lot in life,” she snapped. “I’ve suffered more in my childhood—and throughout my life—more than anyone else. And I’m not about to sacrifice what I have left for people who never cared about me.”
“People care about you.”
Everyone turned to Maressa. She had been so quiet the whole time, the others had almost forgotten her. But as she stepped out from behind Tabitha, Courtney fully took her in. Her eyes roved over Maressa’s scarred body. She sneered.
“What happened to you?”
“I was tortured.”
Before Courtney had a chance to reply, Maressa kept speaking.
“You’re not alone, Courtney. I know you were tortured and abandoned. I’ve been through that, too. I’m not saying I understand everything you’ve been through—I don’t. Our situations were so different. But… I have been betrayed and tortured by people that love me—at least, I thought they did…”
Maressa glanced at her hands—at the scars mapping across her body, detailing a roadway of punishment. She saw the Tentacruel stingers, felt the water flood her throat, the salt sluice through open wounds, the press of Matt’s body—
Impending doom welled up within her; she involuntarily hugged herself and took deep breaths. She couldn’t break down—not here, not now.
Opening her eyes, she looked back up at Courtney, trying to steel herself. Trying to keep Matt out of her mind, trying to think of anything other than him, other than the things he forced onto her—
“Quack?”
Maressa gasped as someone touched her back. The sound of Golduck’s quack pulled her out of her thoughts, and she saw his vermilion eyes gaze at her with concern. She pursed her lips as tears fell from her eyes, as she pulled Golduck into a hug. She hoped nobody could see her crying.
Inhaling, she looked back up at Courtney. The Magma commander’s expression had considerably softened; she stared at Maressa with her mouth partly open, and Maressa could see the confused child hiding behind the vengeful woman.
“You’re not alone,” Maressa said again. “I was never alone, either. I know you’re afraid, and I was too; I still am. Afraid nobody will forgive me for the bad decisions I made. But I can’t just give up. Even when people gave up on me, my Pokemon never did—and your Ninetales never gave up on you.”
Courtney looked down at Ninetales, and the rage on her face slowly gave way to pain. Ninetales looked at Maressa in surprise then glanced back at her trainer. Maressa couldn’t read the expression of her monochrome ruby eyes.
Courtney bent down and cradled her Ninetales’ head in her hands. Maressa heard snippets of her quiet murmuring as she and her Pokemon exchanged words.
“She’s right, you’ve been with me—through everything... You don’t deserve to go through this… You’ve always helped me out, done anything I’ve asked for… What do you think of all this?”
Maressa released Golduck from her hug. His head was cocked back as he watched Ninetales and Courtney communicate. As she slowly breathed, she calmed down, and the flow of tears stopped. She wished they would hurry and de-face the Cave—the chills running through her bones had only increased, and she still felt a dire need to get out of there.
She glanced at Tabitha. His hand rested on Mightyena, who still looked about the cavern fearfully. Tabitha’s dark eyes glanced back at her.
“Can we get started?” she whispered.
Tabitha said nothing but looked down at Courtney and Ninetales. The two sat, Courtney holding Ninetales’ silken head in her hands, leaning their foreheads against each other’s.
“Courtney?”
She slowly opened her eyes and looked up at Tabitha at the sound of her name. All the anger was gone; her red eyes gazed sadly at her fellow commander. Maressa noticed bags under her eyes and thought she saw the glimmer of tear tracks as well.
“Don’t let It know what you’re doing.”
Maressa felt Tabitha put something in her hand and he whispered to her:
“Use this to scratch away the marks as best as you can. Don’t speak. Be ready for anything. Mightyena and I will start on the right side.”
Maressa nodded. “Come on, Golduck.”
Maressa glanced at the object in her hand. It was a sturdy knife; a jewel in the pommel had the exact same glow as the other gems in the Cave. She looked up at the markings on the Cave walls, still giving off autogenic light. It felt horribly wrong to do what she was about to. There was something special, even sacred, about the space they were in. She glanced at Golduck and saw, from the fear in his eyes, that he felt the same way. The two of them glanced back to Tabitha and Mightyena.
Tabitha looked back at Maressa. “Having a hard time, too?”
“Yeah…”
She looked at Courtney. The female Magma commander sat in the middle of the floor, stroking her Ninetales. She didn’t acknowledge either Tabitha or Maressa but devoted all her attention to her Pokemon.
Her eyes moved over to Phoebe. The Ghost-type trainer sat on the floor next to her Dusclops. She hadn’t moved or said anything since seeing the vision of the Orbs’ creation, and her Dusclops sat silently next to her. It sent another shiver along Maressa’s arms to see Phoebe looking so numb.
Maressa looked at Golduck.
“Let’s get this over with.”
Bracing herself, she shore the blade of the knife over carvings on the wall while Golduck let loose a blast of psychic energy, defacing a large portion of the interior. Mightyena launched a hyper beam attack, sending bits of rock spraying in all directions and filling the air with dust.
“AH!”
As soon as the Pokemon attacks hit the wall, the carvings glowed a bright, blinding white. Maressa heard a scream and a loud, deep rumbling. The scream was given by Courtney—the markings on her body glowed white, and those that were damaged on the Cave wall appeared as cracks in her skin. Her Ninetales leapt to her feet, looking at her trainer worriedly.
A loud, distressed moaning echoed throughout the Cave at an incredible volume, as if some giant had been injured and bellowed out its pain. As ordered before, Golduck and Mightyena continued shooting beams of energy at the markings on the Cave wall. Cracks raced along Courtney’s body as lightning ruptures beneath her skin. Maressa gasped as she felt the ground beneath her shift—but it wasn’t just that beneath her. All around her, the cave walls, floors and ceilings were moving, cracking open and melding into each other as if made of liquid instead of stone. Falling to her hands and knees, Maressa watched as pits opened in the floor and sections of the ceiling descended to the ground. The ground beneath Golduck gave way, and he was soon clinging to the side of a vertical stretch of earth. Mightyena leapt around the room frantically to avoid the same fate. Tabitha’s eyes met Maressa’s and he dashed over to her as best as he could with the Cave shaking uncontrollably. Maressa could do no more than lay flat on the ground, feeling it warp and change all around her.
Tabitha gripped her arm and pulled her close to him, trying to find some security in the constantly-changing environment. Maressa desperately wanted—needed—to get to Golduck, but she couldn’t even stand. She raised her eyes to look at the wall—a section of the carvings was still untouched. Her eyes roved to Courtney, still screaming bloody murder and whose body illumined so brightly Maressa couldn’t make out any features. Ninetales was shaking. The Fire-type looked up at the brightly-lit walls; her claws dug into the earth below her, her jaw set back, and her brows furrowed as her ruby eyes blazed.
Ninetales vanished for a moment before reappearing in the air, dark energy streaking all around her. She dug her claws into the carvings, ripping them up and sending bits of rock flying in the air.
As the last of the carvings were defaced, a higher-pitched groan echoed through the walls all around them, reverberating through the stone, causing it to vibrate and Maressa’s whole body to shake. Her teeth jittered from the force of the moan; she clenched her jaw to try prevent the throbbing within her skull, but it was no use. The vibrations were so violent that she felt her body must split into two before long—
And then, the light on the walls died. Courtney and Phoebe were nowhere to be seen. The vibrations ceased; all sound stopped, and the Cave became pitch-black and as quiet as the grave.
The thought lingered in Maressa’s mind: was this the grave? By destroying the origin of life, had they destroyed life itself?
But after a moment, she noticed the loud breathing in her ear and remembered the warm weight of Tabitha’s arm on her back. And no sooner had Maressa realized this than there was a dim red glow above them. She heard the cracking sound of rocks being shorn away as lines appeared in the cavern wall in a faded red light, as though the Cave itself was tired. The lines met and formed letters in a shaky, spiked handwriting:
IF YOU WANT TO SAVE YOUR LIFE
LOSE IT
Maressa stared at the cryptic message, not really registering what she was reading. After a few seconds, the letters darkened and she felt the ground sift beneath her feet, forming a pit beneath her. The weight of Tabitha’s arm disappeared. As she slid down the dirt, her heart caught in her throat and all she could do was gasp and grunt.
The sliding eventually stopped, but she heard the rock around her shift and change. Maressa lay still, her face on the ground as the darkness closed in about her. She heard the shuffling of some feet and a familiar moan.
Looking up, she saw a red glow from the gem on Golduck’s forehead.
“Golduck?”
An affirming quack responded. The red glow came nearer, and she could dimly make out Golduck’s eyes looking at her with relief and concern.
“I’m all right… I think.”
She heard high-pitched whining and snuffling. Golduck tensed and Maressa froze as Mightyena came into view. The Dark-type looked at Maressa and Golduck with drooping eyes, his ears flat against his head and his tail hanging low. He whined.
Golduck turned to Maressa. Mightyena wanted to know where Tabitha was—he couldn’t smell him at all!
Maressa got to her feet with difficulty, grabbing the wall for support. Where was he?
“Tabitha?” she called into the silence.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Tabitha groaned as he picked himself up—after seeing the red writing on the Cave wall, an opening emerged in the ground near him and he had fallen through. He had tried to cling to Maressa, but she was ripped from his grasp. He looked around, but there was nothing but blackness.
“Mightyena?”
Silence. Fear pricked Tabitha’s heart—was his companion okay? Where had he gone?
“Maressa? Courtney?”
But no answer came.
Tabitha reached out and felt a wall to his right. Holding the other hand out in front of him, he edged forward, following what seemed to be a tunnel. His mind buzzed with questions. What happened to the others? Courtney looked like she was at death’s door as they attacked the Cave. But her Ninetales was the one who finished tearing away the magic markings when the Cave started fighting back. Was that what the Cave was doing now? Was it luring Tabitha down somewhere, to crush or swallow him?
It struck him how, what was once regarded as the center of life in the Hoenn region, had actively tried to kill them.
As he walked along, he realized just how long it had been since he had taken time to reflect in silence. He hadn’t had an extended period of quiet since the evening they captured Maressa and Derek made his escape, when he let Maressa sleep in his room and he stood out on a balcony, staring at stars and wondering why things were happening the way they were.
Though the Cave itself was eerie, Tabitha found something comforting in the silence and the darkness. It just occurred to him that the weights previously pressing on him were gone, and it felt easier to breathe and move about. He might have been in an entirely different cave than before.
As he made his way down the tunnel, he noticed a dim, dark blue light ahead. He moved along, keeping his eyes on the light. Would it be gemstones, like the ones he saw before? Or more writing?
It turned out to be neither. The lines melded together on a wall so dark it looked as if they were floating in midair. They formed a small family with four children, three brothers and a sister. That was how Tabitha’s family was—
As he stared at the lines, he realized it was his family. His parents stood side-by-side, wearing their yukatas and smiling. As the eldest child, eleven-year-old Tabitha stood directly in front of his parents with his two younger brothers and two-year-old sister standing in a line in front of him.
