﻿Chapter 2


“Everyone get back!” Jack held his shield forward while waving the sword behind himself, pushing Elizabeth and Luna up against the other boys to shove them to the right away from him. 


Confusion occurred for Rook and the students as they were shoved and fell upon each other. The loud clang of the weapons meeting each other was followed shortly by a loud ‘ZZZRT!’ as Professor Jack’s energy attempted to match that of his attacker’s.


Everyone was able to look back up from within their pile, trying to clamber off of each other in the process. They could see that the creature’s weapon had sliced straight through the Professor’s shield. Sparks of electricity scattered from the jagged line the black blade had apparently sawed and carved through it. 


“Professor!” Elizabeth screamed as she was the first to realize that the creature’s pure black weapon had not just carved through the shield, but also Professor Jack’s electronic body behind it. The scent of burning and scorched circuitry soon followed as it built within the air.


Sparks of electricity scattered from the jagged line the black blade had carved through it, sending a shower of glowing embers across the ground. The shield buckled under the weight of the attack, and with a sickening crack, the blade continued, slicing through the electronic display that housed Jack’s spirit. The left side of his screen went dark, and the vibrant glow of his spirit dimmed, as if part of him had been erased.


“Wh…what…?” Professor Jack stammered, as intense pain registered to his mind shortly after. Ghost types weren’t living, and so most physical attacks unless specially augmented would pass right through them, but their essence still felt pain from energy attacks.


Jack pushed back with his shield and then crossed his sword in front of it, slashing the blade across it at the creature in front of him to drive it back. The black creature jumped back from the slash, cackling. 


“Surprised?” It started as it landed about six feet away from Jack. “My attacks aren’t physical or energy based. I’m attacking your very being. I will make it so you no longer -exist- this time Jack.”


Jack’s eye stuttered on the still functioning portion of his electronic screen. “Y-you…d-don’t…harm the chi-children…” 


“You know Jack…” The creature interrupted, ignoring Jack’s request and voice suddenly becoming cold and quiet as its pose relaxed, standing before the stuttering Rotom. “When I killed you…I had thought I would’ve felt…that it would have evened out the anger. But it didn’t. If anything I felt even more angry, but I couldn’t for the life of me tell at what.”


“Then Enzlo sent me on my journey…I eventually came to a realm where I couldn’t physically exist. And then I found you. Except you weren’t…you. Broken by a world that thrived on lies and the suffering of others…you tried to love and that world discarded your desire and everyone you knew told you you were wrong…I watched on as the greedy and powerful of the world stamped down the wills of the weak and many, created a dystopia where people slaved to live in a disguise of “Peace” for little more than scraps to survive while they lived like kings! I felt like I had been watching your punishment for your betrayal of my trust, a life where you toiled for survival, where the humankind you had betrayed me for was the very thing that kept you crushed, but that didn’t make sense becuase so many others were just like you, or worse…so I eventually made myself known to you. I tried to help you and those you loved, tried to help others through you…but…then you died. And I couldn’t do a thing about it…it was all I could do just to keep you and others like you for as long as I did...” 


The creature’s hand tightened on its weapon, and the air around it seemed to vibrate with the intensity of growing anger. Its voice, once calm, now rose like a storm building on the horizon, “That’s when I found out what I was, what every realm I’d been through was for…your Everything…Every realm I had ever been in, just some kind of…sick mental joke. An impossible, never ending journey that only ever ended with your own death...it didn't matter, no matter what choices I made, no matter how much I tried to make it mentally instantaneous…it ended the same…death.” As it spoke, its form seemed to ripple with dark energy, the air around it growing colder and heavier. Air warped around its body, visibly being affected by Nothing’s being to distort the scenery around its body.


“That’s when I finally understood your rage, why you had betrayed me to give me the power you had. When I finally understood our true Connection. This shared feeling we have is the betrayal of reality itself. So I decided that such a place, such an existence that pitted you and me against each other…that denied what we both wanted! It didn’t deserve to continue existing!” It shouted these last few words while tearing at the air in front of itself with its hands, before stopping and pulling them close to its chest. The rising intensity it had been growing suddenly just faded out, that vibrating and distortion of air just ceased as it returned to calmly saying the last of its words. “…nothing did.” 


It then pointed the end of its weapon at Jack, standing taller. “So that’s what I became. Nothing.” It spat out the last word. “For both of us, I would remove the cancer that is existence itself.” 


“I-I have n-no idea what yo-you’re tal-talking about.” Jack responded, his voice stuttering from the electronic display of the pokedex. The Rotom panted slightly. No matter how much he tried to reoccupy the now damaged part of the pokedex, he couldn’t. It was as if the creature’s weapon had not just damaged it physically but had removed it from existence, despite it still being there visibly to the students watching. It felt as if the left side of his own face was just simply gone, a sudden empty numbness where he believed he should feel it.


“Of course you don’t.” Nothing growled. “You don’t even have a memory of that realm or of your life before you became a Rotom.”


“But I…I do know, w-what you are.” Professor Jack continued, his half broken face peeking over the shield at Nothing. “I k-know what I am to-to you…You are-are n-not the one who k-killed me. Th-that version of u-us…h-here, they ne-never existed. That y-you ch-choose to b-become someth-thing like this…”


In confidence, Professor Jack lowered his sword and shield slightly so that Nothing could see the smile upon the pokedex’s lower screen where it still functioned. With a moment of effort, even while more sparks continued sputtering from the cracked open screen and his shield, he stopped his voice from stuttering by focusing on it.  


“Thank you…my friend…but I can’t let you go on. Seeing you like this…breaks my heart.”


There was a short, nearly imperceptible moment, a near half a second,  in which the air around Nothing was sucked in on itself, a tight bubble around Nothing’s body before it burst with the dark feeling of Nothing's rage. 


Up until now, the children had remained huddled close together just about a dozen feet behind their Professor, but the released blast and forceful wave of air and energy from whatever move or attack Nothing had just done covered the land and sent them tumbling backwards by several yards. Nothing howled in rage, “YOU’D DARE!? YOU’D DARE SAY THAT AFTER EVERYTHING I’VE HAD TO GO THROUGH!?” 


A pillar of dark energy had erupted from behind Nothing, as suddenly, and all across the world of Lumaria, every single Rift expanded vertically into the air by several thousand meters. While their width did not increase, the sudden gash of light the seemingly tower-like rips in reality itself caused was shocking and pokemon all around the world would pause in confusion, shock, and the first buildings of fear. Like black obelisks against the fabric of the sky, the Rifts stood as gashes upon the light of the world, or blocks to the stars of night.


“DO YOU FEEL AS I CAN? EVERY DEATH I HAVE BEEN THROUGH, THE MONSTERS I HAVE HAD TO KILL, THE MONSTER I HAD TO BECOME IN TURN?!” Nothing snarled, its pitch black body wildly pricking. The sound of the ground being broken up at its feet was like cement in a grinder. Nothing’s own being ate and destroyed the very ground it stood on, as even its feet grew spikes of what was just simply…in essence, little needles of ‘Nothing’ simply carving the ground. The sound was gyrating to the senses of the pokemon there, as the ground began to shake soon after.


