Pokémon Mars

Chapter 71: The Sacrifice

Hadron's Aegislash knocked Hera's Duraludon out. She revived Guzzlord by then. It chomped straight through one of Celesteela's floating arms. The arm was reduced to nothing. Guzzlord seized Aegislash in its remaining pincer. It couldn't swallow it whole with that mouth, but it bent it until it fainted. Hadron sent out Xurkitree. It blasted Guzzlord with Dazzling Gleam. Guzzlord toppled onto its back and fainted again. Hera sent out Aggron. It charged and trampled Xurkitree. Then it sank its horns into Xurkitree's cables until they were wrenched open. Aggron was electrocuted. Praise's two Buzzwole attacked it from all angles until it fainted. Xurkitree short-circuited. Black smoke billowed from its wound. Hadron had no choice but to return it. He sent out Metagross. Celesteela was disoriented with an arm missing. Abram returned it and sent out his own Tyranitar. Hera revived Guzzlord again.

At the summit of Mt. Coronet, Groudon was about to strike the cannon. Firmino examined a glowing yellow panel.

'A warp panel...'

He suddenly took a knee to the helmet. That wasn't deliberate. He was just there when Wish arrived from the warp panel installed in a hastily-dug basement of Delta Lab 3.

'Groudon!' Kazuki yelled, 'Destroy that cannon! Now!'

Groudon didn't move as fast as Wish's Shadow Mega Mewtwo Y. It hurled Groudon off the summit with a hateful blast of shadowy psychic power. Kazuki returned it before its landing caused a deadly quake.

'Hahahahahahahahahaaaaaaa!'

Wish shoved past. He seized the cannon's controls. Kazuki sent Groudon back out to crush Mewtwo. It never got the chance. Mewtwo knocked it out with another shadowy blast. Kyogre fired Origin Pulse, knocking Mewtwo off the mountain, but it floated back. A roar boomed from the space-time rift. The ground shook. The world began to distort, in twists and fractures, before everyone's eyes.

At the Birch Lab, Betty and her friends panicked more than ever before. If that rift wasn't closed – let alone if the cannon fired – existence itself would be irreparably damaged, if it wasn't already. The rift's decay into distortion escalated much faster than it did when Volo and Giratina tore open that rift 298 years ago.

'And our friends are up there...'

'Eeeek!' one of the older scientists shrieked, 'Now what?! Some – some – something just – just came out of a glacier at the south pole!'

A glance at the map confirmed that was true. The ancient glacier collapsed where a living being escaped. Betty, Farah and Linchee rushed to the window in time to see a trail of yellow, like a shooting star, arching over the White Hills until it was swallowed by the horizon. The glacier was billions of years old. It was never touched by human hands.

'One of the original Martian Pokémon?' Linchee nervously suggested, 'It must be... but why now?'

'I can only think that it's a special Pokémon,' Betty replied, 'Like, a guardian of some kind... responding to the rift...'

The Sandygast watching over the greenhouses were startled. In one of the Iron Craters in the basin south of Mt. Battle, a pink glow seeped through the rapidly growing cracks. The ancient ground shattered. The Sandygast shuffled to protectively surround the greenhouses, but as soon as the trail of pink filled the distorting sky, they knew there was no need. Whatever that was, it was a benevolent force.

Something rumbled in the Olivine Canyon. Jin and Eden ran outside to see an ancient cliff tumbling. A Pokémon burst out in an explosion of blue light. Azelf flew low over their heads. Then it was gone.

'That wasn't any old Azelf!' Jin exclaimed, 'It was a Martian Azelf! That must mean there are three lakes here! But...'

He was going to say that it confirmed something was wrong at Mt. Coronet, but the sky, pulsing every colour of the rainbow with the distortion that flowed from the rift, told them all they needed to know.