Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Altered Bonds
Chapter 14 — Kill Her and Make This Right
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Peace cozied itself at the shores of the beach. Tranquil waves out at sea lapped over each other.
A small figure, blacker than the clouded night sky, floated over the beach’s coastline and found what he suspected.
A battle had taken place here, with remnants of elemental attacks scattered about. Even one with an Oblivious Ability couldn’t ignore the smoking crater of burnt sand at the epicenter. He touched it, feeling bits of hot glass nick his crystalline armor-like body. And something else too, something brittle that crumbled at the touch of his oversized claw.
Shattered bones.
The figure rasped, his tail swishing with agitation. One of the keys to Lugia’s domain had been activated too — it’d been hidden in the nearby Stormsoaked Shores dungeon. On a whim, he turned his head to the sea, probing its depths.
Deep within, he felt an overwhelming presence. Lugia was still here? How unexpected. For what reason would he remain in this place?
Perhaps he should send him a message. An associate, he said, spitting out the phrase with distaste, came for you today. I can shackle that hound for a favor. Give me the item he seeks, and you will find peace.
The presence shifted. Loathing emanated from Lugia, but the figure sensed the fear beneath, the storm bird swimming away to keep a distance. Ironic — he was hardly a match for Lugia. He doubted he could even get an opening to stab him with a mutagen, not that he would resort to such idiocy.
But somebody else would.
The figure spun away from the sea, having more important matters to attend to. The Dungeon Plague take you, Oblivion Matter! Where are you?
He Teleported.
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Eastward. That was the direction Lucario fled in, trees blurring past.
He’d considered heading to Berrypark Town, considering it was the last place where Team Heavendust would expect him and Kecleon might be able to assist, but the low chance of finding him quick enough and the lower chance of getting actual help made him reconsider. Mismagius turned that reconsideration into a certain no.
Kecleon would curse him regardless, and he pitied his inability to at least warn him. He didn’t feel any guilt, however, nor deserving of the merchant’s irate temper.
This wasn’t his fault, after all. “You told them,” he judged Eira the Vulpix.
The false vixen hung tight in his arms, facing away from the constant wind blowing into their faces. “I—”
“Do you have the slightest idea how moronic that was?” Lucario zigzagged past a large trunk, resisting the urge to bite his lips off. “Acting behind my back and ruining everything?”
“I- they were going to—”
“Listen? Sympathize with the real you? Are you so naive that—”
“Excuse me?” Vulpix’s tails swished with sudden agitation, like he had hurled expletives at her. “Who are you to talk?”
The audacity in her words nearly made Lucario trip. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked. “You’d be dead if not for me!”
“If not for you? Thanks to you, now they’re certain we’re villains!” Vulpix snapped back. “They were just about to hear me out—”
They never would have. “Their auras were bright red! I watched the whole time—”
“They were scared! I could’ve calmed them down if not for you—”
Wind whistled, and Vulpix yelped as Lucario strafed to the side, but to no avail. Something plopped onto his back, between the blades of his shoulders, and he could’ve sworn everything seemed a little hazier, his focus dulled. It gave him a strange sense of anxiety, his sleepiness suddenly gone—
Worry Seed?
Aurasense was up too late. An Air Slash tossed Lucario into the air, the jackal hanging on to Vulpix for dear life and forcing himself to ignore the biting urge to drop prone and curl into himself. In the depths of his mind, he howled at his accursed luck.
One, his Inner Focus Ability was gone, replaced by Insomnia.
Two, Shaymin and Togetic were already free from their stun condition.
Which led to three — they were virtually everywhere. Lucario’s aurasense saw Togetic’s red aura darting amongst shadows with impossible speed, Land Forme Shaymin riding atop her. Their attacks spoke for them, Lucario hard-pressed to dodge Tri-Attacks and Air Slashes with a combination of Quick Attacks and Detects. Vulpix had her eyes wide and her breath shallow, understanding what would happen if he stumbled.
Which, without Inner Focus’s flinch immunity, was a very real threat. One hit from Shaymin’s Air Slashes would end everything. How did they catch up already? questioned Lucario, before realizing the obvious answer.
Shaymin’s Natural Cure to shake off the Stun Seed’s effect, Togetic’s purity sensing, and a Quick Seed. His only consolation was that the Mythical couldn’t fly herself during nighttime. Should’ve gotten rid of Togetic’s Treasure Bag, he mindlessly thought.
Yet Gabite could just loan them his items, couldn’t he? His sense of justice snarked back. You’re failing her, you simple-minded fool. Your trainer’s as good as—
An Air Slash nicked his aura feelers, Lucario growling at his poor attention span. In a deft motion he moved Vulpix, cradling her with one arm and scrabbling for the Worry Seed planted on his back with the other. Feeling its shell, he crushed it and tossed its remains away, his Inner Focus returning to him. One problem handled.
A second Worry Seed whizzed by, followed by quick beams of Tri-Attack and Energy Balls. Lucario fired back with Aura Spheres, defending himself from the hailstorm of moves. Rocks surged from the ground ahead with bright energy, and in fear Vulpix’s eyes flashed out.
By a miracle her Disable connected, Togetic’s Ancient Power crumbling to dust. Momentum carried her and her passenger Shaymin into a tree trunk, both grunting. “N-no wait, I didn’t—” stammered Vulpix.
Hollow words. Lucario barely distanced himself before a scowling Togetic was upon them again, Vulpix stiffening as the angelic’s forehead glowed up. Oh, irony, thought Lucario.
Multiple Extrasensory attacks followed, puncturing tree trunks and kicking up dirt with every explosion. Lucario practically rode the aftershocks, searching for an escape. It came in an unexpected way when Togetic foolishly darted in front of him.
Detect was enough to dodge a point-blank explosion. Lucario’s aura-eyes shone as he slipped to Togetic’s side and struck as painfully as he could with Metal Claw, before Force Palming her away. Vulpix hid her face as she tumbled over dirt, tossing Shaymin off. Lucario didn’t let up, firing Aura Sphere after Aura Sphere at the Mythical.