Tabitha froze as he gazed at his family, drinking in their appearance. Sixteen years since he had seen them. There weren’t even any photographs. Reaching out a hand, he ran his fingers along the grooved lines of the cave, taking in what was the only standing image of his long-gone family, as if he could hold on to the memory of them.
Normally, he might have been curious at the appearance of the images. But now, all he felt was longing—longing for them, for simpler times, for their disciplined way of life. He gazed at the image of his father and it added an extra dose of sorrow. It was what Tabitha had always wanted to be: a loving husband and father who could protect and provide for his family.
More lines appeared in the Cave walls. Tabitha saw the pack of Mightyena and Poochyena that his village lived in community with. He saw the attacks and the fire… and the time he lived in the wild with the remaining Mightyena and Poochyena. He traced his hand along the glowing carvings of the Pokemon, as grateful as ever for taking him in and for everything he learned from them.
He walked along as more lines grew in the walls and ceiling around him. There was the time he stowed away on a series of carts, trucks, and ships, landing himself in Rustboro. His heart hardened slightly at the image of the large, polluted city with a small ragged boy and his Poochyena standing there looking lost. His involvement in street gangs, his years of theft, and being found and taken in.
His heart skipped a beat as he saw the image of an older man looking down at a fourteen-year-old Tabitha. Tabitha reached up and touched the man’s face, his heart twisting in his chest.
Kenpo.
When his home and family were taken away from Tabitha, Kenpo had given him new life. Tabitha pursed his lips as he looked at the various images of the time they spent together: cleaning the studio, cooking, studying, and hours of martial arts training.
“Why did you do it?” Tabitha asked the old master when he was sixteen. “I was ragged street rat who tried to steal from you. I had nothing to my name, my family was gone, and I had nothing to give you. Why did you take me in? Why have you been training me and teaching me?”
Kenpo looked at him with dark-brown eyes. The shape and color of the eyes reminded Tabitha of his parents. The man’s grey whiskers twitched in a gentle smile. “You said it yourself: you had nothing. But I could tell you had a natural knack for self-discipline and a thirst to learn. Besides,” he added as he looked down at the mushrooms he was chopping, “I hope you’ll be willing to care for me when I retire.”
But that chance never came. Tabitha couldn’t bring himself to look at what happened next. Those horrible days were ingrained into his memory. He still remembered coming home to see Kenpo’s mangled body. He remembered hunting down the gang who did it and, together with Mightyena, picking them all off. Their screams and cries for mercy still echoed in his head.
He glanced over the less-savoury portions of his life that followed and curled his mouth in distaste. The years of living on the street again, desperately seeking a purpose in life through the women he dated, all of them ending in heartbreak and emptiness… His eyes stopped as he saw the outline of a man with shoulder-length hair talking to a twenty-one-year-old Tabitha.
Maxie, and all of his grand promises for a new world, had instantly ensnared Tabitha’s mind. A world where people held on to order, where people had to learn to fight for themselves and stick together to survive. A world more like the village Tabitha had grown up in, away from modernity, relative morality, and where everything a person could want was within their grasp.
Building this new world required work, and having a goal to work towards was rejuvenating for Tabitha. Maxie was someone he could look up to, someone he could trust—having watched his parents’ shipping company fall to shreds after storms and increased competition from oligarchs, Maxie’s family was left destitute. But Maxie never gave up; he always clung to a vision of a better world, of picking out the people who leeched off others and teaching everyone the value of hard work.
Tabitha took his eyes off the image of the two of them and moved down the line as he saw more images appear in the walls: he commanded groups of Team Magma grunts, sent their Pokemon through training regimens, punished and disciplined team members who preyed on each other. He broke into buildings, stole ancient artifacts and scientific research, kidnapped scientists and forced them to give information. He fought Team Aqua members and the Hoenn police force; he stabbed a Team Aqua member several times in the chest, leaving him lying where he was. He burned down buildings and bases, hunted down and terrorized scientists and employees of various companies, and physically squeezed the life out of several men—
All in the name of Team Magma.
The tunnel had opened out and Tabitha stood in what seemed to be a room with the images of his life all around him. His eyes roved over the deeds he committed as a Team Magma member before they were drawn back to Kenpo and his father. As he gazed at the two men, it suddenly struck him how he had turned out to be nothing like them.
He felt hollow. His father stood by his mother’s side and spent the last decade of his life giving everything he had for his children. Kenpo had spent several years training young, fatherless boys the value of self-discipline and work to give them a better chance of life.
Tabitha turned back to the images of his life as a Team Magma member, seeing his sins laid bare. His father and Kenpo had sacrificed so much to take care of and raise him—and he had given his life for murder, terrorization, and that which would ultimately lead to genocide of his own race.
He turned numb. The times in his life as a Team Magma commander that held the most meaning were when he invested in others—when he protected women like Sarah (even if she was not in Team Magma) from men who tried to hurt her; when he comforted Courtney when she was having visions or suffering from her marks; when he coaxed struggling trainers along; when he interviewed new recruits; when he showed grunts the ropes of battling and spying.
What was left now?
The images had not finished forming; he saw more blue lines appear on the cave walls and he followed them. A woman with long hair argued with him outside a forest. The next scene showed her hovering over a man, protecting his bruised and beaten body from Tabitha. The last image showed the two of them standing outside large, circular opening.
Tabitha’s heart faltered as he gazed at the images of her. Maressa had protected a man weaker than himself—a man more like Tabitha’s father. A man who, despite not being a capable fighter, did not back away when he was scared or knew he was at a disadvantage.
A better man.
Tabitha tore his eyes from the image as guilt settled in to his heart.
He looked over as he saw a different colored light appear. It was as dim and dark as the rest, but of a softer, golden hue. He followed it and saw images—but not of the life he led.
It was another image of himself, holding a circular object in each hand. Lines similar to those on Groudon and Kyogre ran along his body. The two ancient beasts stood to either side, facing him, while above him floated Rayquaza and what appeared to be the entrance to the Cave lay below.
Tabitha stared at the image. He knew what it meant, what the Cave wanted him to do. He glanced back at all the images. The Cave knew everything, every little detail of the lives who inhabited the planet it gave life to.
If it prophesied the truth, then he could still do something meaningful with his life—he could give it for one last attempt to right the wrongs he had committed and to set others free from the chaos he caused.
And he knew, in his heart, that he was ready to. In a way, he had been ready for a long time—he was just looking in the wrong direction.
Once he acknowledged his willingness, the rock ahead of him shifted and flowed, forming another tunnel. Gemstones peeked out from crevices, giving off more of the soft golden glow to light his way. He glanced back at the blue images behind him, lingering one last glance on his family.
Turning around, he walked resolutely down the tunnel. He was scared of what was to come. But since when did fear ever hold him back?
+++++++++++++++++++++
Maressa edged her way along the tunnel wall, holding on to Golduck’s hand. Small gemstones shone from the walls and gave off enough light for her to see. Mightyena walked forward, his nose to the ground and tail high in the air, sniffing with every step. Maressa’s heart leaped as she heard the rumble of stones ahead of her. She froze in her tracks; the blood in her veins turned to ice. What was happening?
Golduck stuck by her side while Mightyen raised his head in alarm. The Dark-type’s nose twitched for a moment as he examined the air and then he sprinted forward.
“Good boy—I’m so glad you’re all right!”
“Tabitha?” she called uncertainly.
She heard the sound of footsteps and Mightyena and Tabitha stepped into view. He smiled at Maressa—something about him was different. His hood was down. he looked relaxed.
“Are you okay?” he asked her.
Maressa nodded. “You?”
“I’m all right. Have you seen Courtney?”
Maressa shook her head. “She’s not with you?”
“No…” He looked down the third path that stood between him and Maressa. “Looks like this is the only path left for us.”
The Pokemon and Maressa agreed, and Mightyena led them all down the tunnel. The walls were lined with red and blue gemstones that gave off a soft, gentle glow. As Maressa walked, she realized that the feeling of incoming disaster, of everything being wrong, was gone. She felt free, able to breathe, as if weights she was dragging before were suddenly lifted off. It was easy to walk, and she was able to appreciate the soft light given off by the gems and the gentle slope of the Cave.
There was a loud, cracking sound that seemed to come from beneath them and the entire Cave lurched forward. Maressa fell flat on her face as the gentle slope became a moderate incline. Tabitha had fallen down, too, but Mightyena and Golduck were able to retain their footing. As the humans stood up, Maressa heard the sound of rushing water echo through the cave halls behind them.
Fear engulfed her heart.
“What is that?” she asked fearfully.
“I think the Cave is flooding—come on!”
The four of them sped down the decline—which was relatively easy and quick—and made their way through the winding hall as the light of the gems guided their way. They stopped as the ground leveled out slightly. Tabitha swore.
Water filled the area ahead of them. It went right up to the Cave ceiling. And from the rushing sound behind, Maressa knew it was coming.
Golduck breathed a sigh of relief. This water looked calm, at least. Maybe it led to the open water?
“Good point,” Maressa said as she saw the silver lining. Taking out a Pokeball, she sent out Seaking.
“King!” he said happily as he bounced excitedly in the water. Maressa turned at Tabitha, who was looking uncertainly at Seaking.
“This is our only way out. It’s okay, Seaking knows Dive and can take us underwater, so we won’t be affected by the pressure and we can breathe for a while.”
Getting down, Maressa slid into the water again. As it did the last time, anxiety rushed through her and brought tears to her eyes—she wanted to get out and turn around. But with Golduck’s gentle guidance, she grabbed Seaking’s puffy white fin and wiped her eyes before looking up at Tabitha.
“Come on!”
“Are you okay?” he asked. He still looked skeptical.
“Yes, I’m okay,” she said impatiently. “But we need to go now! I don’t know if you hate Water-types or you don’t know how to swim, but either you come or you drown.”
Tabitha said no more but got down, slid into the water, and grabbed Seaking’s other fin.
“Let’s go!” Maressa said.
Seaking took them below the water, blowing out a bubble so they could breathe. For a few brilliant moments, gems in the wall illuminated the underwater caverns. Stalactites and stalagmites grew in ways that Maressa could never have imagined, forming slender fingers of rock and sometimes even merging to form straw-thin columns.
Maressa was both entranced by the natural beauty and overwhelmed by it. She tried closing her eyes, but that was almost worse—without the beautiful visual spectacle, her ears flooded with the sounds of water: of bubbles floating with each exhale, of Pokemon chirping and grunting as they moved about the cave. It was as if she was closed in by the dark sea, stuck in this underwater cavern with no discernible way out. She was totally helpless: there was nothing she could do to get out of here on her own. If Seaking and Golduck failed—
She didn’t want to think about that.
