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A/N: Sorry for the wait, this chapter was extremely difficult. As always, this is a fight with no rules where Pokemon and people try to kill each other, so trigger warning.

CHAPTER 309 - TO SLAY A MONSTER

It barely took a second for everything to go to shit.

First came an intense heat washing over Denzel's skin and a light bright enough to blind him through his eyelids. It refracted all over the cave's gems and became a rainbow so radiant that colors were wrong the next time he opened his eyes. Above them all was a sun— a ball of raging, boiling plasma so loud he could barely hear himself think. Continuous explosions and howling, scorching winds from the most powerful Sunny Day he had ever seen instantly had him sweating bullets from beneath his winter coat, and it would have gone further, still, had Froslass not instantly sapped the heat from the air to keep Chase and Denzel from suffering from burns akin to Grace.

Chase said something to his left, but he quite literally couldn't hear. He had forgotten to keep track of Dusknoir and flinched when the ghost reappeared right in front of him, the mouth of his abdomen wide open and the screams of the souls he had captured barely breaking through the roar of the sun. The world turned monochrome as Dusknoir struggled against the shimmering Protect from Milotic that had kept him from dying right then and there, and a darkened, flaming void from Houndoom pushed him back. Lucario blurred with a burst of aura at his feet and shrapnel from aura-infused bones burst from Lucario's palm and shredded past his sickly, ghostly form.

Take a deep breath.

Fights all around him were going on simultaneously. Vikavolt crackled with a brilliant burst of electricity, shooting toward the floating Wigglytuff who had inflated like a balloon and was in the process of swallowing the sun. Bellossom was walking with thick, thorny vines from beneath her dress like an Octillery and kept Zangoose at bay, but a flex from Chase's Abomasnow froze them in place long for Altaria to hit the grass type with a Flamethrower. Seviper cut across Lopunny's arms with an acid-infused tail, melted fur and skin until Sylveon pulled her away by extending his ribbons. Dusknoir continuously tried to snipe off members of their team by swallowing them whole, but Lucario was barely enough to track him with aura and constantly communicated with Houndoom and Froslass so they could stalk the ghost and keep him at bay. Milotic blasted high-pressured water, foaming and barely contained toward Ninetales to keep it on the backfoot. If it was focused on shielding Mars, then it wasn't burning them to death.

The sound, the visual stimulation, the panic—it was all so overwhelming that he didn't know where to look or what to say. This was a battle with eighteen Pokemon, and he would never be able to keep track of what was happening at all times. It was only when Wigglytuff swallowed Ninetales' sun and glowed just as bright that Chase pulled Denzel close and yelled in his ear now that he had any chance to be heard.

"Ninetales is acting as her psychic!" he clammed. Sigilyph teleported away a blast of electricity from Clefable's fingers and hit Seviper instead, allowing Lopunny and Sylveon to press their advantage until Dusknoir forced them to retreat. "If we hit her or Dusknoir and kill them, we win the fight!"

"We have the numbers to overwhelm!" Denzel screamed back so hard his throat hurt. "But—"

Wigglytuff landed on the ground with a loud crash, creating a crater so wide that Roserade fell in. With the roar of the sun now gone and only other attacks from the surrounding fights to impede them, they could speak clearly again, and Chase barked out an order at Denzel to snap him out of it. He managed to recall her and release her close before her head slipped out of view, and high above them Vikavolt and Altaria tried to interrupt whatever it was Wigglytuff was doing, but Dusknoir— and it looked like that fucker was way faster than they'd ever given him credit for— stood in front of the attacks and took the hits like they were nothing. Wigglytuff's ears twitched, it scowled, and it opened its mouth again.

Then, light and a screech—

Denzel couldn't see.

He was blind. He blinked, he rubbed his eyes, but he couldn't see anything. The next moments felt like an eternity, underneath Milotic's protective bubble, and even that strained. When it all dissipated, no crystals or rainbows remained in their part of the cave. They were dust and ash, colorless stones that littered the floor. Milotic sagged with heavy breaths and the Protect dissolved. The cave itself was glowering red, save for the area below their feet. The heat from the attack had scorched every inch of stone, and Denzel could feel the heat on his face. The blast had left a clear indentation in the cavern floor where melted stone slowly pooled.

Their fliers were fine, and were still fighting. Vikavolt, Altaria, Sigilyph had been out of the blast's range. Roserade, Lucario and Sylveon were lucky to have been around Milotic at the time of the attack. Froslass had disappeared, fortunate not to have to bear the brunt of the attack, and Houndoom was nigh immune to the fire, but…

Zangoose, Lopunny and Abomasnow weren't as lucky. The first two were barely standing, but they'd been fast enough to get to the edge of the blast. Their legs were trembling, and their fur had been burned clean off. Their skin was charred— cooked to an extent than Denzel could smell it, and it took everything he had not to empty his stomach in front of him.

Yet, they were standing. Abomasnow, however, was not.

He'd been at the center. Denzel could barely recognize his shape.

Chase shut his eyes. "Is… Ri, is he—"

Denzel didn't know what Lucario answered to that, but there was no time to even mourn Abomasnow's possible death. Wigglytuff burped and grinned, Ninetales summoned another sun, and the fighting resumed all around him.

They could do this all day, he quickly realized. They were not alive, and so this attack— a blast from a sun amplified by Wigglytuff's belief— could be replicated over and over and they would never tire. Chase recalled his Abomasnow amidst the fighting, and again, the roar of the sun destroyed any chances but the loudest of words to make their way toward him.

Denzel screamed toward Chase, but he realized his friend must have had his hearing screwed by Wigglytuff's attack. Even he, still had a ring in his ear. Sigilyph wasn't good enough with barriers to block out sound, she had focused on other things like remote Teleportation.

Case in point, a column of flames powered by Ninetales' Sunny Day burst from Clefable's finger, and the fairy type got hit by its own attack. It snarled, but had no way to hope to even touch Sigilyph when she was in the sky. Instead, Clefable lifted a hand, brought it down, and Sigilyph crashed to the floor under the weight of gravity. Cracks formed in her ceramic-like skin, but the real attack came from Dusknoir, who phased back into reality with a fist wreathed in shadows whose screams Denzel could somehow still hear, and Seviper stopped dueling with Lucario and rushed toward the fallen psychic. The poison type's skin was scarred by countless aura or electrical burns, but again, they did not tire.

