Chapter Text
Chapter 1
There was not much noise once they were outside of the facility. In fact, other than the sea crashing into the cliff below them and their own heavy breathing, the two individuals were alone for the moment. Both members were trying to understand their new surroundings in the dead of night, along with coming to terms of what they have done. One of them, a teenage boy, was staring down at his hands which were covered in a mixture of his blood and blood of the groups he killed. The other, a Pokemon, tried to give the boy some reassurance despite his body telling him to rest from fatigue. Both human and Pokemon were injured from a couple different sources, one of which was them fighting their way thorough numerous humans and other Pokemon to escape the hell they were subjected to for a month. An experience neither of them would ever wish their on their worst enemies… well except for the one who caused their suffering to begin with.
As if on cue, the open area the boy and the Pokemon were in was illuminated by a few search lights. They had to shield their eyes for a couple minutes to adjust to the brightness as many different voices and footsteps started to fill the silence around them. Once their vision cleared, the two escapees saw a small army of men and women dressed in red suits with sunglasses and matching red styled hair. Each red suit was armed with a rifle that shoots a beam which will paralyze the target for a short enough time to capture said target. As the red suits took aim, in the center of the group, a tall man with orange hair styled like a male Pyroar’s mane walked forward to the escapees. “Tsk, tsk, tsk. Come now Ash and Greninja. Haven’t you two done enough for one night?” Ash gritted his teeth in frustration while Greninja muttered a couple curses under his breath (not that anyone, including Ash will hear him).
The tall man stopped within five feet of Ash and Greninja, and just stood in front of them. Ash was hit with a mixture of anger and fear from the man who towered over him. He wanted to do nothing more than rip the man’s throat out with his bare hands, but his body was telling him to run like hell and never look back. Greninja felt the vibe Ash was giving off and wanted to cause bodily harm to the man as well, but his and Ash’s safety comes before that. Retribution will come at another time. “Lysandre…” Ash started to speak when he found the courage to do so, “I already gave you my answer on top of Lumiose tower and it hasn’t change since you have had me. I will NEVER join you or your cause.” “Gren, greninja,” Greninja echoed Ash’s sentiment, and stood in-between Ash and Lysandre.
Lysandre’s smile dropped from his face, and his eyes narrowed at their declaration, “Is that so?” Lysandre raised his right arm, and all the other members of Team Flare raised their guns at Ash and Greninja. Lysandre smirked as he spoke, “Look around you two. There’s no way to escape! I have 25 grunts pointing weapons at you, both you and Greninja are wounded, and we are on an island in the middle of the ocean! What chance do you have of getting away from us?” Ash wanted to scream out in frustration. What could they do? Both him and Greninja had cuts and bruises all over their bodies, and the torture they have endured for the past month has left them weak from hunger and tiredness. All the adrenaline from before was gone, so they could not fight their way though the grunts again, and Ash did not have any of his other Pokemon on him, so he could not ask Talonflame or Noivern to fly him and Greninja off the island. In fact, the only way they could escape is if they jump off the cliff… jump… off… the… cliff…
Ash looked down off the side of the cliff to the water below. It wasn’t a big jump, probably 40 feet if he had to estimate. Greninja is a water-type so, when they jump, Greninja could protect him from the fall and hopefully swim far away enough to get away from Team Flare. Maybe they will even get lucky and wash up on a shore of a town to ask for help. Greninja noticed Ash contemplating about the jump behind them and realize what his trainer was thinking about. Unsurprisingly, Greninja was ok with attempting this plan since they did not have any other option, and between jumping to their freedom/death or going back into the clutches of Lysandre, the former sounder way better.
When Ash looked at Greninja and silently asked if he wanted to jump off the cliff, Greninja nodded his head. Ash nodded back and turned his head towards Lysandre, who was calmly waiting for them to walk towards him in defeat. "You know Lysandre," Ash said as he slowly moved backwards towards the cliff edge with Greninja, "There is one way out of here you overlooked." Lysander raised his right eyebrow, "Oh yeah? Please enlighten me to what..." Lysandre instantly realized what the teenager was implying as Ash and Greninja stopped moving to spread their arms out. "I say this once more since you don't understand Lysandre. Greninja and I will stop you at all cost. You may have turned me and my Pokemon into lab experiments, but that is all the more reason you and Team Flare need to be extinguished from our world. That much, I promise. Until then... good-bye."
Ash and Greninja fell backwards and off the cliff, as Lysandre yelled at his underlings to fire. Fortunately, they missed in time as Greninja grabbed Ash and fell head first into the sea below. Lysandre and the other Team Flare members ran towards the cliff edge but were not able to see anything due to the night covering the ocean in almost pitch blackness. Lysandre continued to look at the sea for another minute before he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Turning around, Lysandre began to walk back to the facility until he heard one of the Flare grunts speak out to him, “S-Sir? Are you ok?” Lysandre turned to the male underling that spoke and smiled, “Yes, I’m fine. Why do you ask,” as he walked towards the grunt. The grunt took a deep breath of relief, “Oh, thank Arceus. I thought you would be mad at us for- GUAK!” The grunt did not finish his sentence as Lysandre plunged a hunting knife into the grunt’s stomach. Lysandre held the grunt at face level as he pulls the knife out of the soon-to-be dead underling, “I… am… NOT… ok you idiot! Our plan to eradicate the ugliness in the world just gave me the finger and JUMPED INTO THE OCEAN BELOW!! All that hard work, gone! Because of you incompetent fools!”
Lysandre threw the grunt towards the ledge of the cliff, and the grunt, trying to stop the blood flowing from his wound, lost his balance and fell off the cliff. The last two sounds everyone else heard from the male grunt was his scream as he fell, and the “plop” sound as he hit the ocean. All the other Flare grunts slowly turned their heads towards Lysandre and did not say anything in fear of being on the wrong side of his blade as well. Lysandre collected himself, and addressed his group in front of him, “Listen up everyone,” as his grunts straightened up. “I have a new mission for you. I do not care how long this takes, I do not care how many resources we go through, and I especially do not care if you like this or not. Our plan to create a new world has escaped, and I will not let our plans be ruined twice. Your orders are to find and capture Ash Ketchum and his Greninja alive. Once they are caught, bring them back here to continue with our goal of a beautiful world. If they escape again, or are killed,” Lysandre says with a wicked grin as he holds his knife up to threaten everybody. “I will hold each of you, including everyone in the base responsible for our failures. Understand?”
All the Flare grunts yelled, “Yes sir,” and ran back into the base to prepare for the search. Before he headed back in, Lysandre walked back over to the edge of the cliff once more to mumble something, “Just you wait Ash and Greninja. This world will be beautiful, and you will understand what I am trying to accomplish. I promise you that.” With that out of his system, Lysandre walked back to the facility to plan his next move.