Lesson #1

Kita heard the scream, only a moment before Articuno's own screech. She flinched, closing her eyes and clinging to the soft feathers of the ice bird. "I'm here, Articuno. Please, don't be concerned for me!" she shouted, feeling Articuno's through her aura sensing. However, the light had now faded, the aura she had used to leap to Articuno now faded with the moment. Kita glanced back, where Kyurem was now at, next to Nakaharu, and Jirachi.

"No..." Kita said quietly, eyes widening in fear a bit as she looked into Kyurem's eyes. She didn't understand what could cause such hate in a Pokemon, for it to be this aggressive. "Articuno...we have to do something..." she said, simply staring as her long time partners, as well as new friends were moments from fading before her eyes. She felt something within her stir, a courage that she didn't know she had. Being faced with such a situation, she might have thought to just sit and cry helplessly. However, this was not the case as her heart began to race, pumping adrenaline throughout her body.

"Kyurem, over here!" she shouted angrily. "If you want a fight, it's not with them!" she shouted once more. "Forgive me, Articuno...but now we must help each other," she said quietly for only the two of them to hear. "Kyurem!" Kita shouted one last time, this time the radiant blue light was a darkness that seemed to emanate from within her core. As though the rage she felt for Kyurem's actions were manifesting in reality, supplying Articuno with more power temporarily, Kita being its own personal energy source.

The Kyurem heard Kita's yelling and it faced her. It faced Nakaharu one last time, before letting out an ear-piercing screech, its icy breath causing the tips of Nakaharu's hair to grow small ice crystals, and flapped its wings, ascending upward. It rose sky-high, then twirled and made a dive so that it was only about a few centimetres above Articuno's level. It then started to form a large, purple sphere that would soon become a beam of energy.

Nakaharu, still a bit paralyzed from his seemingly moment of horror, looked toward them. That sure doesn't look like an ice-type attack, but that doesn't mean it won't be a strong attack... he thought to himself. Kita, be safe... don't get hurt out there, he thought to himself, before trying to get to his feet, and a few times he muttered it under his breath.

Kita was mounted at the base of Articuno's neck, clinging to the large ice bird's feathers. The black energy surrounding her fueled by her rage flowed into Articuno, powering the beast up. Even her eyes seemed to have grown black as a demon's, her hair seeming to stand on end from the static of the battle. It was definitely a different side to this girl from what had been seen before. Now she was almost frightening. She leaned in, appearing to whisper something to Articuno.

The beast nodded in response, opening its beak as a blue light began to charge up within its mouth. Those familiar would recognize it as the charging stage of an Ice Beam attack. However, being powered by Kita's rage, would it be enough? The darkness surrounded the blue light, flowing from Kita, through Articuno and into the attack.

Kita was utterly shocked by the sudden flames bursting from the sidelines, or at least she would have been if she hadn't been so consumed by her rage. Her fingers wrapped tighter around Articuno's feathers, seeing the opportunity present itself for an attack. It had become clear to her, there was no negotiating with this monster.

Her teeth were bared, clenched tightly as her eyes stared forward sharply. Her long hair rose within the aura, heart rate rising rapidly. The dizzying feeling the adrenaline rush was causing making her tunnel vision only that much worse. "Kyurem, you will pay for your actions! You had your chance to repent, now feel my wrath!!!" Her voice rang out strong, but the undertones didn't sound like the girl Nakaharu had grown to know. Could it be she was only pretending before, and this was her true nature?

Articuno seemed to react to Kita, wings rising up as a faint glow surrounded them. The earth shook, large stone slabs rising from below and surrounding them in a ring. "Ancient Power!" Kita screamed, every fiber of her being being thrown into the attack. The boulders hurdled forward, flying through the air at Kyurem at an alarming rate. Fueled by the hatred and dark powers within the girl of light, would it be enough?

Nakaharu was in awe, feeling as if he were watching a new Kita, or maybe angry kita. He made a mental note to himself to not do anything to upset her. He tried to find his footing, but simply fell back onto the snow. He realized now that the cold was getting to him. If this prolonged too much, it may be unhealthy for him. As if to make it harder, snow suddenly fell at the opening to the cave they had took their exit from. That had been his last chance, and he had refused it. However, in exchange for discomfort, maybe he saved Kita's life. That was a more comforting thought for him. He used the snow that now blocked the cave to pick himself up. He kept Kita's bag with her pokémon safe from the elements of the moutain, making sure it wouldn't be ruined by the snow, in his lap. He then looked up to Kita and the two ice pokemon in the sky, mentally cheering Kita on as if she could actually hear his thoughts.

