[GCEA God Complex Event] Fighting Fate (Content/Trigger Warning: Language, Violence, Torture and Suicide)

[[Desolate Divine]]

Notes
-I get that there are things that don't obey rules of time. However due to many different stories having different views of how time flows and works, and how the universe compensates for changes, I don't mind there being a couple of plot holes. Because let's be honest, who can actually figure out what would happen with these events changing?
-Anyone who read my last story involving Sophie would know in a heartbeat that this is nothing like it. The timeline created at the end of this story is the one that is used for the other story with Sophie.
-Kya is the name used by Kyogre in her human form. L is the name used by Latios in his human form. Lewis is the name used by Lugia in his human form. Skye is the name used by Celebi in her human form.


Chapter 1: Retribution

Spoiler:

Eight years ago, myself and the rest of Team Delta Emerald (we added the Delta once Brettles and I joined, seeing as we weren’t original Team Emerald Members) managed to stop the Shadow Crisis and save Hoenn. Miraculously, none of us were killed doing so. We managed to fight off hordes of Shadow Pokemon, take down the Shadow Cult, as well as kill Shadow Deoxys without any of us being killed in action. That’s not to say that we weren’t hurt by it. When I get changed, I see numerous scars across my body that weren’t there before the Shadow Crisis. And those are only the physical ones.

I kept in touch with Lucian, and occasionally Clea and Joseph. However Brettles and I haven’t spoken since. Towards the end of it all, we just couldn’t see eye to eye on how to address the Shadow Crisis, particularly Deoxys. It was too dangerous to leave alive, and had to be killed, but he insisted that we don’t kill it, and find a way to capture and tame it, even though it’d be near impossible and risk thousands more lives to do so. It got to the point where I had a chance to kill it, and Brettles got in the way. I remember when the disagreement first began, I told Brettles I wouldn’t hesitate to cut him down if he got in my way. I made good with that promise. The scar across his back from my sword is evidence of that. Even if we did keep in touch, it doesn’t matter. None of them visit me here. Not many people do.

After the Shadow Crisis, Phoebe and I began dating. Some say it was rushed, but six months later I proposed, with no plan for the future. With the amount of near death experiences I had in the two years prior, we both knew that if we wait for the right time, it might never come. Six months later we were married, and managed to get by. Then a year later the best thing that could have happened to us happened. We had our first child. A little girl. Sophie. Even though we had our difficulties in life, like the rest, it felt like we had achieved our happy ending. I guess that’s where reality stands out from fiction.

Shortly after Sophie turned four, I got the call nobody wants to hear. Phoebe had a late shift at the hospital, and our car had broken down. I had offered to meet her at the hospital and catch the bus back with her, but she said that Sophie needed to get to bed early, and we couldn’t leave her by herself. She insisted that she’d catch the bus home by herself. That was the last I heard from her.

As she waited at the bus stop, two guys decided to drag race down the main street. A Pokemon ran out onto the road, and one of them swerved his car to miss it. He lost traction, causing the car to go sideways, before hitting a pothole, causing it to flip over and roll. The rolling car hit Phoebe, killing her instantly. Going in and identifying the body was the hardest thing I ever had to do.

The two guys who raced that night that Phoebe died were twenty-one and twenty. Came from rich families. Somehow, they got out of it with community service for drag racing. I am certain that the judge was paid off. We were told for sure there would be jail time, the minimum being two years.

I look at the wall opposite my bed as I think about all this. My pondering is suddenly interrupted when I hear the door to my cell open.

“Reed. You have a visitor.” Says one of the prison guards. It is getting towards the end of his shift, and I can tell by the irritated look on his face that he was hoping to sneak out early.

It is nearing 4pm, as I am escorted from my cell to the visiting room near the front of the prison. As the door opens I look around the room. There are tables and chairs bolted to the floor, and guards posted by both exits. There are a few inmates with friends or family visiting, and I look around to find my visitor. After a few seconds, I find her. Laura. I make my way over to the table where she is sitting and sit down. For a few seconds there is silence. Finally my sister speaks up.

“How have you been?” Laura asks nervously.

“Same as I’ve been the last two years.” I respond, “Getting by. I still have a long time left here.”

Laura looked at me solemnly. I can tell she is trying to be positive but struggling.

“The guards treating you okay?” she asks, looking over at the irritated guard who escorted me from my cell.

“Yeah, they’re fine.” I explain, “They know I am here to serve my sentence and leave, and don’t want to cause any trouble. Occasionally someone gets in my face, but I make sure they only do it once. The guards know that if I do hurt someone, it is self-defence. The other inmates leave me alone most of the time.”

Laura sighs at what I say and gives me a cold look.

“What?” I ask, “What do you want from me?”

“All you care about is violence.” Laura says, “Look, I get that things were difficult in the Hoenn Crisis, and that your childhood was a bit messed up with Mum leaving you, and I can’t begin to imagine how you felt after Phoebe died. But how long are you going to keep using them as excuses for hurting people?”

I clench my fist when she mentions Phoebe’s name.

“Laura, you are skating on very thin ice here…” I mutter to her.

“I don’t care how thin the ice is, because you need to understand this. You aren’t the only person in the world who has been hurt. There are probably hundreds, if not thousands who have been through just as much, if not more than you, and they don’t let it turn them into monsters!” Laura says, “I used to look up to you. Now, I try to not let myself remember the things you have done. All you think about is yourself! You being here proves it! Sophie had just lost her Mum, and now she has lost her Dad too!”

“Those b*****ds had it coming!” I say, “And Sophie doesn’t want me as her dad. I mean, she hasn’t had anything to do with me since I came here. She hasn’t come with you to visit me at all.”

“You think she doesn’t love you?” Laura shouts, “She has wanted to visit you for months! Sure, she didn’t want to for the first little while, seeing as I can only imagine how hard and confusing this is for her. But she has been pestering me to bring her here to see you for nearly six months now!”

“Is everything alright?”

We look over and see one of the nicer guards walk over to us cautiously.

“It’s fine.” Laura mutters. He didn’t look convinced, but he went back to his post, keeping a close eye on us.

“Then why haven’t you brought her?” I ask, “If she is so desperate to see me, why haven’t you brought her?”

“Because she thinks you’re a good man who made a bad mistake. She thinks that you know what you did was wrong, and that you have learnt your lesson.” Laura explains in an angry tone, “You really think I should bring her here and let her see that her father is a monster? She is six Jacob! She is meant to see you as some sort of superhero at that age.”

“I have a long time left in this place.” I hiss at Laura, “Do you plan on not bringing her here until she decides to come herself?”

“No.” Laura mutters standing up, “I was hoping you would grow the f*** up after a bit of time in here, and that Sophie could see that her father isn’t a bad man. But I guess I am just being naïve.”

Laura walks out as I am escorted back to my cell. I make my way back to the same place on the bed, thinking about that night a few weeks after the trial for Phoebe’s death, when I dropped Sophie off at Laura’s house.


“Daddy, why are we going to Auntie Laura’s so late?” Sophie yawns from the back seat. The illuminated digital clock face on the dash reads 11:28pm. I put Sophie to sleep a few hours ago, but only half an hour ago made the decision about what I would do tonight.

“There is something I need to do, that you can’t come along for.” I explain as we drive along the freeway. There is no traffic, but I am sitting on the speed limit. Before Phoebe passed away, I’d happily go ten kilometres over at this time of night. Not anymore though.

We arrive at my sister’s house ten minutes later. As Laura takes Sophie to the spare bedroom I stand out the front taking a silent inventory. I had everything I needed. My sword Titan, the butterfly knife I stole from the Team Aqua Admin years ago, and six Pokeballs, all containing Pokemon to help with reaching places. I intentionally didn’t bring any Psychic types. Especially Gwaine. I don’t want them knowing what I am doing.

Laura returns down the stairs, and stands out the front in her dressing gown.

“So what’s going on?” She asks, fighting back a yawn.

“Something’s come up. Lucian found what might be a shadow stone.” I lie, “He is getting the old group together to round up any infected Pokemon before they spread too far.”

Laura looks at me as if she doesn’t completely believe me, however seems to dismiss it.

“When will you pick her up?” Laura asks, “Hopefully I can spend a bit of time with Sophie in the morning.”

“Some time tomorrow morning.” I reply, “Don’t wait up for me.”

“Believe me, I have no intention of it.” Laura replied, “Just don’t go doing anything stupid. You’re a father now, and have a lot more to lose than you did during the Shadow Crisis. I don’t want to be the one to tell Sophie that her dad got himself killed.”

“I’ll be fine.” I say, as I walk to the car. I get in and take a breath. I can feel myself having second thoughts about the whole thing, especially with what Laura said. I put them to the back of my mind and drive.

I arrive later at the multilevel car park, and drive to the top floor. I remember being teenagers; I’d go with Blake to car meets every so often. They were usually in places like this. Well lit so they could show off their pride and joy.

I was right. I see a bunch of cars, and people nearby them. I park the car, leaving Titan and the knife inside. I don’t want to do any permanent damage to these guys. As I jump out of the drivers seat and walk over to the small crowd, one of them shouts out.

“You lost bro?”

“No, I know where I am.” I respond as I walk over, “I’m hoping you can help me.”

I pull out of my pocket a picture of the car that killed Phoebe. There was no conventional way for me to find the people who did it, so I was resorting to this. The car was a red VF Commodore sedan.

“You know who drove this?” I ask.

“Yeah.” One of the guys responds, “What’s it to you?”

“I have some business with him.” I reply coldly, “You know where I could find him?”

“I do.” He stated, “But whether or not I tell you is a whole other story.”

I can’t help but sigh.

“For your sake, I am gonna give you a chance to change that answer.” I say, looking him dead in the eye. There are four other guys with him, so I need to be smart about how I do this.

“Don’t hold your brea-” he starts to say. Before he can finish, I grab him by his right shoulder and spin him around, before knocking him to the ground. As he lay on his chest, I kneel on his knees, and start to pull his arm back slowly. I feel him squirm more the further back I pull it. I see the other guys move towards me.

“Come any closer and he isn’t driving a manual for a long time.” I bark at the others who stop moving towards me.

“Which car is yours?” I ask as I hold his arm behind him.

“The XR8.” He grunts. I look up and see a deep blue 2016 XR8.

“If you don’t want to be borrowing your mums Yaris for a few months, I’d be speaking up whilst you can still change gears.” I say. I start to pull his arm back further again. He screams, before finally yelling something out that wasn’t a general ‘Go f*** yourself’.

“What was that?” I ask, releasing his arm slightly.

“Acacia Street. He lives there with a guy who drives a black Skyline.” He sobs.

I remember seeing the security camera footage from a nearby shop of the drag race that killed Phoebe. That was the other car. Perfect.

I let go of the guys arm, and get up, making my way silently back to my car, before driving off. I punch Acacia Street into the GPS, and follow the directions. It is nearly 1am by the time I arrive. I park down the street and walk until I find a driveway with a black Skyline in it. The window of the front room is still lit up. They’re still awake.

I bash on the door, and a few seconds later, an angry looking man in his early twenties opens the door. I recognise him from the trial. He is the one that killed Phoebe. The moment the door opens, I was blown away by the smell of weed.

Before he has a chance to say anything, I punch him square in the face, and he hits the ground unconscious. I shut the door behind me and walk into the lounge room, where a Playstation is paused, and another man who looked the same age runs at me with a wooden broom. I grab it with my left hand when he swings, causing it to sting and ache, and grab his other arm when he tries punching me, before smashing my head into his forehead, knocking him out also. I check the rest of the house to make sure it is empty, lock the doors and draw all the blinds, before tying both of them to a chair and gagging them. As I looked through the house, I noticed a cheque on the table with a letter. Based on the name, I am pretty sure it was from his father, to cover costs of living. I now believe even more that the judge was paid off. I make my way back to the lounge room where the two mean are unconscious, pull out the butterfly knife, and flicking it open.

“You’re going to pay for what you did to her.” I mutter…


It gets to near midnight when I finally get distracted from reliving that night. I am pulled from this flashback by footsteps walking towards the door of my cell. Light floods in when the door opens, and an official looking man in a suit stands in the doorway.

“Come with me.” He says coldly. I pull myself off the bed, and let him handcuff me, before being escorted to what looks like an interrogation room, before being told to wait there. As I sit in the cold metal chair, I can’t help but remember when I was in court.

I sit in front of a judge with no lawyer next to me. I am alone at this table. On the other side of the courtroom is the prosecutor, explaining the case against me. I am not sure why he is bothering. I am not trying to plead innocent or get out of this. I knew what I was in for the moment I dropped Sophie off at Laura’s.

On the table in front of me is a series of photographs of the men I beat and tortured, one of them even killed. They are both battered and bloody within an inch of their lives. One of them has words cut across his back.

‘This is for Phoebe.”

“Police arrived at the house on Acacia street at roughly four in the morning, where the accused had been torturing his victims for nearly three hours.” The prosecutor explained, “He didn’t resist arrest in any way, and seemed to welcome it. As if he knew what was happening but just didn’t care. The victims were both rushed to hospital, however one of them died due to excessive blood loss.”

I remain silent as I watch the scene unfold. I know what is coming.

“It is obvious that this wasn’t a random attack, but is in fact some sick form of retribution for the death of the accused wife, which the victims were found not guilty of causing.” The prosecutor continues.

He keeps talking, as I zone in and out of concentration, until the judge finally turns to me to make his sentence.

“I understand that losing your wife is difficult, but this monstrous act isn’t justice.” The judge says coldly, “Your daughter just lost her mother, and only has you left. This is the only reason I am not sentencing you to death. I sentence you to fifteen years to life in Hoenn General Penitentiary.”


The door opens, and another man in a suit walks in. I have little doubt in my mind he is some higher up from the government. What he wants with me, I have no idea. He sits down, slamming a folder on the table in front of me.

“You, Jacob Reed, you are unique.” He says, opening the folder and reading out my file.

“Psychologically, you aren’t too f***ed up.” The man says, “Slight anger issues, but other than that, you’re deemed mentally stable, other than the fact you have no remorse for what you did.”

He continues reading.

“People like you, the monsters of the world, don’t tend to act the way you do in prison.” He continues, “It’s as if you only wanted to do that, and are now just waiting until you can get out of here. Most people who pull the sort of s*** you did two years ago, usually come here, picking fights, making weapons and causing riots. You on the other hand, keep to yourself, and tend to even be on good terms with the guards.”

“Then there was your contribution to saving Hoenn eight years ago.” He says, as he closes the folder, “Everyone else may have forgotten what you did. But we didn’t.”

