My feet carried me down the path, with everyone else following behind. "Okay. Here's the spot." I turned back to Ash. "Is everyone ready to go?"
They all nodded. "Ready when you are, Ellie." Lucy said.
"Okay," I turned around to look at the blue sky. "I'm going to try and summon it through my mind. I'm sure it will hear me."
"Are you sure this will work?" Serena asked. "I heard Palkia's nearly impossible to find."
"But I also have met it before," Ash explained. "I could help myself, and maybe it will recognize my voice." He stepped up next to me.
I smiled at him. "Thank you, Ash."
He gave me a weird look as he lost his smile, and then looked down to have his hat hide his eyes. "No-" He cleared his throat. "No problem."
I looked at him in confusion, but regained my focus when he looked up at the sky. We both closed our eyes, and I felt the dimensional rift shimmering not that far away.
Palkia. Please help us. You know why we're calling.
The ground shook.
YES.
I gasped. It was actually responding to me...and by the sound of the voice in my head, it was female. I focused harder.
What's going on? Why are there Pokémon in Fiore?
I DO NOT KNOW.
I opened my eyes in shock. Not even Palkia knew?
You have no leads whatsoever?
NO LEADS, BUT A HUNCH. ARCEUS.
My chest exploded with fear. Ash felt it too.
What's wrong with Arceus? I heard him ask.
I MAY BE MISTAKEN, BUT IT MAY BE AWAKENING. THAT IS WHY THINGS ARE OUT OF BALANCE.
I couldn't contain my fear. If Arceus wakes up...
How do we keep it from waking up?
YOU CANNOT.
Of course not! Why did I think we could? It was Arceus for crying out loud!
Then at least take us to Fiore. We'll make sure every Pokémon is safe in our hands until all of this is figured out.
The ground shook again. The feeling in my head warped, and me and Ash had to grab our heads due to the power being so close.
"What's happening?!" Serena cried.
"It's coming," Lucy said seriously. Natsu grunted in agreement.
The sky exploded with pink light as I opened my eyes. The lights disappeared when the giant legendary Pokémon dropped from the sky. Me and Ash stepped back when Palkia landed with a boom in front of us. Pikachu looked up and let out an amazed cry. Palkia let out a roar.
"Palkia..." Clemont breathed.
I stepped forward. "Will you open the portal?"
She growled, and then stepped to the side a little bit. Her pearls glowed, and the circular portal appeared.
BE CAREFUL. FIORE IS NOT THE SAME FROM SIX MONTHS BEFORE.
I nodded. I knew this wasn't going to be easy, but if it was to restore balance to the universe, then I was going to do anything for that. "Natsu, Lucy. Lead the way." I pointed my arm towards the portal, and they stepped towards the spiraling purple circle. They stopped, and an image of Magnolia appeared within.
"That's Magnolia," Lucy said, turning to me. "Ready to go home?"
I looked down in shame. "Lucy..."
"Forget it," she interrupted. "We'll talk about it later."
"Fine." I could feel the confused looks of the Pokémon trainers behind me, and I dropped my head in shame. I couldn't tell them about how I wanted to live in Magnolia. It would hurt their feelings and they would feel betrayed. "Just wait until we're alone."
"Whatever. Let's go!" She walked forward, and the portal shimmered and let off a white light as she stepped through it. Natsu glanced at me, but said nothing else as he swiftly looked towards the portal and followed Lucy.
My forehead creased. Huh? Why was Natsu so quiet all of a sudden? Then I remembered the incident with Team Rocket, and blushed. Did I go too far with it?
"It's our turn, right?" Ash asked next to me. I focused on him and my face went back to normal.
"Oh, yes." I cleared my throat. "Are you guys ready?"
"Yeah," he answered while nodding his head.
"I can't wait to see what kind of stores they have there!" Serena beamed.
"Uh, I don't think that's a priority, Serena." Clemont sweat-dropped.
"But we'll still have fun!" Bonnie threw her arms up.
I giggled. "Right, Bonnie. You'll also get to meet Fairy Tail!"
"Then let's go!" Ash ran towards the portal. "I want to make sure those Pokémon are safe, too."
I walked up to the portal as well. "Okay. Follow right behind me. Don't let the pressure of the dimensional rift get to you." That's when I took a deep breath, and stepped into the portal. Natsu and Lucy were waiting for me patiently. I turned around, and Ash, Serena, Bonnie and Clemont all came through. When Clemont stumbled over to us and adjusted his glasses, the portal shrunk and disappeared.
"No going back now," I said.
BE WISE. BECAUSE OF THE MAGIC IN THIS WORLD, DARKNESS IS AT RISK. Palkia's voice faded and disappeared in between dimensions.
I let out a breath. "Okay, the first step is to find out how many Pokémon are here. What has the guild been trying to do to keep it under control?"
"Mostly just trying to keep them locked up," Lucy answered. "We didn't want all of Magnolia go into a panic."
