by KJ Harlow
She got to her feet. Looking at her hands, she flexed her fingers, testing to see if she was still able to conjure up her attacks. Angel turned around and swept across the floor, fists in front of her like a superhero.
Angel used Ice Fist!
Tiny shards of eyes in the air shivered then zipped towards the charging Legendary, forming a long weapon in her hand with a thin, curved blade at the end. She made a beeline straight toward Xark, whose aim appeared to be getting worse and worse. Starry was still singing, keeping just out of harm’s way. He didn’t see her coming.
SWISHHHHHHHH!...
Something thudded to the floor, splashing in a puddle that wasn’t there before. Xark’s right wing twitched on its own, as if alarmed at being separated from his back, before it fell still.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!” Xark screamed. The room shuddered, as if appalled at the dismemberment. Cracks raced each other up the ice walls, seeing who could get from the floor to the ceiling first.
“You… you monster!” he bellowed.
Angel swept her scythe to the side. “Takes one to know one.”
Yoshi couldn’t help but smile. The Angel of death… she was going to end him.
Starry had stopped singing. She was backing up, feet stepping in puddles that were now all over the room.
Angel’s smile faded. A large sheet of ice shattered to her left. “Have at you,” she said quietly.
Xark charged at her, new ice sword in hand. Yoshi watched as she let go of the ice scythe. It seemed to drop in slow motion, falling to the ground. It didn’t break until Xark’s sword was deep in Angel’s belly and had burst through her back. His maniacal face was inches away from her, the palm of his hand driving the sword further in.
“Noooo!” Yoshi yelled.
Angel gritted her bloodied teeth. She extended her left hand.
Angel used Ice Fist!
A sword the same as Xark’s formed in her hand. She threw open her wings and flapped herself towards Xark, impaling his sword even deeper into her. With her right hand, she lunged forward, hugging him around the neck and pressed her body against his. With her left hand, she turned the sword inwards and stabbed Xark through the back and chest… and into her own.
Her mouth opened, a staggered breath escaping. She blinked several times, refocusing on the enemy inches away from her. “This is what you wanted, wasn’t it?” she growled. “My blood?”
Xark stared at her, unable to speak. Angel reached down with her hand, grabbing something inside his chest pocket. She looked back over her shoulder, flinging it into the air. It spun and landed in Starry’s safe hands. The interstellar-type dashed back to her stunned trainer’s side.
Angel looked up, arms falling to her side. She looked at Yoshi, smiling again. If possible, it was even happier than her last smile. She looked at Starry and gave a firm nod.
Starry used Mind Mine!
Starry handed Yoshi the item Angel took from Xark. She raised two hands, pointing them not at Angel and Xark, but at the ceiling above them. Yoshi looked up… and understood.
Right above them was the mother of all icicles. It was at least eight feet across and twelve feet long. It shook precariously, as if it was about to fall at any moment.
A watermelon-sized ball of transparent, rippling energy travelled from his girlfriend’s palms. It came out slowly, as if mired in mud initially. It travelled faster and faster, striking the base of the icicle until it was absorbed.
Starry kept her palms up. She glanced down at Angel. She was on the ground, on top of a screaming, squirming Xark. Her wings were opened and flat against the ground, pinning him down. “Now!” Angel shouted.
Starry closed both hands and turned her face away.
KA-BOOM!
Like the incisor of a giant, the icicle fell, pried free from its roots. It slammed into Angel and Xark, the third and final nail in their shared coffin. Maybe the angle wasn’t right, but it was still sharp enough to drive itself through both ice beings.
But the damage had been done. Angel and Xark lay on the ground in pieces, unmoving. Yoshi found himself moving towards them. It was a ridiculous notion of course, but… what if… I mean, she is a Legendary…
Yoshi peered at the ice angel’s face. Her eyes were closed, a smile on her lips. If he didn’t know better, he would have assumed sadness hadn’t plagued the last few years of her life.
He couldn’t help but look at Xark. The man – no, the creature – was a complete mess. His face was frozen in a rictus of terror forever… what was left of it, anyway.