She looked up as she felt someone grab her hand and saw Tabitha. He looked more scared than she had ever seen him before: his eyes were wide open and his face was pale. His dark eyes met hers as he tightly held her hand—Maressa wondered if he had ever been in water before, or if he had marked life experiences with it. Feeling like she should be the more comfortable one, she held on to him, trying to put on a strong face for his sake.
The underwater cavern stretched on for too long. The gemstones gradually disappeared; Maressa took that to mean they had left the Cave of Origin.
As the light of the cave dwindled behind them, Maressa saw the water around her gradually turn blue. And that deep, dark blue soon turned to brighter shades of navy and eventually turquoise as the sun sent its rays through the ocean waves. Maressa’s heart soared as she saw the sunlight—Tabitha’s did, too, apparently, for Maressa felt his grip loosen slightly.
She saw debris floating about in the water: coquina walls from houses and stores littered the rocks around them; household objects and broken windows drifted in the waves; trees and bushes had been uprooted and floated around them, still green even in the watery embrace of death. The litter from the damage had been spread out very far; Maressa saw it everywhere she looked.
As they emerged from the water, Golduck helped Maressa climb up the rocks on to the shore. She looked down at her Pokemon as Tabitha clambered up next to her. Her breath was shaky and her body trembled. Golduck and Tabitha sat next to her while Seaking stared up at them.
“That Cave tried to kill us,” she said numbly.
Tabitha nodded.
“Yeah. But we made it through; things are okay, now.” He glanced at her. “The Orbs can be destroyed; we just need to get them and take them into the Cave of Origin. Then their power will be completely broken.”
Maressa didn’t question how Tabitha knew. She still didn’t fully understand what was going on. She was grateful that the feeling of incoming danger had faded, but beneath her numbness, she felt anxiety and nerves rise within her. But she just needed to keep going—if she took time to think, then her feelings caught up to her…
“Maressa?”
She snapped back to the present and saw all eyes on her. Her Pokemon looked at her with concern; Tabitha’s gaze was a little more critical.
“You’re not okay,” he observed.
“Well…” Maressa released a shaky breath, trying to hold it together as she gestured to the ruin all around them. “Who is okay?”
“You should probably get back to the Pokemon League.” Tabitha looked up to where Steven had stood a while before, but he was nowhere in sight. Maressa saw for the first time just how drastically Kyogre and Groudon had altered the environment.
The entire western side of the crater was gone, either broken to rubble or carved aside. Platforms of rock rose out from where there was only miles of water before. Groudon stood on one of those plateaus, the intense sunlight immediately drying out all the water that drenched them. Several new walls of rock surrounded Groudon, forming columns that stretched into the air and pierced the sky. The Ground-type poked his way about, firing shots of mud and beams of solar energy. Kyogre was farther north than before, trying to dodge Groudon’s attacks but also trying to get a clear shot at its enemy. Its flippers were too wide for it to squeeze through the rocky columns.
From their distance, it was difficult to make out anything clearly, but Maressa saw a few of the League members standing on a ledge far away. When she turned her head, she saw others fighting Team Aqua members.
“Do you want me to take you back to them?”
Maressa looked at Tabitha. “Where are you going?”
He switched his gaze to the rocks to their left, where a few people in red stood about. Occasional bursts of energy flashed out and boulders were suddenly hurled into the air from an unseen source.
“I’m going to get the Red Orb back from Maxie.”
“But didn’t you say that he absorbed it?”
“I did. Once the Orb has eaten his soul, it will expel from his body. And if his body expires first, I imagine that will also expel the Orb.”
“So… you’re going to kill him?”
Tabitha said nothing but kept his gaze locked on the cataclysmic battle taking place far ahead of them.
“I’ll do whatever is needed,” he said quietly. He glanced around. “I don’t even know what happened to Courtney, or Phoebe, or their Pokemon.”
Maressa glanced at the Sootopolis crater; the Cave of Origin sunk far beneath it like some water-borne grave. Maressa shuddered as she remembered the blackness, the cold, the lifelessness…
“What are you going to do?”
She snapped back to see Tabitha gazing at her.
“Do you want to regroup with the Pokemon League and go from there?”
Maressa raised her eyes—she knew the League members must be somewhere on the rocky terraces of Sootopolis, but it was all too far away for her to make it. Swiveling her head, she looked and saw Team Aqua’s submarine sitting in the crater on its own.
“It might be best if I look for the Blue Orb. I don’t think Team Aqua is expecting me. They haven’t seen me at all yet. Sneaking up will be easier—won’t it?”
Tabitha looked surprised. “You really want to plunge in? Don’t you or your Pokemon want rest first?”
Maressa looked at her Pokemon. “What do you guys think? Do you need a break?”
Seaking shook his head. He was ready for action!
Maressa looked at Golduck. He quacked. He was fine—but what about her?
Maressa pretended to not hear the last part of what he said. Looking up at Tabitha, she said, “Both of my Pokemon say their fine. We don’t have time to waste, so I say we find the Orbs and get this over with.”
Tabitha gazed at her critically; Maressa felt uncomfortable. She knew he could see through her façade—he saw how scared and weak she really was.
“I feel like, once I leave you, you’re going to end up in more trouble.”
“But this time, my Pokemon are with me! They’ll make sure nothing bad happens.” Turning to Seaking, she said, “I’m going to Team Aqua’s submarine. Can you take a look under water and see if you find a way in through there?”
He affirmed and disappeared below the surface. Her heart pounding with anticipation and fear, Maressa turned and began to walk towards the Team Aqua submarine. She still had enough pride that she didn’t want her Pokemon or Tabitha to see how she really felt, how terrified she was, how all she wanted to do was curl up and cry and wait until everything was over, to never fight again, to just give up and let it all pass…
“Maressa.”
She turned and saw Tabitha still looking at her. He hadn’t moved.
“Be careful.”
She nodded. Then, with Golduck in tow, the two of them made their way along the rocky outcrop to where Team Aqua’s submarine lay. But it was far from easy. They were both exhausted; the rocks were steep, and some of them were covered with algal slime that made it difficult to climb. Talking was too difficult, but without having someone to talk to distract her, the reality of the present moment was slowly hitting Maressa.
As she put her hands on a ledge to try and climb up, they shook too badly to hold her weight. Letting go, she sat down on the ledge and curled up. Her whole body shook. She stared mutely out at the two Pokemon—the giants—the gods—fighting. Their roars shook the area—ear-splitting roars. Sootopolis City was in ruins. The lower buildings were washed away, no more than rubble littering the sea, carrying the memories of those who used to inhabit it. Any houses and buildings still standing were empty, abandoned. Rayquaza lay along a crater ledge, limp and unmoving while humans examined its body. Maxie’s soul was wasting away within him. The Cave of Origin had nearly eaten her and her Pokemon. And the horrible roar of the ocean echoed just below her, sending shivers through her body.
Tears came down from Maressa’s eyes and her body shook with sobs. Her chest heaved—deep within her, something told her that everything was about to end, that she was going to die.
“Quack?”
She heard Golduck quack softly and he placed a webbed hand on her back. For a moment, he just sat there with her, letting her cry out her emotions and fears as he had done so many times in the past.
Golduck took his hand off her and let out a throaty quack in alarm. Maressa looked up—
Her blood froze.
An Azumarill doused in a coat of water flew over the rocks and slammed into Golduck.
Maressa sprung to her feet.
“Golduck!”
Whipping her head around, her heart clenched as she saw him—
Matt.
He stood a few meters away, glaring at Maressa. There was no playful smile or smugness about him now. His pale blue eyes burned with hatred as he made his way down the terraces and to his former subordinate.
Maressa bolted away, all alarms going off in her body as adrenaline coursed through her veins. She sprinted more quickly than ever before, flying up ledges and over boulders.
But it was no use. At the end of the day, Matt was much bigger and stronger than she was. He caught up to her quickly and pinned her to the rocky ground. Maressa cried as she was slammed into the dirt and kneed in the stomach. The breath whooshed! out of her and lances of agony surged through her body. She couldn’t scream—she could barely cough as Matt lifted her up as if she was a rag doll, slung her over a shoulder, and carried her.
Chapter 39
“Crawdaunt, use bubblebeam!”
A burst of bubbles unleashed from the crustacean’s oversized pincers, overriding the Torkoal’s heat wave and sending her flying. Shelly looked behind her and saw Archie standing on a ledge far below her, the Blue Orb shining in his hand. He had paid no mind to the multitude of Pokemon fighting around him; his eyes were only for the battle that raged in the center of the crater.
It was unsettling to see him standing so still, not moving, not giving any commands. It was as if the life that once flowed through his veins now pulsed only within the Blue Orb.
“Altaria, now!”
Shelly whipped her head around and opened her eyes wide in surprise when she saw Winona, the Gym Leader they had captured, standing on a ledge near some grunts.
“Still fighting, are you?” Shelly called. “You should know when to quit! Crawdaunt, defend!”
Crawdaunt crossed his large pincers in front of him and formed a protective bubble around him. He waited like that for a few seconds, but nothing happened.
Shelly looked around but couldn’t see an Altaria anywhere. This wasn’t right. If Altaria was going after her, she would have been attacked by now. But if Altaria wasn’t attacking her, then the only other one she would go after would be—
“Archie!”
Shelly turned around just in time to see a flash of white light descend from the burning sky. She screamed his name, but it was too late—the blazing sun hid Altaria’s sky attack until she was on top of them. Archie didn’t even turn around to see the Flying-type collide with him, shooting him forward into the gravel and sending him toppling down several meters.
Shelly screamed—the fall was too much for any human to bear. She sprang forward, leaping down ledges, trying to keep her Leader in sight, trying to see him—she had to see him—she had to make sure he was okay, that he was still alive… She heard shouts, explosions, crashing streams of water, the scuffle of people and Pokemon running—but none of that mattered now. None of that mattered if Archie was out of commission.
As Archie tumbled onto a ledge, he fell flat on his stomach. There was a brief flash of blue as the Blue Orb flew out of Archie’s hand but the light died once it left his grip. The Aqua leader lay in the dust, unmoving.
“ARCHIE!”
Shelly didn’t slow down until she reached the still form of her leader. Kneeling down next to him, she hesitated to look carefully at him—the force of the fall had been so powerful—but she had to. With shaking hands, she gently lifted him and turned him over on to his back.
His face was scraped a little, but otherwise, he was completely unscathed. She couldn’t believe it. How could he be unhurt? The fall had been powerful enough to crush bones—even the sky attack alone should have caused severe bodily damage. But he lay in her arms, whole and unharmed.
He blinked a few times and groaned. His pale blue eyes looked up at her in mild confusion. “Shelly…?”