Rook yelped as he’d finally hit the ground, tumbling once before he managed a stop, bracing himself against the pushing force of air. Blake managed to catch himself on the ground a little after him, while Elizabeth, Luna, and Finn continued to get tossed. Elizabeth would finally manage to catch her own footing and catch Luna in her arms, while Finn landed upon an upturned rock in the valley and used it to anchor himself down to the ground.  


At every Rift across Lumaria, the land did the same shaking upheaval. Some that were close to a City shook their very foundations. The entire world suddenly was feeling the result of this confrontation. Screams and shouts of panic began within the cities and villages throughout the world.


“It’s a little early.” Nothing said, its voice suddenly cold and heavy again, calmer, “But I no longer want to hold back…” 


“I shall show…an end…to all. Like demons and gods of lore, catastrophes against and from nature…a beginning to all ends and an end to all beginnings…” Nothing’s voice rang out oddly louder than the noise its body made as it stepped forward, foot again just grinding right back down into the ground. This left a kind of footprint where it stepped away, but it was more just a grinded pile in the shape of a Lycanroc’s footpaw. 


“I’m afraid we both were a little naive about what existence was!” Professor Jack shouted. Oh how he wished he knew…He actually only knew very little of his own life. When he had been Reignited, he had been told that those who knew him…did not wish to see him. In fact, his name itself had seemed to instill fear even into other ghosts for quite some time after…it was only his Mistress’ protection which provided him with enough connections to learn and become a teacher. Overtime though, that fear of his name had also seemed to go away. It had been a strange beginning to a long 5000 years, and in due time, Jack made peace with that. But now he had some clues as to why that had been. Jack’s mind raced as he stared at the creature before him. This was no ordinary enemy—this was a twisted reflection of a life that could have been. But he couldn’t let the students see his fear. They were his responsibility, and he would protect them, even if it meant facing a past he barely remembered. Whoever this thing had once been, from what he could gather by the way it kept talking and spilling itself to him…it had apparently killed him, but it had also been his friend. 


It was time to use what his Mistress had once taught him…first he had to keep his students safe! He’d have to use Custom Moves afterall…


“You don’t understand…what I’ve had to do…because of what I am.” Nothing’s voice said calmly, even though its form remained agitated. “I can’t destroy an existence…I can’t…” 


The air and that pushing force was suddenly both heavy and immoveable. There was a sudden pressure in the air that pushed the pokemon there against the ground while also having that heavy wind passing over their bodies. Professor Jack remained mostly unaffected, his spirit body unaffected by the physical pressure. 


“They are all here!!!” Nothing crouched down, its paw holding out that weapon towards the towering tear in spacetime behind him. Out of the gaping Rift, shadowy figures began emerging one at a time but in rapid fashion—Wraiths, their forms twisted and ethereal, smoky black bodies twisting into long, multi limbed, thick bodied creatures with glowing green eyes that flickered like distant stars among the blackness they resembled. They moved with a sinister grace, almost perfectly silent, their bodies wreathed in smoky darkness that seemed to absorb the very light around them. “Every reality has such amazing things!” Nothing shouted, its voice cracking a bit suddenly. “It’s part of what makes me!!! To exist…you can’t destroy other existences!!! So instead…I convinced them to join me!!!” 


Professor Jack rattled back as the Wraiths poured from the gate next to them, but the beasts did not attempt to jump and attack at Professor Jack, instead rushing past and around him to swarm the land like a tidal wave of darkness.


“No! Kids!” Jack shouted.


“EVERY SINGLE REALM!!!” Nothing roared on, as Jack turned and attempted to rush towards and help the kids, when suddenly even HE became affected by the forceful Gravity Move, his Pokedex body suddenly slapped itself to the ground to stand upright. The pushing air flicked pebbles and small rocks into the pokemon’s faces, forcing all of them to often need to close their eyes as they tried to keep sight of Nothing. 


“EVERY ONE OF THEM REDUCED TO ONE THING! THE NEED OF NOTHING!!!” Jack heard as the Wraiths let out screeching noises akin to banshees of their own, unaffected by Nothing’s attack. They raced for the five students, with Rook and Blake being the closest. 


“NO!” Rook shouted as the creatures were just a few dozen feet from himself and Blake. The gravity was too strong! 


“Custom Move! Limit Freeze!” Professor Jack shouted. 


Suddenly, a wall of frozen, hard ice erupted between Rook, Blake and the approaching Wraiths, it wrapped around and surrounded them both by about five yards like a dome. 


“Limit Scorch!” A circled wall of fire surrounded Elizabeth and Luna by about five yards apart.


“Limit Hydra!” A pillar of water erupted around Finn, gushing into the area he stood as it geyser's from the ground in another five yard circle. 


With a psychic link to them all, Jack quickly shouted into the kids' minds even as Nothing continued to scream on with a steady tide of Wraiths pouring from the Rift. “Get out of here as soon as you can kids! I’ll be right behind you!” Jack could feel his energy being drained by the moves, keeping a constant attack up like this as a barrier to the Wraiths was going to drain him quickly.


“NO YOU WON’T!!!” Nothing snarled, “Especially not you, Jack!” 


Professor Jack froze. It could sense his thoughts…?


“HAHAHA!!! Don’t you get it!?” Nothing’s voice went manic as it leaned in, flexing its arms and baring chest and face forward. With Nothing’s pitchblack body, its sharp teeth created deep looking triangles of darkness in the air, and lines fell from the top jaw to the other. Even Nothing’s drool was nonexistent looking… “WE WERE MEANT FOR EACH OTHER!!” 


And suddenly, Nothing, and several Wraiths near him, jumped on Jack. 


_________________________


All across Lumaria, every Rift, even those that had yet to be found, were ejecting Wraiths at an alarming rate. Alarms and sirens blared and pokemon reacted, but a death toll already surging from hundreds and into the thousands by a minute had begun ticking. The Wraiths made no distinction—civilian, Rifter, Arena Fighter, Schooler, Bandit, Wild, young or old, all were prey. They killed and slaughtered all they could. Teams of Rifters and Eeveelutions and Keepers and Guild Members all engaged the Wraiths, protecting and escorting whoever they could, taking shelter to stay hidden. 


But only so much could be done. Buildings and forts crumbled under the relentless tide of Wraiths that would tear open walls and buildings to get to their targets. The outskirts and streets of city’s flooded with darkness and glittering green eyes. The sounds of screams and the chill of rising dread induced panic upon the Citizens. Rifters were overwhelmed, they had been a large number of the first casualties, the camps they had made by Rifts as part of their profession were overtaken. Even those in their sleep were slaughtered or injured with barely enough time to let out screams or try to fight back. 


Guilds and Cities defended their walls with everything they could, but even their ranks and high level members began to falter against the never ending waves and were quickly overtaken. Fighters and Gladiators clashed with mobs of Wraiths within the Arenas they championed, with their honor they encircled and protected civilians and their apprentices, but one by one would begin to fall, becoming dishonorably outnumbered. 


