Chapter Text
“GHETSIS!”
Heat flared as massive wooden doors were nearly blown off their hinges. They slammed into the crumbling stone walls so hard, shaking the dilapidated room to such an extent that N contemplated if the force was enough to bring the roof down on them.
An emboar lumbered through the doorway, each footstep echoing and thundering throughout the once elegant, majestic hall. The ground shook slightly as N realized to whom the emboar belonged.
Human anger and pokemon anger were different, as N consistently argued. Pokemon anger tended to be much less restrained, and wild in a sort of way. Human anger was subdued, and could be hidden behind icy stares and forced smiles. It was civilized and almost didn’t feel like anger at some points. Though as N stared into the eyes of the intruder, it was the first time he’d seen anger from a human in such a feral, uncompromising state.
Hilda strode up next to her partner, crossing her arms, and she looked nearly disgusted at seeing N at his side. She didn’t hold his gaze for more than a few seconds before staring directly at him.
Ghetsis held his scepter, a hand snaking out from under his cape to rest on top of it. He shot a mocking grin in Hilda’s direction, “Aren’t you aware you should bow to a king?” He mused, looking her over, sizing her up. How much of a threat did she really pose?
She narrowed her eyes and looked directly into N’s eyes. Cold, unfeeling, but masking another emotion that N was working to pinpoint. Hilda crossed her arms and spat at his feet, looking up at him again, with nothing other than rage in her stormy gray eyes, as far as N could tell.
“I bow to no one,” she said tersely, but N hoped she said it more to Ghetsis than to him.
The walls, although crumbling, still held their original purpose. This was meant to be a throne room, but Hilda looked more like a righteous queen reclaiming her territory than N felt like a king. Next to Ghetsis, he felt like a foolish prince, too young to claim his kingdom in his own right, handing off control to a scheming regent, hell-bent on gaining as much power as he wanted.
But Ghetsis wasn’t like that. He wanted something good, and he’d placed the crown on N’s head, so how could the two of them disagree? They were father and son, one of the most natural alliances within human society.
“I’ve played your games,” she spat at both of them, “Zekrom stands at my side as a fully-fledged member of my team. That I caught in my own right,” she made eye contact with Ghetsis, “and I didn’t steal.”
“Some would argue that you stole from nature,” was all Ghetsis said.
“I’m done being a pawn in whatever game you’re playing with the people and pokemon of Unova,” Hilda snarled, and then she stared at N, “I’m done with you trying to force your ideology in my face at every turn, especially when I know that you stand at his side. I’m done being your personal pawn in whatever twisted-”
“You were never a pawn,” N whispered.
Ghetsis clicked his tongue in disappointment, before looking to N, gesturing vaguely to Hilda. “We have work to do, get rid of her.”
N looked between him and Hilda, and nodded, “Yes father.”
“I almost believed Concordia,” Hilda said to him, “when she said that your heart was pure and innocent. But with everything you’ve done,” she clenched her fist, “your lies and manipulations and tricks,” N noticed that she seemed angrier with herself as she said that. Hilda stared him down, her gray eyes a storm, waiting to be unleashed. His blue eyes flickered with some sort of apologetic glance, “I realize that you’re just as bad as him,” she pointed at Ghetsis, before turning back to him and pointing at him instead, “and that you’re a coward.”
There was a beat of silence.
“Hilda…”
She shook her head, “Emboar! Let’s do this.”
N hesitated, something felt wrong. Maybe it was how righteous Hilda looked in the sunlight filtering down, spotlighting her in the otherwise dank and sad throne room. It might’ve been her words, as he looked at Ghetsis and tried to make sense of the jab. Ghetsis wasn’t bad. He couldn’t be bad. Bad was for people who kept pokemon against their will, bad was for people who wanted to stand in the way of protecting pokemon from people by keeping them separate.
But Hilda wasn’t bad either…
“Are you going to stand there like an idiot and let that insignificant wretch call you, King of Team Plasma, a coward?” Ghetsis hissed.
N still hesitated, and grabbed one of his pokeballs from one of his pockets, “Reshiram, Guardian of Truth, I call upon your power.”