“What do you want?” I ask, “Because as you said, I am happy enough to sit in my cell ‘til I get let out of here.”

“My name is Wayne Smith, and I’m the acting head of the Hoenn Bureau of Intelligence.” Smith explains, “We want to make a deal with you.”

“What kind of deal?” I ask, slightly curious as to what he had to offer.

“You help us find something, and we reduce your sentence. Three years and you’re out of here. You get to see your little girl become a teenager.” Smith says confidently, “We know what you did to save Hoenn and are thankful for that. We also know what you’re capable of.”

“Why me though? There were others who helped save Hoenn that aren’t a criminal you’d be letting back onto the streets?” I explain.

“Because out of the whole group, you will do what needs to be done a lot quicker than anyone else.” Smith says, “We don’t have time to waste thinking about how to do this without breaking a few eggs. This mission is of the utmost importance.”

I think for a few minutes. By the sound of it, this is something that could get me killed. I think back to what Laura said this afternoon about Sophie losing her dad. I could say no, and spend the next thirteen years here. By the time I am eligible for parole, Sophie will be nineteen. I will have missed everything in her childhood. Or I can take the risk now, and be out by the time she is ten. I won’t miss out on all of her childhood.

“I’ll do it.” I say. A smile hits Smith’s face, making me start to doubt whether this is the right thing to do.

“Excellent.” Smith says as he stands up, “Follow me.”

I get up and follow him out the door to the front entrance. Guards approach, however with the flash of a letter and badge, they say nothing, and open the gate. They keep their rifles ready, in case I try to run, however have no need to use them, as we walk to the black four-wheel drive parked out the front.

The car is rushing along a dirt road for nearly an hour when I finally speak up.

“So what do you want me to find?” I ask.

“We will discuss it once we are in a secure location.” Smith says, before pulling out his phone, and swiping at the screen. I glance over and see him playing what I am guessing is Digimon Go. It came out a few months ago, and was on the news about how it was causing people to go outside, catching fictional monsters.

“Looks f***ing stupid.” I can’t help but think.

A few hours later, we arrive at the ‘secure location’. I was expecting a big government facility. Instead it was an abandoned shack in the middle of nowhere. The whole building was surrounded by armed guards. Granted, there wasn’t much to surround. As we get out of the car, Smith pulled the one who seemed in charge aside.

“If anyone tries to interrupt us, shoot them.” Smith says coldly, before leading me into the shack.

“Why here? Why not some big government building?” I ask.

“Because we don’t have time to waste travelling to Slateport for that.” Smith explains, “We have these outposts all over Hoenn. Buildings that are in the middle of nowhere, completely disconnected by phone or internet, and out of range for regular cellular signal. It is harder to bug one of these outposts than a typical office in one of our buildings.”

We walk inside and I can’t help but notice that the interior is like the interrogation rooms I know so well. Cold, grey and well lit. The chairs and tables are bolted to the ground. There is a laptop on the table, positioned so both people can see it.

“Take a seat.” Smith says, gesturing to one of the seats. I make my way and sit down as Smith takes the seat opposite me. As he does, he taps a button on the laptop, causing it to wake up. On the screen appears a picture of the legendary Pokemon Arceus. I recognise it in a heartbeat, hoping I don’t show my recognition

“Do you know what this is?” Smith asks.

“I assume it’s some sort of Legendary Pokemon?” I lie. The less people who know of my involvement with legendary Pokemon the better. I know that L, Skye, Lewis and Kya would all value my secrecy.

“This is Arceus.” Smith explains, “A legendary Pokemon with God-like powers.”

Smith clicks the laptop and the next image pops up. It is a platinum coloured, thin slab of metal. It seems to have a glow to it.

“Years before your group got involved, the Shadow Cult attempted to harness Arceus’ power, and managed to lock it in this plate. However they couldn’t use it. Arceus fled, and locked the plate. Whatever power is in there, they didn’t know how to access it.” Smith explains, “Our inside informant let us know that they had made no progress after years of research, so the project was shelved and other projects were taken up, which is what you guys fought against. During the Shadow Crisis, the plate was lost.”

“So has it resurfaced?” I ask.

“No.” Smith explains, “But it will.”

Smith clicks a button on the laptop causing a video to appear. There is a timestamp at the bottom, reading twelve years in the future. On the screen is the man sitting in front of me, looking significantly older. This isn’t just some doppelgänger who looks a lot like him, but sincerely looks like him in ten years.

“This is not a hoax.” On-screen Smith says. “My name is Wayne Logan Smith, and I am the acting head of the Hoenn Bureau of Investigation. My wife’s name is Mary, now deceased, and my children’s names are Kara and Ethan. Twenty-five years ago, a plate which was the manifested power of Arceus was created by a group known only as the Shadow Cult, in attempt to harness Arceus’ power. Arceus locked the plate before fleeing, and they couldn’t access its power. Eventually the plate was lost, and assumed never to be found.”

An image on the screen appears of the plate, before Smith appears again.
“A month ago, the major governments of the world received a threat by an unknown party regarding this plate. They demanded that the information regarding any Legendary Pokemon, and anyone known to have been affiliated with them be released, otherwise the power of this plate will be used to level cities by the day. We were given fourteen days to comply, so investigated the last known location of the plate, and followed any rumors of its whereabouts with no luck. When the fourteen days were up, and we didn’t comply, Saffron City crumbled. Since then, another seventeen cities have fallen across the world, with no explanation as to why. These events defy the laws of physics and nature, and the only explanation is that the plate is the source of this. Someone has found it, and accessed its power, and now we’re paying the price.”

The clip cuts off, and Smith closes the laptop, before facing me.

“When I had someone approach me claiming to be from the future, I laughed in her face, until she showed me this.” Smith explains, “In my line of work, you don’t let people know those details about yourself. There was no doubt that was myself in the video.”

“So what are you saying?” I ask, “Someone from the future has tipped you off about what happens with this plate, so you want me to track it down, and secure it to stop it from happening?”

“Pretty much.” Smith responds. “We will be sending you out with the person who tipped us off. She seems to know a lot more about this than she is telling us, but we think she will work well with you.”

“What about law enforcement?” I ask, “My trial was a pretty big incident. It was on news a fair bit. What if some do-gooder cop tries to arrest me?”

“They won’t.” Smith says, “We will issue a statement to all law enforcement to leave you alone whilst you do this. As long as it gets this plate, you have free reign to do whatever you need to, within reason.”

I nod at what he says, feeling slightly reassured. I still can’t help but think what would happen if anyone recognized me though.

“You start tomorrow morning. You will meet with our informant at 11am by Rusturf Tunnel.” Smith says before gesturing to a room off to the side, “There are sleeping quarters behind those doors, with a PC. Get some sleep, and don’t be late. She already doesn’t think too highly of you.”

Part of me wants to ask who she is, but the fatigue gets the better of me and I let it go. I make my way to the sleeping quarters, and fall on the bed, falling asleep nearly instantly. Tomorrow will be the first time in two years that I get to walk around as a semi-free man. And I need to be ready for it.

Chapter 2: An Untimely Reunion

Spoiler:

I wake to the sound of a typical digital alarm clock. A beeping that gets progressively louder and harder to ignore. I remember in the short time I lived in Mauville, Laura had one, and when she’d stay at a friend’s house, she’d forget to turn off the alarm. At 7am, it’d go off with her not there to turn it off. I’d end up walking over to her room angrily and unplugging it. I think at one point I even cut the wire. She wasn’t too happy with me for that. I guess I should have gotten used to it. She isn’t too happy with me now…

At the other end of the room, I see some clothes folded, and recognise them as the clothes I wore when I first went to prison. Next to them are a small butterfly knife, my Mega Watch and a sword, with a slight green tinge to it. Titan. These had both been taken as evidence, but obviously Smith was able to pull some strings. I get dressed and fasten Titan to my back, before walking over to the PC and punching in the credentials I haven’t used in over two years. I gave Laura the details so that she could withdraw Pokemon instead of them being stuck in the PC for years. As I look, I have a look at which Pokemon are missing. The only ones I can see are Artemis and Apollo. I can’t help but imagine them playing with Sophie at Laura’s house. They’re probably the best for that. As I get my belongings together, I look out into the main room. The building is empty.

I withdraw Gwaine, Mushu, Skipper, Garde, Chaos and Sparks, and place the Pokeballs on my belt. All but one. I let Gwaine out of his Pokeball. The Gallade materializes and opens his eyes. When he sees me, I am nearly knocked off my feet by him nearly tackling me for a hug.

“You’re a f***ing idiot.” Gwaine says to me telepathically, “Why the f*** did you think it was a good idea to torture those guys? To carve ‘This Is For Phoebe’ into their backs?”

“They paid off the judge. If the justice system wasn’t going to punish them, I was.” I mutter.

“Do you think Phoebe would have wanted this? We all miss her, but what you did was bordering on psychotic.” Gwaine continues, “Sophie had just lost her mum, and you gave up the chance to be her father for a few hours of stupid revenge.”

“How is Sophie?” I ask, “Have you been keeping an eye on her?”

“Sophie is doing well.” Gwaine explains, “As well as she can be without her father. But why are you here? Why aren’t you in prison?”

I feel Gwaine poke around my mind before I can answer. Within seconds he knows.

“You made a deal?” Gwaine asks. If he had eyebrows, I have no doubt they’d be raised.

“Yes. For a reduced sentence. I just have to find-“ I begin.

“The Arceus plate… Gwaine says, however he seems to be holding something back.

“What aren’t you saying?” I ask curiously.

“Do you have any idea how powerful this plate is?” Gwaine asks.

“They told me it was used to level cities.” I explain.

“I get the feeling it can be used for much more than that.” Gwaine explains, “Arceus is a God. And I don’t say that in the same sense that we talk about Kya or L. Arceus is believed to have created the whole universe. I think that anyone with such power could change the past. Stop certain events from happening.”

“You mean it could save Phoebe?” I ask. It seems plausible but I had never thought of that.

“Possibly.” Gwaine explains, “Skye has mentioned that there are certain events that cannot be changed. Too much hinges on them for someone to go back and stop them from happening. This was one of them. The universe just can’t balance out the change. But Arceus may have the power to change it and not cause temporal problems.”

I can’t help but feel a hope that I haven’t felt for years. I spoke to Skye shortly after Phoebe’s death, hoping for her to take me back. I planned on either slashing the tyres of the cars drag racing, or to catch the Pokemon that ran onto the road. Anything that I could do to save her. But Skye told me the same thing. She must have known what I’d do, and how big an impact her death would be. It caused another person to be killed, someone to be crippled, me to be incarcerated and Sophie to grow up without a father. Too much for the universe to bounce back from. But with Arceus’ power, maybe it’s possible…

“We’re running late.” I say, “I have to meet the informant soon. I’m glad to have you back Gwaine.”

“You wouldn’t have lost us in the first place if you had have thought a little more that night.” Gwaine said, “Are you going to visit Sophie while you’re out?”

“No.” I say, slightly pained, “Laura doesn’t want her to see me. She thinks that I might disappoint her at how much of a ‘bad guy’ I am. She still sees me like some sort of superhero, and Laura doesn’t want her to see me until I can live up to that. She hates my attitude towards what I did.”

“What is your attitude towards it?” Gwaine asks.

“They deserved it.” I say, “Nothing less.”

“Then Laura is probably right.” Gwaine says coldly, “You aren’t ready to be her father.”

I feel Gwaine telekinetically push the button on one of the Pokeballs on my belt, causing him to return to it. He was done talking about it. I gather my things and leave the shack. From the outside I could appreciate using this place as a safe-house. Though it didn’t look it, the building is sturdy. The windows are all bulletproof, I assume, and the door is solid. If anybody were to stumble upon this place, and chances are they wouldn’t, they wouldn’t be able to get in and uncover what it really was.

I pull my Pokenav out of my pocket and am surprised to see it has a full battery. They must have charged it before giving me my belongings back. I boot up the map application to find out where exactly I am. I can’t help but chuckle when I see where. Between Rustboro City and Rusturf Tunnel. The last time I was here, it was in a Team Magma Uniform. Looking around, I can start to recognise it. I begin walking east towards the meeting point. After a few minutes, the tunnel entrance is nearby. There area looks pretty empty. I stand by it whilst I wait for the clock to strike 11am. A few minutes after eleven, I see a figure in a pair of jeans and a hoodie approach me. She has her hood up and is hiding most of her face. I can hardly see her eyes behind the hood.

“Come with me.” She mutters irritably, before turning and walking back towards Rustboro City.

“Are you the informant?” I ask, walking to follow her.

“Are you expecting anyone else?” she asks coldly.

“No.”

“Then who the f*** else would I be?”

“What a *****…” I can’t help but think to myself.

We walk in silence until we reach a diner on the edge of Rustboro. We walk in and find a booth in the corner. When we’re finally sitting down, she removes her hood. She looks about eighteen. It takes me a second to recognise her. She has her mothers light brown hair and green eyes. Luckily, all she got from me is my scowl, and unfortunately my temper. Even though she should be twelve years younger, I can tell she is my daughter.

“Sophie…” I whisper. She looks at me in disgust, “You’ve grown up…”

I put my hand forward to touch hers but she pulls it away.

“Don’t touch me.” She mutters, “And don’t pretend like you give a s*** about me. You never cared about me.”

“Of course I care about you!” I start to say, before she interrupts.

“You totally cared about me when you dropped me off at Auntie Laura’s and got yourself thrown in jail. You cared more about fulfilling your bloodlust than being a f***ing father!” Sophie mutters coldly. “You know that Auntie Laura didn’t let me visit you when I was a kid? She’d make sure I was at school when she’d visit. We argued about it constantly, until I skipped school one day to visit you in jail. Then I realized why. You are a sick human being. All you want to do is hurt people. You can go on about how they deserved it, but you really, that was just an excuse to have your temper tantrum.”

I am shocked hearing this. I always thought that Sophie missed me. Hearing all this, it kills me.

“It’s not like that.” I try to say.

“Really? Do you mean to tell me that when you dropped me off at Auntie Laura’s that night, you were intending to come back for me? Because the fact you let yourself get caught so easily, and made it that f***ing obvious what you did kinda says that you were prepared to give me up.”

“Would you like to order?”

I look up and see a waitress approaching. It has taken her a second to realize that she has walked in during a fairly intense moment.

“I’ll get the pancakes.” Sophie mutters.

“I’ll have an omelette please, and an apple juice.”