Buildings collapsed. Screams filled the air. Darkness flooded the streets, suffocating all hope. Fires soon spread, either by cause of moves or otherwise to try and stem the tide, their light blotted out by the waves of Wraiths. The smoldering smoke and scent of ash and burning wood masked over the scent of blood and death left in their wake. 


At last, the hearts of cities and guilds held fast against the onslaught, with the most powerful pokemon at the front to defend those unable to more powerfully fight. It was by some fool's blessing that the Wraiths only had numbers on their side; their power levels mostly remaining low. Beam attacks were prioritized, cutting down swaths of the creatures pouring through the streets. Eventual coordination by leaders and teams alike slowed the rise of deaths and managed to keep it from rising higher.


As abruptly as the chaos began, the Rifts snapped back to their original sizes after ten minutes, as if recoiling from their own violence. The thousands of Wraiths that had been invading evaporated, their bodies melting upon the air and green glinting eyes fading with it. But the destruction and death remained…As the last Wraith evaporated, an eerie silence settled over the cities. The cacophony of battle was replaced by the oppressive quiet, broken only by the crackle of still ongoing fires and the occasional groan of a collapsing building.


As the Wraiths had dissipated, the darkness they caused vanished and the light returned, revealing the crushed buildings, smoldering fires, and the bloodied and slain corpses, torn and shredded by the Wraiths and their relentless assaults. A few got lucky, and survived because the Wraiths vanished just after they were overwhelmed or caught, their nearby team members rushing to assist them. For most however, the silence that had followed resembled the end Nothing promised, as deafening as the destruction and chaos itself had been, with everyone too stunned to think. 


Groups of pokemon, with powerful defenders at the front of gathered groupings, panted and jumped at any small sound of rubble clattering and falling in the aftermath of the assault, wide-eyed as they absorbed the damage that had been caused before themselves. Several were left with telling wounds and in critical condition. Some remained where they were for minutes until other survivors managed to find and call out to them.


A mother Milktank, clutching her crying child to her chest, wept silently as she realized the rest of their family would never emerge from the wreckage of her home. She tried desperatly to hold back her own tears as they escaped her eyes one by one, to remain a solid anchor for her remaining child.


A Rifter Torracat, bloodied and battered, dragged himself from the debris of his camp, only to find his comrades reduced to lifeless forms around him. Luck and smarts had deemed him to survive when a broken tent cloth covered and hid him, and he choose to remain silent as the wave of Wraiths washed over his camp.  


Survivors' guilt was quick to take root among many in similar scenes. The weight of their survival pressed down on them as heavily as the rubble surrounding them. The guilt of survival was immediate and suffocating. They questioned why they had been spared when so many others had not, their relief tainted by the haunting knowledge that they were now alone.

From the sprawling metropolises to the remote villages, no corner of Lumaria was spared. The devastation was as widespread as it was sudden, leaving no sanctuary untouched except one. The only pokemon that had remained safe were those who lived within or happened to be traveling by Mystery Dungeon routes, where somehow, even while this mass hysteria and chaos was induced outside in the world of Lumaria, they remained unaffected. Even at that moment, a single wild pokemon was just waking up and greeting the daylight of the copied realm it lived in…unaware their home had become one of very few with peace still available and thousands had just been slain.


It had been ten minutes. Ten minutes like a mythical hell that had felt both impossibly brief and endlessly torturous. It left wounded and shattered pokemon, for the moment terrified of each passing second and many left with nothing, their families and friends scattered and presumed dead. The shock and losses of this attack were yet to truly be felt by many…as pokemon began to call out for their families and friends, others stood in shock, simply unsure of what they needed to do now. 


However panic-stricken but resolute, leaders scrambled to coordinate a response, their minds racing as they grasped for any explanation, mental and telepathic communication chaotic as everyone tried to speak at once. They knew one thing for certain: if this could happen once, it could happen again. The world they had known was no longer safe, and every moment they hesitated could mean more lives lost.The Rifts had shrunk back down, the Wraiths had vanished. In all the five thousand years that they had existed alongside the Rifts, this was the first time they had seen this kind of attack. What had just happened? What were they up against? And would it happen again? 

Despite their best efforts, the leaders found themselves grasping at shadows, unable to piece together the nature of this unprecedented attack. Only more questions were asked through the confusing mix of mental communications. Had some outlaw pokemon gained some dark control over Rifts and Wraiths? What force had orchestrated this? What dark purpose lay behind it? The more they searched for answers, the more elusive the truth became.


These were questions that lacked clear answers and only speculation was achieved. Instead, efforts to reinforce and plan, as well as care for and provide shelter for those who needed it, were shoved ahead in importance for preparation and assumption that “Yes, it could happen again.” 


Out of the millions of pokemon that lived that day, just nearly 100,500 were killed in ten minutes. A mere small percentage yet still frightening for the timeframe it occurred within. Had it continued, no one was sure how long they would’ve been able to hold out. The fear of it happening again needed to be addressed and the civilian populace assured of their safety. It was a few days more before coordinated effort truly began, messages of positivity, working together, and unity were spread while other pokemon oppositely continued to fall to despair when finding their loved ones killed along with their homes ruined.


The shockwaves of this event would ripple for weeks to come as Guilds and Cities and even individual groups began investigating and preparing, leadership took shape once more. As the survivors began to sift through the wreckage of their lives, a sense of foreboding hung in the air—this was only the first strike, and the darkness that had touched Lumaria today would not easily be dispelled.


This was a day that would be etched into the history of Lumaria, a day of reckoning that would be remembered as 'Nothing’s Toll.'


_________________________


(Within those ten minutes, back at the Rift of Crossroads. Just moments before Nothing jumped upon Jack.)


“We’re late!” Mew shouted as he and Mewtwo zoomed across the mountains, closing in on the Rift of Crossroads at just under the speed of sound at 700 miles per hour. From Enzlo’s Tower, it took the pair nearly 5 hours with their already insane speed to cover the distance of just nearly a quarter of Lumaria. The wind roared in their ears as they tore through the sky, the landscape below blurring into an indistinct smear of colors. In the distances ahead and around them they could already make out the long black lines of several Rifts stretching up into the sky.


They had left to arrive at the first Rift with time to spare exactly as Nothing had stated; two days from when it had vanished from atop The Shard. But now it appeared Nothing hadn’t any intent to wait for their arrival. Each second felt like an eternity as they pushed their speed to their limits, focused upon the chaos ahead.


“Technically we’re on time.” Said the calm voice of Enzlo in their heads, despite the chaos affecting the whole of the planet, he remained Mewtwo’s and Mew’s calm guide.


“This is no time for your technicalities Enzlo! Nothing struck before the two days were over!” Mewtwo snarled as he and Mew came to a sudden, air booming stop just above the valley the Rift sat in, its towering, now obelisk-like form reaching high into the sky before them, blotting out the stars of the night. The ground churned with darkness as swarms of Wraiths covered the once empty valley and cascaded into the landscape beyond.  


