Shalour City
Chris: Gosh; that tower’s incredible, isn’t it, Ruby? I’ve read about it but it’s even more amazing to actually see it!
Ruby: Mmm, I suppose even I must admit it’s rather impr- wait, hang on, you can read!?
Chris: Come on! Korrina said that’s where she hangs out most of the time; let’s go see her!
Ruby: Yes… yes, the human who travels with those two Lucario. They’ll not escape me this time. Whatever secrets they hold will be mine! MINE! HA-hahahahaha-HAH!
Fisher: …my lady, I must confess you frighten me sometimes.
Spruce: Sometimes?
…
Ruby: All right, you two! I’ve got a bone to pick with you!
Amaldos: The blinded one comes to promise the moon to the sky, and explain both to the earth.
Lelanthion: Our sky is its limit. We who live in stone houses shall throw all the glass we please.
Amaldos: The gods give us two eyes, and blind us, two ears, and deafen us, but with only one mouth, even the blindest of us they do not leave mute.
Lelanthion: Bah! Our deaf ears speak louder than our blind eyes.
Ruby: Oh, for- if you don’t stop your deranged rambling, I’ll do worse than blind and deafen you, you pair of lunatics! You stand in the presence of the greatest sorceress alive! My magic has beaten you once; I’d be happy to show you the same again, and growing happier by the moment! Now tell me what you know about the Mega Stones!
Lelanthion: A stone that gathers no moss will always be in motion. Should the moss presume to question the stone?
Amaldos: [to Lelanthion] Knowledge that is shared is kept, but a secret is lost, and silence dies when its name is spoken. If all that glitters should fall silent, can silence be broken by a silver tongue? [Both turn towards Ruby]
Ruby: I’m… going to take that as meaning you’re prepared to talk. The stones. Where can I find one?
Lelanthion: In the right place at the right time.
Amaldos: In the wrong place at a worse time.
Lelanthion: In a place for everything.
Amaldos: Where everything is out of place.
Lelanthion: Under our very noses, which we cut off to spite our faces.
Ruby: That’s… that’s incredibly unhelpful; look, can you just speak plain Kalosian?
Amaldos: No.
Ruby: …
Merneith: In retrospect, you were asking for that one.
Lelanthion: A stone could gather all the moss it pleased and never come to rest, if it found no valley that suited it. And moss grows poorly when blinded by the light of the sun.
Amaldos: But once a stone is rolling, new words roll off a silver tongue. A mouse with all its eggs in one hole will soon lose its baskets.
Lelanthion: Mice do not lay eggs.
Amaldos: Nor do eggs hatch into mice, but a headless chicken may still count both.
Lelanthion: Hmph. Perhaps.
Ruby: [sigh] I am almost certainly going to regret even asking this, but do you in fact know anything about the Mega Stones at all?
Fisher: Forgive me, my lady, but I believe that is what they are referring to.
Ruby: What? Don’t tell me you can understand them?
Fisher: Not… not as such, no, but their way of speaking, veiled in metaphor and wordplay… it is reminiscent of certain elder priests of my church, those whose minds have become… detached from this world, from long and intense contemplation of the mysteries of the Blessed Helix. These two may have been exposed to some similar influence… or something darker.
Amaldos: [sadly] Darkness comes before the dawn. We who are blinded by the light outside the cave see only shadows of doubt on a wall long since written on.
Fisher: I see…
Lelanthion: No. You do not.
Amaldos: [to Lelanthion] We old dogs learn the oldest tricks from the oldest book, but a young fox may pen a new book altogether.
Lelanthion: Or perhaps simply cook the old!
Amaldos: We can never try if we already know.
Lelanthion: Try, then. But those prepared to try again will never succeed at first.
Amaldos: Then we play with all our dice loaded. [Holds out an object to Ruby] As for you, blinded one, write your story, turn your pages, be a candle to burn through the night, and a bell to break the silence!
Ruby: This… is this a Mega Stone? It’s smaller than the others I’ve seen. Is its power lesser than the others’? I feel barely anything from it. Pah! What is this, another test?
Amaldos: A splendid idea! Korrina’s emblem will open the way; go, face our underlings in this city’s Gym, and see whether you hold a candle to the chime of their bells… [Both Lucario leap away and vanish]
Ruby: Hey! Hey, I’m not done with- HEY! THE SORCERESS SUPREME DOES NOT GIVE YOU PERMISSION TO LEAVE HER PRESENCE! YOU-! ARGH!