Wigglytuff, instead of floating up to swallow the sun again, swelled to an unbelievable size and blocked the ray from Chase's Pokeball. The red light just harmlessly touched its skin.

He couldn't recall her, yet instead of panicking, they used the opening to attack the sun with everything they had. Altaria's fiery Moonblast nearly collided with the burning ball of hot plasma and threatened to cleanse it, but Ninatale's eyes flashed with fury and the Moonblast exploded before it could touch it.

Something snapped in Zangoose's eye, and she blurred impossibly fast— she was already in front of Wigglytuff, her claws having grown twice their size and full of poison. The claws themselves didn't cut through Wigglytuff, but the poison did, and combined with multiple Poison Cutters from Roserade, the fairy type deflated like a balloon and went flying in the air. Vikavolt jumped to the opportunity and his mouth clamped down on Wigglytuff as he snatched it out of the sky, and appearing nearly completely like electricity, he flew away until they were both out of view. When all was said and done, Sigilyph was gravely hurt. Relying on her to be as snappy and reactive would be a lost cause, even if she could still fight.

Denzel turned to Chase, and he saw him mouth 'what now, bitch?'

Denzel blinked.

Through everything, he was still so focused on taking her down that he didn't even let the worry about Abomasnow and Vikavolt show on his face.

What am I doing? he asked himself, floundering and panicking, and for what? He moved for what felt like the first time in an eternity despite the battle barely having lasted two minutes, and he wiped the sweat of his forehead with a relaxed hand. Now that Wigglytuff was gone, Ninetales opted to fire lasers, literal lasers from her sun that scorched anything near them. Froslass managed to sap them of the worst of the heat, but any ice type attacks she fired would melt within seconds in the face of such power, and so she could only rely on Shadow Balls, Hexes, and Draining Kiss. Even Will-O-Wisps seemed to fall under Ninetales' control, once they got too close. They cried out from under their radiance and were pulled into her gravity as if they were fighting the sun itself.

Focus, he thought with a clenched fist. Ignore the fights around you. Ignore the fact that Dusknoir only hasn't killed all of you thanks to Houndoom fighting for his life and everyone else keeping him protected. There was more. Seviper, hidden in the shadows and looking for an opening. Bellossom, burned from her own teammate, yet constantly regenerating herself and slowly growing plants beneath her feet. Vines that snaked across the stone and Denzel feared what they would be capable of once the setup was finished. Clefable, jack of all trades, fired attack after attack and was capable of bending gravity to its will when anything got too close.

It was so difficult, to find an opening. To break the careful balance they had struck, only thanks to their advantage in number that still remained, yet he knew the situation was untenable. Sigilyph was letting Clefable's Thunderbolts, Flamethrowers, Magical Leafs and Water Pulses hit so much more often. Each of them was as powerful as a Pokemon who had mastered that type, or more. It wasn't infallible, given that its range with Gravity was at the very least manageable, but the point was this:

They were going to lose if nothing changed.

He could hear a little better now that Ninetales had exhausted her sun some, so he took a step toward Chase and screamed directly into his ear. "It's like you said!" he had to say it once, twice, three times for him to hear. "Ninetales needs to go before Bellossom finishes whatever the hell she's doing!"

"We can't really coordinate with this sound! Sig can't talk to relay, and Ri can't fucking hear!"

This might be a tough one, but…

"Let's hit Seviper!" Denzel yelled. When Chase looked at him like he was stupid, he continued. "It's out of left field, but they won't expect it!"

Out of every Pokemon here, Seviper was the least useful. It was an assassin built to take down its enemies by surprise, yet that was difficult when so many Pokemon had eyes and could track it with their various senses everywhere it went. Common sense therefore dictated that it should be the target they worried about the least.

He wished he could explain more, but he couldn't. Every word Chase understood was a miracle rather than the norm. If Denzel looked at this battle— really looked at this battle and took a step back, he could see the moving parts. The whole, rather than the individuals. At that level, at that scale, a fight turned more into a battle of concepts and tactics. Like two tides shifting and struggling against each other for every inch.

Mars' tactic was to keep Lucario, Houndoom, Froslass, and to a lesser extent, Sigilyph and Sylveon, stuck to her Dusknoir to have him absorb pressure that could be applied elsewhere otherwise, because if they didn't, then he would just kill all of them. Ninetales was her anchor, the crux of her strategy. It was the fire type, who was pulling the most weight. Who was allowing Bellossom to creep closer and closer with her thorny vines, and who had allowed Wigglytuff to hit them with something akin to the most powerful of Hyper Beams. Hers was a game of waiting and tiring them out, because as powerful as her Pokemon were individually, as much as they could battle at full capacity for so long, Denzel and Chase were enough to stand up to her for at least a few minutes.

Their impetus was to finish the battler quickly, and Mars knew it. She had, despite everything, good instincts. Her Pokemon knew exactly how to space his and Chases'. There was, however, a flaw in her plan.

Treat this like a battle. It's all a game, Denzel. Sport.

The words were crisp in his mind even with everything raging around him— mostly fire. A Moonblast from Sylveon had captivated Mars' team enough to allow Sigilyph to hit Mars with a blast of psychic energy akin to Psybeam, but stronger. Countless multicolored lightrays that were mixed together and grew into a single ray. The attack broke through Ninetales' barrier, and Mars' still wounded shoulder snapped clean off, and she lost an arm.

She was bleeding for this, too. Struggling. It was not a one-sided beatdown as Denzel feared it would be. They could live through this!

The weakness in Mars was that her Pokemon were treating Chase's with much more caution. They hesitated to get within their range or grasp and most of their ire was concentrated toward killing his Pokemon while Denzel's were allowed far more freedom of movement.

Oh. Oh, he saw it now. As if he was floating on top of the entire fight with an analytical eye and his instincts were pulling him forward. There was a very narrow path through this fight. He didn't know if she was underestimating him because he wasn't a shard, but this would work in his favor.

Next to him, Milotic spat out water in a cone and instantly froze it. From afar, Froslass briskly waved an arm and deconstructed the ice. The bits of frost and slush, barely held together by the ghost's technique, rushed toward Dusknoir and clumped around him, turning purple as they did so. Dusknoir screamed, and the ghost-posessed ice shattered in an instant, as did the spirits, but Houndoom used the opportunity to blow his arm away with more darkened fire that would never lose its vigor. Its fuel, as Denzel understood it, was—

Concentrate! There was a shape to this, a way to destroy Seviper before Mars or her Pokemon could realize what was happening…

Through a clenched fist, he managed to pull a plan for a small victory out of nothing. He could do this. He could conduct this battle in the right direction.