And then aurasense made him roll to the side, Gabite propelling out of the earth like a bullet. Red tracking lights hovered over his eyes, which equally saw red. “Forgot someone, traitor?” he said, forcibly slowing his words to balance out the Quick Seed he too had eaten. “What did she offer you for your loyalty?”
If dead silence conveyed Togetic and Shaymin’s aggression, then Gabite’s rant was a garbled poem of rancor. “Or do you have a choice?” he asked, Vulpix choking on air as he inspected her like an eldritch bug he yearned to squash. “She brainwashed you, didn’t she? Like they did. Making you follow her half-baked plot for who knows what.”
Lucario edged back, only for the earth below him to rupture. He yelled, barely managing to leap away as a flare exploded out, Lucario having a double-take when he noticed Shaymin’s paw pressed forcefully against the ground.
Gabite gave a manic grin. “She has Earth Power, you know that? There isn’t a place you can run away with your monster. Maybe now you’ll answer the questions bubbling in my mind? The questions that I’ve been waiting for SO LONG TO HAVE ANSWERED?”
He stomped closer, hissing like it was but breathing to him. Shaymin covered Lucario’s back, and Togetic rose to complete the circle. Vulpix shook under a constant tremor.
“P-please,” she pleaded.
Togetic spared nothing but her most demonic glare. “A friend wouldn’t lie,” she whispered.
And Shaymin, her dirtiest scowl. “There’s a reason you two always kept so quiet about your situation,” she said. “Why would you do that, when Togetic’s purity sense should’ve been enough to trust us? Instead, the human tries to coax us with a fairytale story to gain her sympathy, and when that fails, the jackal covers for her and assaults us.”
And Gabite — well, he was simply deranged. “I didn’t think the rabbit hole went so deep,” he said. “A human working with Abhorrents fighting against other Abhorrents. A power struggle, perhaps, a faction war? And Lugia surrounding it all? You two are the center of everything.”
To all this, Lucario could only think of one thing: Paranoid idiots.
Gabite brandished his claws. “Run and I’ll make this far more painful than necessary.”
Vulpix squeezed her eyes, her forehead a swirling mess of psychic energy. Lucario only smirked, however, and Gabite suddenly became uncertain, fear seeping into his frame as he scrutinized the false vixen’s forming Extrasensory. “A s-spell?” he questioned, Shaymin and Togetic backing up. “No, I—”
A perfect accidental distraction. Lucario grinned with relief as Eevee and his siblings razed the field.
He stood in the calm eye of their hurricane, Team Heavendust pelted under a barrage of element attacks. Fairy lights, flames, volts, waves, leaves, darkness, it all engulfed them. Espeon flung the trio at each other, Gabite unwillingly dogpiling his teammates with a roar, only for Glaceon to finish them with a sustained beam of ice.
In moments, they were frozen over, encased in layers of ice. Relief and mourning flashed in Vulpix’s eyes as Lucario turned to their rescuer with his aura eyes, Eevee staring back from atop a tree branch.
“Never question me again.” Eevee’s siblings congregated over his head, the Abhorrent himself taking labored breaths. “Now hurry, I don’t want to learn how fast they can thaw out.”
Very fast, considering Shaymin’s Natural Cure. Lucario ran after Eevee.
The twosome blitzed through the forest in record time, both bursting forward with timed Quick Attacks. Eevee became appalled when Lucario explained the situation, including how Vulpix had messed everything up. “Eira told them?” he yelled in a low voice.
“I’m as stunned as you,” replied Lucario, looking at Vulpix. The girl pursed her lips.
Eevee rolled his eyes. His siblings floated alongside them, ready for another fight if need be. “I’ll bite your heads off for this later,” said Eevee. “We’re now on the run, you two. We’ll lie low for a short while, then get off this island posthaste. I need your full cooperation, you understand?”
Ariados’s deal lingered in Lucario’s thoughts, the jackal sighing to himself. Had he chosen her, what would she do to protect Eira if word about her humanity spread? Regardless, he was forced to follow Eevee now. Abhorrents of all people might know where to best stay hidden, he considered.
Vulpix made a throaty noise. “This shouldn’t have happened,” she lamented.
“You caused it,” Lucario said back.
“I-I could’ve made them understand.”
Though Eevee didn’t understand the raw human words, he still picked up on how stubbornly foolish she was being. “You still hope to win their trust?” he said. “And I was told humans were known for their sharp intellect and insight. Even a child wouldn’t be so aloof to her plight.”
Eira the Vulpix writhed. The forest thinned out ahead, Lucario and Eevee reaching the hilly plains beyond. Considering their current location, Tallgrass Meadow wasn’t too far away from here, with the road to Lakehome Town up north. And Stringed Forest too.
They descended a small hill when Vulpix’s mouth opened. “Did you know?” she said. “About the prophecy?”
Eevee skidded to a stop, his siblings appearing uncomfortable. In the silence that ensued, Lucario realized why she asked — because Eevee would’ve known. Because he’d been searching for humans, and knew rumors about them.
The Abhorrent’s reply came a little forced. “Tall tales,” he said. “Who told her, Lucario?”
The jackal prayed it was only tall tales — that Eevee could show Eira the silliness of this whole prophecy thing. “Ariados,” he said. “And some Mismagius.”
“Wha- excuse me? There’s a Mismagius who knows about the girl?”
Feverish warmth spread through Lucario’s face. Did he have to tell Eevee about the witch? “Look, she could see through her disguise—”
“Imbeciles,” snapped Eevee, his tail spiked upward and seeking to stab someone. “How’d you let everyone and their deceased Shedninjas know your secrets? Do both of you have no sense of self-preservation?”
Lucario clenched his teeth. “I swear, Eevee, I’ve done all I could to keep—”
“How much did you know?” Vulpix cut in, Lucario barely able to keep her restrained in his grasp. “Is it true? Am I a m-monster?”
Eevee’s mouth opened to yell, only to pause when Vaporeon swooped upon him with a restraining look. The Abhorrent fidgeted and dropped his aggression, though impatience remained.