Spruce: Um… are… are you okay, Ruby?
Ruby: Ugh. I am this close to just burning this whole damn tower to the ground, but they obviously know something. Come on; let’s get this over with.
…
Ruby: [sigh] It’s perfectly simple. By my almighty magic alone, I have slain your acolytes and driven your forces before me…
Martial: Hmph. That is not precisely how I remember it, witch.
Ruby: …so now, you tell me anything you know about your ‘masters’ or the Mega Stones, and I’ll destroy you.
Hawlucha: …surely you mean “or you’ll destroy us”?
Ruby: Yes, yes, whatever makes you feel better. Just start talking.
Hawlucha: It seems I have little choice. Lelanthion and Amaldos are the keepers of the shrines within the Tower of Mastery and guardians of the secrets of the Mega Stones, this city’s greatest treasures. They are chosen by the gods, the only ones among us who can access the stones’ transcendent powers. We of the Shalour City Gym serve as their faithful acolytes, helping to maintain the sacred places and take care of any duties to which their… elevated minds… are no longer suited.
Ruby: So they were holding out on me… they do have a stone, then? And they know how to use them?
Hawlucha: The masters both hold Mega Stones, but they would be of no use to you. Lelanthion and Amaldos both wield Lucarionite, and only Lucario can unlock the aura power within. I know of no Mega Stone in Kalos that can be attuned to a member of your species.
Ruby: Pffft. I’ve found plenty of use for so-called Charizardite and Aerodactylite. Why should these be any different?
Hawlucha: You speak of heresy! Each Mega Stone contains the truest essence of one and only one species of Pokémon, the culmination of everything that they are! What you suggest is an abomination, a crime against every member of the race to which the stone truly belongs! The gods would surely strike down anyone who dared such insolence!
Ruby: Yeah, well, like I said, been there, done that, and no one’s struck me down yet. And to be honest, it didn’t seem like your masters were all that upset about it either. Amaldos even gave me this. [shows her the Key Stone]
Hawlucha: [eyes widen] The Humanite? No! No, you lie! Amaldos may be- but- but he would never-! I don’t know what vile sacrilege you’re planning, witch, but this will not stand! I defy you to the end!
Ruby: [rolls eyes] Like I said, you tell me anything you know, and I’ll destroy you. PSYBEAM. [fizzle-KABANG]
Merneith: Serves her right, for her blind devotion to such ridiculous ideas. I can’t stand zealots.
Spruce: That… that doesn’t seem at all… ironic to you?
Merneith: No, why?
Spruce: Um. No reason.
…
Amaldos: Colours fly where once we saw only shadows on the wall.
Lelanthion: And what is the true colour of shadow?
Amaldos: Our colour, surely, we who are shadows of ourselves. [to Ruby] Come forward, blinded one.
Ruby: I hope we are finally through with ridiculous tests. Your pathetic henchmen have been annihilated.
Lelanthion: Then you have effected their release from our service.
Amaldos: And released our service from their effects.
Ruby: [raised eyebrow] So it would seem. Your senior acolyte had an… interesting reaction to seeing the stone you gave me. They weren’t quite on the same page as you, were they?
Lelanthion: We have long been reading from a closed book.
Amaldos: And they have taken pages from many others. We blinded ones can only read between the lines, and what I read has been written off.
Lelanthion: Not written off, but written up, written on, and written back, before it can be written down. [to Ruby] What book has bones, but no spine?
Spruce: Uh, the um… the heron may swallow a pinecone, but it shall not sprout a tree as it dances upon the lake.
Lelanthion: Nor may the soaring eagle slither unnoticed beneath as the snake.
Spruce: Yes. Um. Exactly. And… and a bird in the hand is worth beating around the bush.
Amaldos: But is a beaten bush worth the bark of the wrong tree?
Spruce: Uh. True. Point taken. Very true.
Ruby: What on earth did you just say to them?
Spruce: I… I have absolutely no idea.
Ruby: As always, Spruce, you have met my every expectation of you spectacularly.
Spruce: Thanks!
Ruby: …quite. [to Amaldos] Look, clearly I’ve somehow done you a favour by decimating your dysfunctional little cult. May I assume I have earned some degree of goodwill, or shall we just get right to the fiery death?