"Lopunny!"

Almost furless she might have been, her ears were still in good shape. Like he had found Chase through her, he would have her listen to his plan. She had to slowly approach him as to not alert Mars. The normal type jumped back to avoid a flurry of elemental attacks from Clefable, but the Water Pulse that somehow didn't vaporize in the sun scraped her leg and bled her. Eventually, she was close enough and he spilled everything as fast as his mouth could move. She could not relay it to the others, but she could have Sylvi feel what the plan was through his ribbons. The normal type landed right next to him in a single jump, creating a tiny crater, and she grabbed onto his ribbons like her life depended on it, pulling them tight. Mars was all too distracted by Chase, and his Pokemon had suffered for it. Sigilyph had to be recalled due to being focused down by Clefable, and that piece of shit was everywhere, always smiling with glee whenever one of its attacks hit.

Vikavolt was gone, fighting Wigglytuff on his own, and both Sig and Abomasnow were down. Chase was down to three Pokemon, and Mars had only lost a single one. Still, they had the opening they needed.

Roserade was tiring, now. Every plant, vine or thorn she tried to bring forth burned to smithereens, unlike Bellossom's, and this was not a gentle sun from which Synthesis could be effective, but one created to burn the world to ashes. The most she could do was spray her opponents with poison. Hurt it as much as she wanted to, for once. She carried around her three spheres of noxious liquid potent enough to dent steel, and from them, an array of Poison Cutters shot out continuously. She could control them with Extrasensory like a water type toying with water, and she was the reason Clefable couldn't let completely loose.

He hadn't planned for what happened next, but he had expected it.

Roserade burned to a crisp as a ray of sunlight bore through her. He had noticed that they'd been targeting her the most out of all his Pokemon, along with Seviper striking from behind. Denzel guessed that it was because they feared she'd be able to screw with whatever Bellossom was springing up and Mars' team was generally weak to poison. Seviper slid around Zangoose, who had attempted to block it from getting closer, but Lopunny stepped on top of its tail and grasped it by the throat with a flaming fist until Clefable separated both, dissecting the gravity in between them to pull them away. That precision was such fucking bullshit.

But it was still fine. His stomach felt like it was twisted into a knot and his chest was squeezed so tight it was as if he was having a heart attack, but it was fine.

Now propelled by gravity, Seviper coiled around Roserade and squeezed. Its fangs bore into her neck, but nowhere Denzel aimed with her Pokeball made contact with her skin. The poison type writhed and thrashed around, constricting her with enough force to crush metal, and he dragged her toward the indentation in the ground created by Wigglytuff and Ninetale's giant beam of plasma.

"Sylvi! Altaria!"

He wasn't heard, and yet they were already moving. Sylveon's ribbons extended and gained weight, each movement laborious and slow, yet when he closed the distance and gravity slammed into his face, his ribbons kept going. Altaria covered for him, both with attacks and defense. Layers and layers and solid cotton, not yet burned through the sheer force of her will, clamped around Sylveon and kept him insulated from Ninetales's fiery rays or Clefable's catalog of offensive moves. The ribbons tore between the little space Seviper gave between its and Roserade's and pulled.

Seviper screamed. They couldn't hear it.

Sylveon's rage tore the snake in half, and blood, shadows and guts poured onto the floor. Seviper writhed and convulsed against the stones, and Mars' face fell in a very satisfying way. It was so quick, too. Too quick. Two seconds, and it was gone. Denzel felt a shiver go up his spine, yet he tempered it and tightened his jaw. It wasn't for nothing, that Sylvi could use Hammer Arm.

Seviper was a ghost, a revenant that had come back from the dead, and yet it could still die again.

And it did.

See, that was a weakness. She had come to kill, but had not expected to be killed in return, or at least not by his Pokemon, and Mars was, as Grace had told him, not someone who could change. What you saw was what she was, and so she was also, when you thought about it with a clear mind, a battler who could not expect the unexpected, because the world, to her, fit in one, neat little box. What had just happened was as if someone had tried to cut a cube and shove it in a triangle-shaped hole.

Battles such as this— battles with so many participants you couldn't keep track of everything, were not won through individual orders or grand, sweeping plans. Denzel finally understood, now, that they were won through figuring out the flow of a battle, and he could do that, if he treated it like a sport. It was the thing he was fucking good at.

The roar of the sun ended like someone had flipped a switch. The fire remained, but the sound was contained by a neat, tightly wound psychic barrier courtesy of Ninetales. Sylveon grabbed Roserade's unconscious form with bloodied ribbons and allowed Denzel to recall her. He tried not to think about the extent of the poison— about how Seviper had been so strong he had managed to poison a poison type— and hoped the stasis from the Pokeball would be enough, like he imagined Chase was doing with Abomasnow.

"You don't— you don't kill." Mars was looking at him like she was meeting him for the first time. "You're a flake! A boring flake!" she raged. Her face twisted in disbelief and grief. "You killed Snuggles!"

She seemed so much less scarier than before. It was like hearing a child scream for candy. Her stump of an arm flailed wildly as tears streamed down her cheeks. It looked like Dusknoir wasn't going to be able to bring Seviper back. The ghost hadn't even reacted to his teammate's death. Instead, he was still burning with endless pained wails of the people he tortured. Lucario fired off bubbles of concentrated aura that exploded with a brilliant blue upon impact with Dusknoir, somehow still shining through the monochrome grays.

Were the suffering in there like he was due to Houndoom's fire?

Denzel swallowed and buried the thought. This was a normal battle.

Eight against four.

Chase grunted and rolled his shoulder. It was slightly burned and bleeding. "Cry me a fucking river," he said, his voice still steady. "You're—"

"Bella! Dusky! Kill them!"

Ah.

They were too late.

From deep below the earth—

Denzel would have fallen on his back, had Milotic's tail not brushed against him to keep him standing, and Chase crouched, a hand against the ground to keep steady. Bellossom cried out as the sun mellowed out in an instant with conditions favorable to plants. No longer was it blinding, scorching, killing. It was the glow and warmth of a summer afternoon in the middle of July.