“As I said, I’ll bite your head off later,” he told Lucario, who snorted in response. “And Eira the Vulpix, please, save this prophecy thingy for later. We need to reach shelter before your former teammates catch up.”
Vulpix tilted her head in reluctant acceptance. Scarcely did they resume moving, however, when Espeon swung her head in alarm. Lucario felt his feelers twitch, and the other siblings turned as one, Eevee darting to the top of the next hill.
Ariados teleported in front of him, accursed red tracking lights over her eyes, and swiped without abandon.
Lucario failed to process, much less react to the moment. Startled from the teleportation, Eevee took every single blow before being tossed aside by the spider, his siblings sharing his pain as their forms wavered. Espeon hurried to lock her in place with Psychic, but Ariados again teleported to Eevee, scoffing as her foreleg sharpened into a needle glowing with Bug-type power.
Eevee took the Fell Stinger to the chest and collapsed. His fellow siblings ruptured at once, turning into agonized wisps that fled back into their soul-linked host, and Ariados beheld a horrified Lucario and Vulpix with sheer malevolence.
Red energy shot up from her needle and coursed through her entire body, empowering her. “You accepted war,” she hissed.
Dropping Vulpix, Lucario conjured a Bone Rush and ran at her. A foolhardy attempt, as Ariados punished him and blitzed forward to throw a Sucker Punch first, hurling him with great strength. She spat out a glob of webbing, and Lucario grunted as the sticky material latched on and expanded into a net, entangling him.
That grunt turned into an animalistic howl when Ariados forced down a flailing Vulpix, her screams muffled as the spider furiously spun her into a ball of silk. Soon she was trapped in a solid cocoon.
“I came to get a response on our alliance, and I find you here, cooperating with Abhorrents.” Ariados tossed the cocoon onto her abdomen, the arm-leg appendages on her back clutching her with a death grip. “What innocence is there in such a deed?”
The Warp Scarf on her arm-leg glowed and hummed, and Lucario felt heartache. Ariados had caught them with Eevee.
No.
She was going to murder Eira.
No, I refuse!
He failed at his one purpose.
I WON’T LOSE HER TOO!
Metal Claws tore apart the Sticky Web, Lucario’s guardian instincts on overclock as he flung himself at Ariados. The spider fired more webs, but he evaded with a single Detect, dashing into her—
The air twisted, and Lucario and Ariados tumbled away from each other, the jackal sensing the abrupt change in surroundings. A dirt path lay underneath him, next to the shaded woods he immediately recognized as Stringed Forest. He’d been teleported.
And the resulting dizziness cost him. Ariados wasted no time scurrying off with the squirming pile of silk that was Vulpix’s cocoon, her legs moving with Agility’s swiftness. She’ll lose me in her dungeon! realized Lucario.
He ran, but Ariados had her headstart. The further they delved into the forested area, the gloomier it got and the more twisted the trees became. Thick webbing began to hang from the branches as an ominous marker, Lucario getting the feeling that once he went past—
Ariados vanished in the deepest part of the gloom. Lucario gasped and dove after, his body tingling as the Mystery Dungeon laid bare its true form before him.
The twisted trees stayed, but spider webs now grew all over the moody place, silk dangling from tree branch to tree branch. Coarse brown paths covered in stray leaves, sticky webbing, and fallen twigs carpeted the ground. Eerie bug-like noises chattered in the background, an irritation to Lucario’s ears.
And Ariados stood a distance away, mocking him with her still gaze. “Drop her,” rasped Lucario, his body burning up with a warning flare of aura.
Ariados blinked at the brilliant blue light, the tracking lights over her eyes shifting in tandem. Red-purplish mist swirled around her foreleg.
Lucario moved too slow as she struck the earth, a field of mist bursting out and condensing into enraged spider Pokespawn. Green Spinarak restrained the jackal with String Shots, and tiny yellow Joltik jumped and shocked him with their Electrowebs. In moments he was lying on the ground, the spiders crawling all over him.
He could’ve sworn he heard Vulpix’s voice, drenched in terror as she called for him. Despair stabbed Lucario, and he hacked away at the swarm of Pokespawn, fighting to save the one and only thing keeping him from breaking apart. “ARIADOS!” he roared out.
The matriarch scuttled away. In his mind, eyeless Unown forming the phrase ‘Stringed Forest, B1F’ jeered at him in garbled, distorted screeches.
Lucario yelled like never before.
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She was a goner. Eira the Vulpix knew that. And yet she screamed for help anyway.
Nobody came. Nobody could.
Though only the tiniest gaps in her cocoon did she even see what happened, Lucario fighting off the swarm of Pokespawn with a ferality that matched Gabite’s. She shivered when Spinarak walked past her and Ariados like they were invisible, the spider waving them toward Lucario with her hindleg.
She’d been told Ariados held minor control over her dungeon — that was where she was now, wasn’t it? — but summoning and commanding Pokespawn did not feel minor. How much power did Legendaries have then in controlling dungeons?
Ariados turned a corner, obscuring Vulpix’s ability to see Lucario’s plight. The hole in her heart throbbed.
This wasn’t how she wanted to reunite with Mother.
All this because she messed up her talk with Togetic and Shaymin. She’d been too worried about saying the truth, too slow to say it, and Lucario’s overzealousness in keeping her safe ruined her last chance. They could’ve hindered Ariados from spreading the word about a Vulpix disguised as a human, she thought. With their reputation as explorers, people would believe them over her, right?
And Kecleon didn’t already do that for you, Eira?
Vulpix frowned and let her eyes droop.
Perhaps owning the dungeon gave Ariados a sense of direction too, for she quickly found the stairs she sought. You didn’t plan for anything, her inner voice snapped as Ariados descended, darkness covering what little vision Vulpix had as the entrance sealed itself. Once Ariados revealed the exact disguise you’re taking and who you’re with, who’d save you then? You never knew how Togetic and Shaymin could help you! You just hoped they’d understand.
True. All of it was true. She put herself at risk without even knowing what payoff she wanted, and that brought her here. But we needed allies, she still argued. People to trust.
