Metamorphosis (Pokémon Watties 2017)

9: Xerneas's Call

Isa sat against the cave wall while holding Sandshrew, humming to himself. "Come on, Kaden. You're taking forever." Isa moaned, looking up at the roof of the cave. Since Houndoom had gone with Kaden, there was little to no light without the fire.

They sat in silence, waiting. It wasn't long before a few footsteps were heard. "Hey, you're finally back." Isa stood up to look for the sound, turning his head to the way Kaden had went. When he saw nothing there, he turned again to look the way that they had come from. Coming down the tunnel was a small deer Pokemon, providing a small source of light with glowing horns. It stumbled down to where Isa and Sandshrew were before it collapsed onto the ground. "Whoa, are you okay?" Isa rushed to kneel beside the Pokemon, slowly picking it up.

The Pokemon let out a faint call, looking up at Isa. The horns on its head continued to glow, but at a much fainter level.

"Hey, it's gonna be okay, just hang in there." Isa glanced over the Pokemon for injuries, a bit confused when he found nothing major. "What do you need?"

It let out another small cry, barely nodding its head down the tunnel from which it came.

"You want us to go down there?"

There was another weak nod.

"Okay, then we'll go that way." Isa stood up with the Pokemon, heading down the tunnel with Sandshrew following along. The Pokemon occasionally made a noise, leaning its head one way or the other to lead Isa to an empty cave.

The cave was much lighter than the rest of the tunnel system they had traveled through, and much taller as well. Scattered across the ground were crystals of all sorts of colors to match the glowing horns of the Pokemon Isa was holding, providing all sorts of colored light. Towards the back of the cave was a spring, lit up by blue and green crystals. The Pokemon started to squirm a bit until Isa let it go. It immediately approached the spring, its steps growing more and more confident before touching the water.

"Thank you for that." A soothing voice filled Isa's head, causing him to jump.

"Who's there?" He started looking around, only for the voice to start laughing.

"Look in front of you, little one." The Pokemon was starting to glow from its feet, slowly increasing in size until its horns nearly touched the ceiling of the cave. It stood proud and tall, looking down at Isa in a gentle sort of way.

"Are you Xerneas?" Isa hesitated before he asked the question.

"I am." Xerneas seemed to laugh a bit. "It's been awhile since I've seen one of your kind. I think the last to visit me was your people's Empress."

"Valencia visited you?"

"So that is her name. She had never given it to me before. But yes, she comes to visit me every once in awhile." Xerneas spoke with a bit of a somber tone.

"You don't sound that enthusiastic about it."

"Not particularly. Your Empress is the reason I've brought you here, actually. I don't think that you will find much truth to what I'm saying, but Valencia is a corrupt leader and unfit to rule. I doubt you would believe me after all she's done for her people, but I hope you can at least listen. If you don't want anything to do with me, I understand, and you can go back to your own goals."

"How so?"

"You're actually interested?"

"I mean, I have no reason not to believe you. Valencia's never done anything for me." Isa shrugged a little.

"Very well. Valencia claims to have rescued the people of Axiom by defeating the armies of the Dark Lands, but this is mostly a lie. Valencia was from the Dark Lands, then called the land of Ruria. She and three others led Ruria and the region controlled most of the world. Lugia, Kyurem, Rayquaza, and Darkrai, four legendary Pokemon with the power to change the world, allied themselves with the leaders of Ruria to keep balance between humans and Pokemon. Nearby, Axiom was a land just starting to prosper, thanks to a group of humans who had offered peace to Yveltal, Zygarde, and I. The leaders of Ruria lived in fear of the land it could become, so they started to war against Axiom."