“There! There it is!” Mew shouted, as near the base of the Rift, they could make out the pillars of fire and water and the dome of ice. The Emotion pokemon could clearly feel the roiling anger that boiled from Nothing, easily pinpointing where it was in the mass of Wraiths that was escaping the Rift. “Someone is fighting Nothing!” The 


“Who is there? And what species?” Enzlo asked them. 


Mewtwo focused on the energy, feeling at the essence of the pokemon on the ground among the tide of surging darkness. “Low levels…multiple species. A classroom of Rifters maybe.” Mewtwo began, feeling further to try and separate the energy to feel their species… 


“Braxien and an Eevee. They are in the fire pillar. A Froakie is behind them in the walls of water. A Poochyena and a Rockruff are in the ice dome. A Rotom is-” 


“Did…you say a Rockruff…?” Enzlo mumbled lightly in their heads.


“Yes…” Mewtwo droned back, disgruntled at being interrupted, before realization of his own came upon him. 


Enzlo didn’t even need to say it. Right then, Nothing and several Wraiths jumped at the Rotom. “Mew! We’re going in! You get the kids!” 


With the same kind of insane speed, Mew and Mewtwo both launched themselves into the conflict. Mewtwo injected himself between Nothing and Jack with the force of a hurricane, scattering Wraiths like leaves in a storm, and Nothing vanished among the waves of darkness and glittering green eyes. Meanwhile, Mew flashed inside the ice dome, his presence a brief flicker of light inside the dome that Rook and Blake had been trapped in. 


“Come on!” Mew shouted at the Rockruff and Poochyena, who were both too panicked and on edge to even realize or become awestruck that a Legendary had just appeared to help them. “Touch my tail!” 


Mew offered his tail to Blake and Rook, but it was then that Rook shouted over the sound of the Wraiths stampeding around them. Even though a single Wraith didn’t make much noise as it ran, the number of them was near deafening.   


“What about the Professor!?”


“Don’t worry about him right now!” Mew shouted back, “This is a situation in which you run! Don't fight!” 


“But-!” 


“Listen to him, Rook!” Professor Jack’s voice called over the mental link they shared, “We must run!” 


Blake barked beside Rook, “He’s right Rook! We’re overwhelmed here!” 


“If you stay here you’re all going to die!” Mew shouted, desperate for the Rockruff to listen to him.


Rook only took a second to weigh those arguments, realizing they were correct. He nodded and reached to take hold of Mew’s tail, and then Blake did after. They began to float, as Mew lifted them up and then he teleported them higher into the air, his telekinetic power keeping them flying. 


Without speaking he immediately poofed to the inside of the fire pillar where Elizabeth and Luna were, but this was when Nothing howled, its voice carried through the air with a sheer malevolence that gave Mew the feeling of dread as he sensed the emotion coming from Nothing when it entered his range of psychic senses, rushing through the Wraiths which just seemed to flow around it, as if it and them were part of the same darkness. That was the emotion of something ready to kill…What happened next was too fast for anyone's reaction…


“STAY OUT OF MY WAY!!!” 


From the nearby herd of Wraiths being kept back by the fire pillar, Nothing crashed through the flames, the orange fire clung to its body. The hot flames quickly shrunk to small wisps and then vanished with final puffs of smoke just about a second after it touched Nothing. It was as if all oxygen was removed from their vicinity to burn with; Nothing's body a cold and chilled void where no spark could burn.  


Nothing landed, crouched and relaunched itself again just as quickly as the flames were snuffed out, twisting wildly through the air. Mew's breath hitched as he saw the flicker of movement in the flames—too fast, too deadly. He attempted to project a barrier to block the attack he believed had been coming for him. 


Only for the wet sound of splattering blood to echo from his left. 


By the time Mew looked, Nothing had already jumped through the flames again, and Luna fell forward onto her side, eyes wide and wavering as a huge gash gushed blood from her chest. Luna's eyes, wide with fear, flickered with a desperate will to survive, but the void-black line across her chest snuffed out any effort in an instant. The light in her eyes dimmed as blood pooled around her, the fire in her spirit extinguished too soon.


She was dead within the next second after she hit the ground. Her eyes stared straight ahead and still reflected the sight of the flames that had been protecting her and Elizabeth from the Wraiths.


“Ah!” Finn’s voice shouted from the vortex of water. 


Mew quickly tapped and sent Elizabeth up next to Rook and Blake, and the Braxien reacted to what she had just seen happen, shouting out down towards the ground while falling to her knees within the telekinetic bubble that now kept her in the air. 


“No! Luna! Luna!” Elizabeth cried, eyes wide and shaking.


But the Eevee remained still, as blood slowly spread across the ground. 


“Finn!” Blake shouted, and the three students as well as their Professor and the two Legendaries looked just as Nothing plunged its’ weapon into the back of the Froakie’s head, standing with one of its feet upon his body. It had tackled him down and then pinned him. It had all only taken little more than four seconds, from the moment Nothing had jumped from the flames to slash Luna to the moment it had pinned Finn. In the chaos of the Wraiths surrounding them, a reaction even by the Legendaries had not been possible.


Death was instant. The tip of the void bringing sword left an empty space within the water frog's very brain. Finn barely saw it coming, getting tackled down to the ground by Nothing’s charge and the sudden smash of its foot had immediately followed Nothings blade of nonexistence through his head. His shout of pain and surprise was the last he would make. 


“Finn!!! No!” Professor Jack shouted, just then barely starting to rise up and recover as Mewtwo spun to blast a trio of Wraiths that jumped at their backs. His mind reeled with refusal to accept they were dead.


“Mew! Get them out of here!” Mewtwo shouted mentally out loud at him. His heart beat like hell in his chest, both in anger and calculating anxiety that kept him from trying to attack Nothing directly. He had the element of surprise before, but now Nothing was aware of him. As quick as the psychic was, he’d not get a free shot again.


Mew teleported up to the three students and his eyes glowed as he reached out mentally towards the safest place he could think of at that moment. That it was unfortunately nearly 3500 miles away meant that it was going to take some time. 


“Finn! Luna! Get up! You monster!” Rook, Blake and Elizabeth all began shouting different things, their forms shimmering in the telekinetic hold Mew kept on them. The realization of his friend’s deaths sent a rage of desperation through the young pokemon.


“NO!” Rook growled alongside Blake and Elizabeth’s own shouts of despair and rage. His heart pounded in his chest, torn by an instinct to fight as he witnessed his friends get cut down, yet knowing they were up against a foe far too powerful for them. He looked at Professor Jack as the Rotom had become frozen, seeing the look of pure shock upon his teacher’s face. “Professor! We-!” 

His shout was cut off as Mew would finally latch to his destination and pull himself and the students there with Teleport, as they all would just vanish from that point of space.


Their building wails suddenly cut off, and Nothing cackled over the body of Finn as it removed their blade from their head and stepped off his body; the grinding spikes that quivered across Nothing's feet had also grinded up a portion of the Froakie’s body like it was doing to the ground, leaving it a bloody mush of carved up flesh. 