And so you compromised Lucario and Eevee’s trust.
Ariados emerged onto Stringed Forest’s second floor, Vulpix stuck in a hopeless rut as she hurried onward to carry out her execution. It was stuffy in the cocoon, come to think of it, like a bed blanket thrown over her entire body. A sticky, gross blanket she could practically taste, pressed too close against her muzzle and making her want to gag.
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Another set of stairs. Vulpix waited as Ariados delved into the third floor, wondering when she would do the deed. How much distance did she need from Lucario? He can’t save me now, she whimpered.
Her eyes glazed over an Oran Berry covered in layers of webbing, squished into a gooey and unusable mess. I’m going to die.
Oh, get a grip, Eira.
Her inner voice took on a commanding tone, alerting Vulpix to her left paw. It had a little wriggle room in her cocoon, just enough to shift her paw freely.
Ice Shard. You can cut open the cocoon.
A pointless effort. She’ll catch me again, Vulpix muttered.
So? Fight her off. Run away. Or do you really have no sense of self-preservation? What would Lucario think?
She hesitated. Questioned her chances.
What would Mother think?
Vulpix’s chest burned. She commanded her inner frost, and a single, needle-like Ice Shard manifested within her paw.
It was a slow, grueling effort. The webs were thick, and she needed mobility. She twisted her little ice blade to hack away at the silk holding her foreleg first, giving her a little more wriggle room. Carefully did she move, trying not to alert Ariados. Much to her alarm, the spider was already crawling into the next staircase, and with a calmer gait than usual.
She had to hurry, or else. Vulpix tore at the webs bound to her chest, and then her other paw, chopping them off with the kind of deftness she reserved for chopping up a salad for Mother. And then shuddered, because the thought of it made her homesick, and she had no home left.
Just keep going, Eira, she told herself, cutting through the webs and through her pain. Please, keep fighting.
She breathed a little easier upon tearing off the webs smothering her face. She couldn’t reach her stiff back legs or tails, but fine. She cut up enough of the internal cocoon. Now she had to rip it open.
She elongated her Ice Shard into a dagger, but scarcely did she begin to thrust holes into her cocoon when she realized Ariados had entered one more set of stairs, stone covering the entrance and plunging her into darkness. “The jackal has too many advantages,” Ariados muttered aloud. “Better typing, aura powers — I only bested him with Kecleon’s help. But he’s too far away now to track us.”
Dim moonlight streamed in as the door at the bottom of the stairs opened up to Stringed Forest, B5F. Vulpix gasped as Ariados tossed her down, the vixen rolling into a tangle of limbs within her cocoon.
Barely could she see Ariados’s face peek into the cocoon, the red lights over her eyes gone. “Trying to escape, weren’t you?”
Vulpix cried out in pain as the spider jabbed her through the cocoon and deep into her fur, poison oozing into her wounds. Nausea flooded her mind, a burning sensation in her veins. Bad, Bad!
Vulpix thrashed in her prison, throwing her whole weight to the side, but Ariados kept digging her bladed legs through the cocoon. Each time, more holes were punctured through the string. An opening? A way out? Was Ariados helping her? Of course not, she wanted her dead—
Poison made her delirious. Scars from Aerodactyl’s earlier assault burned anew, and Vulpix felt her tipping point. Her mind was fire, and fire wanted to explode.
It did. Extrasensory sent her ripping out of her prison, and Ariados toppling onto her back. Remnants of her cocoon clung to Vulpix’s back, the vixen slicing them off with an Ice Shard and wriggling her tails free. Wow, she should’ve blown herself up with Extrasensory earlier! It was so liberating to be able to walk and prance around again—
Eira the Vulpix threw up bile and yelled at what little sense of being she had to run. Somehow she thought of the dungeon stairs — Feebas had been poisoned before, and she cured herself by going down a dungeon floor. She had to hurry.
Ariados lunged at her, and Vulpix’s wide eyes shone on the spot before dodging, the spider hissing as she took the Disable and tumbled past her. The vixen peppered her with Ice Shards, making a blind run for it as the spider screeched.
Twice the vixen toppled before rolling back to her unsteady feet, her forehead burning up again. “Stay and die!” demanded Ariados as she came upon her again, only for Vulpix to send her keeling with Extrasensory’s concussive force. Why did she want to get rid of this poison again? Extrasensory was easier to use with all this pain aiding her—
Vulpix grabbed her face with her tails and ran harder, zigzagging between corridors. She stumbled, somehow dodging a String Shot, and found the stairs before her. Her head spun, and she practically tripped inside.
Ariados came after, but Extrasensory instantly threw her out, a sliding stone moving to block access to the stairs. The spider crawled back and peered through the gap, chittering with rage as she thrust her appendages against the stone. For a moment Vulpix feared she’d force it open, but the spider reconsidered in the end, retracting her legs and letting it close.
Total darkness came over her, and Vulpix groaned from happiness. Her muscles slackened, leaving her to lie content on the stair steps. Already she felt the poison fading, and with it the sick feeling that made everything woozy.
How did she pull through against those odds? Pokemon were such hardy creatures.
No time to reflect though. Injured and hurting as she was, Vulpix kept her pace up as the stairs opened up, leading her to the sixth floor of Stringed Forest. How many more to go?
And what next, for that matter? Where would she go if she escaped? Gabite might’ve found Eevee in his knocked out state already, and waiting for Lucario would only make her an easy target for Ariados. Maybe Kecleon? But chances were that Team Heavendust already alerted Berrypark Town to what she was, and Mismagius complicated things further. And Togetic and Shaymin definitely won’t help me now.
Distress grabbed her neck, but she shoved it off. Spotting an incoming group of Spinarak, she iced them in Powder Snow before fleeing from the remainders. Somehow, she would make it. Lucario was her main hope now. He had to make it, but first she had to escape Stringed Forest. And Ariados, who could appear at any moment.
Spider webs lay on the floor around the next staircase. Vulpix sidestepped them and went in, glancing outside the stairs as it closed itself off. She gasped when something snuck in, instantly showering it in snowy pellets.