“Archie!” she breathed out in relief. “You’re all right!”
He groaned and put a hand to his face. “What happened? Where’s the Orb?” He and Shelly looked around, but the Orb wasn’t in sight.
Grunts were descending the ledges and circling around them. Some looked on in worry and confusion; others asked what help they could offer.
“All of you are to look for the Blue Orb!” Shelly announced. “Bring it back here once you find it.”
As the grunts followed orders, Archie stared ahead, thinking. “Shelly,” he finally said. “What happened? I know I had the Orb… But I think I was standing up there.” He weakly pointed to a ledge far above them.
“Yes, sir. You were attacked by the Pokemon League. We—we failed to defend you.”
Shelly’s gut twisted as she admitted her failure, but Archie didn’t respond. He turned his head to look at Kyogre and Groudon locked in a stalemate. The waters in the crater were relatively calm as the beasts pushed against each other, each trying to overpower the other.
“It was Kyogre,” he mused. “It wasn’t me. I didn’t know where I was—I didn’t know who I was, or what I was doing…” He looked up at Shelly. His eyes were wide, as if he came to some realization. “Don’t you see? At first, I controlled Kyogre. But I wasn’t strong enough. Instead, it was using me—to power the Orb.”
“Power the Orb? Sir, what are you… What are you saying?”
Archie took his time to answer. He sat up and slowly, with Shelly’s help, struggled to a standing position. As he gazed at Kyogre, he voiced his thoughts.
“Those Orbs—they were created by humans, from humans, for humans, and they use humans to keep Groudon and Kyogre fighting. The first people who made them thought that they had control over the ancient Pokemon—but as it turns out, we’re just food for gods.”
Shelly’s heart clenched as he explained this.
“Sir, if the Orb is really that dangerous, do you really want to keep using it?”
Archie glanced at her and then swept his gaze over the grunts looking for the Orb. They overturned rocks, crawled into crevices, and combed the ground.
“No. You’re right. It’s too dangerous for me—for any Team Aqua member—to keep using.” His eyes lifted and he looked across the crater, where Team Magma’s helicopters could be seen. “I wouldn’t put it past Maxie to have willingly given his life for the Orb… He’s probably a goner by now. But Kyogre does need an energy source.”
As he spoke, he glanced to the Pokemon League members hovering near them.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Maressa sat with Derek while Steven stood before them, holding the stone slab tightly in his hands. She watched as Claydol used his psychic powers to bind Derek’s injuries. Steven had agreed to give the two of them a break while Winona and Drake took off to recover the Blue Orb from Team Aqua.
Glancing over, Maressa watched, for the first time, the battle taking place in the crater. She had always wanted to come to Sootopolis—the natural wonder and the city were always highlighted in her oceanography classes in school. The phenomenon of a dormant volcano crater filling with rainwater and holding all sorts of unique marine life was fantastic enough on its own. But Sootopolis also held a reputation as a cultural center of Hoenn—the Cave of Origin was renowned in Hoenn myths as where not just the world, but life itself, began. The gym, contest hall, and art museums that graced the city attracted tourists and natives alike. Like the rest of Hoenn, the weather didn’t change much throughout the year but maintained a warm, subtropical temperatures.
And now, the first several layers of houses had disappeared into the crater’s depths. Plants and gardens that once adorned the cliffsides were ripped up and washed away. All houses were abandoned, sitting as empty spectators to the chaos engulfing the city. The crater wasn’t even that anymore—part of it had been shorn away when Kyogre tackled Groudon, and close to it was a large hole from where Groudon first broke through to challenge its foe. As Maressa watched, she Groudon saw fling its arms forward as if to punch Kyogre, but instead of making physical contact, columns of earth shot up from the water and smacked into Kyogre, forming odd spits of land.
Sootopolis could not be any more different from the picturesque city she had seen in books.
Since the golems’ shield had broken, Steven had tried to have the golems remake it, but for whatever reason—whether they were too tired, or Steven didn’t have the strength—the shield couldn’t be remade. The golems instead hovered near the Pokemon League members, deflecting any incoming attacks from the ancients battling in the crater.
Phoebe sat with her Ghost Pokemon. Several of them were injured in one way or another; one of her Dusclops’ had been the victim of pretty nasty assaults and had several bite marks mottling him. Smoke-like substance curled out of the bite marks and diffused into the air.
Derek’s Golbat let out several squeaks.
“What is it?” he asked.
Golbat gestured with a wing—another Golbat was flying towards them. Far behind them, Maressa saw—to her utter bewilderment—Tabitha riding on a Flygon.
Steven glanced at the incoming Golbat.
“It’s probably a messenger. We’ll hear what they have to say.”
At his words, Derek’s Golbat took off. The two Golbat met in the air, and after a moment, Derek’s Golbat returned and let out several more squeaks.
Derek furrowed his eyebrows and cast his eyes down.
“What is it?” Maressa asked him.
“Apparently Tabitha wants to work with us. He says that the Red Orb has taken control of Maxie, so Team Magma is now disbanded and he wants to help us stop Groudon and Kyogre.”
“What?”
Maressa looked over in disbelief to see Flygon gliding in circles while he awaited their answer. Tabitha wanted to help them? After everything he had told Maressa about the Pokemon League—he was throwing it all away?
“As if!” Phoebe scoffed. Her Dusclops looked up curiously. Her eyebrows came down in a sharp V and there was an upset frown on her face. “It’s his fault that all of this happened! Steven, he’s probably just trying to get near you so that he can smash the tablet!”
Maressa frowned as she watched Flygon circle. Tabitha wanting to leave Team Magma was something she found hard to believe—but would he fake becoming friendly? Did stopping the golems really matter that much? With the Red Orb and Groudon, Team Magma had all they could want. Was Golbat’s message true, and Maxie was no longer able to lead his team? If Maxie was out of commission, then maybe Tabitha no longer saw reason to continue Team Magma’s work…
“I don’t know,” Maressa said out loud. She looked at Derek. “What do you think of this? We want all the help we can get, right?”
Derek looked up at her. He looked slightly annoyed and gestured to the bandages Claydol was winding around his arm.
“Really?”
Steven pulled a Pokeball out of his pocket and his Metagross appeared beside him in a flash of white light.
“We’ll listen to what he has to say. If it doesn’t satisfy me, then Metagross will take care of him.”
Derek sighed and reluctantly gave Golbat the message to relay. As Golbat flew away, Maressa noted Derek’s sour look.
“You don’t feel good about this, do you?”
“Maressa, he threw me around like a rag doll and smashed me into walls, injuring me badly and probably breaking my ribs. Twice. He held you in captivity and would have done so again until you crawled over my broken body. No, I don’t feel good about this.” He paused, staring hard at the incoming Flygon. “Tabitha… used to be a good friend of mine. We got along really well when we both worked on Team Magma. But Team Magma always came first for him. The first time he saw me after I deserted, he attacked me and landed me in the hospital. And before that, when I told him I released you and Tate, his Mightyena attacked me—you were there. And while I don’t know what’s going on with him now—I don’t know if Maxie really has lost his mind—I don’t feel too keen on overlooking everything he’s done and just accepting him.”
Maressa pondered Derek’s words as the Flygon steadily flew closer. Her patience with Tabitha had run thin long ago—she bore a grudge that he returned her to Team Aqua and she had no sympathy for him at the Sky Pillar. She still remembered the cold horror gripping her heart when she saw him almost kill Matt… And then he almost did the same to Derek. But something in her still believed that what Tabitha ultimately wanted was good—he just had a bad way of going about it. And at this point, weren’t they desperate enough to try whatever worked?
As Flygon landed lightly on the rock, several Pokemon leapt to their feet. Golduck and Claydol took a stance protectively in front of Maressa and Derek. Phoebe’s Ghost Pokemon rose out of the shadows, glaring at Tabitha with their blood-red eyes. Metagross let out a low rumble that reverberated through the earth. But if Tabitha was scared by any of this, he didn’t show it. He smoothly dismounted Flygon, glanced at each of the humans, and looked straight at Steven. The Champion’s cold grey eyes met those of the Magma commander.
“Well?” Steven asked. “What brought on this little change of heart? Just because your Leader is out, you suddenly want to abandon your team’s mission?”
“Team Magma’s mission was never meant to be like this. Maxie never intended to sacrifice his mind. But the Red Orb has powers that even he didn’t know of, and it’s consuming him.” He said all of this matter-of-factly, staring at Steven unblinkingly.
“Without Maxie… we don’t have a mission anymore.” His eyes were downcast and the pitch of his voice dropped slightly. “And this whole operation works differently than he had expected. The Red Orb can only be used to control Groudon for a small period of time. But humans are too weak to withstand Groudon’s strength, and the Orb eventually takes over their mind and eats their soul. Maxie didn’t know this. And now he’s gone.” He looked back up at Steven with a piercing, cold gaze. “I don’t like the Pokemon League. I never have. But unless Groudon and Kyogre are stopped and the Red and Blue Orbs are destroyed, then they’ll keep fighting and turn this planet into a wasteland.”
Steven stared at him for a moment.
“What do you suggest we do, then? I’ve tried using the golems to contain the chaos, but that’s quickly failing. We’ve had no luck retrieving the Orbs. If Maxie’s soul is gone, why didn’t you bring the Red Orb with you?”
“Maxie’s body absorbed the Orb. He’s a mindless, raging monster right now. But I know how to get it back—I know how to stop the Orbs.”
“We already know,” Phoebe said impatiently. “Mt. Pyre nullifies their power, but we can’t exactly get them there without getting them first.”
“You don’t need Mt. Pyre. The Orbs are powered by the magic in the Cave of Origin—if we deface the Cave and destroy the magic, the Orbs can be stopped.”
“No!”
Everyone looked at Phoebe as she stared at Tabitha in horror. “You can’t destroy the Cave! It’s the beginning of Hoenn—the beginning of life itself! If we destroy the Cave, we destroy everything!”
“I’m not saying we should destroy it, just get rid of the magic that created and powers those Orbs.”
“But nobody knows what exactly that magic is, it’s been lost for millennia.”
Tabitha glared at Phoebe and pointed to a spot across them in the broken crater.
“I just came out of the Cave of Origin. There’s a woman there who’s native to Sootopolis and whose family has carried on the magic and history of the creation of those Orbs. Maxie’s last order to her was to guard the Cave because he knew that if the Cave was damaged, then the Orbs could become breakable objects.”
Phoebe’s eyes widened. “A native Sootopolan? Why would she ever let us destroy that magic—her family created those Orbs!”
“Her family was used to create the Orbs—"
“No, the official Hoenn legend says that Sootopolans sacrificed themselves to savage gods for the power to control Groudon and Kyogre.”
Tabitha said nothing but stared blankly at Phoebe for a moment. He then turned back to Steven.