One of the large boulders had Kyurem directly on the head and put it in a daze, long enough for another to hit just as hard on the same exact spot, in such a way that anyone would cringe at the sight. There was a sound of a loud crack. Luckily, it had only been the boulder cracking in two. This allowed for the barrage of boulders to all hit directly into its body. The Kyurem screeched in pain; a scream that could be heard many kilometers. It was sent backwards into a lower mountain that would not have been noticed without such happening. It warily found its balance in the air, bringing itself upward once more. It seemed Kyurem had lost the rage it had been displaying so openly. Then, sensing it had lost the battle, it turned dismissively away to fly back to wherever it came from. Kyurem looked back at Articuno and Kita, though it somehow seemed its eyes were focused on Kita. There was no intimidating glare. It seemed more like it wanted to say something. It then flew away slowly, the hit to the head still affecting it.

Nakaharu felt a sudden thrill from watching the scene. "That was... awesome!" He shouted. He then realized this was completely out of character for him, and tried to assume the grim expression he thought he always wore. However, it seemed a grin slowly creeped onto his face. He gave up. He was happy to have witnessed this. He had barely known Kita for a few hours, and already he was happy for her. Maybe he had been so absent from the social side, his positive emotion was merely breaking out of the heavily barred prison it had been unjustly placed into.

Kita's eyes were cold and harsh as she watched each boulder strike Kyurem without even flinching. She almost seemed heartless at the moment, a tyrant on a rampage. It didn't take long, though the scene seemed to drag on agonizingly. Kyurem's eyes had now changed, perhaps they would meet again today. Kita went to move, as though to follow Kyurem and pursue the onslaught, but the dark aura quickly faded.

Her hair was now soft, no longer held in the stagnancy of the darkness. It caught in the chilling breeze, her breath seeming to escape her. Eyes opening wide, they no longer looked like those of the monster she'd just been. However, they quickly closed as her body went limp and collapsed backward.

She tumbled from Articuno's back, heading down the chasm toward her certain death. However, the giant ice bird swooped down and caught her on its back once more. Flying back up, it was careful not to drop her, landing gently along the ledge near Nakaharu. It leaned its head down, gently letting her slide to the snow in a heap. She looked almost peaceful now. Articuno looked to the skies, as if ready to return home, then back to Nakaharu. Perhaps this was their chance to escape, on the wings of grace.

Nakaharu managed to stand and step aside, thinking Kita would land where his feet were. The snow was softer than his shoes, after all. Though, seeing she had landed softly beside where his feet were, he saw his effort was pointless. He didn't think it would show as mistrust, but he knelt down beside Kita. He would have done so anyway. At first, Naka was concerned she might have been hurt. He then thought, she's likely exhausted. Whatever she had done, it appeared to have taken a lot of energy. Then again, standing up to a large, enraged dragon, it would be completely natural to be exhausted.

Naka looked back toward the way they came. It was blocked by the snow which he had sat on. In front of them was but a sheer drop. They had no way to get back to the ground with their own power, he realized. He looked up at the Articuno, who had looked at him. Whatever hint he was being given, he didn't understand it.

Nakaharu picked himself up once more. At that moment, he felt his body quaver uncontrollably. Losing balance, he fell right on his back, very close to the edge of the protrusion in the mountain. He questioned himself. Even though he was quite exhausted, this was unusual. Then the ground underneath him was trembling. It wasn't his lack of balance that caused him to fall, rather the shaking ground underneath him. An earthquake was his first guess. Then he saw some of the ground near his upper body gave away. Feeling a sense of urgency, Naka scrambled to get up. He had little time to get to his feet, so he was on his hands and knees to get away from the edge. He more threw himself head first into the blocking snow. A quarter of the ground that had been ther was now gone. This went to show that they were on unstable ground.

Naka lightly touched Kita's arm. He wanted to wake her, but was at a loss of what to say. Then the ground at the edges of either side were crumbling, and quickly. Naka quickly found the words, and shouted, "Kita, please wake up!" He wasn't certain if Kita would be woken with his voice. He looked around, looking for some way out of this. Then he remembered Articuno. He wasn't sure if it would actually help, but then, what could he do. "Please," he said, "could you help us?"