When light finally filtered in from the exit, she found herself staring at a freshly made Joltik-popsicle. The Pokespawn shuddered inside until it evaporated into wisps, Vulpix restaining the urge to pity it. She moved down the stairs, freezing when she saw floor seven.
It was like an entirely different place, the dungeon air losing its foreboding touch. Gone was the ominous webbing and dreary darkness. Well, there was string lying around—
But they made up hammocks and silky ropes hanging around a large village of houses built with modest materials. Wooden, cozy homes, clean dirt pathways, stone structures mixed with ones of faded clay and brick, and lantern lighting gave ambience to the sleepy place, the faux night sky above twinkling with dot-sized stars. Some of the buildings seemed to be reinforced with webs, while others had silk threads layered onto them, dyed in muted colors as an oddly cute decoration. Towering, not-so-gnarled trees surrounded the whole place in a kindly circle, with much smaller ones growing inside the village itself.
Nobody wandered the streets this late. Vulpix turned back, surprised to find she’d stepped out of a gate-shaped knothole in one of the giant trees around the perimeter. The tree in the opposite direction housed a similar hole, clearly the dungeon’s exit.
Stringed Forest Village, Vulpix read the information the red-purplish mist the dungeon gave her about this place. It’s beautiful.
But she couldn’t dawdle. She needed to reach the other side.
As she went down the streets and past humble houses, however, something told her it was too quiet here. Almost sure she could hear legs skittering and moving about, she glanced at windows built with string nets for meshes. She saw nobody, but her fur spiked up regardless.
Afraid, she beelined for the knothole. Her paws kicked up a puff of dust as she came upon an empty field that could pass for a training area.
And there she found someone. An old-looking scarab beetle with white, prominent white hairs and a beet red face that sharply contrasted with his teal body. Waiting.
He floated mid-air, holding a purple sphere with a red-pinkish sphere inside with his arms. “I was told we might have visitors,” he croaked. “You’re the one, aren’t you?”
Vulpix had a double-take upon realizing the Pokemon’s mouth was above his eyes. As it turned out, he was upside-down, holding his sphere with his legs. What kind of Pokemon is he? she wondered.
As if hearing her, the Pokemon inclined his head. “Our matriarch told my name to you, human. I am Elder Rabsca.”
Elder Rabsca. The one whom Ariados learned the prophecy from. Vulpix sucked in a mouthful of air, her feet suddenly refusing to budge despite the threat of Ariados’s imminent arrival.
Not as if it mattered. Emerging from the darkness, a stern Heracross stomped into view, the large beetle flexing its powerful arms. Then a creepy green-brownish spider with a mustache and cylindrical arms and legs, bunched into pairs so that it stood much like a human trained in martial arts. A Scyther flew beside him, the two bickering to each other before staring at her with muddled curiosity.
Now Vulpix was certain she felt eyes watching her back. In the alleyways, she spotted ample shapes, all retreating with hushed whispers upon being spotted. A Butterfree was one of the exceptions, her hands clasped as she watched the scene. Another was a Larvesta, her five red horns drooping as she spoke with the trembling Wrumple beside her.
Turning to the knothole exit, her resolve faltered as she found a tarantula Pokemon she guessed was a Galvantula, standing guard. “You’re trapping me here,” she said.
Rabsca eyed the villagers who’d joined him with a melancholic chuckle. “So you’re not mute,” he said.
“The matriarch,” grumbled Heracross. “She said she would return with the human and her Lucario accomplice. To find them a way out of our homeland.”
“But the infiltrator comes alone,” hissed the green-brownish spider, waving at Vulpix. “A sign, a terrible sign. She will destroy us.”
“I doubt it, Spidops.” Scyther elbowed the spider, who chittered back with anger. “This is the prophesied human Ariados worries herself to sleep over, Rabsca? What a strange thing for our people to fear. She’s so timid, so underwhelming, so—” he waved his mantis-like blade. “So pitiable.”
“An irony.” Rabsca shook himself, facing Vulpix again. “I sense your thoughts and memories, child. The prophecy scares you.”
Vulpix only noticed it then, a silent pressure prodding at her head. The other villagers’ gazes shifted, and she looked over her shoulder with expectancy. A short distance, crawling into the lantern light, was a tired-looking Ariados.
She caught up.
“I’m sorry that I cannot comfort you,” said Rabsca, and Vulpix sensed he meant it. “But I know my myths well, transformed human, and your presence aligns with the prophecy. Somehow, you’re meant to harm us.”
“I—” Vulpix pressed her tails against her, forcing out the words. “How? In what way could I shatter the world? What—”
Ariados’s leg tapped her spine. She shivered.
“My people remember how this dungeon swallowed up our home,” stated Ariados. “We were lucky. As the dungeon warped our land and ravaged the village, I stumbled upon a strange shard-like piece, blue with red-purplish veins and a distorted, shadowy aura, and accidentally absorbed it.” She closed her eyes, reliving the memory. “It gave me fl*dgling control over this place.
“The village survived intact, and Pokespawn wouldn’t harm us so long as I willed it. Still, it never should’ve happened, and many of my people left in fear. The rest of us wondered what would come next.” Ariados tsked. “Then along you came, an ill omen in a time of erratic dungeons and Abhorrent monsters. And you chose to ally with one of those monsters.”
Murmurs came from all around. Vulpix felt like a spectacle on display, a criminal for a mob to dump their grievances upon as she took in Spidops’s vicious scowl and Heracross’s hardened gaze. “The Eevee,” Rabsca said. “If you’ll excuse me, however, dear matriarch? She’s helping him, yes, but apparently to find a cure for the mutation—”
“Is it possible her naive wish to do good will go horribly wrong? Has she deceived herself with a false song?”
Hearing an echo of the prophecy’s verses, Vulpix found herself gutted, a nameless anxiety made crystal-clear to her. Why did she feel a little hesitant to work with Eevee? Why did she think Togetic and Shaymin were better options?
Because she feared this. Because maybe helping Eevee would inadvertently bring about the prophecy.