“I’ll go in to deface the Cave—and possibly fight my old teammate, if I have to. Then it’s just a matter of getting the Orbs. Maxie’s body will have to expel the Red Orb at some point. I can’t say about the Blue Orb. I can try to see if any Team Magma grunts left will help try to retrieve it.”
He and Steven stared at each other for a few moments. Steven eventually turned back to the legendaries fighting and said, “Very well. I’ll make sure to have someone near Maxie for when his body expels the Red Orb, and we’ll keep trying to retrieve the Blue Orb, too. If you need to fight the other Team Magma admin, maybe you’d want to take someone along, too. Maressa?” Steven glanced over his shoulder.
“You and your Pokemon look to be in better shape than anyone else here. If you want to help, join Tabitha and get going.”
Both Phoebe and Derek protested.
“Steven, this is a bad idea!”
“Maressa, no! You can’t trust him!”
“If we destroy the Cave, we destroy life—"
“We have to try, Phoebe!” Steven roared. In an instant, his calmness was gone. Veins stuck out on his clammy, white hands as he gripped the slab. Fire burned behind his eyes, reflecting the smoldering sky. “Look around you! Soon, we won’t have anything more to lose! And do I need to remind you where your judgement got us in the past? So, please, hold your tongue and let me lead!”
Phoebe stared at Steven as though she had been slapped. After a moment, she turned away. Maressa thought she saw tears appear on her cheeks.
“Maressa?”
She looked up to see Tabitha standing over her, looking down at her expectantly.
“Coming with?”
Maressa didn’t know how to feel about this—but what was there for her to feel? All this time, she hadn’t been able to fully process everything happening around her. And at this point, it was just accepting another order—almost like being a Team Aqua grunt again. All she could do was comply. As she got to her feet, she felt felt someone take her hand.
“Maressa, no.”
She looked back to see Derek sitting up, staring at her with drooping eyes. He looked so tired; he was still very pale, and the heat was making him sweat. Her heart panged when she saw how distraught he looked.
“Derek, I’ll be fine. I have Golduck with me!” She looked over to Golduck, expecting him to give a reaffirming quack. But her companion just stood there, looking sadly at Derek.
Golduck’s lack of enthusiasm hit Maressa, and she realized just how distressing this looked for Derek.
“But I promise—I’ll be okay. I’ll come back soon.”
Derek gazed at her with his soft brown eyes—it was so different from the way he looked at her during their conversations aboard Team Magma’s ship. Before, he had been bright-eyed, curious, gentle, and always willing to stand up for anyone he believed in. Now, one of his eyes still had remnants of a bruise encircling it, and his gaze was dark, broken, and distraught—pleading her to listen to him, to not throw herself into further danger. Even their positions were reversed. And Maressa was reminded of the great lengths he went to ensure her safety—risking his life and his Pokemon’s—just to make sure that she would be okay. And she was leaving it all behind again.
The thought made Maressa want to cry. But she couldn’t cry—she had work to do. Relinquishing Derek’s hand, she turned away. She couldn’t look at him anymore—not if she still wanted to control her emotions. Recalling Golduck into his Pokeball, she and Tabitha walked over to Flygon and mounted him.
As Flygon took off, Maressa’s stomach reeled. She clenched her eyes shut and gripped the Dragon-type as hard as she could. The air was so cold that her fingers soon went numb. The wind slapped her face, sending burning shards of ice through her skin. She thought she would freeze.
And all she could see behind closed eyes was the distress on Derek’s face as she left him behind. Tears came to her eyes, but they were quickly lost in the gusts that whipped her eyes.
I’m sorry, Derek.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
As Phoebe watched them go, she stole a glance at Steven. His gaze was locked on the golems. She was antsy—she could not sit there while two people who knew nothing of Hoenn mythology were about to destroy the Cave!
Steven was turning pale. His face was still and expressionless, but Phoebe knew his strength was fading. If she left, she might not get a chance to see him again. With that thought, she truly felt sad. She and Steven had disagreements, but he was always kind to her and was always a capable leader.
She gazed at him for a moment, taking in what might be her last look. She didn’t want to leave, but she knew she had to. She had already taken a decent break—if anything else, she at least had to get back to fighting.
Just a different type of fighting than before.
“Go, Dusclops!”
She released Dusclops in a burst of white light. Taking her hand, Dusclops made her intangible and the two of them sank into the rocks.
“Dusclops, I need you to take me to the Cave of Origin.”
Dusclops didn’t question her. Obliging, the two flitted through rocks and to the Cave, keeping the Flygon and two former team members in sight.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Flygon flapped his great wings, sending up clouds of dust and dirt as his large feet lightly touched the ground. Tabitha slid off his back immediately. Maressa slowly peeled her arms and legs off of the Dragon-type; her muscles were clenched in fear and her stomach churned with nausea. Tabitha held a hand out to steady her as she tottered on the ground, taking in great gulps of air.
As her queasiness settled, she looked up. The mouth of the Cave was not very large, but it loomed oppressively over them. The interior was quickly consumed by darkness and swallowed up the light; Maressa could see no more than a few feet ahead of her. Standing just outside the Cave mouth, she could feel the sweat on her skin cool as a flow of chilly air expired from the entrance.
Even though her nausea subsided, she didn’t feel better. Something was not right. As she stared into the imperceptible darkness, the dreaded feeling only intensified.
Tabitha’s Mightyena appeared in a flash of white light. Once out of his Pokeball, the canine flattened his ears and stared wide-eyed at the Cave. His red eyes looked sadly up at Tabitha and he tucked his tail between his legs.
“I know, boy,” Tabitha said as he ruffled Mightyena’s fur. “And I’m sorry. Hopefully this’ll be the last time. Okay?” He turned to Maressa. “You should have your Golduck out of his Pokeball. To be ready—if nothing else.”
Maressa reluctantly took Golduck’s Pokeball and released him. She didn’t want to subject her friend to this creeping feeling that the Cave was setting in to her. But she understood the need to have at least one of her Pokemon out—and she did feel much safer with him.
Golduck rubbed his arms and quacked. The Cave gave him chills—physical and mental ones.
“Me too,” Maressa muttered. “Hopefully we only have to do this once. Let’s get it over with.”
Tabitha turned to her. “Once we’re inside the Cave, we can’t talk about what we intend to do.”
She said nothing; for some reason, she didn’t feel like talking at all. Maressa wished she could just turn around and walk away—she would rather watch Groudon and Kyogre fight, or sit with Derek and see to his wounds (not that she knew anything about emergency medicine), or watch Steven’s strength fade as he commanded the golems, or listen to Phoebe criticize her and her Pokemon for being ‘low-class criminals,’ or sit with her parents and Betty while they gave her a hard time for betraying them, our go out in the ocean and look for Sharpedo and Lanturn—
Anything other than going into that Cave.
But she couldn’t. Not if she didn’t want all of her sacrifices to be wasted; not if the Hoenn region had any chance of returning to normalcy. Pushing back her rising anxiety, she took Golduck’s webbed hand and followed Tabitha and Mightyena into the darkness.
The blackness of the Cave only grew, and soon she could see nothing at all. She stumbled over rocks and bumped into Cave walls.
“Here,” she heard Tabitha say, and she felt his hand take hold of hers. “Follow me and Mightyena.”
She obliged, trying to control her nerves so that Tabitha wouldn’t know how scared she was. She clenched Golduck’s hand in terror—it was okay for him to be aware of her fear—but she tried to avoid anything more than a loose hold with Tabitha’s.
Her heart jumped as she noticed a blue light ahead—gradual at first, it grew as their group continued their walk. She didn’t know whether to be more scared or not. As they grew closer, she saw tiny crystals peeking out from the walls of the Cave. Her heart clenched as she saw the carvings they illuminated: grotesque figures hacking away at each other with weapons and outlines of Pokemon ripping each other to shreds. There were jagged letters of some ancient writing lining the domed walls, but it was a language she didn’t understand.
In the blue light, Maressa didn’t need to hold on Tabitha anymore, but she was scared to let go. Every fiber in her being was telling her to go back, to leave the Cave and never return. Her body protested against every step she took forward. And she knew the others felt the same. Golduck barely plodded along with her, keeping his head low and his eyes down. Mightyena’s tail was perpetually tucked between his legs and his feet dragged with each step.
“Tabitha, we can’t be here,” Maressa said in a hushed whisper.
“I know,” was all he said. He didn’t let go of her hand.
Eventually, the hall opened into a circular room. Maressa saw indented troughs on the ground run to two recesses in the center of the floor. The walls and ceilings were adorned with crude carvings but Maressa didn’t take time to examine them. Her eyes immediately fell on the woman and Ninetales standing in the center of the floor.
“I thought I told you not to come back,” Courtney said coldly.
Tabitha gazed at her impassively.
“This fighting needs to end, Courtney. And whether or not you’ll help us, we have to stop the power of the Orbs.”
Courtney’s eyes locked on to something to their right.
“And you brought a Pokemon League member here? I didn’t think you would stoop that low, Tabitha.”
Maressa looked over and saw Phoebe and her Dusclops materialize from the Cave walls. When did she get there? Why was she there? She might ruin everything!
Tabitha, apparently, felt the same way.
“What are you doing here?” he demanded.
She glared at them. “Whether you believe it or not, the Cave of Origin is the source of all life. I can’t let you come in here and destroy it.”
“You.”
Courtney stared at Phoebe with her mouth partially open. Her dark eyebrows were furrowed, dark storm clouds churning behind her eyes with rage.
Phoebe took a good look at the female Team Magma commander and exclaimed, “Courtney? Y—You’re a Team Magma commander?”
She quickly shook away her shock and steeled herself.
“So, this is where you slunk to after my sister died, huh? Abandoned my parents without a word and joined a criminal gang?”
“It was better than staying with all of you and letting your damned Shuppet eat my feelings!” Courtney screeched. She was on her feet, her face twisted into an ugly snarl. “Mom and Dad told you to get those things away from me, but you didn’t, and they always kept bringing back my misery, my childhood—all of this!” She punctuated the end of the phrase with a sweeping gesture to the room at large.
“They aren’t your parents,” Phoebe said bitterly. “They took you in when you wandered to Mt. Pyre and had nothing but that Vulpix. If you actually cared about them, you wouldn’t have broken their hearts! Did you realize how they felt when they found you and Tara washed up on the rocks?”
“That wasn’t my—”
“DID YOU?” Phoebe shrieked. She was breathing heavily, her face turning splotches of angry red. “Your body was whole and intact, but my baby sister was dead!”
“THAT WASN’T MY FAULT!” Courtney shouted. She breathed heavily as well, and a chill shot up Maressa’s spine as she saw the markings along Courtney’s body twist and turn, seemingly of their own accord.