(For lack of good stuff to post...)

Articuno looked down as the chunk of ice crashed down the inner walls of the chasm. It looked back up to Nakaharu, screeching as it spread its wings. It felt the ground crumbling beneath its feat, flapping hard and causing a great down draft as it started to become airborne. Kita however didn't even budge when Nakaharu frantically called for her to wake.

The ground all around them cracked, dropping several inches at a time as an alert for what was to come in mere moments. They were in the hands of fate, at the mercy of nature. The ground beneath collapsed, causing the two to tumble uncontrollably down toward the endless darkness.

Articuno quickly swooped down, catching the lifeless Kita in one talon, while managing to snatch Nakaharu along with Kita's pack in the other. It screeched loudly as it took to the skies. Time seemed to be something unmeasurable as they flew high in the sky, the light atmosphere only adding to the disorientation caused by the adrenaline rush. Before he knew it, Nakaharu would feel his body fall a few feet to the ground with a thud, a large weight dropping on top of him as Articuno dropped the two humans to the ground outside of Viridian City. Kita was still unconscious, and would likely need medical attention as well as the Jirachi. Articuno had disappeared, almost as if it had never been there at all. Perhaps one day their paths would cross once more.

Indeed, Nakaharu did hit the ground. He had no clue where he was because of the chill wind biting at his eyes, keeping them closed. He grunted when he felt the impact of his body hit the ground. He nearly lost air from Kita's weight pressing into him, shortly after he hit the ground. He lay there for a few minutes, adjusting to the warmer climate. The surroundings felt unusually hot to him, yet he didn't sweat. He assumed it was the short transition from the chilly air to the suddenly warmer ground. For a moment, he had trouble under Kita's weight. He told himself that this was simply because she fainted that she was so heavy at this moment. She wouldn't be on top of him if she hadn't fainted anyway.

He made certain not to let Kita hit the ground when he got himself out from under. After being freed from her, he rest on the ground a bit longer, acknowledging the grass and the soil underneath it. Naka stood up and took a moment to study Kita's current state, having not been able to in that panic. When he touched her, he acknowledged she was a bit cold to the touch, probably also from their environment. He put together that she was cold to the touch and he was feeling hot. He took his own vest off and gently put Kita into it. It'd be better that way for both of them, he thought to himself, not knowing his own body temperature was below average.

He tried to pick Kita and Jirachi up, now realizing their condition needing help he could not provide himself. He didn't know exactly where he was, being a bit new to the Kanto region. His efforts were flawed with his own lack of strength due to what had happened.

The Jirachi that had been unconscious before seemed to choose now to awaken. It started floating almost instantly, seeming like it had never been in a bad condition, but simply been in a slumber. Jirachi glided to Kita, Nakaharu's astonished gaze upon it, and it touched Kita with a touch that had the ability to rejuvenate the energy and strength of a snorlax, and it flew back upward, just past the point one could reach while standing.

Kita felt herself enveloped in darkness. She couldn't see, and it was cold here. She opened her mouth to scream, but nothing came out. She tried to move, but her limbs were heavy. She could only lay there in the dark silence, waiting for the cold to claim her. The darkness had finally won, they had won...they would consume her now.

Suddenly she felt something, a warmth against her cheek. She couldn't hear anything. Was there something there? She wanted to call out. Then there was a light, bright and breaking through the darkness beckoning her. It was true then, she really was dead. No, that wasn't it. As the light broke, she could see a face. The face of a young boy. Nakaharu, yes that was his name. He had been there, seen everything. Yes, that's right! Everything came flooding back to her, her eyes opening as she suddenly sat up coughing.

The sudden rush of energy, she could feel it. She was rejuvenated, her limbs no longer weighted and the world around her no longer swallowed in darkness. "Naka-" she coughed, "Nakaharu..." she said, spitting out her words with a pant. She glanced up to see him there with her. "Where are we?" she asked, slowly changing her glance. Her head turned, eyes trailing up to the hovering figure. "Jirachi..." She was sure it would have needed medical attention. It had been frozen, right? She didn't understand it all, but then again it was pretty awe inspiring to be in the presence of the legendary Pokemon to begin with. Nobody would believe their stories, surely.