The waitress walks away, and as soon as she is out of hearing range, Sophie leans in close.

“I had to grow up alone. As amazing as Auntie Laura was, she wasn’t a parent.” Sophie says, “Mothers Day was hard enough, but I thought if you were there it’d be okay, because we’d have each other. But no, I was f***ing alone.”

We sit in silence as I try to take this all in. I don’t regret doing what I did to those guys, but I do regret not being able to spend Sophie’s childhood with her.
Eventually the food arrives.

Sophie eats her pancakes, and I try to eat my omelette, but struggle to find my appetite. I can’t help but smile as I watch her eat her food.

“What?” She asks, sounding annoyed at my presence.

“Ever since you were little you loved pancakes.” I say, “Your mums especially. After she passed away I tried a couple of times to make them, but they came out s***. You lied about it though, and said they were just as good as hers.”

“Don’t think you can fix this with some sentimental talk about Mum.” Sophie says, looking back down at her food. “It’s going to take a whole lot more than that to fix things.”

I remain silent for a second. I know it will take a long time to fix things with her. I guess that if we find this plate, I can get the reduced sentence and try and work things out, or even save Phoebe and stop this from happening.

“So why’re you here? Why you of all people to come back to secure this plate?” I ask.

“You had a Legendary Pokemon helping you during the Hoenn Crisis, didn’t you?” Sophie asks, sounding slightly more civil, “Mine is Skye. Or was. Her and I were trying to track down the plate. But she sent me back alone.”

“That doesn’t sound like Skye to send you back by yourself?” I say, slightly concerned.

“We couldn’t locate Dialga, which meant that unless there was another one of Skye in that timeline, she was our last time traveller.” Sophie explained, “If time and the universe act like we think it should, and chances are it won’t, that timeline will cease to exist if we’re successful and be replaced by a new one. If we fail, it will continue to exist. Skye knows that if everything still exists after I leave, we are going to fail, and she needs to send back more help. But as far as we know, it could go completely opposite to what we expect. Only Dialga and Arceus know these sorts of things.”

“Okay. So where do we begin?” I ask, “What do you know about this plate?”

“It is around somewhere, but it is locked. When it was pulled from Arceus, he used the last of his strength to lock it before fleeing.” Sophie explains, “But I know where the key is. And what it is.”

Sophie looks around to make sure nobody is listening, before continuing.

“Arceus itself is the key.” Sophie says quietly, “When it fled, it fled to a pocket of space outside of existence. Without that plate, it is too weak to defend itself, so it is dormant there until someone can find the plate and summon it.”

“Wait, are you saying we don’t give it to-“

“The government? No.” Sophie says, “The safest hands for that sort of power are Arceus’. We find the plate, and summon Arceus to give it back its power.”

Part of me recoils hearing this. I planned on trying to use the plate to save Phoebe. And if I couldn’t do that, at least give it to the government and get a reduced sentence. I consider speaking up, but decide against it. Sophie hates me, and now isn’t the right time to try and argue with her about what to do with it.

“So how do we summon Arceus once we get the plate?” I ask Sophie who seems to have all the answers. I am surprised seeing her like this. The last time I saw her, she was a teary four year old, who wouldn’t let me go when they took me away in handcuffs. Now she is an adult, who is taking charge of this mission. I can’t help but grin slightly.

“What are you smiling at?” Sophie asks, sounding annoyed again.

“I’m just feeling a little proud of you.” I reply with a slight laugh.

“You don’t get to feel proud. You gave up that right when you dropped me off with your sister.”

I recoil a bit hearing that. I had better get used to it. There is much more coming.

“Anyway, to summon Arceus, we need to play the Azure Flute.” Sophie says, “Playing the song will summon Arceus who will unlock the plate.”

“Sounds easy enough.” I say half-heartedly. Now instead of tracking down a mystical metal slab, we have to track down a mythical flute as well. If I don’t turn over the plate to the government as soon as I get it, they will turn on me. I practically am giving up our deal and any chance of getting out of my sentence early.

“Do you know where we should start?” I ask, as I gesture at the waitress for the bill.

“The shadow cult had an old base beneath Petalburg Woods. Years before you travelled.” Sophie says, “We start there.”

As the bill was dropped off, I got out my wallet and pulled out $50. I look over as Sophie starts rummaging through her backpack for money.

“Don’t. I’ve got this.” I say, “It’s the least I could do.”

“You’re right, it is the least.” Sophie says coldly, “Don’t think you can try and buy back nearly fifteen years of abandonment with breakfast.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.” I mutter. I get up; not bothering to wait to get change from breakfast, figuring the waitress would just get a nice tip. There are more important things to worry about than money right now. Sophie follows me, as we leave the diner.

As we walk the streets of Rustboro, I pull my hood up. This is where the court cases for Phoebe’s death and my murder and torture were, and I wouldn’t be too surprised if someone recognised me from the news. Smith said that law enforcement was told to leave me alone, but I wasn’t too convinced. Nearly an hour later, we were on the other side of the city, walking south along Route 104. The whole trip was made in silence. It was going to be a long trip. Finally I decided I had to break the silence and address the Donphan in the room.

“Look, if you hate me so much, and are so angry with me, and I understand why you do, why did you get the HBI to pull me out of prison?” I ask, “Why not tag along with Lucian or Brettles?”

“If you understood right now why I hate you, then Auntie Laura would have let me see you in prison by now. You don’t understand, even in my time. Even in twelve years, you’re a self centred, sadistic a**hole.” Sophie lashed out, “And I didn’t ask for you. They saw my name, and suggested you help me, and refused to take no for an answer. Said something about you being able to do what needs to be done. Being here with you is not what I had in mind.”

Eventually we reach the woods. I hadn’t been through here in a long time. Not since the five-month gap before joining Team Emerald. It’s easy to forget how big this place is.

“So how do we find this place?” I ask, “There’d be some sort of hidden entrance, but if we are looking under every tree stump, we will be here for weeks.”

“You spent the last two years in prison, you can deal with this being a little time consuming.” Sophie mutters.

Honestly, her attitude is starting to get on my nerves. I know I deserve it, but she has to let up eventually.

“Sophie, how long is this going to last?” I ask, slightly irritably.

“Funny you ask that. I asked the same thing for the last fifteen years.”

“Seriously, this is going to be a long mission at this rate, and I am trying to make things work.”

“It’s a little too late for trying Dad.” Sophie hisses at me, “Honestly, Gwaine was a better father figure than you!”

Wait a minute. That’s it. Gwaine.

“Sophie, you’re a genius, and you sure as hell didn’t get that from me.” I say, before tapping the button on Gwaine’s pokeball. The Gallade materializes, looking around. As he sees me, he gives his usual nod. Then he turned around and is almost tackled by Sophie giving him a hug. Gwaine is still for a second trying to take it in.

“That’s Sophie, isn’t it? Gwaine asks me telepathically.

”Skye brought her here. She was the one who tipped us off about the plate. I think back to Gwaine.

“Okay, as much as I have missed Gwaine, and am glad to see him, why did you let him out?” Sophie asks, “How can he help us?”

I feel slightly shocked at that question. She really did miss a lot. I always knew that but it is hitting home a bit harder now.

“Laura never told you what sets Gwaine apart?” I ask, “Why he is gold?”

“She mentioned he is a Light type, but with the Shadow Crisis over, how does that help?” Sophie asks.

“As well as being a light type, he has the ability to detect certain energies. Kind of like auras. Shadow energy being one and the energy of a Legendary Pokemon being another.” I explain, “If the plate is here, Gwaine might be able to sense it.”

“Gwaine, you’re incredible.” Sophie says, giving him another hug.

I can’t help but feel a tiny bit jealous that Sophie loves my Pokemon, my partner, more than me. I know that he deserves it more, but it still gets to me. I try and hide it from Gwaine, but I am too slow. He gives me an awkward look.

“Sorry Jacob. I guess she became attached when I started babysitting her when Laura had to go out.” Gwaine says telepathically.

“It’s fine. I’m glad you looked out for her all these years.” I think back.

We walk along the trail from the northern to the southern end of the forest, with Gwaine looking for the silver aura that is the presence of a Legendary Pokemon. We are relying on the plate giving off this same energy field, but if it doesn’t we have no choice but to search the place the old fashioned way. An hour later we reach the end of the trail, with no luck. After that we strayed from the trail by about a hundred meters looking around. I can’t imagine a hidden entrance being close enough to the trail that it would be accidentally found, but I can’t imagine it being too deep into the woods either. After a few more hours in the mid afternoon, we finally found something. Well, Gwaine did.

We were about four hundred meters from the main path, by the southern entrance to the trail. Gwaine was with Sophie, who called me over. As I found them, Gwaine was looking at the ground beneath us.

“Did you find what we were looking for?” I ask.

“No, but something that could get us closer.” Sophie says, “Gwaine can see a slight tinge of shadow energy beneath us. Not enough to infect us if we don’t stick around for too long. We should be fine for a few hours.”

“Gwaine and I should be.” I say, “You’re waiting here.”

“Bulls*** I’m waiting here!” Sophie yells at me.

“Gwaine is immune to shadow energy, and I have been around enough of it that I have developed a tolerance to it.” I say, “You haven’t. There is no way I’m letting you come down there.”

“You gave up your right to make those decisions about me when you dropped me off at Laura’s!” Sophie shouts, “This is my mission, that you’re tagging along for. Not the other way around. I’m going in there whether you like it or not! We won’t be in there long enough for it to affect me! Gwaine was barely able to see it!”

“What about if there’re Pokemon down there who have been infected by it for years? What if they attack you?!” I say, “Shadow Pokemon haven’t got a soul. They have no sense of right and wrong, all they know is violence and killing!”

“Then you’d fit right in!” Sophie shouts back.

“Will both of you cut the s*** already?!” Gwaine shouts telepathically, “Jacob, Skye wouldn’t have sent Sophie back here if she couldn’t take care of herself. Sophie, Jacob is trying to think of you in all this.”

“It only took him fourteen years and the end of the world…” Sophie mutters before storming off.

“Is this what I have to look forward to when she becomes a teenager?” I mutter.

“She’s your daughter, what did you expect?” Gwaine replies, “Besides, you brought this on yourself. Did you really think you’d get let out of prison in the end and she’d love you like she did when you left?”

“I didn’t think about it much.” I admit.

“No s***.” Gwaine says, before starting to walk towards where Sophie stormed off, ”The shadow energy gets thicker this way.”

I follow Gwaine and his vision through the woods, eventually finding Sophie who silently joined us. Eventually Gwaine found somewhere on the surface with the thickest cloud of shadow energy.

”The entrance is around here.” Gwaine says, “If you guys can take care of yourselves down there, do you mind if I rest? I haven’t used my vision that much in a while, and I’m not as young as I used to be.”

“We’ll be fine.” I say, as I press the button on his Pokeball, causing him to disappear. There are a few moments of awkward silence before finally spoke.

“There will be a latch or something to reveal the entrance.” Sophie says, starting to look around. I join her, looking around the direct area thoroughly. As the time passes it hit me that Sophie is my daughter, but I know next to nothing about her.

“Other than the Donphan in the room, that has been pointed out a million and a half times, what was your childhood like?” I ask Sophie, as I looked around for the hidden switch. Sophie is silent for a second, before she speaks.

“It was okay… I guess. Auntie Laura did her best considering the position she was in. Not everyone thinks they will be bringing up someone else’s kid when they’re twenty-one. Grandma and Noah offered, but Auntie Laura wanted to.” Sophie replies slowly, as if hesitating to say too much, “I got my first Pokemon when I was ten. A Cyndaquil, that I called Wolverine. I’d practise training against Auntie Laura and occasionally your Pokemon. They knew how to battle without being directed, so it made it easier to get experience.”

I’m glad to hear that Sophie had inherited my knack for battling. That’s one thing I was able to give her.

“Yeah, between travels, I taught them strategies for if I am not there, or don’t direct them, so they can fight on their own.” I explain, “It has saved my a** a few times.”

“Anyway, when I was sixteen, I travelled to do the gym challenge. I’m surprised Auntie Laura let me. But then again, she was out helping you guys when she was fifteen.”

“Yeah, your grandma would have killed me if she knew what Laura had gotten involved in.” I chuckle, “That was probably the scariest part of coming home once it was over. Facing her.”

As I say this I look in a small hole in a tree, then turn on the torch on my Pokenav to look in it. Inside is a small switch. I flick it, causing the ground nearby to shift. It slides to the side, revealing a staircase going deep beneath the forest floor. Keeping the torch on my Pokenav on in my left hand, I draw Titan with my right.

“I really would prefer it if you waited here.” I say to Sophie, “I have no idea what is down there.”

“And I really would prefer it if you’d stop treating me like a kid.” Sophie responds, “I can handle it. I trained against your Pokemon after all.”

I sigh as I walk down the steps, Sophie close behind me. I make sure to stay in front. When we reach the bottom of the steps, we find ourselves in a series of caves.

“This place could be like a labyrinth.” I mutter to Sophie, “Stay close to me, and write down which way we go. That way we can backtrack if we get lost.”

Sophie nods, remaining silent, getting out her Pokenav, which looks significantly newer than mine. Granted, hers is probably twenty years newer.

As we walk along, there is mostly silence except for the echoes of our footsteps on the cave floor. Luckily for us, it is fairly straight, leading straight to a solid metal door. This must be the entrance to the base. On the other side I hear high-pitched noises. Zubat and probably Golbat.

“You hear it too?” Sophie asks. I nod.

“Nobody has been down here for years, which means that these Pokemon are infected beyond purification. There is nothing left.” I explain, “You know what that means? I’m not going to be killing them out of some psychotic rage.”

“I know.” Sophie says, “Just remember that.”

I open the door, hoping for it to be silent, but am not too shocked when it makes a loud creak. We walk in slowly, and look around. On the ground I can see tiny skeletons of what I can only assume to be Zubat. They must have lived here, but killed and eaten each other when food ran out. But if nobody had been down here in years, how many Zubat were originally in this cave?

The base seems to be made of a main hallway that branches into different rooms. It seems pretty contained. I am about to call Gwaine out, when I notice the Pokémon noises getting closer.

“Get behind me.” I mutter to Sophie. She goes to grab a Pokeball, but I stop her. “Don’t risk getting them infected down here. I will deal with it.”

Within seconds, two Zubat and a Golbat come flying towards me. I cut down the two Zubat with two quick motions, however am knocked back by the Golbat. It is huge, as if the shadow exposure has mutated it and caused it to grow. Before it can strike again, I slash across, cutting off one of its wings, causing it to hit the ground, and fly in circles trying to fly with one wing, before spinning Titan, and stabbing it where I assume its brain is.