“Yoshi,” Starry called from behind him. “We have to go.”
“Hold on.” Yoshi looked at Xark’s body. His arm lay lifeless, splayed out on the side. Yoshi looked at his own hand. He unwrapped it, looking at what Starry had given him for the first time. It was cylindrical in shape, like a test tube but metallic. At one end was a pump. He unscrewed it and the metal cap clattered to the wet floor.
It was a new syringe.
So, he was coming here to get more of Angel’s blood…
“Yoshi!”
This time, he didn’t answer. He stared at the syringe in his hand. Without thinking, he shuffled over to Xark’s chest. Blood still seeped out from the stab wound Angel had inflicted on him, though the ice swords had now melted. Yoshi held his breath, then drove the syringe downwards into the wound. He drew up, watching the canister fill with dark red blood.
CRASH!
Another icicle had fallen, mere feet away from Yoshi.
“Yoshi!”
He finished collecting the sample, snatched up the metal cap and screwed it back on.
You got Xark’s Blood Sample!
He turned and ran back towards Starry.
There was someone else there. A pink-feathered Fiona stood with them, eyeing the ceiling nervously.
“You’re…”
“Caleb,” the tan trainer said. “I said I was going back to the cruise ship, remember Mr. Aion?”
“Yeah,” Yoshi said. “Of course. But why are you here?”
“There’s no time to explain,” Starry said. “We have to get out of here.”
“No,” Yoshi said. “There’s still something I have to get.”
I promised.
“Where is it?” Caleb asked.
“In a room near the top of the tower. I’m going to run back up. I shouldn’t take too l–”
“Don’t think this place will hold, bro,” Caleb said. Where his Fiona was becoming increasingly frantic, he was almost too calm. “How about this: my Fiona can fly you up. There are windows all along this tower. You can go in through one of them.”
“Are you sure?” Yoshi asked.
Caleb looked at his girlfriend, who rolled her eyes.
Fiona used Fly!
She squawked as icicles fell, pink feathers all over the place.
“She’s going to take off now. Grab onto her legs. She’ll fly around. Tell her where you want to get off.”
“Thanks.” He withdrew Starry, then grabbed onto the flamingo’s slender legs. Damn, they’re quite nice and smoo-
WHOOOSH!
She zoomed out of the arched window, Yoshi hanging on for dear life. She soared up and up, spiralling around the tower. There was a dull grinding sound around it as ice and snow crashed from it, falling to the ground far below. Angel has died… her ice powers over the island have been dispelled.
“Hey, when do you want to get off?” the Fiona squawked.
Yoshi snapped back to attention. “Keep going. Just fly to the top.” The pink bird said nothing and flapped harder.
Minutes later, Yoshi let go of Fiona’s legs on the balcony. The water/flying-type zoomed away, leaving him alone. He ran towards the ice doors, which had fallen off their hinges and now lay in pieces on the floor. He ran past the toppled-over chair and through the door.
Part of the tower had fallen off, its side completely exposed to the air. Yoshi ignored it, running down the steps as fast as he could. Seconds later, he arriv
ed at the platform. He turned the knob, but it didn’t budge. He tried the other way. Same thing.
Damn it! Has it been jammed shut, or…
There was a big keyhole above the knob.
“Duh!” Yoshi said, smacking his forehead. She deliberately left the key behind for me.
Yoshi pulled the key from around his neck, lined it up with the hole and put it in. He jiggled it around and turned it clockwise. There was a heavy, satisfying click as a bolt slid free. Yoshi pushed in.
The room was small, only slightly bigger than a broom closet. There were shelves on the two sides, but something directly in front of Yoshi caught his eye.
Is that… what I think it is?
He stepped into the room, unable to take his eyes away from the round object. The football-sized egg was creamy white and speckled with light blue. It jiggled in its basket, perhaps of its own accord or maybe because the tower was falling apart. He picked up the basket by the handle and stepped out of the room.
GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR…
The part of the tower that had been exposed became even more exposed as more of it fell off the main body, slowly grinding to the ground several hundred feet down. It took the stairwell with it. Yoshi was stranded on the upper level, clutching a basket with an egg in it, with no way down. Surely Angel didn’t die for nothing?