Scyther sighed as if he was the only reasonable person around these parts. “Surely the human recognizes her mistake, matriarch,” he said. “If we must get rid of her, why do we commit to murder? Wipe her mind of this place if you want, cast her off the islands by tying her to a ship or by finding some Ultra Wormhole to drop her in—”
It took massive amounts of willpower for Vulpix to not violently squirm. Ultra Wormholes? Anything but those horrible murder rifts, anything!
“—but killing is a grave thing. Death could prove her innocence anyway, that another human is fated to do the deed. Must we be so rash?”
More murmurs. Heracross softened a little at the thought of execution, and even Spidops seemed reluctant to kill, human or no human.
It meant little in the end. “Only a villain or a naive fool works with Abhorrents,” Ariados chided, before expressing a piece of her inner turmoil. “Believe me, Scyther, I’d prefer this to end without bloodshed. But humans are too dangerous, and this one chose a path toward our world’s destruction. The dead can’t come back to haunt us.”
She pinned down Vulpix. “Your guard dog isn’t the only one who’ll go to any lengths to protect what he holds dear,” she whispered, a strain in her voice. “You know what you are, and fear yourself just as we do. By killing you, we make things right.”
Vulpix shivered. In spite of knowing she was a goner, in spite of the prophecy’s condemnation, she still clung to life. “Please,” she begged.
Scyther fidgeted with his bladed mantis-like arms. “You’re sure she’s a human?” he said with a tone of defeat.
Ariados’s leg snapped toward Vulpix’s wristband. She snatched it away.
She may as well have torn off her skin and muscles, Eira feeling herself rip apart before forcibly morphing back into her normal self. Gasps from the village audience ran around at the sight of her larger, helpless human form, Rabsca turning away and Scyther eyeing her with resignation. Heracross’s face was a mask, Spidops hissing beside him.
Ariados said something she couldn’t translate without her band, which she now threw to the ground. The leg she wasn’t using to pin her down glowed, seeking to rip apart her only means of protection.
It was silly, really. She couldn’t do anything to stop Ariados, yet she still reached out to spare her wristband. Instincts from being a Vulpix held on tight, Eira calling upon her spirit as her hand moved forward.
It scared her when her soul responded. Ice formed.
Ariados leapt back as much as she did, everyone present freaking out at the bolt of misty frost that left her fingertips. Eira and Ariados scrambled away from each other, Eira withdrawing her hand and disbelieving the sheer cold she felt come out of it. What? Did she— how? How?
It was too surreal to think about. In a daze she turned back to the wristband, left unclaimed. “Rii!” screeched Ariados, darting to snatch it away first.
A loud whack reverberated throughout the village, and Ariados went high into the air. Eira’s eyes rose with further disbelief as she grabbed the wristband and met Lucario.
Her saving grace had come, and a boulder’s weight was lifted off her shoulders.
And then she realized something was amiss. Lucario was growling like mad, aura bone spinning in his paw and his chest heaving with fury. Recklessly he leapt at Heracross, striking away his powerful horn and hurling him with a vicious Force Palm. An uproar occurred amongst the hidden villagers, Rabsca fleeing for his own safety while Spidops shifted into a fighting position. Scyther scowled and joined him.
String Shots flew out from the shadows, Eira hastening to put the wristband back on before morphing into her Alolan Vulpix form. Few targeted her, fortunately, the villagers focused on restraining Lucario as he slammed into Scyther with a roaring rage. Spidops swung his many arms only to receive a brutal uppercut, Lucario grabbing his body to use as a meat-shield against the String Shots. What’s gotten into him? thought Vulpix.
Silk covering his sputtering face, Spidops locked his arms behind Lucario’s and flipped. The jackal gasped as he flung him off in a fancy act of acrobatics, Vulpix feeling the impact of his body crashing into one of the stone buildings. Ariados reemerged, her visage warped into pure disgust as her foreleg glowed red-purplish.
Pokespawn appeared at her command, Spinarak and Joltik striking the stunned Lucario. He can’t fight them off, Vulpix realized, before shaking herself. Not alone.
She rushed to Lucario’s side, aware of Spidops moving to stop her. Intense focus sent her into a trance, and Vulpix’s forehead lit up, Extrasensory forming with an awaiting hum. Hers to command for once.
She fired, and the explosive force sent him careening away. Vulpix continued onward, tossing Ice Shards and buffeting Ariados’s Pokespawn in Powder Snow, the matriarch watching them vanish into wisps with widened eyes. Those eyes shifted to Lucario, who pulled himself up with a dark cackle.
“You’ll pay,” he said.
“Stop them!” Ariados ordered, and Scyther moved. He and Lucario traded blows, swiping at each other with swift strikes, Lucario’s greater strength only beset by his accumulated fatigue. Vulpix’s Ice Shards instantly put down Scyther, however, the mantis staggering from the super-effective blows.
Lucario knocked him away without a second glance, dashing toward Ariados with vengeful intent. Ariados’s eyes widened, her face twisting into a look of unbearable horror—
Vulpix Disabled her Scary Face, Ariados flinching from the stun. Horror followed when Lucario followed up with a barbaric Bone Rush, bludgeoning her like it was his sole mission. One definitive strike and she was sent sprawling, labored breaths coming from her chest.
And he kept going. “Lucario, stop!” cried Vulpix.
“YOU’LL PAY!” said Lucario, bashing her again and again as Ariados feebly fought back. “TRYING TO KILL HER—”
Vulpix pinged him with an Ice Shard, Lucario swinging around to freeze under her cold stare. “She’s not worth it,” she said, “just get us out!”
That pulled him out of his bloodlust, thank goodness. Lucario growled once at Ariados before moving to the exit, and Vulpix followed, clutching her head.
Villagers moved in the shadows, spitting out String Shots and other attacks, and Vulpix covered for Lucario by blocking with her Powder Snows. The Larvesta from before rolled in, a spinning wheel of fire that she stopped cold with her icy breath. Butterfree flew in, only to flee back as she fired Ice Shards at her. Heracross again came for her, but Extrasensory again pushed him back, knocking him into an unprepared Spidops.