“Are you alright?” I ask Sophie as I turn around. She seems to be looking at me with a hint of fear, but trying to hide it. I remember that these are the weapons I used to torture the guys who killed her mother. No wonder she seems uneasy.

“It had to be done.” I say, “There was no way for them to be saved, and if they got out, and infected others, we’d have a whole other nightmare to deal with.”

“I get it.” Sophie mutters, “It’s just strange seeing you do that. It’s something I always tried to not think about. You… killing…”

There aren’t any more Pokemon noises, so we split up and look in the rooms nearby. I look in the bunkhouse and the mess hall, whilst Sophie looks in the lab and what we think might be a shrine. I was halfway through the mess hall when Sophie calls me over to the lab.

I go to the lab, and find her looking at a filing cabinet, looking at a bunch of folders, all with a red stamp on them.

Suspended

“These are all projects they shelved.” Sophie explains, “They must have decided that these weren’t the highest priority to move, and never got around to taking them to the new base.”

“Any of them stand out?” I ask.

“One.” Sophie replies, pulling out a folder, “Project Alpha.”

Inside the folder are a bunch of papers, surprisingly well preserved considering how long they’ve been there. They are all dated back roughly ten years.

“Did you find anything?” Sophie asks as I read through the files.

“Nothing. I don’t think it’s here. But this could be something.” I say, tapping at the signature at the bottom of the page I was reading. It is on most of them, which I can only assume means that this was the project supervisor.

Dr. Attano

“Let’s find somewhere to stay tonight that isn’t a Pokemon Centre, and do some research into Dr. Attano while we’re there.” I say, closing the folder.

“I have somewhere we can stay.” Sophie replies, “Let’s get out of here.”

Chapter 3: Music

Spoiler:

I was taken by surprise when Sophie levered open the back window of a beach-house in Route 115. She climbed in, and soon after unlocked the door.

“So how did you know about this place again?” I ask as I close the door behind me, and begin shutting the blinds.

“It’s my friends families holiday house.” Sophie replies, “They only ever come here during the summer. They brought me along when I was fifteen, and there was no alarm or anything then. Figured that there wouldn’t be one in the past either.”

I look around the house. The decorations and furniture seem old, and it has a smell of dust to it. Under normal circumstances, I’d open the windows to let a bit of airflow through, but we don’t want anyone walking by and seeing anything out of the ordinary. The closest neighbours are far enough away that they can’t hear us, as is the path to the beach, but I don’t want to take any chances.

On our way here, Sophie went to the supermarket and got us some supplies to last us a few days. As she puts the bags on the bench, I grab what I had asked her specifically to get. Energy drinks.

“I have missed these things.” I mutter to myself.

“You know it’s all sugar and caffeine right?” Sophie interjects, “A glorified way to p*** more, and die sooner?”

“You’re definitely Phoebe’s daughter.” I say trying to get her to lighten up to me a little more. Instead she shakes her head and walks to the lounge room. I decide to leave it, and grab the folder we brought from the abandoned base. I sit at the kitchen table, and begin looking through that under candlelight, as to not give away that the house is being lived in at the moment.

The files themselves don’t provide too much information. All they seem to reveal is the different ways they tried to unlock the plate, all of which failed. When I finish the file, I open the web browser on my Pokenav, and Googled Dr Attano.

It took a little bit of digging, but I eventually find what I am after. Dr Attano was a physicist from Devon, who about fifteen years ago, quit unexpectedly and seemed to disappear off the scientific grid for seven or so years, before retiring shortly after the end of the Shadow Crisis. She must have survived it, and decided to cut her losses. Upon further research I managed to track her to Fallarbor Town.

As I read, I hear soft music coming from the living room. I close the file and walk out there to see what it was. I had my suspicions, and they were proven correct when I see Sophie playing softly on the old upright piano.

“I’m glad to see that you learnt music.” I say. She hadn’t heard me walk in and jumps slightly when I say it. “I remember when you were little, you’d always play the piano at home, but your mum didn’t want me teaching you until you were a little older. She thought I’d get too into it and turn you off learning.”

Sophie lets out a slight chuckle, before realizing, that she has shown some emotion other than disgust, before composing herself.

“I do remember watching you play, before you… Before you went away.” Sophie says, staring blankly at the piano. It isn’t tuned to concert pitch, but is tuned to itself, so it still sounds nice. “Auntie Laura ended up organising lessons for me when I was nine. She knew that I wanted to learn, but I refused to let her find me a teacher. I kept telling her that you would come home soon and teach me. Eventually she just found one anyway, and I learnt from him.”

There are a few moments of silence. Then Sophie speaks.

“Could you please play something?” she asks, “It’s been nearly fifteen years since I have heard you play.”


She stands up from the piano stool, and I walk over sitting down.

“I haven’t touched a piano in over two years, and even then, I was always a guitarist primarily, so I might be a little rusty.” I say, cracking my knuckles.

“I don’t care. I just want to hear it.” Sophie replies softly.

I play through a scale or two to warm up and make sure I still had the muscle memory before launching into a song. I’m surprised at how quickly it all comes back to me after so long. When I finally finish, I can’t help but shed a tear.

“What was that?” Sophie asked.

“That was the song that was played during the first dance at your mother and I’s wedding.” I say quietly, “I don’t know how she managed to talk me into doing all the dancing and s***. I guess she just had that effect on me…”

“I’m sorry…” Sophie whispers, “I shouldn’t have asked.”

“No, don’t be.” I say, “I’m glad that you did, and we can talk about it. I just miss her so much...”

I can’t help but weep. Tears fall on the piano keys, and I feel Sophie sit next to me, and put her arm over my shoulder. We sit in silence for a few minutes before Sophie finally speaks.

“Why did you do it?” She asks, “Why did you do what you did to those guys?”

“I couldn’t bear for her to just be swept under the rug. Those guys paid off the judge, and got away with it. I couldn’t bear for her to have been killed by them and they have nothing to show for it.” I say quietly, “For them to kill her and get away with it, it felt like everyone was saying that she wasn’t worth punishing them for. That you losing your mother and me losing my wife meant nothing to them.”

There are a few minutes more of silence before I finally bring myself to speak again.

“I’m so sorry for abandoning you for that.” I say, trying to wipe away the tears, “It was selfish and f***ed up of me to make that a priority over you. I know this doesn’t bring back the last fifteen years, but it’s the best I can do.”

I feel Sophie tense up for a second. She stands up and looks at me.

“No, you can’t do that.” Sophie says, starting to tear up, “You can’t just tell me everything that you did was for her, then apologize for ruining my life, and make me feel bad for hating you!”

“Sophie, I’m not trying to guilt trip you!” I say, slightly shocked at what I am hearing.

“Bulls***!” Sophie says, “If this isn’t meant to be a guilt trip, then why the f*** do I actually feel bad for what you did to me?”

“You shouldn’t feel bad for what I did!” I exclaim, “I was the adult that made the stupid decision, not you.”

“You can’t just do this to me! Apologize and force me into the corner where our relationship still being f***ed is on me instead of you!” Sophie yells, “I’m not ready to forgive you, and putting me in a position where I feel like I have to is not making it any easier!”

Before I have a chance to say anything, Sophie storms away, walking into one of the bedrooms and slamming the door behind her. Suddenly I’m alone again. I have been alone and used to it for two years, yet after only a day of being with Sophie, I am already accustomed to it.

When I decided she isn’t coming back out, I get up, and walk into the kitchen, and start reading through those files again, and doing more research on Dr. Attano. She lives in Fallarbor Town, but that wasn’t going to be enough for me to track her down. I needed more than that. An address. After a few minutes of Googling, I manage to find a LinkedIn account, which has an email address on it, and from there, I am able to track down a Facebook account.

Luckily, like most people her age, Dr. Attano doesn’t seem to know how to use Facebook properly, and hasn’t set her profile to be as private as it could be. Though I can’t see details about her , the photos she is tagged in are visible from her profile.

Scrolling through the photos of the fairly pretty middle aged woman, I am searching for anything that could give us any sort of location. Finally, I find something. A group of photos that look like they were taken on the same night. There are a few photos of her with a group of people, that look like some sort of club, then another of her next to a painting. From what I gather, it was an Art Class she attended.

The picture is a few months, old but it is the best lead we have. I click onto the page that posted it.

Fallarbor Community Center

After looking at the Facebook page for a few minutes, I find what I am after. A schedule of all the programs they run.

Wednesday Night Art Classes: 7-9pm

Tomorrow was Wednesday. We have to get to Fallarbor Community Center before the class to identify Dr. Attano, and find out which car is hers, and then follow her home.

I look at the clock in the kitchen, and realize that it is nearing 11pm. I spent a lot longer stalking this woman than I intended to. I feel a wave of fatigue, caused by a mixture of the energy drink I had earlier wearing off, and a slight dose of placebo effect, and decide to call it a night.

Before crashing on one of the couches, I stick my head in each of the rooms, trying to find Sophie, and if she is still up, apologize. I finally find her, asleep in one of the bedrooms. I decide to let her sleep. It’s going to take a lot more than me waking her up to apologize to make things right, and if she is anything like me, waking her up will probably do more harm than good.

I find a blanket in one of the cupboards, and pick a couch to sleep on. Though it isn’t the nicest, it is nicer than the prison bed I have slept in for the last two years. It isn’t long before I fall asleep.

The alarm I set for 8am goes off waking me up. I get out of ‘bed’ and fold up the blanket, putting it away, before making my way to the kitchen, where Sophie is eating breakfast and reading through the files.

“I know how to find her.” I say as I sit at the table, pulling a bag of Pop Tarts out of the bag of supplies in front of us.

“You know how much sugar is in those things?” Sophie asks, slightly unnerved by the overly sweet smell of Pop Tarts.

“If you could see the food I ate in prison, you’d understand why I am not too fussed about counting calories and my sugar intake.” I say, “Don’t you even want to know how I figured out where to find her?”

“Okay, enlighten me.” Sophie says, leaning back on her chair.

“I managed to find her Facebook page. Even though it was mostly private, I managed to find a couple of photos on her Facebook from an art class she takes.” I explain, “We go there before it is due to start, and wait for her to arrive so we can figure out which car is hers. Then we wait for it to finish and follow her home from air. Or even better, strap my Pokenav to the bottom and use the ‘Find My Pokenav’ app to track it, and get pizza or something while we wait. I mean it’s not like anybody will be calling it.”

Sophie seems slightly impressed, but as if she is trying to hide it.

“Come on…” I say, “You can admit it that I did well…”

I grin at her, hoping to get her to break and at least smile. It doesn’t work.

“So when is this art class?” she asks, before looking back at the files she is reading.

“Tonight. 7-9pm.” I say, as I take a bite from the Pop Tart, and open another can of energy drink.

Sophie looks up from the files for a second.

“And what if we miss it? You know that Fallarbor Town is about a days walk from here?” She asks, “We should really get moving.”

“Then we either wait another week for the next class, or try and find another place she attends and do the same thing. But I really don’t want to wait that long.” I explain, “If I am double crossing the HBI, I’d rather keep them off my trail and not stay in the same place too long. They’re probably watching me from a distance.”

Sophie finishes her breakfast, and heads back to the room to gather her things. A few minutes later, we’re out the door and heading north. Sophie suggests flying there, but I talk her out of it. We won’t be able to walk the whole way. There is a part of the journey that either needs to be via air or water, and I don’t fancy swimming there. Best bet was to save our Pokemon’s strength for when we actually need it instead of wearing them out at the start. She didn’t want to outright agree with me, but I know she could see my point. We walk the first few hours in silence, arriving at the waters edge at roughly noon.

There, I call out Mushu, and Sophie calls out one of her Pokemon. Togekiss. Part of me was curious to see what other Pokemon she has. She mentioned having a Cyndaquil, and chances are it’d be a Typhlosion by now. That means she could have up to four more with her, and Arceus-knows how many back in her time.

My Charizard was naturally the faster flyer, so every so often, he’d slip ahead of Sophie and her Pokemon, before I’d pull him back to slow down and let her catch up. She however refused to acknowledge it. She was still p***ed from last night. As much as I want to, I know that very little I can do will make things better. The damage has been done.

It takes nearly two hours of straight flying before the other side of Route 115, and the trail up to Meteor Falls is in sight. Half an hour later, we land, and call our Pokemon back, before making our way up the trail to the cave entrance.

The last time I had been in here, it had been in secret, shortly after meeting Rain and Clea, watching a Team Magma gathering. It seems different under these circumstances. Though it is large, there is a clear path, which is well lit that goes through the main cavern that seems to go on forever. Though there are passages off to the side, the path is still clear-cut, making it hard to get lost. After a few minutes, we can hear the sound of running water.

“I’ve been through here before.” I say to Sophie, trying to break the awkward silence, “Except when I was here, it was a stealth mission.”

Sophie remains silent, the only noise being the running water and our footsteps echoing throughout the cavern. I continue talking anyway.

“We were hiding in the shadows, watching Team Magma have a meeting.” I continue, “Then we saved one of their hostages. It was right before I got this.”

I pull up my sleeve, revealing the tattoo on my forearm.

It’s Not Real.

Sophie’s eyes widen slightly when she sees it.

“I forgot you had that.” Sophie says, “After you went away, I had a look at all the photos that Auntie Laura had of you and Mum when you were younger. I asked her about it and what it meant, but she didn’t tell me. Said it wasn’t her place.”

I’m slightly surprised that at this age, Sophie doesn’t know much about what we went through.

“It was what I got to protect me from my own mind.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Sophie asks, “You felt guilty for things you did, so you forced yourself to believe it wasn’t real.”

“No, nothing like that.” I say, “I became… Sort of infected, sort of possessed. It caused me to see things. I got this to keep myself calm and stop myself from going insane.”

Sophie stays quiet. I can half imagine what she is thinking. I went through the same thing with my mother. Even now, things are still rocky. She left me when I was three, and I didn’t see her again until I was nineteen. Nearly the same as Sophie and I. I remember when I first moved in, I didn’t want anything to do with her. I was only there because I needed her, and I wanted to meet the rest of my family. I’d make snide remarks, and when I actually was interested in what she had to say, I’d never show it, but try and get her to say more.

“What did you see?” Sophie asks.

“A Legendary Pokemon. Deoxys.” I reply, “But it was a Shadow Pokemon. I’d see it, and it’d twist my reality. I’d see it kill people I cared about, and be helpless to stop it. Then the hallucination would stop and I’d realise it wasn’t real. Until I got this. The hallucinations kept happening but I was able to keep a level head.”