“Such great emotion…” Nothing snarled, turning himself towards Mewtwo and Professor Jack. Even though he was so far away from them, his voice could be heard by the psychic and ghost, protecting their mental senses onto his location, and of course, Nothing knew they were doing it, he could tell exactly where their senses were focused from. He saw it like little colored lines in the ‘darkness’ that was his own vision; his own way of seeing. It saw life as color. “Those emotions just as they realized their friends were dead…I knew exactly how to use that to bring them to understand me…I could’ve turned them into Wraiths…that start in emotion leads to the same feeling I’ve felt so easily.” 


Mewtwo shifted beside Jack as the Rotom rose, visibly shaken as the ghost's electric like body began to momentarily shift and fade, a sign of a frightened ghost. “N-no…you…without even a second thought…”


“Yes…” Nothing’s voice almost sounded pleased, chilling in the air as a dark whisper. “That’s right Jack, follow that emotion, see the place I have…feel how coooooooold it is…there is no hope, no warmth, just an endless, dark, silent void. That is the truth of all existence, when stripped of its lies.” 


It was working too, Jack was spiraling. He barely even registered that three of his students had escaped with Mew’s help. Just that two of them were dead, their bodies just laying about fifteen yards from each other and fifty from himself. The world felt…empty…there was a chill running through the ghost’s mind, the kind that would make one’s spine quiver and hair stand on end. 


What could he have done? What could he have possibly done? No one quite noticed how an aura of darkness began to overtake the Rotom’s usually bright blue energy…his thoughts became stuck on repeat with no answer.


“You’ve not just lost all your light but also your morality…” Mewtwo snarled beside Jack, which thankfully helped to snap Jack back to his senses enough to hear Nothing’s laugh, as it stood at the edge of the water barrier.


“An end…” Nothing simply stated, waving its paw behind itself towards Finn’s body. “It is not a distinction…it is not a burden I allow myself to do without grievance…I’m well prepared to end myself once I know everything -else- has too…” Nothing turned towards the body, “A small spark that would have grown into a roaring fire, if not snuffed out by that which simply was more powerful.” Nothing turned back to Mewtwo and Jack. “Just like how existence treats reality…an end is inevitable.”  


“We won’t let you drag this world into that darkness.” Mewtwo growled in response. “As long as one stands, that light will never be extinguished.” 


“It is already in the dark,” Nothing’s voice echoed with an eerie calm, yet pointedly punctuated its use of already. “All other realms surge around you, drowning your cities and villages in death. When all realms are given everything they desire, their hearts yearn for just one thing…A want of Nothing. When one has everything they’d ever even need, when granted unlimited power, they want for Nothing…This world, the final glimmer in an endless void, is the last to fall to this truth. Reveal the location of the current Bright Star to me, and I will extinguish that light once and for all…” 


Jack felt the cold sinking into his very being. Nothing claimed it could kill the Bright Star- was that true? What…what was it he had…what…?


“I-...” Jack started, the words escaping him with a whisper of guilt as Nothing’s previous accusations reverberated through his mind. “I did this…This thing…it exists because of me…” 


Mewtwo started with a jolt at the Rotom beside him, with their words came a shock that the psychic mistaking believed the ghost knew of it’s previous life, but this was impossible…In truth though the possessed pokedex hanged lamely in the air, the one still functioning half of the screen with its electronic eye staring at the ground with cold intensity. It was horrifying to hear that Nothing’s words rang true… “In a reality in which all existences were given everything they’d always wanted, they would want for nothing…” Mewtwo knew who Jack was, but Jack himself did not. Mewtwo sensed the despair overtaking Jack, the Rotom’s form hanging lifelessly in the air, eyes dim with the weight of realization.


“That you two meet each other here is a fateful encounter, the exact same place you’ve both met each other twice before.” Mewtwo spoke to the Rotom. In a gentle prodding of his memory, Mewtwo saw what Professor Jack had just said to Nothing prior to the chaos being unleashed from the Rifts. “The threads of both of your existences are stitched together…Are you going to let your friend sink deeper into darkness, or reach out and pull him back?” He asked sharply.


Jack felt a sensation rise through his being as he heard this, a spreading warmth that built in his core and fired through his essence, completely dispelling the cold and rebrightening his soul.  His spirit shone, glowing with the light of resolve. He remembered now—he remembered what his Mistress had told him.


Now that the children…or three of them…were safe. It was time to use it.


___________


(A flashback, 4000 years prior) 

Jack floated through the dark woods of his MIstress’s domain, having been just summoned to her presence by her own call, he answered without undue delay after managing to escape from the studies of his classroom!


Jack floated through the dark woods of his Mistress’s domain, where the trees loomed like silent sentinels and the ground was shrouded in a thick mist. The air hummed with the whispers of ghost types bound to their Mistress, their voices weaving an eerie lullaby that would lead the living astray. Here, the mist clung to every surface, a tangible presence that seemed to breathe with the spirits that called this place home.


“Hello Jack~ It’s been nearly an age since we last spoke hehe.” The ever buoyant voice of his Mistress greeted him as she floated out of the darkness of the forest around Jack. Mistress Chandelure’s blue flames lit up the air as she appeared to her child. 


“Ah. Mistress.” Jack was quickly bowing, the pokedex body tilting in the air as he did. “I came as quickly as I could.” 


“Worry not about time, dearie,” she gently tutted, her voice carrying a warmth that contrasted with the cold mist around them. As her blue flames lit up the forest, she guided Jack with a motherly grace. “Walk with me. We have much to discuss, and I’ve missed our talks.”


“Is it about what you have summoned me for Mistress?” Jack asked, his voice hinting at his curiosity. 


“Are you that eager to get back to your studies?” The Mistress giggled knowingly. As Mistress to Jack, she could feel his exact emotion when in this proximity to him. The Rotom was eager to keep up his learning as a teacher. “You should try to spend time outside of class with your students as well perhaps.”


“Ah…” Jack smiled and looked away bashfully, “Yes…I suppose that is a bad habit of mine, I simply wish to make sure I can answer any question any student may have of me. I want to be able to stand out among all the other ghosts!” 


With the joining, many ghost types had taken up teaching careers, their longevity made them all a rather unique brand of teacher filled with knowledge to share. It also was sometimes an easy way to get a scream and a scare from the children with an occasional class prank. Fear caused living pokemon to produce an energy that ghost types needed to live in death. As “undead” they didn’t need several of the biological necessities of the living like eating, sleeping, or other upkeep. Just a good jump scare to get a pokemon to scream and feel a moment of fright was enough to feel great for a week!


“You’ll be an amazing teacher~” Mistress Chandelure’s body curved in the semblance of a smile for her species. For a moment, a silence hung between them both, before she continued, “How are the others treating you?” 


“I have no complaints.” Jack said, “I get an odd look every now and then, but no one acts like they did 700 years ago or so anymore.” He frowned, the electronic display of the pokedex stuttered as his smile flipped on it. “Why…why did my name always do that?” 