"What?!" I asked sharply. "You kept them locked up for this long?!"
"Chill out, Ellie!" Lucy countered. "It's not like we haven't neglected them! We had a feeling they were Pokémon, so they've been taken good care of!"
"What do you mean?" Serena asked.
"We built a special room in the guild for them. There have only been a few we've found, so they are given food, a nice bed, and Mira and Lisanna take care of them every day!"
I softened my face in surprise. "Wow," I said. "You should've told me that in the first place."
She let out a sigh. "You know, you're back in Magnolia again. Fairy Tail has been waiting for you for half a year now, and they still care about you even when you weren't there. You need to have more respect for us!"
I was about to snap again, but then I pulled back, my head lowered. "You're right."
"God, Ellie! I was so happy to see you again, and you treat us like...wait, what?" Lucy widened her eyes in surprise.
"I'm sorry..." I felt tears in my eyes. "I was so angry at you for what you were doing in Kalos, I didn't even..." All my happy feelings came flooding out of me. I didn't even realize how scared I was that I would never see them again. I looked up at Lucy with tears of joy. "Even though it was nowhere near as long as you guys, I still missed you."
Lucy smiled, her eyes shimmering. "We missed you too, Ellie. You have no idea how much..." Tears fell from her face as well, and we embraced as we sobbed. "You're back," Lucy said. "I thought it wasn't possible..."
I pushed away from her, and sniffed. "It usually isn't," I chuckled. "But these are dire circumstances."
"You guys are pretty close, aren't you?" Ash asked behind us.
We turned to him with smiles. "You bet we are."
"We haven't seen her since six months ago, so we missed her deeply. Right, Natsu?"
I looked at him in wonder, and he let out a questioning breath as he glanced at us. "Yeah...I guess." I scrunched my brow as he turned away again. What was wrong with him? This was not the Natsu I remembered at all.
"Elena, look!" Serena yelled over to me. I looked at her, and she pointed at the bushes. They were rustling, and all of a sudden a Nuzleaf appeared.
"That's a Nuzleaf!" Ash responded. "There really are Pokémon here!"
"Okay," I said. "Good thing we packed so many of these." I pulled out a pokéball, enlarging it. "Ready, Eevee?" She cried, and leaped off my shoulder. Nuzleaf noticed, and tensed up. "Use Sing." Musical notes flew out of her mouth, as she sung, and when they hit the scared Nuzleaf, it's eyes slowly closed. It fell over and began breathing slowly in sleep. "Good. Now we can catch it safely." I threw the empty pokéball, and it bounced off Nuzleaf. When it opened, Nuzleaf dissolved into red energy, and disappeared into the ball.
The pokéball landed on the ground, and shook as the button flashed red when Nuzleaf attempted to escape. Lucy and Natsu widened their eyes in wonder. "Nuzleaf is trying to get out," I explained. "It was wild, which means it had no trainer. So I'm catching it in a pokéball. But wild Pokémon never want to be captured, so we have to weaken them first in order for them to prevent escaping." The ball beeped in success. I grinned. "And it didn't."
"I'm learning something new every second with you, Ellie." Lucy's eyes sparkled.
I laughed. "Well there's not much more to learn, now." I picked up the ball, and minimized it to put it in a special pocket. "Let's get to the guild so I can talk to Papa." I put my bag over my shoulder, and then glanced at Lucy again. She was giving me a surprised look. I blushed. "What?"
"I just..." she started. "Haven't heard that nickname in awhile. I missed it." She smiled.
I blushed harder, but looked away with a smile. Natsu cleared his throat. "Can we get going?"
I blinked at him in confusion. "Uh...yeah."
I waved to the others, and they followed as we walked further towards Magnolia. On the way, we found a few more Pokémon I had to catch. A Weedle, Mankey, Butterfree, and even a Goldeen in a pond nearby all were roaming in the forest. I hated to take them from their environment, but they didn't belong in this world and I only wanted to get them back home safely. Ash, Serena, and Clemont helped a bit with pokéballs of their own.
"So, what are we doing when we get to Magnolia?" Serena asked.
"We start by talking to the Master of Fairy Tail about what's going on. I'm sure he'll know what to do about all of the Pokémon if we tell him the situation." We were now walking into the outskirts of the town, and the guild was dead ahead. "And then we try to get as much help as we can in catching every last Pokémon to send back to our world."
I noticed Lucy flinched a bit when I said that, but I ignored it. "Is the Master the one you called Papa?" Bonnie put in.
I blushed in embarrassment. "Yes. It's the nickname I gave him while I was here. He's the most powerful wizard of Fairy Tail, and is an amazing leader. So remember to show the proper respect when all of you meet him, okay?"
They all nodded. "I just want all of the Pokémon to be rescued as soon as possible."
"Believe me, I do too." But a sharp pain went through my chest as I remembered what Palkia told us about Arceus. If that legendary Pokémon woke, we'd be in deep sludge.
What scared me the most is it would come to Fiore if it did.