Nakaharu was staring in awe at the Jirachi and didn't notice her wake up. When she started coughing, he was snapped out of his daze. He panicked, not sure what to do. When she called his name, he thought she was going to say something. When her eyes followed upward to the Jirachi, his did too.

When all attention had been inevitably summoned to Jirachi, it moved downward toward Kita and dropped something into the grass beside her. After that, it flew in circles, and before much could be said, it disappeared with a sparkle. The object on the ground was what looked like a chunk of ice. On it was an odd character. It seemed much like a frozen rune.

Nakaharu once again looked to Kita. She had been laying limp before, and now suddenly she's wide awake. "Are you alright?" he asked.

Kita stared off into the distance where Jirachi had disappeared for several moments thereafter. When Nakaharu spoke, she broke from her distant glaze and turned to him. Of course, this was only momentary for she saw the glimmer in the grass. She bent down, picking up the icy rune and examining it. It seemed to be made of NeverMelt ice, as it didn't even cause her hand to become damp as she held it.

Standing back up, she turned to speak to Nakaharu once more. "Why wouldn't I be okay? Wait...where are we?" she asked, glancing around. Last thing she remembered was seeing the light at the end of the icy cave they had been in. This surely was not the same place, as there was grass and a soft yet comparably warm breeze here. She frowned, she had blacked out in the past, but never had she woken in such a vastly different place. "And how did Jirachi get healed?"

It took her a moment, but she finally realized something was missing. A weight on her back, and a warmth by her side. "Umber, Ella! Where are they?!" she panicked, glancing around before zero-ing in on the pack in Nakaharu's arms. She quickly grabbed it from him, opening and looking inside to see the two pokeballs resting calmly. She let out a sigh of relief, setting the bag down and lifting out the two orbs. Holding them out, two beams of light emerged to reveal her Espeon and Umbreon who yawned and stretched after their rest.

     Why wouldn't you be okay, you ask? Nakaharu thought to himself. You lost consciousness at what seemed like the edge of the world, and you wonder how? He didn't say it out loud. He reasoned that it would be easy to forget that. "We are," he started, though honestly, he had no idea. He looked behind him, and saw a mountain, and recognized it as the one they had previously walked straight through the fake rocky wall of, except this was on the other side. "I don't think we're very far from where we started," he says.
     Nakaharu found moving to be difficult. I could have used some of that energy, too, Jirachi, he thought to himself. When he tried to stand, his knees simply fell, sinking into the dirt. It felt a bit embarrassing that he had no ability to stand, yet it was Kita who had probably exhausted herself a great deal. He tried to hide the fact that he was unable to stand, and he went through his own back, and grabbed out a Pokeball. It contained the Vulpix he had met in Johto. It was warm out, and there was no ice on the ground to hurt Vulpix's feet.
     Vulpix shivered for a second or two, as if she had felt the cold through the pokeball the whole time. Then it looked up, sounding its mighty call. "Vuuuulpix!"

"Near...where we started?" Kita questioned, eyes scaling the large rock formation beside them. Yes, she remembered now entering the icy path. Now she was again curious as to what had caused the illusory wall. That wasn't important for now, she blinked shaking her head to clear it and focus on what was at hand. She glanced over in time to watch Nakaharu slump to the ground and paw through his bags. It was clear he was drained physically, and probably emotionally too as his aura was weakened.

Smiling and walking over to the Vulpix, she knelt down and stroked its fur. "You know, we should..or rather, we could find shelter and rest a while. We could both use it after what we've been through [not that she remembers half of it anyway]," Kita suggested, trying to dull the blow of the suggestion to Naka's ego. Ella trotted over eagerly, stopping in front of the Vulpix and taking a playful stance as though nothing had happened recently. Umber merely sat beside Kita looking serene. "What do you say we head to Viridian City and get the heck away from this place?"

"North," Kita said, standing once more as the Vulpix left her hands toplay with Ella. She glanced up toward the sun, the day was starting to darken and the sky was a deep orange. The sun was setting toward the west. "Which means..." Kita muttered to herself, scanning the horizon as she held out a watch. "North is that way."

Walking over to Naka, she pulled him up and tossed his arm over her shoulder. "Come on, I can help you walk a little ways. We should be able to make it there by midnight," Kita said, tapping her side with her free hand. This motion broke the play session short, both Ella and Umber joining at the girl's side.

She didn't wait too long for an answer from Nakaharu before she began walking, leading him on to the next town.

Fin