And seconds later, Hilda was staring into the cobalt blue eyes of the twin to Zekrom, who rumbled inside its pokeball. She looked up at N, “Then what does Zekrom represent?”
Ghetsis’s slimy cackling sent shivers crawling down Hilda’s spine. “Foolish girl,” he sneered, “Zekrom is the Guardian of Ideals.”
Truth and Ideals.
Opposites, but still connected.
Two sides of the same coin.
“Are you really going to fight me?” Hilda interrupted, noting how N still hadn’t made so much as an aggressive twitch.
He stared at her, “You possess the other half to the duo of Truth and Ideals. I will not attack you. You are not my enemy.”
Ghetsis, again, clicked his tongue in disappointment. “Of course, you weak, pathetic, sorry excuse for a human.”
Hilda’s eyes widened in shock at Ghetsis’ words. Her stance changed, and her fist clenched, wanting to pummel it straight into the side of his face.
“You will never be human, you will never be strong, and you will forever be the sorry excuse of a child I took pity on, but you weren’t even worth enough to properly use you as a tool.”
The room was silent, save for what N could feel of Hilda’s simmering rage.
“What the hell did you just fucking say?” She whispered, sharply, that even N fought a flinch.
Again, Ghetsis’s oily cackle filled the room. He turned to N, “You actually believed that this was all for the greater good? You fool. You absolute, withering, barely-human fool. People don’t deserve to have pokemon, you, N, said that yourself. So why let them keep their pokemon? Why not give it to someone worthy?”
“You mean, you,” N whispered, horrified. Every opinion he’d ever had of Ghetsis shattered as he saw the man he’d called his father for who he truly was, outside of the lies and the manipulations. And he was disgusted. No wonder Hilda had looked at him with such contempt.
“THAT CROSSES SO MANY DAMN LINES YOU SON OF A BITCH!” Hilda screamed, lunging forward, only to be restrained by N grabbing her upper arm tightly. Emboar roared aggressively, stomping on the ground meant to intimidate.
“Angry people, such as yourself, should not be able to wield their supposedly beloved pokemon as weapons,” was all he said.
“Do not talk to her that way,” N warned. “She is stronger, wiser, and more than worthy for her team to stand at her side.” Hilda glanced up at him, face slightly scrunched, searching somehow, for an explanation in the sudden change, as was Ghetsis.
“And why do you think you can stop me?” Ghetsis challenged stepping forward as Hilda moved between father and son. Emboar dutifully at her side, snarling at Ghetsis, waiting for him to back off.
“Zekrom,” N whispered.
Hilda nodded.
And that’s when N realized he was right about how hard Hilda had slammed the door open.
The ceiling crashed down on the throne room, letting the dust rise as Hilda and N were high above the ruined castle. N holding the scruff of Reshiram’s neck tightly, and Hilda had her arms wrapped around Zekrom’s neck.
The wind whipped Hilda’s brown ponytail back and forth, sending goosebumps up her bare arms. “Where will you go?” Hilda asked, looking down as Team Plasma ran from the castle as fast as they could.
N looked down at the ground, his green hair blowing over his eyes, leaving him as the perfect example of wistful contemplation, “I’m…I’m not sure. What do you’ll think you’ll do?”
“I’ll travel. See the world outside Unova.”
“Then I’ll be here, making sure Ghetsis doesn’t get any more ideas.”
“You’ll put him in prison, right? For what he’s done?”
N nodded, “I shall see that he is held responsible.”
She nodded.
“And Hilda?”
She turned.
“I’m sorry.”
8 Years Later
“Might I ask why I’ve been called from my home alongside Reshiram?”
Iris bowed her head, “We need you, N. For your help, and to keep you and Reshiram protected.”
N cocked his head to the side, surveying the group that stood behind her. He recognized one other person, but the others. Their faces were foreign, “Why have you called me here, and what else do you need me for?”
Iris hesitated, “Hilda Touko is rumored to be the trainer of Zekrom. We’ve heard that she might have known you once,” she paused as N raised his eyebrows, “and we need to find her.”
“ Why ?”
She looked to the one other familiar face that N recognized and he moved to stand next to the Unovan Champion. They nodded at each other, opening their mouths to speak in unison.
“Ghetsis has returned.”