Living in the Shadows: Bonus Features

MIDNIGHT PARTY

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It was after eleven o'clock when I woke up. I looked out the window and saw the waning moon. Hey, Cresselia?

Hmm? What? she asked, sounding half asleep.

Do you want to absorb this world's moonlight while we're still here?

She was silent as she thought for a moment. Go ahead.

She knew what I meant when I asked about the moonlight. I got out of bed and used the shadows to find a secluded place to go. Ironically, that place was by the cliff where Queen Vespiquen's hive is.

Perfect, Cresselia said, sounding more alert. One-stop shopping.

I tapped Luxray on his shoulder to wake him. Once he was up, I put his paw on my mark. Jenna and I are going to Queen Vespiquen's hive to check on Darkrai. We should be back by midnight. Cresselia told him.

"Alright, just be careful," he whispered.

After I shadow-jumped there, I lifted my sleeve and exposed my mark to the moonlight. Be sure you absorb as much as you can, I told her. The next time we do this, we'll be in Darkrai's world.

If I absorb too much too fast, you'll get a pounding headache in the morning.

I'll deal with it.

Well, alright. But don't say I didn't warn you. The mark on my shoulder glowed. After ten or fifteen minutes, it started pulsing and then vibrate, before it started throbbing.

"Oww!" I practically shouted after one painful spike as I hastily covered the mark.

Sorry, sorry! Cresselia said frantically. Are you OK, Jenna?

My shoulder and arm are still stinging, but the pain is steadily going away. Going away from my arm and traveling through the rest of my body. It wasn't a painful pain, more like overworked muscle pain. (The kind you notice but don't take seriously.)

If I had known that was going to happen, she said. I wouldn't have absorbed so much.

It's OK. . . . Does this mean my headache will be worse than what you predicted?

Unfortunately.

Well, I sighed. Nothing we can do about it now. We might as well check on your boyfriend.

I could feel Cresselia blushing. He is not my boyfriend! she shouted in my head.

That's not what your mom said. I told her in a teasing tone after the pain of her shout faded. I was looking for shadows in the hive's main chamber to appear in.

That was private! Is there anything my mother didn't tell you?! She didn't shout this time, but she might as well have with the tone she used.

Nope. I said, still teasing. Not about how you two met. How you and my great-grandmother saved his life all those years ago. And most definitely not about how you both were going to confess your feelings for each other that night sixteen years ago.

If Cresselia were here in corporal form, her entire head would be bright red. Grr! Of all the-! She tells me I can't meddle in anyone's life, but it's all fine and dandy for her to-! Wait, what?

What? I asked as I appeared through the cave's wall.

What was that last part?

I could feel her heart pounding in my arm. It beat faster when I answered; Nope, sorry. That's something you and he should say to each other in person. Like you planned on.