He looked out in the distance, towards the north. The Cruisy McCruiseface was still there. He could just make out a pink bird taking her trainer back towards it.
I guess she couldn’t have carried two people any–
“Hey!”
Yoshi looked up. A flying-type girlfriend with red feathers was flapping in front of him. “Thank Frank I found you. Asshat would have killed me.”
“Asshat?” Yoshi said. “You’re… Perri? His Soara?”
“Yeah,” the bird-kin said, flapping slowly. “Jump onto my back. Let’s get out of here before the entire place falls apart.”
40
Going Back
TOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!
Yoshi stood on the deck of the Cruisy McCruiseface, looking southwards. Agate Island was getting smaller and smaller, not just because they were moving away from it, but also because much of the snow and ice on the island had melted. He could just make out a shard of ice pointing skyward, all that was left of the tower that had deteriorated just as he made his great escape.
“Yoshi.”
He didn’t respond, still staring at the remains of the island.
Angel… she wasn’t planning on living at all…
He gripped the handle on the basket a bit tighter. Now he could definitely feel the egg jiggling inside it, insulated from the cold by his down jacket that he wrapped around it.
Asshat walked up and stood next to him. Yoshi’s childhood foe shoved his hands into his pockets, his breath misting in the air.
“Thanks for sending Perri back to rescue me,” Yoshi said.
Asshat was silent for a moment. “Whatever.” He eyed the basket. “The Legendary leave you some fruit or something?”
Yoshi glanced at his fellow Topazarian. “Not really.” How much did he tell him? He was his rival, but Asshat did just save his ass.
“I had just come back off the ship when everything started melting. I mean everything.” Asshat turned around and took a step back towards the cabins. “The sea ice was first. Just about knocked everyone off their feet when the boat got unstuck. Then the snow on the trees. Next minute, I see the whole damn tower shaking in the distance.” He stopped and turned around again. “What in Frank’s name happened up there?”
“Xark, the guy who defeated all your girlfriends, killed Angelika.” Yoshi set his mouth into a line, waiting for Asshat’s response.
“That… thing… killed the Legendary?” Asshat murmured disbelievingly.
Yoshi finally took his eyes off the island and faced him. “He’s… not normal. Someone found her on Mount Opus years ago, took a sample of her blood and injected it into Xark. He somehow gained her ice-type powers, grew wings and was on his way back to get some more blood off her.”
A sudden gale blew across the deck, blowing the hood off Asshat’s jacket. It revealed his stunned expression as he stared incredulously at Yoshi. “How...? Who…?”
Yoshi shrugged and sighed. “It all happened so fast. All I know is that both their corpses are now on that island, probably crushed from all the falling ice.” Along with the bodies of those trainers who Xark froze.
“What are you going to do?” Asshat asked.
Yoshi walked past him. “I’m going to heal up my girlfriends first.”
“You fucking fuckhead!”
NAME: Sophie (Soph)
NATURE: Bossy
TYPE: Flying
ACC.: Sakura Speedrobe
LEVEL: 25
HP: 66/66
- ATTACK: 29
- DEFENCE: 23
- SPCL ATTACK: 21
- SPCL DEFENCE: 20
- SPEED: 30 (+3)
MOVESET:
Bird Run - Type: Flying - 35/35 PP (Run at foes and crash tackle them)
Sand Screen - Type: Normal - 40/40 PP (Lower accuracy by kicking and flapping sand up into opponent’s face)
Fell Swoop - Type: Flying - 20/20 PP (Launch up and dive at foe. 5% recoil damage)
Dagger Wing - Type: Steel - 15/15 PP (strike down foes with sharpened metallic wings [bird-kin only])
The walls shook with unbridled fury. Pete – along with two other nurses – was holding Yoshi’s bird-kin girlfriend back, but only just.
“Good to see you again, Soph,” Yoshi replied.
“‘Good to see you again, Soph’,” she parroted back. “You don’t get to say that to me after you abandon me!”