Houndoom, having put everything he was into shutting down Dusknoir, had not been able to burn through the vines snaking their way underneath the ground— or soil, now, Denzel noticed. It was mushy, like the stone had turned to dirt, dust and silt. Had he not, then maybe, just maybe they would have been able to dig their way underground to burn them at the source. Had Clefable and Ninetales not kept Bellossom so well protected, had the sun not melted ice so quickly it barely had any effect—

If, if, if.

Hypotheticals didn't matter right now. Stones fell from the ceiling, each boulder as large as a small house. One nearly crushed Zangoose, but Lopunny jumped in the air and kicked through it like butter, splitting it cleanly in two.

He—

Veilstone, three and a half months ago. Zachary v Grace. Ampharos creates a platform of cotton to stand on to avoid falling into a ravine.

He realized he'd been speaking his thoughts out loud when cotton gathered underneath their feet. They were too scattered to all get on the same platform, but Altaria managed to get the majority of their Pokemon into the sky. The flying type strained under their weight, and when Mars' Clefable targeted her, she too, retreated underneath a fortress of cotton. She would be hurt, eventually, but right now, she was all they had. The ground underfoot was full of vines, each as sharp as a knife. They were shaped like blades rather than thorny columns and they had filled the entire cavern, the walls and ceiling above them included. Denzel saw Seviper's corpse being swallowed by the vines. They writhed like maddened snakes and even sliced at the intact stone around Mars, Ninetales and Clefable.

This is exactly like Tangrowth's vine terrain, Denzel quickly realized. His footing was uneven, like he was walking on, well, cotton, but he couldn't expect the platforms to be solid when Altaria was focusing on so many. Only Milotic was on his own platform, while Chase and all of his remaining Pokemon had his own. The rest were strewn about the skies, barely held afloat by Altaria's belief.

"Burn them to ashes!" Mars hissed. "Dusky!"

They were separated, now, and even if they weren't Dusknoir had them in his sights. He was easily traceable due to the ever-burning fire, thank the Legendaries, so Milotic, now free from protecting him the awful burning of the sun, summoned a torrent of water around the black flames. The liquid snapped into place, and once more, Froslass froze it. A Blizzard was gathering around her, but she couldn't let it loose or she would get all of them killed. Instead, the cold wind helped to instantly freeze the water into crystals, trapping Dusknoir into yet another prison. Anything to buy them time.

But it also helped to stave off Ninetales' white-hot Flamethrower, as did Milotic. Water and ice, combined together, were barely enough to turn the jet of flames into something manageable for the cotton not to burn. The flames licked at the edges of Denzel's clothes and he felt the sheer heat on his ankles and legs, but the fact of the matter was that they weren't winning hard enough. In fact, they were barely hanging by a thread. Sickle-like vines were perpetually trying to get to them, and only Zangoose and Froslass managed to keep them away, the former by cutting and the latter by flash-freezing.

Now that Froslass was growing more and more distracted, Dusknoir was already out and barrelling toward Sylveon with the howl of a thousand voices, and Denzel quickly recalled the fairy type before he could get anywhere close. Mars stomped her feet against the ground and whipped out a Pokeball and—

Denzel screamed as loudly as he could, "She's releasing him on us—"

Behind him, the temperature plummeted. More light than he thought possible drained from the world, and chills upon chills crawled onto his skin. He couldn't react. His thoughts were fast enough, but his body wasn't.

There was a screech from Froslass, and something exploded behind him. He fell onto the cotton, his body limp, and his arm hung from the side. He would have fallen off the platform, had his sides not frozen against the surface.

Frozen. That was what he was. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see another one of Froslass' clones explode onto Dusknoir. He tried to bypass her, but Milotic coiled around Denzel with a tight Protect. Sylveon was still in his Pokeball, but every time he tried to move, his fingers shook uncontrollably. He'd never been this cold before. So cold the sensation turned into a weird, warm numbness instead that had him unable to even clench his fingers like he so desperately wanted to. So cold his body was starting to shut down and he could only hear himself breathe.

Breathe.

To be this cold was to have someone whispering in your ear to close your eyes and drift off to sleep, but he wouldn't. Denzel's nose flared, and warmth slowly returned to his body. There was a shaking of their platform, and he felt an arm around his shoulder. No, he didn't feel it. Touch was entirely gone, somehow, but the pressure from contact, he could still sense. Someone slapped his cheek a few times—

"Wake the fuck up!" Chase yelled.

"Huh?" The word came out slurred, somehow. "What?"

"Keep warming him. Keep fucking warming him."

Denzel blinked a few times and saw Zangoose dispatch of at least twenty sharpened vines in one slash. Despite the fact that the claw hadn't even made contact with the plants, they still fell apart like shredded paper. Chase had apparently released Sylveon, too, given how he was yelling in his face in anguish.

Altaria had brought the islands together for Chase to grab him, and then separated them from Dusknoir while Froslass had distracted him, it seemed, but for that, the dragon had suffered an awful wound. Clefable, who had been firing attack after attack without end had finally broken through her wall of cotton and she was barely keeping herself afloat. It had not been a crushing loss, however. While yes, Clefable could not tire, Denzel could see that it had suffered many wounds, mostly burns and cuts deep enough to reveal the shadowy construct holding its artificial flesh together.

But he couldn't recall her. Not when she was the only thing keeping them alive. That meant that they had a little bit to deal with Bellossom.

Froslass was—

"W—where's Fro—slass?" Denzel's tone trembled both due to the cold and his fear. He could see Dusknoir circling them thanks to the flames, but he was confident their entire team could keep him at bay. Powerful or not, there was no way he could approach without suffering, and he actually did get tired. "Lop—punny?"

"Lopunny's right here." Chase quickly said, and she patted Denzel on the head. He still couldn't feel it. "Froslass is dead. Sacrificed herself to buy us time. Sorry, Houndoom's flames probably contributed."

His heart sank—

"Ghost," Chase said, rubbing his bloodied shoulder. Mars bellowed out orders from bellow, and he clicked his tongue and called her a bitch under his breath. "It doesn't mean anything. She'll be back and when this is all over and the mountain's back to normal, they can send people to look for her. We have to deal with Bellossom. How much time does your Altaria have?"