“That is a bit of why I decided to call you here. It seems the world of the living has moved on, and I’m sure other ghosts will soon too.” The Mistress began, before she tilted slightly towards Jack, eyes twinkling in some kind of mischievous thought. “Have you been enjoying your new existence?” 


“I mean…I can’t remember anything of my previous one…” Jack returned evenly. A constant harrowing thought to most ghosts who didn’t know anyone living who had known them when they’d been alive was the consistent realization that they’d existed before and could not recall anything from it. He however, clung to his question with a slightly pointed return, “You don’t answer my question though Mistress…” 


Mistress Chandelure giggled, “I have a gift for you. It’s from someone who once knew you. They are no longer with us. They have, for the time, moved on, but they will be back~” 


Jack’s eyes furrowed in confusion, but he didn’t try to question the Mistress’s words or that she was still avoiding answering the question he posed. He knew, given the way it had elected reaction in the past, it was probably for the best that he didn’t know why his name had caused such fear. 


“I kept it somewhere very safe. Hopefully no meddling, curious explorer has moved it!” The Mistress hummed playfully as she led her charge through the forest, approaching a large stone sitting in the ground, its lower half firmly rooted deep into the soil. The grass had built up along the side of the rock like thick moss.
 
“I’m going to say what they told me to tell you when I would give this to you…This is no ordinary gift Jack. It carries the weight of a cold past and the promise of a warm future.” Mistress Chandelure said, as she bent forward so that she could brush her metal like appendages through the brush at the base of the rock, her blue flames brushing across its surface without leaving any marks. Digging into the vines, she freed a small wooden box. 


“Open this.” She half asked of the Rotom, knowing that as his Mistress, Jack really didn’t have much of a choice in obeying or not. She commanded many ghosts and an entire region of Lumaria’s ghost type population answered to her for any doings of the undead variety. 


Jack readily lowered himself and reached with his antenna to take the box and then opened the top, revealing within a small, black gemstone. A piece of glasslike Obsidian. It seemed to drink in the light around itself as its container was opened. How long had it rested within it? Jack wondered.


“I want you to remember.” Mistress Chandelure stated, as Jack reached for and took the stone in his hand, he was surprised to feel a gentle cold upon his spirit. Holding it and staring at it intently as that chill remained, he realized he didn’t mind it. In the dim light provided by his glowing spirit energy and Mistress Chandelure’s flames, he could make out their somewhat blurry reflections.


“In the darkness…there will always be one spark. There will always be one being that refuses to accept it. That one being who never gives in. It will always answer to stand against it.” 


“The Bright Star?” He asked, trying to predict his Mistress. 


“Hehe…do you think?” She hummed back. “The Bright Star died 5000 years ago.”


“Legends don’t die.” Jack countered firmly, only a brief moment of concern in the back of his mind in debating against his Mistress. 


“Hehe…than for you, it can be the Bright Star. But that’s just part of the full message~” 


Mistress Chandelure held up her arm to show her flame burn bright upon the tip of her metal appendage.“When one flame fades, another will always rise to take its place,” Mistress Chandelure said, her voice filled with a wisdom that spanned centuries. “This flame, this will, is passed from one to another, a torch carried without rest. As long as that desire exists, there will never be just an empty darkness.”


“When it comes your turn to carry that flame, even if just for a short moment, remember my words-”

____________________________

“The Inextinguishable Flame will always burn for its desire.” Jack confidently recalled those final words with renewed purpose. “For all to bask within its light once more.”  


“The Inextinguishable Flame?” Nothing responded, voice taking a slightly annoyed tone. “You mean that pirate and his twelve boy scout sailors? Hahaha…” Nothing spoke casually of things Jack knew nothing of; its memory and past clear to itself. 


“Another Legend within a Legend.” Mewtwo clarified, his eyes narrowed dangerously at Nothing. “And there will be a legend within that legend; and another legend within that one!”


“That’s the true answer.” Jack agreed. “There was one, and then there were many.”


“HIGH WISHING NONSENSE!!!” Nothing howled out, voice thundering across the valley at them with the power of Hyper Voice.


Both Mewtwo and Jack’s very minds rattled at the force of the decibels, ears immediately set to ringing as their eardrums became shocked by the intense vibrations of Nothing’s shout, making the very air shiver. Their sight became blurry as the air was torn by the sonic attack, but both felt Nothing’s presence begin moving the fifty yard distance with teleportation powers of its own in about three seconds, jumping from one point to the next towards them in a wild, lightning bolt like pattern. 


Despite the disorienting force of the attack, Mewtwo and Jack moved in perfect sync, their wills united against the darkness. With a fierce determination, they released simultaneous Dark Pulse moves, the energy of their combined resolve crashing towards Nothing, intent on avenging the fallen and protecting the future. Oddly, the inner darkness of wanting to stop darkness itself ignited those Pulses into a shockwave that managed to stop Nothing in its attack, knocking it back in the air. 


Nothing hit the ground upside down, tumbled once, and pushed off the ground with its other hand to land after a vault to right itself. It crouched and snarled out, surprised at being stopped and knocked back. “What!?” 


Beside Mewtwo, a part of Jack’s body glowed bright, a small and bright spark of light bellowing from a compartment under his monitor suddenly. That’s right, Jack realized. He had kept the gem there. He had completely forgotten he’d put it in there; he rarely had had any other use for the compartment. It glowed warm with light even while it was in his body, but the moment he opened the space and let the stone roll out into his waiting hand, halos of color followed it. 


However, the moment he held the stone in his hand, it burned unbearably hot! He gasped and was made to drop the stone, its light glimmering as it spun on its way down to the ground. 


When the Obsidian Gem hit the ground, it didn’t just explode—it shattered, its glass-like surface burst apart like it was a container, the sides of the gleaming surfaces breaking away from each other to glow with the black shards of Obsidian circling the epicenter of the eruption of light that broke it open. The light that erupted was not just bright, but blinding, searing through the night with a brilliance that turned darkness into day for a brief few seconds. For a few cities and villages close by, this flash might have been seen in the sky above, but went unnoticed with the currently raiding Wraiths. The air crackled with energy, as if the very fabric of the world was being rewritten in that instant. The beams cascaded high into the air like spotlights against the night sky above, before they shrunk together into a single beam and then it zipped into a fading, glittering shower of sparks. 


However, now standing in front of the Legendary and Rotom was a glowing being; also in the shape of a Midnight Lycanroc. Its body shined with a white and yellow shimmer, mane of fur wafting back and forth as glowing, bright energy cascaded off its body and into the air around itself. Its claws gleamed black like that of the Obsidian Gem, along with the tip of its spiky mane and the rocky growths on the sides of its body. Its foot and a half long tail swished and flowed behind itself, while that mane of fur covered its entire backside and up over its head, far thicker than a normal Midnight Lycanroc’s, as if a fluffy cloud sat upon its body. Glowing sparkles of red, yellow, blue, purple, and green danced off its fur and twinkled in the air to fade just about a foot away from its body. The Obsidian Gem, once again reformed, sat dark once more upon the ground right under where the being stood.