“I didn’t abandon you,” Yoshi responded. He was surprised at how calm he was. No, calm wasn’t right. He was numb. “I’m back now, see? Besides, you were frozen. Even if you weren’t, you would have been in danger on Agate Island. It was full of ice-types.”
Yoshi nodded to Pete, who let go of the flying-type. She swept across the floor in a blaze of feathers. She raised an arm, anger glittering in her eyes. Yoshi didn’t flinch.
“Soph, it was too dangerous. As much as I want to help you get stronger, I still want to protect you.”
The bird-kin stilled, her arm suspended. For a second, something replaced the anger in her eyes. Before Yoshi could get a proper look, she slapped him across the face, leaving a handprint on his cheek.
“Don’t think you can just sweet-talk our way out of this one, dickface.” She swept past him, one of her brown feathers lodging in Yoshi’s hair.
“Where are you going?” he called after her.
“Back to the room.” With that, his bird-kin was gone. He was surprised; he wasn’t expecting a response at all.
“Even amongst Sophies, she is pretty hot-tempered,” Pete said, tentatively stepping towards Yoshi.
For some reason, Yoshi felt proud to hear this. “That’s my Soph. Thanks for looking after her anyway.”
“Don’t mention it,” Pete said. “So what have you got for me?”
Yoshi unlocked three of his rings. “One’s fainted. Two injured but otherwise OK. Could you revive Ai first?”
Pete nodded. “Release her onto that bed.” Yoshi sent out the gym bunny. She materialized lying down, with her eyes closed. “We’ll have a look at your others in a moment.”
Yoshi nodded. He walked away from the treatment area and back out onto the battle deck. The sun was out, blazing down far too hot. Trainers were already back out in the daylight, pitting their girlfriends against one another. They didn’t give him a second look. They all seemed relieved to finally be on their way back to Sapphire, smiles all round.
Yoshi walked back to the rail where he had first noticed Xark looking at him. He stared at the spot where the tall man in the coat had stood. Why had he targeted him? Yoshi shivered and frowned. It didn’t make any sense. Wait a second… he pulled out the tickets from his bag, where
they were crumpled up. These were Chester’s to begin with. Had he been sent to kill him?
Yoshi thought about calling the new mayor of Sapphire and decided against it. He’s probably busy right now. I’ll see if I can find him once I get back.
Yoshi leaned on the rail for a moment, absent-mindedly staring out at the ocean. He then realized he hadn’t spoken to his girlfriends since he got back onto the ship.
“Starry, Flick, Crystal, Arlif.” One by one, his girlfriends came out.
“Starry!” Flick squealed, crushing the interstellar-type in a bear hug. Arlif and even Crystal joined in, surrounding her. Yoshi stared at her, not sure how to feel. Guilt at leaving her, despair at her ‘death’, only to be replaced by joy that made his heart swell to see her standing in the window. She met his gaze and smiled.
The water-type pulled away, wiping a tear from her eye. “Yoshi said that you were…” She let the word remain unspoken, in case uttering it would shatter the illusion in front of her.
“No I’m not dead,” Starry said with a smile. “It’s going to take a lot more to kill me than a bit of snow.”
“We wanted to come back for you,” Yoshi said, stepping towards her. “We were trying to but then we went onto a slide on a frozen lake, we found Xark and Angel and–”
Starry stepped towards him, sealing his lips with a kiss. Feeling the warmth of her lips was too much. For moments that felt like an eternity, he lost himself in her gesture of affection. He pulled her in from the small of her back, pressing her body into his.
“Why are you crying?” Starry asked, eyes full of concern.
“I’m sorry…” Yoshi said, scrubbing his tears away. You apologize too much. “I’ll explain everything after Ai’s revived and we go back down to the cabin.”
Starry regarded him with her large eyes and nodded. “Well, while we’re waiting let me tell you how I escaped that avalanche.” She closed her eyes for a moment, shivering.
“When all the snow hit, there wasn’t much I could do. I remember opening my eyes and… seeing darkness. Feeling coldness. I existed there, suspended in the snow, helpless for I don’t know how long.