Amaldos: You seek the knowledge that corrupts power, and the corruption that is the power of knowledge. I would join you, and help you find the moss that gathers as your stone rolls. What could be more fitting than for the blind to lead the blind?
Ruby: …wait, what? You want to-?
Lelanthion: A blind horse can be made to drink, but how can it be led to water? I forbid it.
Amaldos: Time is the longest distance between two places. There is water all around us, but we sail on a ship whose every plank has rotted and been replaced.
Lelanthion: That which is changed is as good as broken.
Amaldos: Then we stand at the crossroads, over a matter most trivial. To war, then?
Lelanthion: [shrugs] What else can happen when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?
Spruce: Uh… are they about to-?
Martial: Good sirs, can we not resolve this matter peacefully?
Amaldos: Silence, all. Now shall we idiots tell our tale of sound and fury, to signify everything!
Lelanthion: We dogs of war cry havoc, and let slip our monarchs’ voice! Behold, ephemeral creatures, what it is to be blinded by the light!
Amaldos hat sich zu Mega-Lucario entwickelt!
Lelanthion hat sich zu Mega-Lucario entwickelt!
Spruce: WHOA! What the-!?
Merneith: …I wonder whether those stones come in a chemical-free herbal version.
Ruby: …oh. So that’s what they’re really for.
Amaldos: Do you remember the steps to our dance?
Lelanthion: I remember nothing, but perhaps it remembers me.
Both: SWORDS DANCE!
Spruce: How do they move like that!?
Fisher: I can scarcely even follow the blows with my eyes… Is this how the Dragonslayer ATV moved in his final battle?
Lelanthion: Our feet are one step ahead of us.
Amaldos: We were faster once.
Lelanthion: Or our feet were one step slower.
Amaldos: A pity a swan cannot dance.
Lelanthion: Has the final blow been struck yet?
Amaldos: Yes, but with a double-edged sword.
Lelanthion: We ought to catch up with our steps, then… at last… [collapses]
Amaldos: [sadly] The end of another beginning… and the beginning of another end.
Spruce: Wait, you just- did you- is he-?
Ruby: Certainly looks it. But what about… argh. [holds up Lelanthion’s Lucarionite] Cracked and ruined. No power left in it. It’s useless. [tosses it aside] Bah!
Spruce: But… but he was your friend, wasn’t he?
Amaldos: We cowards die many times before our death. Once more signifies but little. Let us be gone from this place, brave ones. You have only one life to waste.
The Team:
Ruby the Rutena (Braixen)
Female, Bold nature, level 32, Großbrand (Blaze)
Lichtschild (Light Screen), Psystrahl (Psybeam), Nitroladung (Flame Charge), Feuerwirbel (Fire Spin)
Spruce the Tauboga (Pidgeotto)
Male, Rash nature, level 32, Adlerauge (Keen Eye)
Windhose (Twister), Daunenreigen (Featherdance), Windstoß (Gust), Ruckzuckhieb (Quick Attack)
Fisher the Enton (Psyduck)
Male, Brave nature, level 32, Wolke Sieben (Cloud Nine)
Aussetzer (Disable), Dunkelklaue (Shadow Claw), Konfusion, Surfer (Surf)
Merneith the Rokkaiman (Krokorok)
Female, Bashful nature, level 32, Hochmut (Moxie)
Knirscher (Crunch), Steigerungshieb (Power-Up Punch), Felsgrab (Rock Tomb), Schaufler (Dig)
Martial the Nidoking
Male, Brave nature, level 32, Giftdorn (Poison Point)
Energiefokus, Doppelkick, Gifthieb (Poison Jab), Hornattacke
Amaldos the Lucario
Male, Hasty nature, level 32, Felsenfest (Steadfast)
Steigerungshieb (Power-Up Punch), Schwerttanz (Swords Dance), Metallsound (let’s say this is Triple Kick and see if anyone gets confused), Knochenhatz (Bone Rush)
Graveyard:
Melissa the Bibor (Beedrill)
Female, Jolly nature, level 16, Hexaplaga (Swarm)
Giftstachel (Poison Sting), Duonadel (Twineedle), Energiefokus (Focus Energy), Furienschlag (Fury Attack)
Boreas the Amarino (Amaura)
Male, Mild nature, level 29, Frostschicht (Refrigerate)
Natur-Kraft (Nature Power), Bodycheck (Take Down), Felsgrab (Rock Tomb), Aurorastrahl (Aurora Beam)
Pokémaniacal 