Heart of Steel [Pokémon Fanfiction]

43| A Guardian's Role

The moment I felt myself descend into freefall, I closed my eyes. Out of everything else I could have done, enclosing my vision in darkness was my first instinct. Perhaps I didn't want my last sight to be of Valerie smirking victoriously as she watched me fall, perhaps I didn't want to see how quickly I was approaching the ground, perhaps I was afraid of seeing myself die. Regardless, I closed my eyes.

The wind whipped around me, tearing at my clothes and drowning out everything, including my thoughts and any words Meteor could have been trying to say. I was effectively alone here.

Thoughts barraged me, each in a different tone and intensity, screaming out how much danger I was in, yelling at Valerie for pulling such a low, desperate move, whimpering about the pain that would be forced onto me when I hit the ground, crying that I wasn't going to be able to say my goodbyes. I still said them, yes, but it wasn't like anyone would be able to hear them. I also thought one other thing, something I prayed would become reality.

Please, let Meteor survive.

Then something unexpected happened. I thought I was imagining things when the wind began to fade. It didn't vanish completely, but it certainly slowed.

Terrified as well as curious, I cracked open one of my eyes, only to have them both fly open in shock. A wavering field of magenta energy swirled about me, turning my rapid, fatal descent into one akin to a feather serenely drifting downwards. I didn't have to wonder who or what the cause of this was, this wasn't the first time he had done it.

I let my fear fade for a moment, the comfort of knowing that my partner was still trying to save me driving that negativity away. But all good things had to eventually come to an end, and so did the telekinetic safety net. Meteor's psychic range didn't extend very far, and it was a matter of time until the connection would automatically be severed.

The strange tranquility ceased when the connection did, and I was thrown back into freefall. This time, I did scream. I screamed bloody-murder, and the situation causing it was certainly something similar to that descriptor.

To put a morbidly positive spin on the circumstance, Meteor's timing couldn't have been more perfect. I didn't have nearly as much distance left to fall, two yards or less. But it didn't spare me from injury whatsoever.

I landed mostly on my left side, I knew this because of the loud snap I felt and heard in my left arm. I hardly noticed the pain as it was drowned out by the other injuries I quickly began to accumulate. The terrain I had fallen onto was a rocky slope, and there was nothing that stopped me from tumbling down it. I felt every rock, every pebble, grinding and jabbing and slashing into me all the way down to the bottom.