“You were supposed to watch her—”
“Your Shuppet chased me off that cliff—”
“Left without even thanking my parents—”
“I couldn’t stay where your Pokemon kept eating away at me—”
“Leaving me alone to pick up the pieces—”
“I don’t care about you—”
“And joining a criminal gang—”
“The first person who treated me like a human being—”
“And now you’ll cause the destruction of the whole world!”
“This isn’t my fault!” Courtney shouted, a fire burning behind her eyes—Maressa jumped as she realized that Courtney’s eyes were literally glowing. The marks on Courtney’s body and those along the Cave walls began shedding their own eerie, off-color light.
But Phoebe was undeterred and kept shouting at her long-lost sister.
“This is all your fault! It was your people who chose to sacrifice yourselves to heathen gods for selfish control over Kyogre and Groudon!”
Courtney’s eyes, markings, and the walls of the Cave glowed more brightly. Her hair stood up on end. She spoke, but it sounded as if multitudes of others spoke as well.
“The Pyrites sacrificed the people of Sootopolis to satisfy their hunger for power. This is what your people did to us!”
Courtney lunged for Phoebe and grabbed her head. Phoebe’s jaw dropped and her eyes started glowing with the same light as Courtney’s.
All around them, the markings on the Cave not only glowed, but flowed and moved as they recreated the sacrificial scene from three-thousand years ago.
Maressa watched with horror as the simplistic figures moved on their own, depicting the gruesome ritual. She hugged Golduck. Tabitha stood between her and the inner part of the Cave so she was closer to the tunnel leading to the entrance.
Once the carvings lingered on the depiction of a human outline holding the Orbs, they stopped moving. Courtney let go of Phoebe’s face. The glow left Phoebe’s eyes and she reeled, clutching her head. Her eyes darted around and she breathed heavily.
Courtney looked up at Tabitha.
“Now you’ve seen what happened. The invading conquerors of Mt. Pyre sacrificed the natives of Sootopolis to feed Kyogre and Groudon to gain control over them. Now get out.”
“Not until we finished what we came for,” Tabitha said definitively.
“And you really think I’ll sit here and let that happen? Ninetales—”
“Why are you so defensive about all of this?” Tabitha cut across. “You just wanted the Hoenn region to return to a more natural state, and that’s not what’s happening outside. Why are you afraid of the Orbs losing their power?”
“It’s not that!” Courtney cried. “Look at these walls! And look at me!” She gestured to the markings in her body which mirrored that on the walls. “My life is connected to this Cave—if you destroy the magic in it, I don’t know what will happen to me!”
“Courtney, if we do nothing, then everyone is going to die.”
“That’s just their lot in life,” she snapped. “I’ve suffered more in my childhood—and throughout my life—more than anyone else. And I’m not about to sacrifice what I have left for people who never cared about me.”
“People care about you.”
Everyone turned to Maressa. She had been so quiet the whole time, the others had almost forgotten her. But as she stepped out from behind Tabitha, Courtney fully took her in. Her eyes roved over Maressa’s scarred body. She sneered.
“What happened to you?”
“I was tortured.”
Before Courtney had a chance to reply, Maressa kept speaking.
“You’re not alone, Courtney. I know you were tortured and abandoned. I’ve been through that, too. I’m not saying I understand everything you’ve been through—I don’t. Our situations were so different. But… I have been betrayed and tortured by people that love me—at least, I thought they did…”
Maressa glanced at her hands—at the scars mapping across her body, detailing a roadway of punishment. She saw the Tentacruel stingers, felt the water flood her throat, the salt sluice through open wounds, the press of Matt’s body—
Impending doom welled up within her; she involuntarily hugged herself and took deep breaths. She couldn’t break down—not here, not now.
Opening her eyes, she looked back up at Courtney, trying to steel herself. Trying to keep Matt out of her mind, trying to think of anything other than him, other than the things he forced onto her—
“Quack?”
Maressa gasped as someone touched her back. The sound of Golduck’s quack pulled her out of her thoughts, and she saw his vermilion eyes gaze at her with concern. She pursed her lips as tears fell from her eyes, as she pulled Golduck into a hug. She hoped nobody could see her crying.
Inhaling, she looked back up at Courtney. The Magma commander’s expression had considerably softened; she stared at Maressa with her mouth partly open, and Maressa could see the confused child hiding behind the vengeful woman.
“You’re not alone,” Maressa said again. “I was never alone, either. I know you’re afraid, and I was too; I still am. Afraid nobody will forgive me for the bad decisions I made. But I can’t just give up. Even when people gave up on me, my Pokemon never did—and your Ninetales never gave up on you.”
Courtney looked down at Ninetales, and the rage on her face slowly gave way to pain. Ninetales looked at Maressa in surprise then glanced back at her trainer. Maressa couldn’t read the expression of her monochrome ruby eyes.
Courtney bent down and cradled her Ninetales’ head in her hands. Maressa heard snippets of her quiet murmuring as she and her Pokemon exchanged words.
“She’s right, you’ve been with me—through everything... You don’t deserve to go through this… You’ve always helped me out, done anything I’ve asked for… What do you think of all this?”
Maressa released Golduck from her hug. His head was cocked back as he watched Ninetales and Courtney communicate. As she slowly breathed, she calmed down, and the flow of tears stopped. She wished they would hurry and de-face the Cave—the chills running through her bones had only increased, and she still felt a dire need to get out of there.
She glanced at Tabitha. His hand rested on Mightyena, who still looked about the cavern fearfully. Tabitha’s dark eyes glanced back at her.
“Can we get started?” she whispered.
Tabitha said nothing but looked down at Courtney and Ninetales. The two sat, Courtney holding Ninetales’ silken head in her hands, leaning their foreheads against each other’s.
“Courtney?”
She slowly opened her eyes and looked up at Tabitha at the sound of her name. All the anger was gone; her red eyes gazed sadly at her fellow commander. Maressa noticed bags under her eyes and thought she saw the glimmer of tear tracks as well.
“Don’t let It know what you’re doing.”
Maressa felt Tabitha put something in her hand and he whispered to her:
“Use this to scratch away the marks as best as you can. Don’t speak. Be ready for anything. Mightyena and I will start on the right side.”
Maressa nodded. “Come on, Golduck.”
Maressa glanced at the object in her hand. It was a sturdy knife; a jewel in the pommel had the exact same glow as the other gems in the Cave. She looked up at the markings on the Cave walls, still giving off autogenic light. It felt horribly wrong to do what she was about to. There was something special, even sacred, about the space they were in. She glanced at Golduck and saw, from the fear in his eyes, that he felt the same way. The two of them glanced back to Tabitha and Mightyena.
Tabitha looked back at Maressa. “Having a hard time, too?”
“Yeah…”
She looked at Courtney. The female Magma commander sat in the middle of the floor, stroking her Ninetales. She didn’t acknowledge either Tabitha or Maressa but devoted all her attention to her Pokemon.
Her eyes moved over to Phoebe. The Ghost-type trainer sat on the floor next to her Dusclops. She hadn’t moved or said anything since seeing the vision of the Orbs’ creation, and her Dusclops sat silently next to her. It sent another shiver along Maressa’s arms to see Phoebe looking so numb.
Maressa looked at Golduck.
“Let’s get this over with.”
Bracing herself, she shore the blade of the knife over carvings on the wall while Golduck let loose a blast of psychic energy, defacing a large portion of the interior. Mightyena launched a hyper beam attack, sending bits of rock spraying in all directions and filling the air with dust.
“AH!”
As soon as the Pokemon attacks hit the wall, the carvings glowed a bright, blinding white. Maressa heard a scream and a loud, deep rumbling. The scream was given by Courtney—the markings on her body glowed white, and those that were damaged on the Cave wall appeared as cracks in her skin. Her Ninetales leapt to her feet, looking at her trainer worriedly.
A loud, distressed moaning echoed throughout the Cave at an incredible volume, as if some giant had been injured and bellowed out its pain. As ordered before, Golduck and Mightyena continued shooting beams of energy at the markings on the Cave wall. Cracks raced along Courtney’s body as lightning ruptures beneath her skin. Maressa gasped as she felt the ground beneath her shift—but it wasn’t just that beneath her. All around her, the cave walls, floors and ceilings were moving, cracking open and melding into each other as if made of liquid instead of stone. Falling to her hands and knees, Maressa watched as pits opened in the floor and sections of the ceiling descended to the ground. The ground beneath Golduck gave way, and he was soon clinging to the side of a vertical stretch of earth. Mightyena leapt around the room frantically to avoid the same fate. Tabitha’s eyes met Maressa’s and he dashed over to her as best as he could with the Cave shaking uncontrollably. Maressa could do no more than lay flat on the ground, feeling it warp and change all around her.
Tabitha gripped her arm and pulled her close to him, trying to find some security in the constantly-changing environment. Maressa desperately wanted—needed—to get to Golduck, but she couldn’t even stand. She raised her eyes to look at the wall—a section of the carvings was still untouched. Her eyes roved to Courtney, still screaming bloody murder and whose body illumined so brightly Maressa couldn’t make out any features. Ninetales was shaking. The Fire-type looked up at the brightly-lit walls; her claws dug into the earth below her, her jaw set back, and her brows furrowed as her ruby eyes blazed.
Ninetales vanished for a moment before reappearing in the air, dark energy streaking all around her. She dug her claws into the carvings, ripping them up and sending bits of rock flying in the air.
As the last of the carvings were defaced, a higher-pitched groan echoed through the walls all around them, reverberating through the stone, causing it to vibrate and Maressa’s whole body to shake. Her teeth jittered from the force of the moan; she clenched her jaw to try prevent the throbbing within her skull, but it was no use. The vibrations were so violent that she felt her body must split into two before long—
And then, the light on the walls died. Courtney and Phoebe were nowhere to be seen. The vibrations ceased; all sound stopped, and the Cave became pitch-black and as quiet as the grave.
The thought lingered in Maressa’s mind: was this the grave? By destroying the origin of life, had they destroyed life itself?
But after a moment, she noticed the loud breathing in her ear and remembered the warm weight of Tabitha’s arm on her back. And no sooner had Maressa realized this than there was a dim red glow above them. She heard the cracking sound of rocks being shorn away as lines appeared in the cavern wall in a faded red light, as though the Cave itself was tired. The lines met and formed letters in a shaky, spiked handwriting:
IF YOU WANT TO SAVE YOUR LIFE
LOSE IT
Maressa stared at the cryptic message, not really registering what she was reading. After a few seconds, the letters darkened and she felt the ground sift beneath her feet, forming a pit beneath her. The weight of Tabitha’s arm disappeared. As she slid down the dirt, her heart caught in her throat and all she could do was gasp and grunt.