Mewtwo felt his breath catch in his throat, a rare sensation for the psychic warrior. He had seen many things, but this…this was something else. “Rook?” he whispered, the name escaping his lips as if by instinct, a recognition of the familiar yet profoundly different presence before him. He had never seen the Lycanroc take this form in the past. Jack, too, was struck silent, the usual hum of his energy dimmed in the presence of this radiant being as it stood facing away from them and directly towards Nothing. 


The bright pokemon’s head turned towards them over its shoulder and they both gasped, as they saw that its eyes were empty, the sockets of its skull completely covered by the bright whitish and yellow fur of its face. Its muzzle made no expression as it seemed to stare at them both for only a few seconds before it turned its head back directly towards Nothing.   


“That’s not Rook, Mewtwo, it’s not the Bright Star either. It’s an Echo of his promise with Jack…” Enzlo’s voice said lightly, a mixture of pride and awe in his words. “Cheeky Lycanroc…” He almost sounded like he choked up. This made Mewtwo blink, mind still trying to take in the sight before him of the shimmering Lycanroc. 


“What exactly is it then, Enzlo?” Metwo asked pointedly. 


“Rook infused his will into the Obsidian Gem before he died in the past and left it as a gift to Jack; more likely because he -knew- this conflict would occur. Not quite a reincarnation or ghost, but a reflection born of the promise made between Jack and Rook far in the past…The promise of an adventure together…” The Abra’s voice still held that hint of pride. For once Rook had used what Enzlo had taught him without him knowing he had! It took a lot to get him to overlook something like this!


“Is it…aware?” Mewtwo asked further. Trying to probe at the being psychically, Mewtwo felt his mind simply be pushed gently away from it.  


“Yes and no. It has a will–but only whatever Rook had infused it with; which I would guess is a will to protect Jack. Good thing though too. I was totally at a loss about what to do.” Enzlo hummed further, the sound of papers being shuffled about echoed in the psychic’s mind and Mewtwo’s eyes fell with an exasperated sense momentarily.

Jack couldn’t hear Enzlo’s explanation, and was instead left to contemplate what stood before him. Such a drastically different, brilliant looking creature compared to Nothing…he barely even realized that in the bathing light that shined off the Echo, the black void line across his pokedex body sparkled and mended, his body perfectly okay once the line of nonexistence was removed from it, his shield as well. This Echo healed Nonexistence.  


Nothing’s growl deepened, a low, menacing sound that reverberated through the ground. Its eyes—dark, empty voids—narrowed as it studied the Echo, its claws digging into the earth with a restless energy. “An Echo of the Bright Star…” Nothing repeated. Even though it could not hear Enzlo’s explanation, it recognized what was before it. Its voice tinged with a mix of anticipation and unease. It wasn’t fear—it didn’t fear anything—but there was a wariness, a recognition that this was no ordinary foe.


The Echo’s arms both reached up into its mane of glittering fur, expression remaining unchanged as it reached deep into the fluffy cloud of fur. The mane glimmered and shook briefly before the Echo pulled its hands free, and with it two thick, near two foot long swords made of hard looking stone and metal emerged from the thick mane of fur along its back. Their sharp edges gleamed and the swords gave off a short humming vibration as the Echo brandished them and struck a guarded pose towards Nothing, crouching while holding one of the blades out in front of itself with the other held out to its right side. 


Suddenly both the Echo and Nothing unleashed their wells of energy at each other from where they stood, the Echo’s radiance seemed to pulse in waves, pushing back the oppressive darkness that clung to Nothing like a shroud. Where the Echo stood, the ground beneath it was bathed in light, almost as if it had cleansed the very earth from the touch of the void. In stark contrast, Nothing’s presence seemed to drain the world of color, leaving only shadows in its wake.


The Wraiths that had been cascading from the nearby Rift seized, the Rift itself wobbled and its form fizzled and stretched like suddenly ‘static’ filled. The Wraiths that had been similarly running across the valley in circles near them were pushed back by the Echo’s light, instead trying to huddle and merge into the stilled darkness that remained behind Nothing’s own body, their glittering green eyes gazing back upon the radiant light they opposed. Other Rifts across Lumaria continued to pour forth Wraiths, yet this one suddenly shrunk back down into its normal size, however still wobbling and distorting.


The light between the Echo and the darkness of Nothing pushed against each other, the Echo’s energy pushed the darkness onto a pinpoint where Nothing stood. The Wraiths gathered behind it and their darkness appeared to enforce its own as it simply stood in the light, casting a long and dark shadow that stretched out behind itself. The Wraiths kept seeking shelter from the light in it, their glittering gems staring back to the bright light and growing the shadow up into the air behind Nothing. 


“YOU THINK IT'S SO EASY TO STOP!!!” Nothing cackled, leaning itself forward against the washing waves of light, its own energy projected a bubble of darkness in front of itself that it cascaded over. “That one little miracle is all it would take to stop the end of all things!” Nothing shrunk back, its form vanishing into the dark conglomeration of Wraiths that had gathered behind it.


The amalgamation of Wraiths acted as one being; several limbs made of their own dark bodies elongated out from the huge shadow Nothing had been casting which now appeared to have become a new body for the Wraiths to shelter in from the light. Glittering green eyes showed how many Wraiths had joined together to form the new body and limbs. It grew six different arms with thick, hammer-like ends.


Even as Nothing transformed into this new creature before it, the Echo did not move, its expression remained unchanged. The shadow split into a new mouth and distinct head towards the top of itself. 


“Just like your ‘legends’” Nothing’s voice spat out at them, now echoing high above them from the new head that had grown, “Even if you stop me, there’ll be another being whose life, and another one behind them! Beings whose existences are so frustratingly nonsensical, that they’ll be the next one behind me! I know of one, his hatred of reality is right there with mine! HE HAS NO MOUTH AND MUST SCREAM!!!” 


With Nothing’s final shouted words, four of the six arms lifted up into the air and swung down towards the Echo. 


The Echo’s face scrunched up slightly as it looked up at the oncoming hammers. Just moments before the hammers hit the Echo’s body vanished, the loud sound of a lightning bolt cracking upon the air overlapped with that of the hammers crashing into the ground it had just been standing on. 


Mewtwo and Jack were shaken by the impact of the hammers as it smashed open the ground, slaps of rock and dirt hoisted up in jagged shapes, angled inwards from the center of the impact. 


The pair weren’t able to see themselves as the Echo reappeared in the air above where it had just been standing with a second crack of lightning. The Echo’s paws gripped both of its swords tight before it counterattacked, spinning through the air down towards the ends of the four hammers, it slammed onto the now broken up ground, bringing its own weapons down upon the limbs connected to the hammers.  