The villagers were generally wary enough not to engage. Their real hurdle to escape came instead from the knothole exit itself — the Galvantula there had webbed it in crackling Electro Webs, making it impassable. Rabsca too was there to defend, his eyes glowing with Psychic force.
Lucario and Vulpix found themselves immobilized under its weight. “I truly am sorry,” Rabsca said, “but I am obligated—”
Disable. Rabsca reeled and lost his Psychic hold.
Scyther, Heracross, and Spidops converged on the exit, a wounded Ariados teleporting to the sidelines. “They can’t escape, THEY CAN’T!” she yelled, and Galvantula moved to defend her temporary web trap. Lucario engaged the electric spider with Bone Rush, and Vulpix charged up Extrasensory, aiming at the web. Ariados engulfed her leg again in red-purplish dungeon aura, seeking to delay them with Pokespawn.
And then blazing darkness everywhere. Black flames ravaged the area, the web somehow spared from the attack, and Vulpix turned around as Ariados screamed.
She screamed too. Pretty much everyone in the village was screaming, all eyes on the large shadowy monstrosity whose claws nicked a hyperventilating Ariados. “Now why is everyone awake at such a bewitching hour?” asked Aerodactyl.
White spindly pieces of regrowing bones floated in his body. His skull was barely existent, his mouth nothing more than a wreath of darkness that parted to reveal a throat of shadowfire. Not him, not him! thought Vulpix.
Aerodactyl gave an unhinged smile, his teeth made up of solidified void. “My, even the Lucario and Vulpix brat are here,” he said with a polite snarl, Lucario’s face white as a sheet. “You know what a nuisance you and that Eevee were, getting in my way? I’d love to chat with you—”
He swung his head toward Ariados, pressing his claw deeper. “—But I have business here. I’ve heard of your dungeon, Ariados, the one you’ve tamed with a very special item. Give it to me.” His other claw unfurled, and Vulpix had a heart attack at the corrupted icy Z-Crystal he carried. “Now.”
Nobody dared to move. Not Scyther, nor Heracross or Spidops. Rabsca was a stiff statue, the other villagers made a point of hiding from Aerodactyl’s bright red eyes, and Ariados was looking onward like his threat was far graver than any human-related prophecy. And it was, for Vulpix realized if she gave up control of the dungeon, she gave up the entire village.
Ariados couldn’t do that. “You are testing me,” purred Aerodactyl. “Amusing. But I’ve had my fair share of being tested, and while your item only mimics a fraction of the power I seek, it’ll suffice in the short-term. It will make for a wonderful gift to a friend of mine.” A smile too large for a creature of flesh and bones stretched across his body of dark miasma. “But of course, we’re not yet friends, are we?”
He was going to mutate her. Despite all that Ariados did, Vulpix couldn’t stand the thought. She eyeballed Lucario, who bared his teeth, yet offered the slightest of grim nods.
Aerodactyl’s back was turned. “I can fix that,” he said, Ariados shaking as he raised his corrupted Icium-Z. “We can make a trade offer, you see! My gift for your—”
Vulpix let loose a Disable, and as Aerodactyl screeched and spun to glare daggers at her, Lucario leapt in and ripped the Z-Crystal mutagen out of his grasp.
Instantly Aerodactyl clawed at him, the crystal tossed to the ground in the scuffle. Scyther moved faster, however, slashing without abandon at the shadowy monster. Then Heracross and Spidops, the latter hissing with disgust as they ganged up on Aerodactyl. Being little more than a mass of darkness over a barely reformed skeleton, the blows practically warped his very shape, Aerodactyl writhing as he kept nabbing the crystal only for a well-timed strike to make it slip out of his claws.
Nobody else dared clutch the crystal, too afraid of risking Aerodactyl’s full ire or getting accidentally mutated. Ariados’s face stayed stuck looking upward, as if Aerodactyl still held her.
Lucario clutched his feelers as Aerodactyl imploded, his body of shadow turning into ever-shifting black ooze. His eyes were white spirals, Vulpix pressing her lips at the static clouds cloaking him, otherworldly screeches coming out of whatever his mouth had been twisted into. Distortion Frenzy, she realized.
Still Heracross bravely assaulted the crazed Abhorrent, Scyther grunting and following suit. Mindlessly Aerodactyl swiped his mangled not-quite-a-claw, frothing when an uneasy Spidops pinned it down with a Sticky Web. He thrashed and swung his tail, only to clutch his face when Vulpix fired another Disable. A terrible crackle sounded as his head morphed into a myriad of gnashing mouths, one somehow stretching out to grab the unclaimed Z-Crystal.
A smile blossomed on that mouth as it flung the crystal at Vulpix. Just barely slow enough for her to see her life flashing before her eyes, to see pure devastation in Lucario’s as he fired an Aura Sphere to intercept—
The crystal paused mid-air, stuck in a Psychic hold just inches from Vulpix’s snout. The false vixen tumbled back in reflex, looking to Rabsca but finding him just as bewildered, his Psychic apparently still Disabled. The Aura Sphere harmlessly flew past.
And then Aerodactyl screeched at a new yet familiar torment, Scyther, Heracross, and Spidops backing off as Eeveelution spirits attacked his distorted form with their elemental attacks. He turned his head of mouths in time for a collision course with a stony Eevee’s Iron Tail.
The attack sent him flying into Galvantula’s Electro Web, partially tearing it. The resulting electrocution practically shocked him back to clarity, Aerodactyl reforming into a blob of dinosaur-shaped shadow with shattered bone pieces floating within. He pointed at Eevee, but the Abhorrent only batted an eye. “What, too weak to control us?” he taunted.
In front of the dumbfounded village, he struck once more with Iron Tail, felling Aerodactyl. Espeon levitated the Icium-Z in front of him, giving him a front-row seat to watch it shatter under her and Umbreon’s attacks. Vulpix breathed out.
Saved. By Eevee. How’d he recover so fast from fainting?