The sliding eventually stopped, but she heard the rock around her shift and change. Maressa lay still, her face on the ground as the darkness closed in about her. She heard the shuffling of some feet and a familiar moan.
Looking up, she saw a red glow from the gem on Golduck’s forehead.
“Golduck?”
An affirming quack responded. The red glow came nearer, and she could dimly make out Golduck’s eyes looking at her with relief and concern.
“I’m all right… I think.”
She heard high-pitched whining and snuffling. Golduck tensed and Maressa froze as Mightyena came into view. The Dark-type looked at Maressa and Golduck with drooping eyes, his ears flat against his head and his tail hanging low. He whined.
Golduck turned to Maressa. Mightyena wanted to know where Tabitha was—he couldn’t smell him at all!
Maressa got to her feet with difficulty, grabbing the wall for support. Where was he?
“Tabitha?” she called into the silence.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Tabitha groaned as he picked himself up—after seeing the red writing on the Cave wall, an opening emerged in the ground near him and he had fallen through. He had tried to cling to Maressa, but she was ripped from his grasp. He looked around, but there was nothing but blackness.
“Mightyena?”
Silence. Fear pricked Tabitha’s heart—was his companion okay? Where had he gone?
“Maressa? Courtney?”
But no answer came.
Tabitha reached out and felt a wall to his right. Holding the other hand out in front of him, he edged forward, following what seemed to be a tunnel. His mind buzzed with questions. What happened to the others? Courtney looked like she was at death’s door as they attacked the Cave. But her Ninetales was the one who finished tearing away the magic markings when the Cave started fighting back. Was that what the Cave was doing now? Was it luring Tabitha down somewhere, to crush or swallow him?
It struck him how, what was once regarded as the center of life in the Hoenn region, had actively tried to kill them.
As he walked along, he realized just how long it had been since he had taken time to reflect in silence. He hadn’t had an extended period of quiet since the evening they captured Maressa and Derek made his escape, when he let Maressa sleep in his room and he stood out on a balcony, staring at stars and wondering why things were happening the way they were.
Though the Cave itself was eerie, Tabitha found something comforting in the silence and the darkness. It just occurred to him that the weights previously pressing on him were gone, and it felt easier to breathe and move about. He might have been in an entirely different cave than before.
As he made his way down the tunnel, he noticed a dim, dark blue light ahead. He moved along, keeping his eyes on the light. Would it be gemstones, like the ones he saw before? Or more writing?
It turned out to be neither. The lines melded together on a wall so dark it looked as if they were floating in midair. They formed a small family with four children, three brothers and a sister. That was how Tabitha’s family was—
As he stared at the lines, he realized it was his family. His parents stood side-by-side, wearing their yukatas and smiling. As the eldest child, eleven-year-old Tabitha stood directly in front of his parents with his two younger brothers and two-year-old sister standing in a line in front of him.
Tabitha froze as he gazed at his family, drinking in their appearance. Sixteen years since he had seen them. There weren’t even any photographs. Reaching out a hand, he ran his fingers along the grooved lines of the cave, taking in what was the only standing image of his long-gone family, as if he could hold on to the memory of them.
Normally, he might have been curious at the appearance of the images. But now, all he felt was longing—longing for them, for simpler times, for their disciplined way of life. He gazed at the image of his father and it added an extra dose of sorrow. It was what Tabitha had always wanted to be: a loving husband and father who could protect and provide for his family.
More lines appeared in the Cave walls. Tabitha saw the pack of Mightyena and Poochyena that his village lived in community with. He saw the attacks and the fire… and the time he lived in the wild with the remaining Mightyena and Poochyena. He traced his hand along the glowing carvings of the Pokemon, as grateful as ever for taking him in and for everything he learned from them.
He walked along as more lines grew in the walls and ceiling around him. There was the time he stowed away on a series of carts, trucks, and ships, landing himself in Rustboro. His heart hardened slightly at the image of the large, polluted city with a small ragged boy and his Poochyena standing there looking lost. His involvement in street gangs, his years of theft, and being found and taken in.
His heart skipped a beat as he saw the image of an older man looking down at a fourteen-year-old Tabitha. Tabitha reached up and touched the man’s face, his heart twisting in his chest.
Kenpo.
When his home and family were taken away from Tabitha, Kenpo had given him new life. Tabitha pursed his lips as he looked at the various images of the time they spent together: cleaning the studio, cooking, studying, and hours of martial arts training.
“Why did you do it?” Tabitha asked the old master when he was sixteen. “I was ragged street rat who tried to steal from you. I had nothing to my name, my family was gone, and I had nothing to give you. Why did you take me in? Why have you been training me and teaching me?”
Kenpo looked at him with dark-brown eyes. The shape and color of the eyes reminded Tabitha of his parents. The man’s grey whiskers twitched in a gentle smile. “You said it yourself: you had nothing. But I could tell you had a natural knack for self-discipline and a thirst to learn. Besides,” he added as he looked down at the mushrooms he was chopping, “I hope you’ll be willing to care for me when I retire.”
But that chance never came. Tabitha couldn’t bring himself to look at what happened next. Those horrible days were ingrained into his memory. He still remembered coming home to see Kenpo’s mangled body. He remembered hunting down the gang who did it and, together with Mightyena, picking them all off. Their screams and cries for mercy still echoed in his head.
He glanced over the less-savoury portions of his life that followed and curled his mouth in distaste. The years of living on the street again, desperately seeking a purpose in life through the women he dated, all of them ending in heartbreak and emptiness… His eyes stopped as he saw the outline of a man with shoulder-length hair talking to a twenty-one-year-old Tabitha.
Maxie, and all of his grand promises for a new world, had instantly ensnared Tabitha’s mind. A world where people held on to order, where people had to learn to fight for themselves and stick together to survive. A world more like the village Tabitha had grown up in, away from modernity, relative morality, and where everything a person could want was within their grasp.
Building this new world required work, and having a goal to work towards was rejuvenating for Tabitha. Maxie was someone he could look up to, someone he could trust—having watched his parents’ shipping company fall to shreds after storms and increased competition from oligarchs, Maxie’s family was left destitute. But Maxie never gave up; he always clung to a vision of a better world, of picking out the people who leeched off others and teaching everyone the value of hard work.
Tabitha took his eyes off the image of the two of them and moved down the line as he saw more images appear in the walls: he commanded groups of Team Magma grunts, sent their Pokemon through training regimens, punished and disciplined team members who preyed on each other. He broke into buildings, stole ancient artifacts and scientific research, kidnapped scientists and forced them to give information. He fought Team Aqua members and the Hoenn police force; he stabbed a Team Aqua member several times in the chest, leaving him lying where he was. He burned down buildings and bases, hunted down and terrorized scientists and employees of various companies, and physically squeezed the life out of several men—
All in the name of Team Magma.
The tunnel had opened out and Tabitha stood in what seemed to be a room with the images of his life all around him. His eyes roved over the deeds he committed as a Team Magma member before they were drawn back to Kenpo and his father. As he gazed at the two men, it suddenly struck him how he had turned out to be nothing like them.
He felt hollow. His father stood by his mother’s side and spent the last decade of his life giving everything he had for his children. Kenpo had spent several years training young, fatherless boys the value of self-discipline and work to give them a better chance of life.
Tabitha turned back to the images of his life as a Team Magma member, seeing his sins laid bare. His father and Kenpo had sacrificed so much to take care of and raise him—and he had given his life for murder, terrorization, and that which would ultimately lead to genocide of his own race.
He turned numb. The times in his life as a Team Magma commander that held the most meaning were when he invested in others—when he protected women like Sarah (even if she was not in Team Magma) from men who tried to hurt her; when he comforted Courtney when she was having visions or suffering from her marks; when he coaxed struggling trainers along; when he interviewed new recruits; when he showed grunts the ropes of battling and spying.
What was left now?
The images had not finished forming; he saw more blue lines appear on the cave walls and he followed them. A woman with long hair argued with him outside a forest. The next scene showed her hovering over a man, protecting his bruised and beaten body from Tabitha. The last image showed the two of them standing outside large, circular opening.
Tabitha’s heart faltered as he gazed at the images of her. Maressa had protected a man weaker than himself—a man more like Tabitha’s father. A man who, despite not being a capable fighter, did not back away when he was scared or knew he was at a disadvantage.
A better man.
Tabitha tore his eyes from the image as guilt settled in to his heart.
He looked over as he saw a different colored light appear. It was as dim and dark as the rest, but of a softer, golden hue. He followed it and saw images—but not of the life he led.
It was another image of himself, holding a circular object in each hand. Lines similar to those on Groudon and Kyogre ran along his body. The two ancient beasts stood to either side, facing him, while above him floated Rayquaza and what appeared to be the entrance to the Cave lay below.
Tabitha stared at the image. He knew what it meant, what the Cave wanted him to do. He glanced back at all the images. The Cave knew everything, every little detail of the lives who inhabited the planet it gave life to.
If it prophesied the truth, then he could still do something meaningful with his life—he could give it for one last attempt to right the wrongs he had committed and to set others free from the chaos he caused.
And he knew, in his heart, that he was ready to. In a way, he had been ready for a long time—he was just looking in the wrong direction.
Once he acknowledged his willingness, the rock ahead of him shifted and flowed, forming another tunnel. Gemstones peeked out from crevices, giving off more of the soft golden glow to light his way. He glanced back at the blue images behind him, lingering one last glance on his family.
Turning around, he walked resolutely down the tunnel. He was scared of what was to come. But since when did fear ever hold him back?
+++++++++++++++++++++
Maressa edged her way along the tunnel wall, holding on to Golduck’s hand. Small gemstones shone from the walls and gave off enough light for her to see. Mightyena walked forward, his nose to the ground and tail high in the air, sniffing with every step. Maressa’s heart leaped as she heard the rumble of stones ahead of her. She froze in her tracks; the blood in her veins turned to ice. What was happening?
Golduck stuck by her side while Mightyen raised his head in alarm. The Dark-type’s nose twitched for a moment as he examined the air and then he sprinted forward.
“Good boy—I’m so glad you’re all right!”
“Tabitha?” she called uncertainly.
She heard the sound of footsteps and Mightyena and Tabitha stepped into view. He smiled at Maressa—something about him was different. His hood was down. he looked relaxed.
“Are you okay?” he asked her.
Maressa nodded. “You?”
“I’m all right. Have you seen Courtney?”
Maressa shook her head. “She’s not with you?”
“No…” He looked down the third path that stood between him and Maressa. “Looks like this is the only path left for us.”
The Pokemon and Maressa agreed, and Mightyena led them all down the tunnel. The walls were lined with red and blue gemstones that gave off a soft, gentle glow. As Maressa walked, she realized that the feeling of incoming disaster, of everything being wrong, was gone. She felt free, able to breathe, as if weights she was dragging before were suddenly lifted off. It was easy to walk, and she was able to appreciate the soft light given off by the gems and the gentle slope of the Cave.