Denzel gulped, happy that Chase was here to keep him centered. He'd been fighting his own fight this entire battle, even though Denzel had paid minimal attention besides Dusknoir. The platform was wavering beneath their feet, and Denzel could feel himself sink beneath the fluffy cloud, now, and without Froslass here, only Milotic could keep Ninetale's fire at bay. This time, they came in the shape of narrow, paper-like slits, almost as if the fire itself was a solid, but Milotic had gathered enough water to counter her.

And… was flooding her sun with it, apparently. Denzel hadn't figured it out, and it was noticeable now that he was closer to the Sunny Day, but Ninetales' sun was desperately trying to grow and burn as it had earlier.

But his eyes snapped back to Altaria. She had brought them close to her, which made sense given that Dusknoir would have been able to just kill her in isolation if she hadn't. Continuous Vacuum Waves from Lucario that made Denzel's ears pop dismantled or weakened attacks thrown their way from Clefable, now. The majority of them still made it and ate at the cotton from below. They were lucky they were so high, or it would have brought them down with Gravity.

"Two minutes, maybe," Denzel concluded.

"Great. Fucking great." Chase's hand went to readjust his cap, but it only found a caving helmet instead. The cloud beneath them shook as another attack hit, something he couldn't see. "Got anything like what you did before? I could have Houndoom burn it, but that means Dusknoir can run free. He needs focus for his flames, or Ninetales will just smother them."

His thoughts were still slow, but the clock was ticking. He groaned as Chase helped him up. They had no Kingambit at their disposal, no grass types to try and wrestle control away from Bellossom, and… his thoughts trailed off as he quickly went through the catalog of battles. Thousands of hours of footage he'd seen throughout the years at every level of play. He didn't know where his mind was taking him. Often, it was his gut that made decisions for him, and sometimes it bit him in the ass.

Not like they had any other choice, though.

"Ri's going to have to go down there and use Vacuum Wave with Zangoose as support to distract," Denzel whispered. "If you buy me… forty— fifty seconds, I can maybe do this."

Chase gestured with a finger, and both of his Pokemon jumped below without a single moment of hesitation, taking Denzel off-guard. His head turned toward Lopunny, and the normal type's ears twitched in anticipation, the scar on her ear she'd gotten from those Paras still visible. Below them, the sound of hacking and slashing filled the cave and Mars called out for Clefable to redouble her attacks now that Ri was no longer on the defense.

"Hey." Denzel's lips stretched into a shivering smile. "Copycat."

Lopunny cackled, all Mightyena-like, which was more disturbing considering the majority of her fur was burned to smithereens.

She backflipped off the flying cotton, and Denzel rushed to the edge to get a good look. Anxiety filled his every nerve, his mouth was so dry it was uncomfortable, and it hurt even to look, but he had to look. A shimmering green barrier from Milotic kept his head from getting blown off by a flying stone launched by Clefable. Arceus bless you, he thought with a sigh, and his eyes focused on the speck of pink and brown amidst the forest of vines.

Using Copycat here was like putting a band-aid over a severed limb. It wouldn't work. Not only was Lopunny not experienced enough with the technique, but the more complicated one was, the more bastardized the copy would be. That was fine, though. Lopunny was a scrapper, and she knew how to fight smarter rather than harder. The first of a hundred vines rushed toward her, and it barely swerved out of the way. Then again. Then again.

Then, she started running.

It gave her a knack for how whatever move was being used in front of her worked, and Denzel thanked his lucky stars he'd taught her Grass Knot two months ago to get her a foot in how grass Type Energy functioned. Lopunny's body caught on fire, and Ninetales yipped, sapping her of those flames before they could be put to use.

Good. It's distracted, too. Milotic's next Hydro Pump was swift, and it hit the fire type's sun, collapsing it entirely. The star exploded, raining fire down in the arena and the fox snarled.

Lopunny slammed a foot down and jumped toward Bellossom, who was using plants to stand about twenty feet and the sky, and was desperate not to get burned by her teammate's flames, but Ninetales had other priorities when Lucario and Zangoose struck at Mars from a distance.

Dusknoir appeared right next to them.

Denzel didn't look. Instead, he heard Houndoom, Sylveon and Chase desperately fight back.

His hands closed, and every muscle in his body flexed. "Close Combat!"

Lopunny's arc in the sky toward Bellossom was a straight line, and the air warped around her with a sharp whistle. The thick vegetation below her dress blurred as one, slicing the air again and again, and another set burst forth toward Lopunny faster than Denzel could blink.

The normal type twisted mid-air, using Bounce to propel herself once more, but one of the thick vines twisted and penetrated through her shoulder. Denzel cursed internally and prepared himself to recall her, but…

No.

Not again.

Endure. Loss, after loss, after loss, she had been through, and while none of them mattered here, Lopunny raged against the vine and clasped it with both of her hands while Bellossom brought her down to the floor. First came ice, and the entire length froze in less than two seconds until she quite literally flexed and the blade shattered in her shoulder, leaving only a gaping hole wide enough for Denzel to fit his hand through. Her right arm sagged as blood soaked her skin and what remained of her fur, but she was relentless. Denzel had ordered her to use Close Combat, and so she would use it even if she died to do so.

The little Buneary who had constantly hid behind his leg bounced once more, and she landed atop her enemy with a maddened grin.

Denzel didn't actually see Bellossom get beaten up, but he did see the vines writhe and retract. He heard the worried scream from Mars, saw her pull her Pokeball and he prepared to do the same for both Altaria and Lopunny.

Unfortunately, Altaria didn't lower them to the ground as soon as it was clear. She couldn't. The cotton disintegrated beneath their feet and they all fell to the floor below. Denzel screamed as he tumbled through the air, and he was, to his dismay, landed face-first. Sound rippled across his throat, but when he landed, he tumbled through what felt like sand instead until he reached the bottom of a dune.

Not that it didn't hurt. His entire face felt like one giant bruise, and he knew his right eyelid would start to swell rather soon. He scrambled back to his feet and looked to recall his Pokemon. First, Altaria, then Lopunny, who was still beating Bellossom's unconscious body or corpse, whatever it was. From the way Mars was reacting, it looked like it wasn't dead, and Denzel couldn't help but feel slightly relieved at that. Milotic had landed next to him, but Sylveon and the others were…

His eyes scanned the surroundings, and he warned Milotic to get ready to use Protect. The water type answered with a tired nod. He too, was on his last legs.