Spidops took a step toward Eevee, but Heracross stopped him, waving at his ghost siblings. Ariados finally stirred, her eyes glazed as she eyed Eevee, then Lucario. They lingered a little longer on Vulpix, lost.
“I’m taking back the girl, so no more funny business, please and thank you.” Eevee whipped back to Aerodactyl, his voice loud and theatrical. “Maybe there’s some good to this catastrophe after all? You can’t run this time, Aerodactyl. Your people have mutated too many good Pokemon, and now you’re going to spill everything to me, right in front of these lovely folks.”
The little fox stared down the large shadow dinosaur. “Who’s behind this madness, and how does Lugia play into this? Who’s this Primal Gear person you mentioned, a colleague of yours? Talk, you blighted creature! How do I freaking cure this disease you’re wrought upon us so me and my siblings can live normal lives again?”
Aerodactyl rasped in pain. “N-no cure.”
“Don’t give us that kind of—”
A black crystalline figure Teleported on top of Aerodactyl and pushed with Psychic, Eevee tumbling back.
A final round of gasps resounded throughout the village. Vulpix quaked as she beheld a fusion of fables floating before her, fearful wonder crossing Lucario’s face. “Gear?” said Aerodactyl.
Primal Gear. He was a Mew, covered in the black prism armor of a Necrozma. The floating cat’s three-fingered claws were nearly as large as his entire body of crystal, and his eyes were twin murals of colorful stained glass.
Vulpix could only be mesmerized in front of the dazzling Abhorrent. A Mythical creature of innocence and delight — said to have the essence of every other Pokemon that did and didn’t exist — tainted with the power of a Legendary being of light that once ravaged Alola. Z-Crystals came from Necrozma, she recalled with a jolt.
Perhaps Eevee thought the same thing, pulling himself up to face the Mew. “You make the mutagens,” he breathed, his siblings shaken at the Mythical’s sheer presence. “You’re the leader?”
Ariados sucked in a mouthful of air, fearful whispers coming from villagers trying to keep hidden in the darkness. Mew swept his eyes over them, then over a still Rabsca. Over Heracross, Spidops, and Scyther, rigid and afraid. Over Lucario, a storm of sweat on his brows.
His eyes strayed toward Vulpix for far too long, the vixen feeling like her own inner cold would freeze her to death. Mew’s mouth quirked, and a metallic laugh scraped his throat.
“I am not,” he said, his voice like clanging pieces of iron. “Nor do I make the mutagen itself. You and your two canine friends hindered Aerodactyl’s quest to mutate Lugia?”
Fear. It flowed in Vulpix’s veins like poisonous quicksilver. Did he see her mind? She never sensed it. How much did he see?
“Wise,” he said when Eevee nodded. “I am Primal Gear, but Mew will suffice.” He flicked Aerodactyl’s snout with an irritated grumble. “Pleased with yourself, Oblivion? You’ve wasted the altering Z-Crystals just to stir trouble, your stunts with Lugia nearly caused pointless destruction that could even rouse the cowardly Legendaries out of hiding, and now I’ve shown myself in front of a crowd just to save your sorry tail. For once, you might get more than a simple scolding for this unauthorized venture.”
Eevee and his siblings tensed, objecting to Mew taking away the vile Aerodactyl. As did Lucario, who formed an Aura Sphere.
Mew arched an eye and formed his own Aura Sphere in half the time, Vulpix wincing twice as hard as her allies did. “The Ariados,” whispered Aerodactyl. “She—”
“She safeguards her cursed village with an item I refuse to take,” snapped Mew. “But of course, the idiot who nearly created a feral Lugia doesn’t understand the necessity of morals.”
Ariados became a confused mess at this, her eyes drooping to the ground in contemplation. Lucario frowned as he made his Aura Sphere dissipate, and Mew in turn did the same.
“I thank you for stopping Aerodactyl, but I can handle him from here. Eevee, you and your siblings seek a cure for your most unusual and unfortunate mutation.” Mew waited for Eevee to acknowledge this before continuing with a wistful look. “I wish you luck, for I don’t know if there is one either. And as you’ve put it, we have mutated too many good Pokemon, haven’t we?”
With that he began dragging Aerodactyl, who hissed as his shadowy form scraped the earth. Mew tossed him into the knothole exit, nobody contesting him. He entered after, vanishing inside.
Vulpix’s tails touched her chest, her heartbeat erratic from the string of extraordinary events. Lucario and Eevee turned around to face Ariados, the spider stiff as stone.
“As if fate itself interfered,” Spidops muttered. “We’re not meant to get rid of the human.”
Heracross regarded Eevee, who gave them a warning glare. “If the human and her Abhorrent did save us from a rampaging Lugia,” stated the large beetle, “can she still be the prophesied one?”
Scyther scoffed. “Whatever she is, Their Highnesses can handle her for all I care. Who kills a child?”
The few villagers within earshot grew more and more hesitant, the fight drained out of them. Ariados moved her mandibles to yell, then stopped, eyeing Vulpix like she was something she no longer knew what to do with. Rabsca was the one to approach their group, shaking his head.
“Just go,” he said.
They did. Amidst the chaotic whispers of the village, Vulpix, Lucario, and Eevee entered the knothole. A tunnel of darkness greeted them inside, stretching onward.
“Another big name amongst the Abhorrents,” said a rankled Eevee. His siblings scowled with him, ticked off at losing Aerodactyl.
Vulpix tailed them and a speechless Lucario, Heracross’s words lingering in her head. Eevee was an Abhorrent, yet one who’d been helpful all this time to her. Surely she wasn’t naive by following him? Nothing prophecy-related would come of it, right?
The thought of it made her light-headed, as if the last hour or so hadn’t already done that. Team Heavendust, Ariados, Aerodactyl and Mew, it all overwhelmed Vulpix. What could come next? Her head fell to her wristband, the one Eevee gave her, and only found a greater burden. In all the excitement, she’d all but forgotten a life-changing detail.
She cast ice. As a human.
But that’s impossible.
Eevee and Lucario vanished in the darkness, and a pallid Eira the Vulpix joined them, leaving behind the village of Stringed Forest.