There was a loud, cracking sound that seemed to come from beneath them and the entire Cave lurched forward. Maressa fell flat on her face as the gentle slope became a moderate incline. Tabitha had fallen down, too, but Mightyena and Golduck were able to retain their footing. As the humans stood up, Maressa heard the sound of rushing water echo through the cave halls behind them.
Fear engulfed her heart.
“What is that?” she asked fearfully.
“I think the Cave is flooding—come on!”
The four of them sped down the decline—which was relatively easy and quick—and made their way through the winding hall as the light of the gems guided their way. They stopped as the ground leveled out slightly. Tabitha swore.
Water filled the area ahead of them. It went right up to the Cave ceiling. And from the rushing sound behind, Maressa knew it was coming.
Golduck breathed a sigh of relief. This water looked calm, at least. Maybe it led to the open water?
“Good point,” Maressa said as she saw the silver lining. Taking out a Pokeball, she sent out Seaking.
“King!” he said happily as he bounced excitedly in the water. Maressa turned at Tabitha, who was looking uncertainly at Seaking.
“This is our only way out. It’s okay, Seaking knows Dive and can take us underwater, so we won’t be affected by the pressure and we can breathe for a while.”
Getting down, Maressa slid into the water again. As it did the last time, anxiety rushed through her and brought tears to her eyes—she wanted to get out and turn around. But with Golduck’s gentle guidance, she grabbed Seaking’s puffy white fin and wiped her eyes before looking up at Tabitha.
“Come on!”
“Are you okay?” he asked. He still looked skeptical.
“Yes, I’m okay,” she said impatiently. “But we need to go now! I don’t know if you hate Water-types or you don’t know how to swim, but either you come or you drown.”
Tabitha said no more but got down, slid into the water, and grabbed Seaking’s other fin.
“Let’s go!” Maressa said.
Seaking took them below the water, blowing out a bubble so they could breathe. For a few brilliant moments, gems in the wall illuminated the underwater caverns. Stalactites and stalagmites grew in ways that Maressa could never have imagined, forming slender fingers of rock and sometimes even merging to form straw-thin columns.
Maressa was both entranced by the natural beauty and overwhelmed by it. She tried closing her eyes, but that was almost worse—without the beautiful visual spectacle, her ears flooded with the sounds of water: of bubbles floating with each exhale, of Pokemon chirping and grunting as they moved about the cave. It was as if she was closed in by the dark sea, stuck in this underwater cavern with no discernible way out. She was totally helpless: there was nothing she could do to get out of here on her own. If Seaking and Golduck failed—
She didn’t want to think about that.
She looked up as she felt someone grab her hand and saw Tabitha. He looked more scared than she had ever seen him before: his eyes were wide open and his face was pale. His dark eyes met hers as he tightly held her hand—Maressa wondered if he had ever been in water before, or if he had marked life experiences with it. Feeling like she should be the more comfortable one, she held on to him, trying to put on a strong face for his sake.
The underwater cavern stretched on for too long. The gemstones gradually disappeared; Maressa took that to mean they had left the Cave of Origin.
As the light of the cave dwindled behind them, Maressa saw the water around her gradually turn blue. And that deep, dark blue soon turned to brighter shades of navy and eventually turquoise as the sun sent its rays through the ocean waves. Maressa’s heart soared as she saw the sunlight—Tabitha’s did, too, apparently, for Maressa felt his grip loosen slightly.
She saw debris floating about in the water: coquina walls from houses and stores littered the rocks around them; household objects and broken windows drifted in the waves; trees and bushes had been uprooted and floated around them, still green even in the watery embrace of death. The litter from the damage had been spread out very far; Maressa saw it everywhere she looked.
As they emerged from the water, Golduck helped Maressa climb up the rocks on to the shore. She looked down at her Pokemon as Tabitha clambered up next to her. Her breath was shaky and her body trembled. Golduck and Tabitha sat next to her while Seaking stared up at them.
“That Cave tried to kill us,” she said numbly.
Tabitha nodded.
“Yeah. But we made it through; things are okay, now.” He glanced at her. “The Orbs can be destroyed; we just need to get them and take them into the Cave of Origin. Then their power will be completely broken.”
Maressa didn’t question how Tabitha knew. She still didn’t fully understand what was going on. She was grateful that the feeling of incoming danger had faded, but beneath her numbness, she felt anxiety and nerves rise within her. But she just needed to keep going—if she took time to think, then her feelings caught up to her…
“Maressa?”
She snapped back to the present and saw all eyes on her. Her Pokemon looked at her with concern; Tabitha’s gaze was a little more critical.
“You’re not okay,” he observed.
“Well…” Maressa released a shaky breath, trying to hold it together as she gestured to the ruin all around them. “Who is okay?”
“You should probably get back to the Pokemon League.” Tabitha looked up to where Steven had stood a while before, but he was nowhere in sight. Maressa saw for the first time just how drastically Kyogre and Groudon had altered the environment.
The entire western side of the crater was gone, either broken to rubble or carved aside. Platforms of rock rose out from where there was only miles of water before. Groudon stood on one of those plateaus, the intense sunlight immediately drying out all the water that drenched them. Several new walls of rock surrounded Groudon, forming columns that stretched into the air and pierced the sky. The Ground-type poked his way about, firing shots of mud and beams of solar energy. Kyogre was farther north than before, trying to dodge Groudon’s attacks but also trying to get a clear shot at its enemy. Its flippers were too wide for it to squeeze through the rocky columns.
From their distance, it was difficult to make out anything clearly, but Maressa saw a few of the League members standing on a ledge far away. When she turned her head, she saw others fighting Team Aqua members.
“Do you want me to take you back to them?”
Maressa looked at Tabitha. “Where are you going?”
He switched his gaze to the rocks to their left, where a few people in red stood about. Occasional bursts of energy flashed out and boulders were suddenly hurled into the air from an unseen source.
“I’m going to get the Red Orb back from Maxie.”
“But didn’t you say that he absorbed it?”
“I did. Once the Orb has eaten his soul, it will expel from his body. And if his body expires first, I imagine that will also expel the Orb.”
“So… you’re going to kill him?”
Tabitha said nothing but kept his gaze locked on the cataclysmic battle taking place far ahead of them.
“I’ll do whatever is needed,” he said quietly. He glanced around. “I don’t even know what happened to Courtney, or Phoebe, or their Pokemon.”
Maressa glanced at the Sootopolis crater; the Cave of Origin sunk far beneath it like some water-borne grave. Maressa shuddered as she remembered the blackness, the cold, the lifelessness…
“What are you going to do?”
She snapped back to see Tabitha gazing at her.
“Do you want to regroup with the Pokemon League and go from there?”
Maressa raised her eyes—she knew the League members must be somewhere on the rocky terraces of Sootopolis, but it was all too far away for her to make it. Swiveling her head, she looked and saw Team Aqua’s submarine sitting in the crater on its own.
“It might be best if I look for the Blue Orb. I don’t think Team Aqua is expecting me. They haven’t seen me at all yet. Sneaking up will be easier—won’t it?”
Tabitha looked surprised. “You really want to plunge in? Don’t you or your Pokemon want rest first?”
Maressa looked at her Pokemon. “What do you guys think? Do you need a break?”
Seaking shook his head. He was ready for action!
Maressa looked at Golduck. He quacked. He was fine—but what about her?
Maressa pretended to not hear the last part of what he said. Looking up at Tabitha, she said, “Both of my Pokemon say their fine. We don’t have time to waste, so I say we find the Orbs and get this over with.”
Tabitha gazed at her critically; Maressa felt uncomfortable. She knew he could see through her façade—he saw how scared and weak she really was.
“I feel like, once I leave you, you’re going to end up in more trouble.”
“But this time, my Pokemon are with me! They’ll make sure nothing bad happens.” Turning to Seaking, she said, “I’m going to Team Aqua’s submarine. Can you take a look under water and see if you find a way in through there?”
He affirmed and disappeared below the surface. Her heart pounding with anticipation and fear, Maressa turned and began to walk towards the Team Aqua submarine. She still had enough pride that she didn’t want her Pokemon or Tabitha to see how she really felt, how terrified she was, how all she wanted to do was curl up and cry and wait until everything was over, to never fight again, to just give up and let it all pass…
“Maressa.”
She turned and saw Tabitha still looking at her. He hadn’t moved.
“Be careful.”
She nodded. Then, with Golduck in tow, the two of them made their way along the rocky outcrop to where Team Aqua’s submarine lay. But it was far from easy. They were both exhausted; the rocks were steep, and some of them were covered with algal slime that made it difficult to climb. Talking was too difficult, but without having someone to talk to distract her, the reality of the present moment was slowly hitting Maressa.
As she put her hands on a ledge to try and climb up, they shook too badly to hold her weight. Letting go, she sat down on the ledge and curled up. Her whole body shook. She stared mutely out at the two Pokemon—the giants—the gods—fighting. Their roars shook the area—ear-splitting roars. Sootopolis City was in ruins. The lower buildings were washed away, no more than rubble littering the sea, carrying the memories of those who used to inhabit it. Any houses and buildings still standing were empty, abandoned. Rayquaza lay along a crater ledge, limp and unmoving while humans examined its body. Maxie’s soul was wasting away within him. The Cave of Origin had nearly eaten her and her Pokemon. And the horrible roar of the ocean echoed just below her, sending shivers through her body.
Tears came down from Maressa’s eyes and her body shook with sobs. Her chest heaved—deep within her, something told her that everything was about to end, that she was going to die.
“Quack?”
She heard Golduck quack softly and he placed a webbed hand on her back. For a moment, he just sat there with her, letting her cry out her emotions and fears as he had done so many times in the past.
Golduck took his hand off her and let out a throaty quack in alarm. Maressa looked up—
Her blood froze.
An Azumarill doused in a coat of water flew over the rocks and slammed into Golduck.
Maressa sprung to her feet.
“Golduck!”
Whipping her head around, her heart clenched as she saw him—
Matt.
He stood a few meters away, glaring at Maressa. There was no playful smile or smugness about him now. His pale blue eyes burned with hatred as he made his way down the terraces and to his former subordinate.
Maressa bolted away, all alarms going off in her body as adrenaline coursed through her veins. She sprinted more quickly than ever before, flying up ledges and over boulders.
But it was no use. At the end of the day, Matt was much bigger and stronger than she was. He caught up to her quickly and pinned her to the rocky ground. Maressa cried as she was slammed into the dirt and kneed in the stomach. The breath whooshed! out of her and lances of agony surged through her body. She couldn’t scream—she could barely cough as Matt lifted her up as if she was a rag doll, slung her over a shoulder, and carried her.
