--> Back in 2006, when I first joined PE2K and was young and completely innocent with an obsession for Ruby and Sapphire and spriting, there was a member named Kaze Megami. She wrote two fictions that I found enthralling: Shadow Mist and Shadow Sky. Not only were they based on Shadow Pokémon (which I think is a rare thing), but they were excellently written and so engaging (even if Sky was left on the most dreadful cliffhanger and has been left as so for three years, fuuuuuuu-!!).
Now, I accidentally stumbled upon them again when I was browsing the forum. Kaze vanished years ago, and her artwork turned to a collection of dead links, but Shadow Mist and Shadow Sky still remained. It was odd, as I’d just started playing through Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness for the second time, and I was suddenly filled with a desire to do something to show how much Kaze was appreciated. Thus, I decided to write. (odear.)
However, I never got past chapter three.
This story is entirely planned out, chapter by chapter, character by character, plot twist by plot twist.
That plan is on a now broken external hard drive. -_-
BUT. I wish to give this another go. I usually think about this fanfic at least once every couple of months, as I thoroughly enjoyed writing it and the plot, I feel, is the best I ever came up with. So, whilst my boyfriend works on extracting the plan from my stupid hard drive, I will edit and reupload the three chapters I did before.
I wish to introduce Shadow End, a fanfic based after the events of Colosseum and dedicated entirely to Kaze. Any praise you may have for this, I feel goes rightfully to her.
Please, enjoy, and please tear my writing to shreds as most of it was done three years ago (to this very month, in fact!). Thank you. n_n
The broken tiles were gritty with sand, and there was nothing but wind. It was a monotone sound, soulless, lifeless, and it meandered through the desolate lab with no walls to block its path.
Everything had crumbled.
All around there were dunes of pale yellow, grains dancing in ribbon-like trails across their surfaces. The sky stretched in an endless watercolour globe, not a cloud in sight, tainted only by waves of heat. The desert was hot and dead.
Snapped wires, tall broken containers with their contents long-evaporated and rusting desks littered the open lab. The ceiling was gone, and everything was scalding to the touch under the steady glare of the sun.
Scattered about, on the floor and on the sand, on desks and drooping in empty windowpanes, were sheets of curled and torn paper. Stamped across them were faded photos of Pokémon and humans, and faint blocks of writing with only a few odd words discernible.
Storage... Tracked... Threat... Successful... Aura... Closed... Heart...
A scuffling sound broke the lazy silence. Near a corner wall of the lab that was still valiantly standing, a large tile started to move. With a scraping noise it was pushed out from the floor and across the other dirty slabs, leaving a dark hole. Voices sounded from below, along with a faint buzzing.
“Vander- where’s Vander? Vander, I moved the tile-”
“You did it? There’s a way out?”
“Reath? Reath... stay with us, man...”
“Wes, move. I want to check the hole.”
“Right here, Vander. I did it right here.”
There were several thudding noises accompanied by exhaling breaths, as if someone or something was climbing, and then the defiant head of a crimson lizard emerged from the blackness. He looked around rapidly with a serious, focused expression, and then hoisted himself clean out of the hole. His head was proud, thin wisps of smoke rising faintly from his nostrils, and his stance was solid and readied. The brilliant flame on the end of his slender tail danced in the sandy wind.
“How is it?” asked a voice from below, the same voice that had spoken first. The Charmeleon’s clawed fingers flexed slightly.
“Stay there.” His brows arched downwards as he cast his steely gaze around the wrecked lab. Equipment and machines had been abandoned. It was possible to step directly from the desert sand onto the tiled floor on which he now stood. It felt so... open. He didn’t realise... it was all so confusing, he thought, intense concentration seizing his face, before another voice sounded from below his feet.
Everything was just so...
“Vander, man, what’s up there?” Appearing directly below the hole and looking up, squinting in the sun, was an ocean-blue turtle with a red rag tied around his neck. The white plumes of his tail waved agitatedly behind him as he tried to catch sight of the scarlet lizard. Next to him were a stack of wooden boxes that had been arranged into a staircase. The room appeared to be some sort of storage facility with no sign of human inhabitancy, yet large tanks filled with neon liquid filled the dark space with an unearthly, multicoloured glow. Computers with blue screens, acting as if by themselves, covered metal desks that had drawers stuffed with papers. The walls were all covered in the same yellow-and-black tape:
SHADOW POKÉMON SHADOW POKÉMON SHADOW POKÉMON SHADOW POKÉMON SHADOW POKÉMON
“... Nothing,” Vander eventually replied, sounding faintly disgruntled. “It’s all... everything’s just...”
Murmuring voices. The Wartortle disappeared for a few seconds then reappeared, clambering up the stacked boxes and hauling his shelled body up beside his friend. Adjusting his necktie, he looked around, confusion in his eyes. His white ears twitched.
“Man... what the hell happened here?”
There seemed to be more to the question than just a simple query. The blue Pokémon was starting to look severely troubled. Vander began slowly, as if his feet were sticking to the floor, to walk around the mess. Swallowing, the Wartortle cast another look around at his desolate surroundings before calling down to whoever was below.