Five against three.

They had the numbers, still, but the situation was not ideal. He'd landed on a small hill turned into a grey dune, and he decided to climb it to get a better view. The moment he reached the top of the dune with labored breaths, another sun appeared, this time scorching enough to have him flinch back and burn the skin on his face until Milotic pulled up a Protect.

No more Froslass to deal with that, but at least Mars seemed to be content letting them hear, probably because she realized she needed to communicate with her team in order not to lose.

There. He noticed Sylveon still helping Chase. His friend was limping on his feet and holding the shoulder he'd been bleeding from, but he was alive, and so was Lucario, Houndoom and…

No, not Zangoose. She'd been recalled into her Pokeball, if he had to guess, so it was actually four against three. Shit. Houndoom stalked in-between Chase and Dusknoir while Lucario kept him shielded from the heat with a clumsy wave of aura. He was still red in the face and sweating like a pig.

Ninetales—

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, FUCK! Ninetales had left her station next to Mars and had become a ball of raging fire, leaving a trail of burned dust behind her that Denzel could smell from here, and Clefable had taken over with Protect instead of a barrier. He was too far, but he cupped her mouth and yelled anyway. Chase's head whirled behind him while Houndoom blasted Dusknoir with concentrated rings of darkness, and while the sun was fucking them, it was helping Houndoom, specifically.

Could he stop Ninetales?

No. Not when three Pokemon were barely enough to keep Dusknoir at bay. If one more fell, it'd be over. Houndoom had carried them for most of the fight, and him falling would be a catastrophe. Lucario was capable of hurting Dusknoir more than the others with how versatile he was with aura attacks, and while Sylveon was mostly there for support, his well-timed Disarming Voices were keeping them afloat. In fact, he had probably kept them as a last resort, and each subsequent scream would have less and less of an effect.

Well.

Shit.

"Surf," Denzel muttered with the weight of the world atop his back. Milotic gave him a look, but he repeated himself, stronger, this time, and he grabbed his breathing mask from his bag to cover his face.

Denzel bit down on the side of his mask, and the Protect went down.

Sacrifice was about throwing everything you could shed off of yourself for the people you loved. It was a testament to the depth of one's convictions and the strength of their commitment. No one would hear of what happened today. No one would realize why. For all intents and purposes, Chase, Mars, Denzel and their Pokemon were the only people who even existed. Denzel turned around and closed his eyes. All of his life, Denzel had been terrified of pain and risk. The day he'd found Sylvi in the wild, limping and bloodied, he'd been forcing himself out of the house, because he knew he'd need not to be scared when leaving civilization if he was to be a trainer like he wanted to. Day in, day out, he had left Twinleaf and desensitized himself to that fear, and today it was completely gone.

Denzel was still prone to fear. He was a coward. The fear of pain, of dying, of failure, of disappointing people, it had molded him into who he was, and yet he had forced himself to be the group's rock, someone they could depend upon, and so, there had been no doubt or hesitation in his mind.

Fire from the sun seared at his skin. At first, he figured he could take it. Painful, but bearable.

But then, the pain became worse.

And worse.

And soon, he was screaming just as loud as Milotic was while gathering up his Surf. Raindrops fell down his coat, though he barely felt them in the midst of the literal onslaught of pain coursing through his back. There was so much, so much, so much, so much— SO FUCKING MUCH.

PERSEVERE. DO IT FOR HIM. FOR THEM.

He didn't see—

He couldn't think—

He didn't know how much time passed, but when he came to, he was on the ground, and he would have been inhaling hot dust were it not for his mask. He grunted and crawled on the dust dunes. Every time his hand touched the ground, the palms of his hands fired off every pain signal imaginable. His back felt like it didn't exist any longer, but when he reached the top of the dune, he saw an ocean.

Ninetales was drowning.

It was visible, still. The Twister keeping it from swimming made sure of that, and water constantly evaporated around it. Ninetales was tumbling in the water, and Milotic's power over it held. Every few seconds, burst of flames bright enough for Denzel to see it through his eyelids flashed in a desperate attempt to blow away the water, but there was simply too much of it for that to matter. The sun was cooling, now, though it was still burning him, but at least he wasn't going to die.

It was then, however, that Mars recalled Clefable and sent it back out in the midst of Milotic's Surf. Denzel had considered it possible, that she would recall her Ninetales instead, but she was committed to this.

Mars was wide open.

But it didn't matter, did it? Not when attacking her with a single Pokemon would spell their doom. Clefable outstretched her hand with a scream, pushing the water in a circle around them.

"Squeeze them," Denzel rasped.

Milotic tried, he really did.

But it wasn't enough. Milotic couldn't blow through the heat and push against Gravity, and despite Clefable burning for its contributions, they were making their way toward Chase. Denzel was hidden enough for them not to target him, but he needed to think. What did he have at his disposal… the names of top-tier trainers, but no way to implement their strategies. He could barely even think straight. He tried to scream, but his voice came out as a low grunt and the inside of his throat just hurt until he spat blood. Communication was impossible—

No, Denzel. Fucking think!

His head hurt so much.

"Milotic," he muttered. "Warn… him."

The water type yelled, but dust gathered in the midst of the dry circle Clefable had afforded both itself and Ninetales. It coalesced, but it was difficult to tell through the water. Denzel squinted to get a better look, finally throwing off his mask.

Five seconds later, Chase fell and went limp. Stone pebbles had hit him in the leg and back, and would have hit his head had Lucario not heeded Milotic's warning and pulled him inward. Denzel internally swore and tried to stand up, once, twice, but he couldn't.

There was no more time for caution. "Get Mars," he coughed. "Get her."

She was just standing there, away from the water with tears in her eyes. Milotic sang, and the murky water rushed toward her. Tons upon tons of liquid that, even if it couldn't drown her, could crush her under its weight. Mars knew immediately, and she tried to run— faster than Denzel anyone had ever seen, but no matter how quick she was, she could not outrun an ocean.

"Dusky!" she called out. She lifted her hand and tried to aim at Dusknoir, but it took a few attempts to beam him in. Once she succeeded, however, she disappeared into the ghost's mouth despite being on fire.

He should have attacked her earlier.

He hadn't known.

He hadn't known Dusknoir loved her so much he would give up everything to save her. This was on him.

"Get me… there."