“That sounds… Horrible.” Sophie mutters, “But why you? And did they ever stop?”

“There were five stones that made up Deoxys. Though it wasn’t incarnate, it existed through these stones, and infected the minds of the five people who touched them. Auntie Laura was another one. They also caused us to see glimpses of the future, where we were killed. And once they were brought together, it manifested Deoxys. Even when we had three together, it came into existence for a short period of time and destroyed a few buildings in Mossdeep. In the ten or twenty minutes it existed there, it killed 2500 people.” I explain, “Then a little while later, all five were brought together. Deoxys manifested and caused chaos, until I killed it.”

“You killed it?” Sophie asks, slightly surprised. I am not sure why. She saw me kill those Pokemon in the cave, and knows what I did to end up in prison, “Was there no way you could stop it and let it live?”

“Maybe there was.” I reply, “But there was no certainty. We knew that it couldn’t hurt anyone else if it was dead, and in the time it’d take us to find a way to stop it without killing it, hundreds, if not thousands more had have died. Legendary Pokemon, as well as other trainers I spoke to agreed with me about killing it. Brettles didn’t though. He was convinced we should find another way, even if it meant risking more lives. To the point where he tried to stop me from killing it when I had the chance.”

“What did you do?”

I pull Titan out of its sheath.

“What I warned him I’d do. I cut him down.” I say, looking at the blade, which I am still struggling to believe used to be Lugia’s golf clubs.

“You killed him?” Sophie asks, horrified, “I thought he was your friend?”

“By that point, he wasn’t my friend, but no, I didn’t kill him.” I say, “I slashed his back, which gave me enough time to get past him and kill Deoxys. He didn’t think I’d do it. And even if he wasn’t my friend then, I didn’t want to. But it was for the greater good.”

We reach the end of the tunnel, stepping out into daylight. Fallarbor Town is on the horizon. Between us and there, are large stretches of farmland. It was mid- afternoon, taking us about an hour to get through the tunnel. We kept walking, as Sophie kept silent, but still seeming like she wanted to talk.

“You seem… used to, well, killing.” Sophie explains, “How many people have you killed?”

I can’t help but sigh. I want to fix my relationship with my daughter, but this topic of all the evil things I have done isn’t helping.

“Do you really want to know?” I ask, “I will tell you, but it isn’t something I am necessarily proud of…”

“I do.” Sophie say, “As much as I struggle to believe it, seeing as you weren’t around, you are my dad, and deep down, part of me wants to make things right, even if consciously I can’t bring myself to. I guess I just want to know more.”

“The first time I had blood on my hands was accidental. It was in Rustboro City.” I explain, “It was the start of our journey, and Team Magma set loose a Legendary Pokemon which was killing people. I had my Combusken ignite the fuel tank of a flipped car to slow it down.”

“Did it kill someone?”

“Not directly. Someone was caught in the blast and got a few burns. But it just p***ed the Pokemon off.” I say, “It irritated the Pokemon, causing it to open the ground and swallow a building full of people.”

“That’s hardly your fault!” Sophie says, surprisingly enthusiastically, “You were trying to stop it.”

“People in my team didn’t think that way. And I don’t particularly blame them.” I say, “My actions directly resulted in them people dying. If I hadn’t rigged the car to explode, those people might have gotten home to their families at some point.”

“Still…” Sophie mutters.

“Then there was Courtney, the Magma Admin.” I say, “Auntie Laura’s Espeon was stolen by Magma thugs, and it ended up being Courtney’s pet. They had taken over the weather institute near Fortree City, and our team laid siege to it, and recaptured it.”

I pause for a second with regard to what happened next. Sophie already knows that I was a monster. I don’t want her thinking the same of Laura.

“I tortured Courtney until she was unconscious, then left her. When she was out, she vomited, and choked.” I say coldly, “This group were all drug addicts, so her body was f***ed beyond repair. I’m surprised it didn’t happen sooner.”

Sophie gives me a funny look, as if she can tell I am lying, but decides not to pursue it.

“Then there was Craw. Some assassin type guy.” I start, before realizing how tedious the multiverse explanation is, and deciding to leave parts out to make it simpler, “Basically, he tried to kill me as a kid, because of what I’d do as an adult. Skye took me back there, and I fought him. That’s where I got this.”

I point to the scar across my face.

“He had gone to my school, and killed a little girl, demanding to know where I was.” I say, “I stuck my knife through the b******s eye, before killing the Legendary Pokemon he brought with him.”

“S***…” Sophie whispers.

“During the end of the Shadow Crisis, there were a bunch of cult members I cut down. I didn’t bother to count. It was either kill, or be killed and have the world overrun by shadow infected Pokemon.” I explain, “Then there was Deoxys, and the guy who killed Phoebe.”

“Do you think about them?” Sophie asks quietly, “The people you killed?”

I remain silent for a moment.

“No.”

I see something move in Sophie. I don’t think she was expecting that.

“What do you mean, no?” Sophie exclaims, sounding annoyed, “You end their lives, then forget about them? Even if they didn’t deserve it?”

I am unsure of how to answer this.

“I’m in a position where I can’t afford to be unable to live with myself,” I say, somewhat coldly, “During the Shadow Crisis, when Deoxys was killing everyone, I wasn’t able to sit down and cry about the horrible things that I had done. Hoenn needed me to be willing to put my s*** behind me and focus on what was happening in the here and now. Even now, they asked me instead of someone else, because they know what I am capable of and that they need me. People depend on me to be in the right state of mind to get the job done whatever it is.”

I pause for a second.

“And chances are, when I end up back in prison after we give the plate to Arceus instead of the government, they will do this again. I don’t have the luxury of being able to think about all the bad s*** I have done, and try and figure out how to live with myself. All I can do is try not to think about it, and focus on what I need to do right here and now.”

Well that conversation backfired. Now my daughter probably thinks even worse of me.

“Sorry for asking you to talk about it.” Sophie says softly, “You’re right. If I were in that position, I’d probably do the same thing.”

Maybe it didn’t…

Chapter 4: Dreams

Spoiler:

The last kilometre of the trip to Fallarbor, we jogged. We really didn’t fancy missing this opportunity to find Dr. Attano, and having to potentially wait a week for the next one. We arrived in the Community Center Carpark at about 6:15pm, as the first few cars were starting to arrive. They were probably the people running the art class. We found a bench in the park nearby with a good view of the carpark. We needed to be out of sight, but also not suspicious if someone saw us.

I get my Pokenav out and open the doctor’s Facebook profile, showing Sophie.

“This is her.” I say quietly, showing her the picture.

“You mean her?”

Sophie gestures subtly in the direction of a middle aged woman getting out of an average looking car carrying a bag presumably with art supplies.

“Well I’ll be f***ed…” I mutter to myself. That couldn’t have been easier, “Wait here.”

I get off the bench, and sneak over to the parked car, trying to stay out of sight of any cars driving in. I find my way to the car, and crawl underneath it, making my way to the engine bay. I pull the Pokenav out of my pocket, and put it on silent before wedging it in somewhere where it won’t get too hot, but won’t fall out, before crawling out, and making my way back to where Sophie was sitting.

“Open up ‘Find My Pokenav’” I say to her. She pulls out her own and opens the app. I type in my credentials, and sure enough on the screen appears my own Nav, in the car park of the Community Centre.

“Done.” Sophie says, looking at the car. “Now we just need to wait for her to get home.”

“Should we get something to eat?” I ask. I haven’t eaten much other than a few snack foods on the way here.

“Sure.” Sophie replies, getting up and walking towards the main road. I get up to follow her, still unsure about how to tread. She is being a lot more civil with me, and is actually starting to be pleasant. But I thought things were going well last night, and got proven wrong.

Sophie and I make our way into a Unova Fried Torchic restaurant (If you could call a fast food place like this a restaurant), and I can’t help but remember the time Phoebe and I tailed Laura, and got dinner at one of these places. A grin creeps to my lips.

As we get our food and sit down, I noticed Sophie giving me a strange look. When we were both sitting, she finally speaks up.

“What are you smiling about?” Sophie asks, “It’s just fried Torchic?”
“Your mum and I had a funny experience one night, involving one of these places.”

“Geez, did you go anywhere and not have some sort of adventure?” Sophie asks, sounding curious.

“This one in particular was memorable.” I laugh.

“What happened?” Sophie asks, still looking fairly stone-faced, as she started eating her food.

“So I was nineteen, and Auntie Laura was fifteen, and had been asked on her first date by some guy from her school. They were going to go see Frozen or something. But Mum was worried about her and asked me to tail her-” I begin.

“Wait, she asked you to spy on her? Why? Was she over protective or something?” Sophie asks.

“Justifiably, yes, she was.” I explain, “Laura went to a party a few weeks earlier. It was her friend’s older brother’s birthday. Mum didn’t want her going alone, so forced me to go. And even though I didn’t want to, it’s a good thing I did, because something bad nearly happened to her that night. If I wasn’t there, things could have been very bad.”

“Oh…” Sophie whispers, filling in the blanks of what happened.

“Anyway, because of that, Mum asked me to tail Laura, and keep an eye on her just in case, but to not let her see me. So I snuck out to the house in a disguise, and was planning on going to the bus stop before Laura’s so I could be on the bus before she got on, and not be noticed. Except there was a slight hitch in the plan.” I explain, “Your mum…”

“Of course.” Sophie says, trying to hide a smile.

“She was visiting Mauville for work, and had the night off, so decided to surprise me. My family hadn’t met her yet, and I walked out the front, just as she was about to knock.” I explain, “I told her what I was doing. And I still remember the exact thing she said. I still laugh about it.”

“What did she say?” Sophie asks curiously. Hearing this much about her Mum is probably new to her. Phoebe’s parents passed away during the Hoenn Crisis, and she didn’t have any siblings. Laura and Phoebe were close, but didn’t really know each other too well. Sophie probably grew up not knowing too much about her mother. I can’t help but feel a wave of guilt for that.

“She said ‘I was going to suggest mini-golf, but stalking your sister sounds entertaining.’” I explain with a laugh, and see Sophie smile for the first time in a while. “She decided to help me stay undercover, by sitting with me and pretending to be my girlfriend, since Laura hadn’t met her before, and figured she wouldn’t suspect that I was the one with pretty girl. Granted, both Laura and I knew that she was enjoying that a little too much.”

“You think pretty highly of yourself.” Sophie says jokingly.

“I ended up marrying her, so I must have done something right.” I laugh, “Anyway, we got to the shopping centre, and followed Laura and this guy to the food court. Laura hates UFT, so we figured that we’d be safe getting dinner there and not being seen.”

“Why do I get the feeling you were wrong?”

“Because the guy she was with liked it, and got in line behind us. It got to my turn and I had to order. If Laura heard my voice, we’d be found, so I did the first thing that came to mind.” I explain, “I talked with a Kanto accent.”

Sophie looks horrified. I guess I have the embarrassing Dad thing down.

“You didn’t.”

“Oh, I did.” I say, “Laura even noticed that this guy from Kanto in front of her ordered the exact same thing her older brother usually gets. She told the guy and he joked about it being me with a funny accent. You know what the little smarta** said?”

Sophie shakes her head, entranced by the story.

“Nah, he is with that girl. He is too crazy, and not good-looking enough to be with a girl that pretty."

Sophie nearly spits out her drink hearing that, and bursts into laughter.

“Well she wasn’t wrong…” Sophie says jokingly.

“Anyway, we had dinner, and went to follow them into the movie.” I explain, “Except Laura told Mum they were seeing Frozen. She lied. They were seeing some horror movie. I don’t do horror movies.”

“You have practically lived one, yet you can’t handle a little bit of blood and gore?” Sophie asks.

“If I worked at UFT, do you think I’d wanna spend my spare time eating their food?”

“Fair enough.”

“Anyway, so the movie finished, and we followed Laura and the guy she was with to the bus stop. Then the s*** hit the fan.” I explain.

“Did he do something to hurt her?” Sophie asks, looking nervous.

“No, the opposite actually. A guy came over trying to mug them, and this kid Damien punched him out.” I explain, “Except then the mugger pulled a knife. That’s when I saved the day!”

“You didn’t mention killing a mugger before?!” Sophie exclaims.

“What, no? I didn’t kill him!” I reply, “I just took his knife and stuck it in his calf.”

“S***…” Sophie mutters to herself, “You couldn’t have just knocked him out or something.”

“The prick had just threatened my little sister with a knife. He is lucky that I decided to leave him with his ability to walk.” I explain, “Anyway, the disguise held up, and once Laura was off the bus, I walked Phoebe to her hotel, and snuck back into my room to find Laura waiting.”

“She knew?”

“She knew the moment she heard my accent.” I laugh.

“How?” Sophie asks.

“The night at the party when I stopped her from… Well, I had a glass bottle smashed against my head. I ended up in hospital that night to get it stitched, and they gave me laughing gas to numb me whilst they did it.” I explain, “Apparently when I was high off that, I tried doing a Kanto accent. And apparently I told her that if she ever wants to injure someone and not kill them, to stab them in the leg…”

I watch as Sophie face-palms at hearing that last sentence.

“So she was mad?”

“Nope. She was thankful. Granted she also was trying to convince me to be quiet and not tell Mum. If she found out, Laura wouldn’t have been able to leave the house alone again. And would have been grounded for seeing that movie.”

“I never knew she was so rebellious.” Sophie laughs, “She always seemed to level headed.”

“She grew up.” I say, “It happens to the best of us.”

“I guess so.’ Sophie says, looking at her Pokenav. The art class still has another hour or so left.

“So tell me something about your time.” I ask, “How did you become partners with Skye?”

“Auntie Laura found out that I skipped school to see you. She could tell something was wrong. I guess I always thought so much higher of you, and you just weren’t what I thought you were. It killed me figuring that out, and she figured it out.” Sophie says quietly, “She decided that we needed a fresh start, so we moved out of Hoenn to Johto. Azalea Town. I was about thirteen then.”

“The next part is strange. I am not even sure that it actually happened, or if I just imagined it.” Sophie explained, “Before Auntie Laura would let me travel, I had to camp out a few times in Ilex Forest. The first few were with her, and then eventually it was by myself. Basically, she wanted me to know how to cope by myself. I was camping there one night when I was about fifteen, and saw something strange.”

“What?” I ask, getting even more curious.