The Echo’s humming swords carved right through the darkness, their edges gleaming with searing white light cut it apart like rippons of paper. The shrill screeching of the Wraiths it carved into in doing so rattled through the air and suffocated out the sound of the ground as it continued to break and shatter from the force of Nothing’s attack. However, it didn’t stop there. With another crack of lightning the Echo vanished and reappeared up in the air by the amassed Wraiths’ head, and a loud ‘WHAP’ was heard by Mewtwo and Jack as it outright kicked the amalgamate in the face, sending its entire, elongated body toppling onto its right side. 


Mewtwo and Jack recovered from the shockwave of Nothing’s attack just as its new body crashed upon the ground. Mewtwo stared in shock as the Echo lightly floated back down to the ground to come to a rest near the hammers it had sliced off. The hammers, and the Wraiths they appeared to be made from, began to steadily disintegrate and vanish into the air, leaving the impact crater of broken up ground behind. 


“Why…” Nothing’s voice frustratingly snarled as the body slowly rose up, its dark, eyeless head glaring upon the Echo as the radiantly glowing being stared back up at it. “Why…why…why…”


“An outright Echo of my own power…” Nothing growled as its entire body shook with overwhelming spite. “Not even the real thing and yet…” 


For a short moment, the Echo and Nothing only stared at each other, before another crack of lightning sounded and this time, Mewtwo and Jack saw as the Echo ‘blinked’ from one place to the next, jumping up into the air to once again slam a hard roundhouse kick across Nothing’s face, sending its entire body crashing to the ground once more. There was more power behind this one, however, as the fifty foot tall amalgamation was sent spiraling across the ground.


As it tumbled, pieces and chunks of the darkness that made up its body scattered and dissipated in the air with the soft and slightly wilted screams of Wraiths as they were destroyed by the Echo’s light soon after. By the time Nothing came to a stop, it was back to the same size and shape as the Midnight Lycanroc form it had normally. The Echo landed upon the ground with a slow descent once again, standing just about ten yards away from Nothing as it, for the moment, remained recoiled on the ground.


Now, with the brilliant light that came off the Echo and without the shared darkness of the other Wraiths, Nothing’s physicality was once again revealed like when the Guardians had affected it with Destiny Bond. Nothing’s face seethed with anger, its muzzle curled up in a fierce snarl with sharp fangs as it glared towards the Echo, its eyes remained blank and black like pits of the very void it claimed to embody. Its body was once more visible; sickly colored greenish fur with patches missing all across its body, disheveled and unkempt, the mane of fur on its back stuck in wild directions and clumps.


Nothing lifted up its right arm, revealing that its paw had been cut off. It stared at the stump for a moment, as black blood began oozing from the wound, before the snarl on its muzzle shifted into a kind of manic grin and it laughed, “Hah…hahahahaha!”  


Nothing began to get back up, stumbling as it attempted to stand and clutching the stump of its arm in its other paw as it rambled, “An endless…cycle of hate and carnage! It doesn’t matter where or when or how you try to place it! Violence used by the forces of light is still violence!” 


“And yet I’m defeated…your cities even now…stand against the waves of never ending darkness and succeed in holding it off…” Nothing admitted, stamping its feet upon the ground firmly as it managed to stand again, although that wide and manic grin remained on its muzzle. “At least here…for now…” Its body began to shift into that of dark smoke as it glared across the field at Jack and Mewtwo. “I leave you to pick up the pieces of your world’s peace. See where it all goes.” Nothing let out a final, cackling laugh that sputtered into a cough as it spat up black blood from its mouth. It fixed a final look towards Jack behind the Echo as it continued to fade and evaporate into smoke upon the air, the wafts of darkness carried off on some invisible breeze. 


“Next time…you won’t have the will of the Bright Star to stand against me…next time…you’ll see your end…Good-bye Jack…” 


With those final words, Nothing vanished entirely. At the same time, the Rifts across Lumaria would shrink down to their original sizes and the Wraiths that had been rampaging across the land would fade away as their sudden assault would come to a just as sudden end. 


Even for Jack and Mewtwo, the silence; asides from the soft hum of the Echo’s weapons and the light cascading from its body, felt oppressive and otherworldly.


Mewtwo and Jack might’ve stayed still in silence for several more minutes as they tried to absorb what had just happened. The Echo, however, began to move. It turned in place to face them and then, after its gaze fell upon Jack, began to step forward. The light and energy that continued to cascade off of its form began to slowly dim. Its paws released its weapons, the swords simply burst apart into a shower of multicolored sparkles that zipped up into the mane on its back.  


Even though it lacked eyes, it was quite easy to tell that it was focused entirely on the Rotom. With each step it took, the light dimmed further, until it stood just in front of him, the white and yellow color of its fur deepened to a more grayish tone, arms lowered and hugged tight to its own body as if afraid to try and touch Jack itself. The Echo’s ears dipped and its head tilted downward towards the ground at its feet. 


Jack blinked, unsure of what to feel. It seemed as if the Echo was apologizing to him. However, he found himself reaching out one of his antennae towards the being, and when he placed it upon the Echo’s head, its ears flicked up and its head picked back up as if to look at him. Jack felt warmth from the Echo, its light and being a complete opposite to what Nothing had been.


Jack smiled, “Thank you…we’ll take it from here. We’ll stop it. For all of us and you.” 


There was a brief swish as the Echo’s thick and cloud-like tail flicked through the air, before it dipped its head again and slowly, its body lost physicality. Like a ghost, its body became mostly see through, the bright light and colors that had been dancing off its fur left their final, momentarily sparkling motes as it too faded away. 


Close by, there was a crackling noise as the Obsidian Gem reassembled itself. Jack reached down and picked it up into his hold, as it was once again chilled and at a normal temperature. Jack felt a myriad of emotions spiral through himself. Relief…sadness…happiness…apprehension. 


With everything that had just happened in the last ten minutes, he had no idea what to focus on. Nothing’s words contrasted to the presence of the Echo which, even though it hadn’t spoken, felt as if it held the opposite truth in its being. Light would never fade–and so such Darkness never would seize its unrelenting struggle to stamp out that light. Its champions would forever shift and change.


There was little time to think, and even less to act on. Jack wished he could know what to do right then and there. There were many things to attend to…not all of which he could even help with. First things first…


He looked across the field at the bodies of Luna and Finn. Even from where he was, he could see that the void black lines of nonexistence were gone, perhaps they too had been healed in the Echo’s presence. However, they had already died before it revealed itself. 


“Help me bury them…” Jack said lightly, directing the words to Mewtwo even though he didn’t look at him as he began floating towards Luna’s body, “Then…take me to my remaining students. I’ll guess that, as a legendary, you can explain much to me about what has just happened, and hopefully clear up how it seems I’m directly involved?” 


Mewtwo felt a moment of clarity as he realized, again, who he knew the Rotom was in the past. Jack the Devil…now accessory to saving their world from Nothing; a creature born from something Jack himself had also created in his once efforts to tear down the rules of reality…

How strangely poetic.


The psychic closed his eyes with a short smirk on his lips, before answering and following the ghost type, “Of course…although, most of it will be better coming from the mouth of someone else. I will take you to them; your students are with them right now.”