Denzel grabbed onto Milotic's back, and the serpent slid down the elevated dune. Eventually, he reached the water and started swimming toward Chase. Clefable and Ninetales were still slowly making their way to him as well, but they weren't going to outpace a water type in his element. Denzel nearly let go a few times and almost breathed in water. He might have drowned, had Milotic's fins not kept him on his back.

Milotic's ocean abruptly ended when they got thirty feet away from Chase, and he stayed in front of the wall to concentrate every effort he had into keeping Mars' Pokemon away. It was odd, to see her cry, and a good thing she cared, because she could have killed all of them had she not been focused on sparing her Pokemon's lives, even when they were focused on creating a new world where none of it would matter. She could have released Clefable closer to him, Denzel thought as he crawled toward his friend. Maybe she isn't used to repositioning her Pokemon, either. Not like she ever needed to be. It was Sylveon, face wrought with worry and rage, that brought him with closer, carrying him with his ribbons.

Chase was bleeding. Bleeding and slightly burned everywhere.

Lucario and Houndoom crowded around him, and it looked like he could barely keep his eyes open. The steel type had a hand on his forehead with aura emanating from his palm and Houndoom licked the bloodied holes puncturing his skin. There was— there was so much blood.

"Chase," Denzel grunted. "Chase, talk to me."

What came back were words Denzel could barely understand and a slew of swears, but this was— he could tell that this was fatal. Denzel quickly grabbed Chase's bag and struggled to unstrap it from his back until Sylveon and Ri helped him.

"I can't move my body very well." Each word was a struggle to get out. "And we might not have much time. Mars could be here any moment. You need to follow my instructions, he's carrying a first-aid kit—"

Lucario tore the bag open at its seams, and all of its contents clattered to the ground. He clawed open the first-aid box and grabbed a gauze, first. It was hard to tell with how much blood there was, but there was no exit wound, meaning that the pebbles were still stuck inside of him. Two at the back of his right leg, two on his back. Close to the… or maybe it had hit the spine. He couldn't tell. Denzel listed off instructions. Applying pressure with a gauze and keeping it there to get the bleeding under control, all while Denzel was desperately trying to keep Chase awake.

"Stay with me," he begged. "You're the toughest guy I know, Chase. Don't— stop closing your eyes! Hey! Good, good. Okay, just look at me. Look at my face. Just stay awake, we'll get you out of here. Can you understand me? Can you nod if you do?"

Chase spat out a mouthful of bloody phlegm and nodded.

"Great! Okay, good! Um, we—"

There was a warning cry from Milotic, and Denzel clenched a fist. Throughout this, Clefable had tried to launch more pellets, but Milotic had been a trooper and kept them safe. He was, however, getting tired, and such a wide Protect while keeping his ocean active and pushing inward to crush Clefable and Ninetales was a lot of work.

They were out of time.

But then, a flash of light. A burst of electricity illuminating the entire cave, and the buzzing of wings. Vikavolt traced through the sky and created a veritable storm that mixed his electricity with the water, and Clefable had to stop. Gravity could not bring electricity to heel, and so Thunder after Thunder started hitting both Pokemon. Even without a trace from Wigglytuff, Vikavolt had suffered from heavy wounds. His carapace was cracked all over and his left pincer was just gone. While he was as fast as he had been, that was more of a testament to his dedication than a statement about how fit he currently was for battle. Denzel knew he hadn't won against Wigglytuff, but dropping it far away from the battle while it had been weakened from poison had been enough and essentially had the same effect.

Vikavolt was fast. Wigglytuff was not.

He wished it had been enough.

Milotic fell to the ground from exhaustion, but not before putting up a wall of ice to keep the water contained. The liquid rushed to the sides instead, and Denzel noticed Clefable's twisted grin from behind the clear ice. But unlike what he expected, they did not break the ice and allow them to get lost to the waters, nor did Ninetales evaporate everything and burn them to a crisp. Instead, Mars fell from the sky and landed with a dull thud in the ground stones. Houndoom instantly tried to strike her, as did Sylveon, but their sluggish movements gave Dusknoir enough time to react with a slow Protect.

How strong was this ghost? How was it, that he could keep going after being beaten up so much? To have gone toe-to-toe with Houndoom, Lucario, Sylveon, Froslass and more? He didn't even look tired despite what Denzel wanted to think. Now free from Milotic's torrent, Clefable and Ninetales floated up and next to Mars.

They had nothing. Nothing but exhausted Pokemon who could barely stand on their own two legs, and a dying and a wounded teenager. Denzel took over putting pressure on the wound while Mars stared down at him with pleasure carved onto her face.

"I win. I fucking win," Mars growled. Her body and uniform were burned and she was barely recognizable. "And I'll have you pay for what you did to Snuggles." She pulled out a knife from her scorched boots and grinned as she approached Denzel. "I'll make it slow. Watch."

Denzel shut his eyes.

Then, a roar.

Then, fire.

Warmth tingled his skin, and a Charizard slammed into Ninetales with all of its— her strength. The fire on her tail shone with a bright white and she bit into the fox's neck with flaming teeth and tore it open. Mars swore, but Dusknoir swallowed her before she could realize what was happening, and Denzel breathed a sigh of relief as the ghost disappeared.

Since when could Charizard's fire be so strong she could challenge a Ninetales of such power?

The answer came soon enough when Braixen showed herself. She was riding on top of Braviary, and with a twirl of her staff, Charizard's flames grew so hot even Ninetales started screaming. There were voices he recognized in the background, and they sounded far away until Mira abruptly crouched next to Chase with Emilia and Pauline.

Lucario strained against Clefable, but the fairy type escaped by reversing gravity for herself and flew away, and endless shards of stone stabbed into it courtesy of Lycanroc. They fell from the ceiling with a vicious spin and sped up thanks to Braixen's support. There was more, so much more. Ambipom threw Vigoroth forward, coating the normal type in darkness, and he nearly crashed into the fleeing Dusknoir until Metang caught him. Was she using Fling on living things? She hadn't done that during their training. Gothitelle, Alakazam and Gardevoir kept the water from drowning them— he hadn't noticed the ice cracking under the water's weight— Magnezone and Porygon combining the electric attacks to hurt as much as possible…

Too much to keep track of, when he was barely conscious himself.

"Keep pressing!" Pauline said.