“I think it was a Legendary Pokemon. Not Skye. Another one. It was about six feet tall, and white and blue. It looked like a jet-plane. I only saw it for a second. It made eye contact with me, as if it recognised me, then zoomed off. It was the fastest Pokemon I had ever seen.”

(OOC: I know that by base stats Latios is about 60th from the top, but I call BS seeing as it is said in the pokedex to be as quick as a jet plane. That’s 550mph, and I doubt Dugtrio is quicker…)

“L…” I think to myself…

“I followed it as quickly as I could, and went in the direction it flew, and found something else. A Celebi cornered by what I can only assume was a Pokemon Hunter, with a Weavile, and a Chandelure.” Sophie explains, “The Celebi saw me, but the others had their back turned, so I set my Pokemon on them, and took the Pokemon out. Celebi used the distraction to her advantage and knocked out the hunter.”

“L lead her to help Celebi? Why not just do it himself?” I think to myself, “Unless he wanted them to meet?”

“She turned into her human form, and thanked me, then said I looked familiar.” Sophie says.

“She came around to the house a couple of times when you were little. The last time she came around was right after Phoebe passed away.” I say, “I tried to get her to take me back and save her, but she said she couldn’t do it.”

Sophie nods.

“She recognised me soon after, and said that it was an act of fate that brought us together that night. The daughter of one of the few people who knew who she really was. She said that she was not going to question fate, and decided to stay with me.” Sophie explains, “She said it wasn’t the first time she had been found in the forest, and that as much as she hated it, she probably shouldn’t stay there any more. She ended up staying with us. Sort of. Auntie Laura had no idea that I was harbouring a Legendary Pokemon.”

“How the hell did you hide her from Laura?” I ask, finding this whole thing amusing. The thought of my daughter hiding a Legendary Pokemon from her aunt reminds me of some sort of sit-com.

“Whenever we were at home, she’d be in her Pokemon form. She was barely two feet tall. Easy for her to hide under the bed or in a cupboard. She’d even pretend to be a stuffed toy occasionally, or would go to her human form and pretend to be a friend from school.” Sophie laughs, “Anyway, a year and a half later, I travelled, and she came with me to keep me company.”

“So how did you know about what was happening?” I ask, “About the plate and the flute.”

“About two months before I left, Skye felt something. A shift in power.” Sophie explains, “She left for nearly a month, trying to track down Arceus, thinking it’d know the cause of this shift, not knowing he was the centre of it. Basically, she had felt the power of the plate being awoken. Somebody had found the flute and unlocked the plate, and her and a bunch of the others all felt it. When she couldn’t find Arceus, she ended up meeting with Dialga, Palkia and Giratina, which she said was not easy to organize. They were all direct creations of Arceus, therefore had the closest bond to it. When together, they had realized what happened to Arceus. It was as if part of Arceus was in them. Not enough to be noticeable or useful when alone, but together, just enough to catch a glimpse of Arceus dormant and powerless, outside of our existence. They devised a plan to send Skye and myself back, after we had done some investigating, to find out where to send us, and where the plate would be. But we didn’t get enough time.”

Sophie looks at her Pokenav again, before continuing.

“When the cities started to fall, and people were killed in collateral, we knew that we had to go back then, even if we didn’t know where everything was. We knew that at one point the plate was with the Shadow Cult, but they were too dangerous for us to take it from them, so we had to come to this point in time. The plan was for Skye and myself to come back here, and if we fail, Dialga send someone else back, but Dialga had vanished. Skye thinks that whoever unlocked Arceus’ power knew that Dialga would be a threat, and disposed of it.” Sophie explained, “Skye was the last time traveller that we knew of, so sent me back alone. If I failed, then she’d keep sending people until we succeeded.”

“We haven’t had anyone else join us. Does that mean we succeed?” I ask.

“Maybe. It could also mean that they have gotten to Skye too, and we’re now on our own. I don’t know. The only ones who truly understand the way this sort of thing works are Arceus and Dialga.”

Sophie looks at her Pokenav again, and then looks out the window.

“She’s on the move.” Sophie says, standing from her seat. I put my rubbish in the bin, before following her out. We walk in the direction that the car went on the Pokenav, and eventually it stops moving. After about half an hour of walking, we are at the house.

“So how do we do this?” Sophie asks, “Sneak in and tie her up until she tells us?”

“I was just going to knock on the door and ask her nicely.”

“Really?” Sophie asks, “I thought I was going to have to stop you from torturing the information out of her.”

“You really think I am Satan himself, don’t you.” I ask, slightly annoyed.

“No, Satan would be scared to mess with you if he knew what you were like.”

I’m unsure if she was being passive aggressive, trying to be funny, or is just blunt, so brush it off.

I walk over to the door, pulling the files out of my bag, then knock. After a few seconds, I hear footsteps. The door is opened by the woman I recognised from the Facebook profile. Dr. Attano.

“Do you have any idea of what time it is?” She asks, sounding annoyed.

“It will only take a second.” I reply, “Are you Dr. Attano?”

“Yes.” She says irritably, “And whatever it is, it can wait until tomorrow.”

She goes to close the door, so I stick my foot in it, stopping it before pulling it open.

“I’m Jacob, and this is Sophie. We have something we need to talk to you about.” I say, before inviting myself inside. I brush past her, and make my way to what looks like the kitchen, Sophie following behind me.

“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t call the police right now.” Dr. Attano says, sounding angrier by the second.

“Because if you help us, we will be out of your hair in a matter of minutes,” I say, giving her the files, “We are looking for the plate. We plan on putting it back in its rightful place.”

The doctor looks shocked at seeing the files again.

“Where did you find these? And how did you find me?” she asks.

“We found these where you left them, and as for you, Facebook.” I explain, “That thing is a stalkers dream. Anyway, the plate…”

“So what, you plan on finding the plate and restoring it to Arceus?” she asks, “How? You can see yourself in these files that we spent years trying to unlock it. What makes you think you could if I couldn’t? Besides, after Arceus fled, we lost any trace of it. I spent just as long tracking it down after it fled as I did investigating this plate.”

“Why? So you could finish the job and kill it?” Sophie mutters. This was the first time she had spoken to the doctor.

“No, so I could make amends for the wrongs I had done.” The doctor replies, her voice dripping with venom, “When I agreed to work for the Shadow Cult, they told me they were looking at ways to harness the energy of Shadow Pokemon. To create renewable energy sources. To figure out what gives them strength against others and harness it, for the good of humanity. And when they captured Arceus, they told me it was for the same thing. They wanted to take some of its power, a small portion, so they could put it to good use. Like a mega-battery.”

“Could you be any more gullible?” Sophie asks her. I shoot her a glare. The doctor was being surprisingly helpful, and I don’t want to jeopardize that by my daughter being a smarta**.

“Do you really think they advertised as ‘The Shadow Cult’ when they were looking for researchers? All of us in the research department were approached by them, told that we would be looking into harnessing energy from outside of what could be considered normal means. Shadow energy being one example. By the time we realized what we had gotten involved in, it was too dangerous for us to leave. Those of us who didn’t end up being brainwashed into their mentality stayed for the sake of trying to find some sort of weakness that could later be exploited, and to undo the damage we had done. But you still didn’t answer my question. How do you plan on restoring the plate to Arceus once you find it? Or even finding Arceus?”

I look at Sophie, before saying anymore. This is her mission, and I am only here to help out. She nods at me before I turn to the doctor.

“The same way you unlock anything.” I reply, “With the key. This key is also able to summon Arceus.”

“And what is this key?” Dr. Attano asks curiously.

“None of your concern.” Sophie says, stepping forward and taking charge.

“If you want my help, it’d benefit you to tell me what you know.” Dr. Attano said, slightly irritated.

“You don’t need to know about the key. You just need to tell us where we can find the plate.” Sophie snaps, “The Shadow Cult have been dead for eight years. If you really gave a s*** about clearing your conscience and finding this plate, you’d be out there looking for it instead of taking art classes. So why don’t you help the people who are actually looking for it, and tell us where you think it is?”

I’d be lying if I said Sophie got her attitude from her mother. This could go either way. The doctor could decide Sophie is right, or she could tell us to f*** off.

“I know where it will be.” The doctor says with a sly grin, “But you won’t be able to get it.”

“What makes you say that?” I ask.

“When we moved from the base in Petalburg Woods to the new base beneath Meteor Falls, the plate was lost. I hid it and said it was lost in transit. I hid it behind a section of loose rock in Meteor Falls.”

“And why do you think we won’t be able to get it from Meteor Falls?” Sophie asks, sounding more annoyed by the second.

“Because it isn’t there. I still couldn’t leave and people had their suspicions I had stolen the plate. I couldn’t get near it until the Shadow Cult were taken down.” Dr. Attano explains, “By the time it was safe for me to get to Meteor Falls to retrieve the plate, that section was off limits, as they were doing excavations. Looking for space rocks.”

“Who?” Sophie asks.

“The Space Centre.” I mutter, “Considering Deoxys was a vital part of the Shadow Crisis, I am not surprised the Mossdeep Space Centre got involved.”

“By the time I was allowed in Meteor Falls, the plate was gone. They must have found it and thought it fell from the sky millions of years ago or something. Honestly, their ‘scientists’ believe in just about anything.” The doctor says, before a look of confusion appears on her face. She turns to me. “How did you know about Deoxys? The government kept Deoxys on the down low?”

“Because I was the one who killed it.” I mutter, before turning to Sophie.

“So the HBI are looking for it, and it is right under their noses? They don’t even realize that a government sector is in possession of it?” Sophie asks, “These are the people we trust to protect us.”

“Dr. Attano said it herself. The people at the Space Centre would probably believe anything came from space if you told them. The government probably have better things to do than sift through the files of all the s*** the Space Centre has collected over the years.” I reply, “Lucky for us. Come on. Let’s go.”

We left the doctors house, stopping by the garage so I could pull my Pokenav loose from underneath the engine bay, and made our way to the edge of Fallarbor Town, where the HLine Train Station was. The region-wide train network had only just been introduced before I went to prison, so even though they had been around for a few years, this was the first time I’d been on one. Granted, I slept most of the trip.

It was midnight when the train arrived to take us to Lilycove City. Within an hour of getting on the train, I had fallen asleep. Granted it wasn’t the best sleep. Even when I was in prison, I had a bed, and wasn’t trying to sleep sitting upright. Even in my sleep, I could feel my body aching from the discomfort. My dreams were enough to keep me asleep though.

I was sitting at a bus shelter. Next to me sat Phoebe, playing a game on her phone. It was dark, and starting to rain. In the distance I could hear the roaring engines of two cars. Within seconds they were nearby. A red Commodore and a black Skyline. All of a sudden, a Pokemon ran out onto the road, causing the Commodore to swerve. It lost traction, and hit the curb, causing it to roll. As it was about to hit us, it stopped. Everything had stopped.

“I know that it wasn’t easy Jacob.” Phoebe says, closing the game on her phone before putting it away. “If I had a choice, I wouldn’t have died here tonight.”

“Getting that call was the worst night of my life.” I whisper, “I love you more than anything. I was so glad that I had you and Sophie. I was looking forward to putting down the sword, and growing old with you, and watching her grow up.”

“I’m glad to know that.” Phoebe says with a smile, “There was a time when I was scared for you. That afternoon you visited me on your way through Fortree City, when we got coffee. You seemed like a different person. As if the violence had pulled you away. I was glad to see the old you come out when it was over. The one whose sister we stalked that night on her date.”

I can’t help but chuckle.

“Admit it, deep down, you wished that you weren’t just pretending to be my girlfriend that night.”

Phoebe laughs in response.

“Maybe a little.”

Phoebe sighs, resting her head on my shoulder. It has been years since I felt that weight there. The good weight on my shoulder.

“Jacob, Sophie needs her dad. She might be here with you now and you’re sorting things out with her, but don’t forget that Sophie is still a kid living with her aunt, who still thinks you’re a superhero that made a silly mistake.” Phoebe says, leaving her head on my shoulder, “You can’t stop me from dying, and you can’t stop yourself from doing what you did. But you can try and be a father to Sophie. Don’t let that slip away. She needs you as a father, not a fighter. Not a killer.”

Before I can say anything else, time moves again. The Commodore rolls towards us, and as it hits, everything turns white.

I open my eyes, surprised to still feel the weight on my shoulder. I look down and see Sophie asleep, resting on me. I look down at her, but instead of seeing the young woman travelling with me, I see the little girl I left behind. If I had have gotten out early, but stayed the same as I was three days ago, if I’d have not seen what that’d do to Sophie, and she’d have been better off without me. I can’t help but put my arm around her and pull her a bit tighter. As I do she seems to relax slightly.

I look up at the monitor at the end of the carriage showing our location. We’re between Fortree and Lilycove. It is nearly 5am, and the sun will be coming up in the next few hours.

I need to find this plate and restore it to Arceus. Not just to save the future, but also to be the father Sophie deserves.

Chapter 5: Endgame

Spoiler:

We arrived at Lilycove City shortly after 7am, and got breakfast there. Seeing as it was still early, and we didn’t have much of a plan and the ferry to Mossdeep wasn’t running until 10am, I talked Sophie into taking a detour, and visiting some landmarks in Lilycove. We spent the morning visiting places like the house where I grew up, Phoebe’s old house, our old school, and even took a trip into the woods where we spoke that night after the party. Granted, I didn’t tell her about what she suggested to avoid getting arrested. I already was dreading having the talk with the Sophie who was with Laura, and didn’t think it was worth giving a second time for the sake of a story.

We got on the ferry and caught it across to Mossdeep City. As we travelled across the water, Sophie spent most of the time with her head over the edge. Phoebe got sea-sick, and apparently Sophie was the same. When she had emptied her stomach and hadn’t dry-reached for fifteen minutes, she came to the table I was sitting at, looking pale as a ghost. In front of me was a sheet of paper and a few pens. On the paper were floor plans that looked like they were drawn by a six year old.

“I went to this place about eight years ago.” I explain, trying not to let on I am talking about the space centre, “I am trying to remember the layout.”

“I’ve never been there.” Sophie mutters quietly, trying not to open her mouth. She naturally was a little pale, but she looks like a ghost right now.

“You’ll be fine once we get off the boat.” I say, continuing to work on the floor plans. I only went there once, and that was years ago, so there are a few gaps in my memory. But this is better than nothing.

“How long will that be?”

“Maybe another hour? Possibly two?” I reply.

“I’m gonna be sick…” Sophie mutter, as she scrambles to the edge. I notice a couple of other passengers giving her looks of disgust. In their defence, the noises she was making weren’t very pleasant. Still, I shoot them a glare anyway, before they move on. Eventually Sophie makes her way back.