“Naps, come up here. Get Ancha to stay with Reath,” he added as an afterthought, looking back out at the dunes in the distance.
This seriously isn’t what I expected...
Over in what would’ve been, in the past, another room, Vander’s claws and dark eyes were scanning everything rapidly and attentively. He picked up his pace, exploring each nook and cranny thoroughly, and his heart began to pound. He tried to gather the facts in his head, but he was still so groggy. They all were, despite having been awake for several days.
Awake...
Picking up a sheet of paper from the floor and staring at it blankly, the Charmeleon tried to take hold of his own consciousness. They had awoken in those glowing containers... awoken, with nothing in their hearts or minds or souls, and they had moved, and the containers had beeped and then drained of their gooey liquid... and the... the wires... they had pulled the wires and suckers off of their skin, and they had fallen, drunken-like, onto the cold floor of that... that room... the room filled with papers and computers and tape and containers and desks and equipment and nothing, nothing at all-
The paper crackled forlornly as it was screwed up in a clawed fist. His eyes shut, Vander stood, his tail-flame stretching and blowing all around wildly as the grainy breeze battered at it.
“Vander?”
He opened his eyes and looked around, dropping the ball of paper as he did so. The Wartortle was standing there, gazing at him curiously, and next to him was a buzzing insect of black and yellow, with blurred, translucent wings and strong needle-like arms that had been the ones to move the tile. Vander nodded at the Beedrill, Naps, and then looked at the blue turtle.
“Wes...”
“What was that?” Wes asked with a nod at the rumpled ball of paper. The Charmeleon sighed and looked away again, his eyes tracing the horizon.
“Nothing, I... can’t read human.”
Silence again... except for the wind. It was still a monotone sound, soulless, lifeless-
“Where are we going to go?” Naps’ voice quavered a little, through the vibrations caused by his frantic wings. Vander cast his eyes down as he started to think again. Something made him want to stay here, in this wreck of a laboratory, to try to find answers- but were there any here? The place was dead. Dead and sandy. There were no other traces of other Pokémon, or- or just any god damn life at all. There was nothing. Nothing.
His body must have tensed, as Wes approached him and laid a hand on his shoulder.
“C’mon. Let’s get Ancha and Reath and get away from here.”
Fire brewed in the pit of the Charmeleon’s stomach, but then it was gone. He gave a reluctant nod and turned towards the Wartortle; both Pokémon clasped each other’s wrists and gave one hard shake, trying for smiles, before both making their way back to the anxious bug Pokémon.
Beneath the floor, back in the room, a beige Pokémon was calling out positive words whilst loping with ease up the stack of boxes.
“Come on, Reath... don’t let the other boys get ahead of you,” she purred, looking down at him as she lifted herself easily onto the tiled floor. Her body was long and sleek, her ears round, a scarlet jewel in the centre of her forehead. Her slim tail curled itself around her haunches as she sat, waiting for her comrade to emerge. Several seconds passed, and then a groggy Ivysaur appeared, the flower on his back wilted and sad-looking. The Persian smiled at him encouragingly as he tried to haul himself up, looking weak and disorientated.
“That’s it... a little more...”
With a grunt, the emerald dinosaur hauled himself onto the gritty tiles and laid there, his eyes drifting shut. Padding to him, the Persian gave his forehead a swift lick.
“Well done,” she said, nudging his ear, before her own pricked and she looked up at the other three Pokémon walking to her. Vander was tying a pale green rag of cloth around his forehead to keep away the sweat, his eyes on the floor, and Wes was busy trying to catch the eye of the exhausted Ivysaur.
“Reath, man, you okay?”
“Let him be,” Ancha told him softly, giving the fur on her chest a brief lick before properly taking in her surroundings. Vander quickly read the expression in her eyes, and he then started speaking.
“I don’t know where we are,” he began, and his voice was calm and steady, “but I want to find out what this place is. That probably means moving, and there’s nothing here for us anyway.” His eyes followed Wes as the turtle tied a pale blue rag around Reath’s leg, and continued. "Obviously something big happened here. We were... in storage. Either that, or...” His eyes flashed faintly. “... We were created.” He avoided their eyes, not wanting to see their reactions, and tightened the rag around his head. “But I don’t believe that. We have memories, somewhere. We have to find them. And we were stored together, we woke up together, we were put together-” He looked at them, with something like ferocity- “and that means we’ll stick together.”
Wes nodded firmly, and Ancha got to her paws, hiding her nervousness with a lash of her tail. With shaking limbs, Reath began to get to his feet, and both Pokémon helped him up. Vander gave them a half-smile, his eyes dark.
“So I say... we get moving.”
“Yeah, man!” With a grin, Wes stood by the Chameleon’s side. Ancha purred, her eyes suddenly bright with the prospect of exercise.
“Those in favour of electing Vander as leader?” she teased, as Reath gave a grunt of appreciation.
“I walk, I get my head on straight.”
The fire-tailed lizard nodded in approval and looked out across the desert. Grains of sand stung his eyes, but he blinked them away, his stare fixed on the horizon. The others gathered about him, the sun warming their skin and fur, and then together, as one, they stepped into the sand.
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