Mira gulped and pushed her now-bloodied hands onto Chase's back while Emilia put hers on his legs. "He's—"

"Going to live," Emilia interrupted. "Keep. Pressing."

"You— you bullies! I fucking hate all of you!" Mars stomped a foot on the ground and bit her lip so hard shadows and blood leaked out of it. Standing atop a dune in the midst of Milotic's sea, she recalled Ninetales and Clefable, releasing them next to her. "Miserable little things."

Dusknoir placed a hand on her shoulder, but she snarled. "Shut up! You fucking liar! You couldn't even deal with like, five of them! Because of you Snuggles died! But you don't care, do you?"

"Emi," Pauline whispered.

Emilia and Pauline shared a look, and they sprung to action without a word.

"Houndoom, can you light Charizard with your dark fire?" Emi asked. "I know you're tired, but this is the only way it's going to work."

"What are you guys doing?" Denzel slurred.

Pauline flinched when she heard him talk, and then she noticed the state of his back, but she answered with a quiver in her tone. "We're going ghost hunting."

The flames on Dusknoir dissipated slightly, and in exchange, Houndoom blasted Charizard with a wide, stream of dark flames that emanated no heat. The flying type's body jittered from the painful flames, but she stayed afloat, each flap of her wings more and more determined than the last. Charizard swooped down and picked up Primeape in a split second while the rest of the Pokemon kept their enemies at bay. Both of them left a trail of dark fire behind them that Braixen gathered and threw at Dusknoir, who looked to be inexperienced with Protect, thank the Legendaries.

Dusknoir opened his mouth right before Charizard tackled him, and Primeape clenched his hands around the ghost's abdomen to keep it open. Dusknoir tried to slip away, but Primeape's hold was absolute, and the fighting type didn't seem to care that the fire was hurting him, or dampening his use of Type Energy like it had with Dusknoir. He looked at Dusknoir with a stare so calm it was almost psychotic.

He didn't need, Type Energy.

Just his arms and hands.

Charizard opened her mouth and blew fire inside of Dusknoir's mouth. Screams filled this hallowed cave, and Mars panicked, actually panicked. She fumbled around her burned belt and grabbed Dusknoir's Pokeball, but Ambipom threw Lycanroc into the sky, Metang pushed him down with a firm, psychic hold, and the rock type landed in Mars' midst. Ninetales' head was basically hanging by a thread, and the stream of fire she tried to throw at Lycanroc exited from the holes in her neck rather than her mouth. Mars sank into the dunes up to her neck, and the shredded stones around her solidified to keep her still.

Denzel couldn't believe his eyes.

Dusknoir was dying.

The ghost rippled at his edges, and he punched Primeape in the face with everything he had while Charizard brought him along for the ride, circling in the skies. The more Dusknoir hit her, the stronger she got. Pauline's mastery of Blaze was truly something to behold. The darkness made them difficult to deal with, and the support coming in from the rest of their Pokemon assured he wouldn't slip away like he had so many times in the past. Dusknoir's eye darted all around its socket, but it settled on Mars before the last of him could be burned away. The ghost screamed, and it was his actual voice, this time, not the countless spirits he had tormented for decades, and Ninetales' and Clefable's bodies went stiff. The fairy threw Lycanroc away by putting everything it had into shifting gravity. It had tried to before, but wind from Braviary and Lycanroc anchoring himself into the ground had worked to stave off the worst of it. Clefable could no longer keep Mars protected nor curve attacks away, and for that, Denzel saw her struggle for the first time.

Lycanroc went flying, and Metang barely caught him on their back.

Ninetales used flaming claws fervently against the ground, digging and digging at the stone until it melted. Digging so quickly Denzel could barely tell they were moving at all. So quickly and without a care for its own self that it shredded its own claws, paws and legs to break Mars away from her prison.

Despite everything, it was heart-wrenching to look at. Dusknoir yelled again, and Clefable lifted both itself and Mars away from the dune and toward where Wigglytuff had been taken by Vikavolt.

They'd left Ninetales for dead.

Only when Mars was safe, did Dusknoir allow itself to die.

Dead.

It was dead. Gone in an anticlimactic puff of smoke, and then even that disappeared, too. It was difficult to fathom how the ghost that had given them so much trouble was just gone, or at least would be for the rest of this entire ordeal, but for the first time in what felt like an eternity, Denzel allowed himself to relax for a single instant.

"Chase, are you still with us?" Mira yelled. "Chase!"

He answered with a small groan. His body was— his body was so cold. Lucario could barely even bear to look.

"No…" Mira cried.

Emilia shut her eyes tight.

Denzel grunted, "Mira. Mira, you have to get a hold of yourself." He coughed and tried to sit upright, but he failed. "You can will the mountain into doing anything. You can bring him back to the entrance if you focus."

"I can?"

"You can! Mount Coronet considers you a part of itself, it's how we got here in the first place. Hell, it's how you got here!" Denzel explained. "Just… shit, I— I don't know it works, just think about— about it really hard?"

Chase huffed air as loud as he could to voice his protest, but they all ignored him. He was probably thinking that they should go and hunt for Mars instead, or that Mira might clumsily send herself back with them when she might succeed in freeing Uxie if she kept going. He could almost make out the name 'Cecilia' on his lips, which angered him even in his dazed state. If he thought they were going to try to bring him to her so she could claim his shard, he was being fucking dumb.

That wasn't who any of them were.

Pauline gnawed on a fingernail. "Stop being a fucking baby! It's not just about you! Denzel can barely speak, and he can't even stand up! His back is more flesh than skin!"

He felt a jolt of pain with her words.

"Don't fight her on this," Emi sighed. "Please."

"I'll try," Mira said. "Recall your Pokemon."

The cave flashed red as they followed her instructions while she closed her eyes, and her breaths grew heavier and heavier until the mountain around them shifted. Once, then twice, then countless other times until they were somewhere Denzel recognized as the first layer. He wondered if going down was so much easier than going up because they'd been there before, or just because the mountain would facilitate that movement, but whatever the reason was, he'd never been this thankful. The adrenaline was fading off, and his back felt like it had been flayed a thousand times.

There was light at the end of the tunnel. Literally. Emilia helped him walk by letting him put a hand around her shoulder, and Pauline and Mira carried Chase by the arms, making sure not to move him much, or the bleeding was going to get worse.

Even if Chase lived.

Would he ever fully recover?

He felt sick to his stomach.

---