“So do we have a plan?” She asks, still somewhat quiet. She sounds like she has a sore throat from dry-reaching.

“I think.” I explain, “Their main power and backup run from the same switchboard. If the main power goes, the switch is flicked to the backup. I’ll have my Rotom overload it. Like, not just trip it, but enough to fry most of the electronics. No surveillance, and it’ll be enough to trip any alarms, and hopefully empty the building.”

“You mean to tell me that we are doing it in broad daylight? Not waiting until tonight?” Sophie asks, shocked.

“Do I look like the type of guy who waits?” I ask, “If we do it at night, there will be more security, and less of a crowd to disappear into. Besides, the HBI told me to do whatever it takes to get it.”

“But won’t they get suspicious if they find out WE broke into the space center?” Sophie ask, “As far as they know, you’re returning it.”

“We’ll cross that bridge when it comes.” I say, continuing on my floor plan. I notice Sophie slap her palm against her forehead.

An hour later, much to Sophie’s relief, we land at Mossdeep City, just after midday. As we walk towards the Space Centre, I run through the plan with Sophie.

“The Space Center has an open to the public museum with all the space junk that they actually know about. That takes up the ground and first floor. The basement floor is the archive, where they store all the stuff they aren’t using. Any artifacts they have given up on for the time being.” I explain, “The plate may be there. Or it may be on the second floor with the research division.”

When the large building appears on the horizon, I can’t help but feel a bit nervous. I haven’t done something this stupid since that night I got arrested.

“You will go with Gwaine to the archives and look for the plate there.” I continue, “His vision will make it easier to find it. There are probably thousands of artefacts down there, and probably less security. I’ll go with Garde to the second floor, and look there.”

“We wait in the museum, hanging around the stairs until Sparks does his thing. Then we sneak through in the chaos.” I explain, “If there are any locked doors, knock them down. There will be enough alarms going off for it to go unnoticed. And under no circumstances are you to try fighting anyone if they get in your way. Leave that to Gwaine. If it goes pear-shaped, leave him and get out.”

“You’d really have me abandon your Pokemon? Not just that, but your partner?” Sophie asks, soundling slightly saddened.

“Gwaine went toe-to-toe with Shadow Deoxys when it appeared in Mossdeep, and managed to get it to the ground. You said yourself that Gwaine was a better father figure than I was. When the s*** hits the fan, I trust him to keep you safe. He’ll be fine.”

I unclip Gwaine’s Pokeball from my belt and give it to Sophie.

“Go to the museum and wait on the ground floor.” I say, as we approach the entrance. Sophie nods, before walking into the building. It is full of people browsing at the supposed space junk that was behind glass cases. After dealing with Deoxys, I’ve had enough of extra-terrestrials to be fascinated by it.

I make my way to the edge of the property, and find what I was after. A square cyclone wire fence, and inside what looks like a large battery and a switchboard. So this is the backup power supply.

I let out Sparks. As the Rotom materializes, I reassess the plan. Under no circumstances could they get power back to the building.

“I want you to possess the switchboard.” I explain, “Draw as much power as you can from the battery, then in ten minutes, rush it through the system. Enough to knock out anything electronic. If you can, drain the battery completely.”

Sparks grins at me with a sense of glee. He was always mischievous and this is his forte. Within seconds, he has phased into the switchboard, which seemed to be humming now. I make my way back to the building, and walk in, making my way to the first floor. I notice Sophie looking at some space rock display by the stairs to the basement. She glances in my direction, before looking back at the display, as I find the stairs to the first floor.

I am halfway to the first floor when there is a bang. The lights go out as the globes shatter above me. For a few seconds there are sirens, before another bang, and the speaker on the wall nearby slows down and stops. The bangs and pops continue, as Sparks is probably having the time of his life. People rush down the stairs past me. After the main wave, a security guard rushes towards me.

“Sir, you need to evacuate the building now!” He shouts, shoving me towards the stairway. There is no one else around, so I pretended to turn around, before swinging my fist at his head. The punch knocks him out cold. I hoped that it wouldn’t do any damage, but reassured myself that if Sophie and I were successful this timeline would cease to exist anyway.

As I cross the first floor and make my way to the stairwell to the second floor, I let Garde out of her Pokeball. The Gardevoir hovers slightly above the ground, floating alongside me as I make my way up the stairs. As we emerge on the second floor, there is a small group of Space Centre employees frantically running around trying to put away artefacts. Two researchers and three security guards.

“Hey, you can’t be here!” shouts one of the security guards when he saw me. I have no intention of turning back. I draw Titan from the sheath on my back, and hold it out, continuing to walk towards the group. I have no intention of killing them. Instead, I plan on using Lewis’ last lesson when I trained with him eight years ago. Precision. The difference between stopping an enemy and killing them.

As I drew Titan, the security guard pulled out his handgun, and open fired. I don’t flinch as Garde gracefully swings her arm, sending the bullets flying away from me with a telekinetic wave. The guard goes to shoot again, however Garde is already on it. She blocks the barrel with her telekinesis, causing the gun to shatter in his hand. His hand is cut up a little, but it is just a flesh wound.

Garde rips the guns from the hands of the other two guards, as the first runs at me. He attempts to bear-hug me, but I see it coming. I duck down, spinning in a clockwise direction, before slashing across his back with Titan. Not deep enough to do any damage. More just a scratch to sting a little and give him reason to give up. He goes to try and stand up, slowed slightly from the scratch on his back. Before he can get back up, I slam my elbow into his head, knocking him out.

Suddenly water pours out from the smoke detectors in the roof. I look at Garde to ask if she did that, and see that the other two people in the room are against the wall, with water pipes super-naturally bent around them to hold them in place.

“You’ve outdone yourself.” I smile as I looked up at Garde, floating in front of her captives. She merely shrugs.

I walk over to the researcher who is still conscious.

“Where is the plate?” I ask, pulling out the photo I have from the Petalburg Woods base, “I know it’s here.”

The researcher says nothing. However Garde’s face lights up.

“In the archives.” she says telepathically, “He was thinking that you wouldn’t be able to get it from the archives in time.”

“Get in touch with Gwaine, and get an image of where he is.” I say, “Then teleport us there.”

Garde’s eyes glow for a few seconds. Without saying a word, she reaches out and touches my shoulder. The world around us dissolves, as another seems to appear. Within seconds we are standing in the basement. A large room filled with glass cases and shelves, with an unconscious security guard tied in the corner. Sophie and Gwaine aren’t anywhere to be seen. I turn to Garde, and give her Sparks’ Pokeball.

“Get Sparks and find us later.” I say, before walking towards the centre of the basement. I feel Garde poke around in my head. Her presence is still unfamiliar to me. Gwaine has been doing it ever since he evolved so I ams used to it, but Garde is different. She finds the location of the switchboard in my head, then disappears, teleporting to the location of it.

As I walk, I hear a voice that I recognise as Sophie’s and make my way towards it.

“Any luck?” I ask. Sophie nearly jumps out of her skin.

“What’re you doing here?” She asks.

“Garde took care of everyone upstairs easily, and found out that it is down here.” I explain, looking at the shelf that Sophie is browsing.

“Gwaine knows it’s down here and it’s nearby.” Sophie explains, “But his senses are a little vague.”

I notice Gwaine give Sophie a funny look. So did she.

“Hey, that’s fine Gwaine. We don’t expect you to be perfect.” Sophie says, tyring to help Gwaine’s bruised ego.

“We gotta find this soon.” I say, looking back to the stairwell, “The power won’t be out forever, especially once Sparks leaves the switchboard, and I am surprised there isn’t more security.”

“Then get your a** moving, and help us.” Sophie says, slightly irritated.

I walk to a section of shelves a little further down and begin looking for the plate. The room is fairly dark from knocking out the power, which makes it slightly difficult. After another ten minutes of searching, Sophie shouts out.

“I think I found it!” Sophie shouts. I run over and look in the glass case she is next to. There is what looks like a velvet bag, about the size of the plate. Sophie is probably right. Before anything else is said, I put my fist through the glass, smashing it, and cutting my hand slightly.

“If you’d think before punching for once…” Sophie says, reaching into her pocket, “You might be able to find another way in.”

From her pocket, she pulls a set of keys, presumably from the unconscious security guard.

“Gwaine can heal me.” I say, “I don’t mind having a scar.”

“I’m used to it.” Gwaine mutters telepathically, “I’ve only been this idiots medic for the last eight years.”

Gwaine uses Heal Pulse, healing the wound on my hand. He isn’t powerful enough to leave me without a scar, but I don’t mind. I have plenty already.

Sophie reaches into the case, making sure to avoid the broken glass, and pulls out the bag. She reaches into it, and pulls out a platinum coloured plate, about the size of a portable hard drive, but thinner.

“It feels…Alive.” Sophie says, putting it back in the bag, then putting it in her own backpack.

“Let’s get out of here.” I say, calling Gwaine back to his Pokeball. We walk towards the stairwell, and make our way up to the ground floor. The room is empty, making it easy to sneak out. We were probably seen emerging from the building, but the crowd gathered out the front makes it easy to slip in and disappear.

An hour later, we are by the beach, out of view of the main city. Garde had arrived with Sparks Pokeball, and Sophie finally opens her bag and pulls out the plate. She hands it to me, and I am shocked at what I feel.

There is a certain energy, or heat to it. Like Sophie said, it is as if it was alive. Except there is something in the way. Like a veil, stopping me from feeling it directly.

“This is incredible.” I mutter to myself. This plate potentially has the power to change everything. To stop Phoebe being killed that night. To give Sophie a childhood.

“Now we just need the flute.” I say, handing the plate back to Sophie, “Where is it?”

“Mt. Pyre.” Sophie replies, putting the plate away, “This is the key to finding the key, to summoning the key.”

“Sounds like a Leonardo DiCaprio film…” I mutter to myself.

“At the peak, there is a slot for the plate, that materializes the flute.” Sophie says, ignoring my attempt at dad humour, “We go there, and get the flute, then restore the plate to Arceus.”

Sophie stands up, and makes her way to the dock.

“Come on. It won’t be long before they find out we have gone rogue with the plate.” Sophie says, “Let’s try and get a few steps ahead of them before they realize.”

I get up, and gp to follow her, now a lot more conscious of how many people see us. We have shown our hand to the HBI, and as soon as they realize, they will be after us.

We make our way to the dock arriving there at 4pm, and contemplate catching the passenger ferry back to Lilycove and going the rest of the way on foot. However that would take a lot longer, and would be the predictable move. Instead Sophie has an idea.

“Have Gwaine and Garde peek into the minds of the crew of all the boats here.” Sophie says, “We’ll try and find a boat going near Mt. Pyre and get a lift.”

It isn’t a half bad idea. I send out the two Pokemon. Garde follows Sophie towards a bunch of boats, whilst I go with Gwaine in the other direction.

“What about them?” I think to Gwaine, nodding my head in the direction of a boat.

“Pacifidlog Town.” Gwaine replies, trying to focus. I know how difficult this must be. Keeping the channel open between us, whilst peeking in to other people’s minds and not getting the wires crossed. I decided to not talk to him unless it was necessary.

It doesn’t take as long as I thought for Gwaine to track down someone going to Mt. Pyre.

“Found a boat.” Gwaine says to me.

“That telepathy thing of yours really comes in handy.” I say to him.

“More my ability to read…” Gwaine says, gesturing at a sign by a small tour boat.

Charter to Mt. Pyre

“Well I’ll be damned.” I mutter to myself, walking to someone near the boat.

“Are you the guy to speak to about getting a ride to Mt. Pyre.” I shout to him as I walk over.

“Yeah, that’d be me.” The middle aged man replies, “You looking for a lift?”

“Hopefully, as soon as possible.” I ask. “Reckon you could help me and a friend out?”

“We have a boat leaving in half an hour, except it is booked out.” He replies, “But I’d be willing to let you and your friend ride with me if you tell me where you found that Gallade? I have never seen one like it. Granted, the bridge isn’t the most comfortable ride.”

“That’ll be fine.” I say happily. This is perfect. We would be going straight to Mt. Pyre, on a private boat, separate from the rest of the passengers. “Half an hour?”

“Yep. Speak to me before we leave, and I’ll take care of it.” The man says, before heading back onto the boat to prepare. I call Gwaine back to his ball, and walk down the docks, trying to find Sophie.

Naturally, it doesn’t take long. Like a gold Gallade, a light blue Gardevoir tends to attract attention.

As we walk back, I explain to Sophie what happened.

“S***, I hadn’t thought of that…” Sophie mutters.

“What?” I ask, wondering if I had stuffed up and not realized.

“Gwaine is unique, and Garde is extremely rare.” Sophie explains, “You have them out in the open constantly. All it takes is for someone to see one of them and know where we are.”

F***…

“You’re right. I’ll keep them away from now on when there’re people around.”

We make our way to the boat, and talk to the captain when we were ready. Soon after, the passengers pile into the boat, and we take off.

I don’t bother lying about Gwaine to the captain as he pilots the boat. My story sounds far-fetched, but he seems to believe it. Maybe he has heard about those berries before.

“So what else can he do?” the captain asks, keeping focused on the sea in front of him.

“He has a sixth sense. Kind of like a second vision.” I reply, “He can sense things out of the ordinary. Shadow Pokemon, Legendary Pokemon. That sort of thing.”

Our conversation is interrupted by Sophie dry reaching over the side of the boat.

“Twice in a f***ing day…” I hear her moan to herself.

“Your friend really doesn’t agree with sea travel…” The captain whispers to me.

“Yeah…”

It was nearing 7pm when we arrived at the docks of Mt. Pyre. The trek up the mountain was long and tiresome. The first half of it was in silence, due to Sophie’s still unsettled stomach, until I realized something.

“What happens to you if we pull this off?” I ask Sophie.

“I’m not sure.” She replies, “I could just vanish because my timeline doesn’t exist anymore. Or Skye could return and bring me back to my time. Or I might be stuck here until I find Skye in this time.”

I am quiet for a few awkward seconds. Even though she is prepared for it, I can tell that she wouldn’t like to just disappear. This could be the last time I speak to Sophie. At least, this Sophie. The Sophie with Laura will still exist, and because her life will be different, she will grow into a different person.

“I’m not good at the cheesy s*** but…” I say, “I just wanted to say, in case you do leave, that I am so proud of you. Even when life, and myself, has dealt you a s***ty hand, you still managed to be strong and brave through it all. Even if I only got to know you the last few days, I am still proud of you Sophie, as proud as I’d have been if I were around the last twelve years. You deserve better, and I hope I can be better.”

I half expect Sophie to stay quiet, or have a go at me for putting her in that position like I did the other night. Instead, I am shocked when she hugs me.

“I’m not your daughter any more.” Sophie says, “My father is still a bitter man in his cell. You though, you’re not him. Not anymore. Now you have a chance to make your Sophie proud.”

We make our way to the top of the mountain, resuming our near silence. I guess that we both know what is coming, and want to try and have what just happened as our last memory. When we arrive at the summit, we find a round slab of white granite, nearly fifteen feet in diameter. On the edge of it, at the front is a rectangular slab, standing at nearly four feet tall, with a slot that looks like it’d fit the plate perfectly. Sophie has the same idea, as she opens her bag, and pulls the plate out. I stick it in the slot, which causes the slab to glow bright white. A few seconds later, the light becomes concentrated a few inches above the stone surface of the slab, forming a solid shape. When the light disappears, floating in front of me is the Azure Flute.

I grab it, and turn to show Sophie. Before I could verbalise my excitement, Sophie places her hand over my mouth.

“Hide the flute.” She whispers, “I can hear footsteps and voices.”

I put the flute in my bag, and draw Titan as she edges slightly closer to the stairway leading to us. As she does, I tap the button on Chaos’ Pokeball. The Hydreigon goes to roar as it emerges, but I quickly put my hand over it’s mouth, hoping it doesn’t bite my hand off.

“Stay in the air, and be silent until I give the signal.” I mutter to the dragon, who immediately obliges. Chaos is a time-bomb. Sometimes he is loyal and obedient. Other times he is psychotic. Both come in handy during certain situations.

A few minutes after Chaos went into the air, the voices stopped. However we know they are still coming. Now they know that we’d probably be able to hear them, and decided to shut up. There is nowhere to run, and if it is the HBI, fighting our way out would not work. We need to wait and see what develops.

“Stay still, or I’ll shoot.” Says a loud voice that I recognise. I look over at Sophie who has raised her hands, as she looks down the steps. She takes a step back, as the owner of the voice makes his way up the steps. Even in the dark I recognize him. Wayne Smith. Acting Head of the Hoenn Bureau of Investigation. They have sent the big guy in charge after us…

“Jacob, I thought we had a deal?” Smith says, keeping the gun pointed at Sophie, “You give us the plate, and we let you out early. I’m now glad I had you followed the whole time.”

“The deal was I find it.” I say, “Whether I give it to you is a whole other story. The safest hands for this plate are Arceus’.”

“If they were the safest hands, the plate wouldn’t exist.” Smith says, looking down the sights of his gun at Sophie’s head. “Now if you don’t want her to be a casualty, hand over the plate.”

“Don’t!” Sophie yells out. Before she can speak again, Smith cocks the gun, making sure to make as much noise doing so as possible to get the message across.

It takes not even a heartbeat to make the decision. I pull the plate from the slot in the pillar and toss it to Smith, who catches it easily, keeping his gun aimed at Sophie. Once he has it, he lowers his aim, and begins walking towards the steps, before stopping for a second.”

“Time travellers are a liability. They know too much. We can’t have that.”

Before I can make any attempt to stop it, Smith whips around, aiming his gun at Sophie, and pulling the trigger.

“NO!” I scream as Sophie was thrown to the ground, “You f***ing b*****d! You had what you wanted! Why?!”

“I never liked her attitude.” Smith says, cocking the gun, “And I guess she got that from you.”

Smith aims the gun at me, however before he can shoot, something distracts him. The shrill scream of a psychotic Pokemon pierces the night. I take the opportunity, and leap at Smith, swinging Titan at his wrist and cutting his hand clean off. Smith falls to the ground screaming in pain.

“F***!” he shouts, as he tries to scramble away. As he run, I slash Titan at his ankles, severing the Achilles tendon on his right foot, causing him to collapse to the ground, then stab Titan into the ground, through his remaining hand, as deep I can get it, causing him to scream in pain. I hear screams in the distance, presumably from Chaos murdering the men that Smith brought with him. There are gunshots, however Chaos doesn’t seem to be making any noises as if they hit.

Smith isn’t going to move, so I run to where Sophie lay, sitting down and resting her head on my lap. I thought I had lost everything when I lost Phoebe. I was a s***ty father, and didn’t think of Sophie. And now I have lost her as well. I have truly lost everything;

“I’m so proud of you.” I weep, “You deserved so much better.”

I close her still open eyes, and sit there for a few minutes, weeping, as Smith lay on the ground, bleeding out and whimpering in pain. It gets to the point where I can’t bring myself to look at Sophie’s lifeless face anymore. The bullet wound and the blood make it impossible.

I lay her down on a clean section of grass, before picking up Smith’s severed hand and gun, and throwing the hand at him. The gun is a standard 6 round revolver. I cock it, before shooting him in the left shin. The screams in the distance have stopped, and Chaos is still shrieking like before, meaning he has taken care of the others. It is now just Smith and I. I cock the gun again, and shoot him in the right shin, causing him to scream again.

“At least you had the dignity to make it quick you f***ing a**hole…” I mutter at Smith, before spitting on him and cocking the gun again, “Unfortunately for you, I don’t have that f***ing decency.”

I place the gun against his forearm, and pull the trigger causing him to scream again.

“You were wrong when you said I wasn’t too f***ed up.” I say, cocking the gun, and placing it against his other forearm, and pulling the trigger. “I was more f***ed up than anyone realized. They were the only ones who kept me in check. And now they’re gone.”

I cock the gun again, and place the barrel in his mouth, aiming towards his brain. As he closes his eyes, expecting me to shoot, I pull the butterfly knife out of my pocket, opening the blade, and stabbing it into where I could only guess his lung is. I hold the gun in his mouth, until he finally looks me in the eye. Once I saw the fear he has for me, I know he is ready to die. I pull the trigger.

As I stand up, and look at the bloody mess around me, I see something shimmer. I almost forgot about it. The plate.

I wipe the blood off it with Smith’s suit, before placing it in the slot. The whole altar begins to glow again, as I pull the Azure Flute out of my bag, and attempt to play it.

Through my tears, the notes sound disjointed and off-key, but even then, the flute and the altar glow brighter. Suddenly the whole altar erupts into white light, and when it dissipates, there lay a white, ten-foot tall, centaur-like Pokemon, within an inch of its life. Arceus.

I watch as the plate in the slot begins to glow, then disintegrate into a million points of light, which flow into Arceus. After a few minutes, the light is gone, and Arceus opens its eyes. As it stands towering over me, I can’t stop myself from weeping.

”So much unnecessary bloodshed.” says a booming voice in my head, ”All for a power none of you understand.”

“Please, save her.” I weep, uncontrollably. Arceus looks down on me.

“You turned my awakening site to one of torture and pain.” Arceus says, “This now-sacred place is littered with those dead at your hands. Yet you expect me to save the ones YOU love? The families of these men would all ask the same. Those merely following orders that were slaughtered at your command.”

I feel a rage burn deep inside me. Before I can think of anything else, I grab the gun from the ground, cocking it, and hold it to my temple.

“Then what’s one more for the body count?!” I shout, “I don’t want to live without her or Phoebe! So if you aren’t going to save them, then I have no reason to not pull this trigger here and now!”

I pull the trigger, expecting for everything to go black, and it all to be over. Maybe a white light, with Sophie and Phoebe on the other side. Instead nothing happens. The gun clicks. The chamber is empty. The last bullet had torn through Smith’s skull a few minutes earlier.

“F***ing hell…” I weep, throwing the gun away, before collapsing on the ground, “Please, just kill me then. Punish me for all of this. I don’t care anymore. I just can’t live like this.”

Arceus is silent for a second. Finally I hear the voice in my head.

“You have murdered countless to restore my power, but even then it was for your own gain. For that I am angry.” Arceus says, “But you also rescued me from what could have been an eternal slumber, and for that, I am grateful. For this, I will grant you your request.”

Everything surrounding me except Arceus begins to turn white, and disappear.

“I am giving you a chance to take a different path. Don’t make me regret it.”

Epilogue: A New Path

Spoiler:

I awake to the sound of my alarm on my Pokenav buzzing. I wake up, and turn it off, thinking it had all just been a dream. Until I see the date on the phone. Two years ago. The day after Phoebe died.

I hear a grunt next to me, and feel the bed move slightly.

“You always forget to turn off your damn alarm on the weekend.” Says a voice which I haven’t heard in what feels like years. I look over and see Phoebe lying next to me, starting to wake up. Trying to remain calm whilst internally I was screaming, I kiss her on the forehead, before laying back down.

“By the time I got home last night, you were already asleep.” Phoebe says with a smile.

“I missed you so much.” I say, rubbing my eyes, and making sure this isn’t just another dream.

“It was only a four hour shift.” Phoebe says, as she changes position, trying to get back to sleep, “You’re crazy.”

“Damn straight I am.” I reply, getting out of bed. I put some slippers on and walk to Sophie’s bedroom. It is 7:30 on a Saturday morning, and she s asleep when I walk in. She would be four years old right now. I can’t remember how long I stood by the door, watching her sleep. After about half an hour, Phoebe walks over in her dressing gown.

“What’s up with you?” She asks.

“I just had a really bad dream. I’m glad to have you both back though.”

“I won’t ask.” Phoebe shrugs, “Come on psycho, let’s have some breakfast.”

As Phoebe makse pancakes for us, I am trying not to act too crazy.

“So how did you get home last night?” I ask her, trying to be casual about it. I’m curious to know what Arceus did exactly.

“I forgot to tell you about that.” Phoebe says, “So after work, I all of a sudden felt really hungry so stopped off at UFT, and decided to catch the next bus home.”

Her face sinks for a second.

“When I was eating, these two kids drag raced their cars on the main street, and one of them lost control. Rolled it into the bus stop where I would have been waiting for the bus if I didn’t get food.” Phoebe explains, “The street was shut down and busses stopped, so I got a cab. I just can’t stop thinking about it, you know? I was saved by fried Torchic…”

I grab her and hug her tight.

“Okay, you’re really acting weird.” Phoebe says suspiciously.

“I’m just glad you’re safe.”

Sophie emerges from her room and walks out into the kitchen, as if attracted by the aroma of pancakes.

“Morning Dad.” Sophie says happily, as she climbs over to sit on my lap.

“Morning.” I say. I couldn’t focus much more on what happened after that. I guess I was stuck in a dream-like state. This all seemed too good to be true. Except it was true.

After breakfast, I sneak out to the back shed, and let Gwaine out of his Pokeball.

“You would not believe what we just did…” I say to him, making sure that Sophie and Phoebe aren’t listening. If Phoebe heard, she’d probably think I was insane. If Sophie heard, she’d probably be scarred.

“I haven’t seen you this excited in a while.” Gwaine replies, “What happened.”

---

“Bulls***…” Gwaine says to me telepathically, “Phoebe died, then Sophie? But you saved Arceus? And he saved them?”

“Look in here if you don’t believe me.” I said, tapping my head.

”I believe you, it’s just… Wow…”

I make my way back into the house. Sophie is playing with a toy in the lounge room, as Phoebe is using her laptop on the couch. As I make my way in, Phoebe talks.

“A package arrived for you a few minutes ago.” Phoebe says, not looking up from her laptop. I used to get slightly annoyed at how sucked into whatever it was she was doing that she would get but right now, I don’t care.

I make my way to the kitchen and find a small box on the counter. I open it, finding inside it the Azure Flute. Last time I saw it, it was grimy and covered in blood. This time, it is clean, and looka brand new.

I blow into it, and play a few notes, and to my relief, Arceus isn’t summoned. It sounds much better now. Inside the box is a note.

‘I have no need for this any more. Consider it yours.
A’

I am unsure if this meant that Arceus’ plate doesn’t exist any more. There is only one way to find out.

“Let’s go for a hike.” I say to Phoebe as I walk into the lounge room. “Mt Pyre. We can walk to the top, then visit Lilycove on the way back.”

“What brought this on?” Phoebe asks, closing her laptop, “Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s a good idea, but you have never even mentioned Mt. Pyre?”

“Who knows when else we’ll have the chance to see it?” I ask, “Life’s short.”

---

“Are we nearly there?” Sophie asks as she sits on my shoulders. The sun is starting to set.

“Nearly at the top. Just a few more minutes.” I say, upping my pace.

“Jacob, slow down.” Phoebe says from a few meters behind me.

I wait for Phoebe to catch up, before continuing up the mountain path. Eventually we reach the top.

Last time I was here, the ground was soaked with blood. I held a gun, and begged Arceus to save my family. Now the grass looks healthy and green, and in the centre of the summit, there is no altar.

“So be honest. Why Mt Pyre?” Phoebe asks, as she catches up, “Mt Chimney is much closer.”

“Because of that crazy dream I had.” I reply, “I had to check something.”

“And?”

“Just a dream.” I say with a grin.

“Good. Just remember that.” Phoebe responds, “This, right here and now, THIS is real.”

“Thank Arceus for that…”

[Pokemon Trainer Sarah]

Wow this is really good! I really enjoyed reading it. :) Your characters are so interesting. It's cool that even your Pokemon have really well developed personalities. And I also enjoyed learning more about what happened in Emerald.

I really love the small moments like Jacob dreaming of Phoebe leaning on him and waking to find Sophie doing the same thing. And also the last few lines at the very end. You have a real talent for this sort of thing. I could totally see this is a movie or something. Thanks for the great read!

[[Desolate Divine]]

Wow this is really good! I really enjoyed reading it. :) Your characters are so interesting. It's cool that even your Pokemon have really well developed personalities. And I also enjoyed learning more about what happened in Emerald.

I really love the small moments like Jacob dreaming of Phoebe leaning on him and waking to find Sophie doing the same thing. And also the last few lines at the very end. You have a real talent for this sort of thing. I could totally see this is a movie or something. Thanks for the great read!

Thanks Sarah! I never really noticed it until you said it, but I tend to write this as if it is a movie going on in my head, hence why I tend to skip over details such as travelling etc.

Fun fact: the original idea didn't include Sophie. Then I decided to do it to allow for more character building and development. Even then I didn't plan for Sophie to meet the fate she did. It wasn't until I was driving with a mate and telling him about it and he said "You should kill off the daughter". At first I was horrified but then thought about it and figured she'd cease to exist anyway.

Thanks again haha I am glad someone actually read it. I figured the length is enough to turn people off.