#jeonghan with umbreon is just ugh

[yoonzeeno]

of burned towers and rainbow dreams. ━━ yjh x ksy

part two of the svt x pokemon!au  ━━ johto.

❀ summary: soonyoung and jeonghan ventured to the burned tower in ecruteak city, only to find something waiting for their arrival. ❀ pairing: jeonghan x hoshi (brotp) ❀ word count: 8k (I OVERDID MYSELF I KNOW I’M SORRY) ❀ genre(s): adventure, friendship, action, slice of life ❀ warning(s): pokémon battle violence at the beginning and the end of the fic. mentions of fire accidents.

━━ a/n: i had so much fun writing this part, it only took me around three or four days, i guess? i wrote the last battle scene without much planning, letting the whole scene play in my head as i wrote it down. it was, undoubtedly, the most fun i’ve had ever since i started writing (probably because it’s two of my biases in one fic but who knows). ALSO PLS FORGIVE ME FOR OVERDOING MYSELF i literally could not find ways to shorten the story without skipping details. anyways, i hope you guys will like this part too!

soonyoung remembered feeling the soft wind blew across his face as he sat down under a tree, shading himself under the harsh sunlight shining down upon him.

his pokémon — scyther, mareep, and wynaut — were playing around, running around here and there, enjoying the sunlight. soonyoung looked to the sky ahead. he was at his home — in his backyard, a tree stood tall. it was a mahogany tree — for he was from mahogany town. 

a rainbow suddenly appeared on the sky — was it raining earlier? soonyoung didn’t remember. however, something bright flying across the sky caught his eye.

it had the shape of a bird — a gigantic bird, to be exact. wherever it flew, a trail of rainbow sparks trailed behind it. soonyoung couldn’t describe the bird except for the fact that it was gold. it headed towards a tower covered in orange flames, and soonyoung immediately knew what tower it was. it was weird though — the original incident had happened more than a hundred years ago, so why was soonyoung seeing it with his own two eyes?

it was the infamous burned tower, formerly called the brass tower, located right at the neighboring city, ecruteak city. even though the tower was in flames, the bird just flew towards it without hesitation. smoke rose to the air, covering the silhouette of the bird. soonyoung longed for the smoke to quickly clear up, but when it did, the bird disappeared along with it.

no! soonyoung wanted to shout, but nothing came out. he tried standing up, but he fell back down to the ground, and the world turned black.

when he opened his eyes in surprise, he realized it was just a dream.

four years later.

“gengar, shadow ball!” soonyoung’s eyebrows furrowed at morty’s command. he had to think of something fast, or scizor was going to run out of hp soon.

“scizor, dodge and use flash cannon!” the pincer pokémon cried in response, before moving his wings to his will, flying to dodge the incoming purple orb of shadow, making it hit the wall instead. scizor growled, gathering light in between his pincers (causing the originally dark room to go darker), and threw the ball of light towards the shadow pokémon. it hit gengar before morty could shout an order, the shadow pokémon falling face forward to the ground.

“nice!” soonyoung could hear his friend and mentor, jeonghan, cheer from the audience’s seat. jeonghan’s eevee, who was out of her ball, was yelping happily, running around jeonghan as she cheered scizor on.

he was currently in the middle of a pokémon battle — a pokémon gym battle, to be exact. this was his fourth gym battle, and winning this battle means he’s going to be halfway through his gym challenge. but morty, ecruteak city’s gym leader, wasn’t making himself an easy opponent, and soonyoung wished he had a ghost or a dark-type pokémon, because his team wasn’t exactly good at countering ghost-types. he managed to defeat morty’s earlier pokémon — gastly and haunter — thanks to ampharos and scizor, but ampharos was knocked out by haunter because she exhausted herself during her battle with gastly, and while scizor, soonyoung’s ace, was holding out well against gengar thanks to his steel typing (for gengar was part poison-type, and steel-types are immune against poison-type moves, but soonyoung only realized at the end of the battle that none of morty’s pokémon had any poison-type moves), scizor was nearing his limit, and soonyoung felt like he’s being pushed to the edge. he still has the chance to switch out to another pokémon. sure, scizor executed the flash cannon perfectly, but what’s he going to do next?

soonyoung’s eyes caught gengar lifting its body upwards, and realized he had to think fast, or the fog badge will not be his. he gritted his teeth. scizor was looking at him, waiting for a command. soonyoung’s hand flew to his belt, where six poké balls were perfectly aligned. he touched a particular one — one that was different than the other five, for, instead of your normal red and white poké ball, it was mostly black, with a red and gold stripe on the upper half of it. there was no other way besides this, he decided.

“scizor, u-turn!” scizor cried, digging the ground with his clawed feet, before pushing himself from the ground, his wings helping him take off from the ground. he flew towards gengar, who was already floating on the air now, before diving head first towards gengar. 

“gengar, night shade!”

before scizor could make contact with gengar, the latter fired a crimson beam with purplish outlines from its eyes, the beam making its way to scizor. thanks to scizor’s speed, scizor could reach gengar first before the night shade could reach him. but when scizor finally made contact with gengar, the close proximity caused night shade to also hit scizor. both pokémon let out cries of pain — for even though both attacks were not very effective against the other, scizor’s hp was alarmingly low, whilst gengar’s hp was still half full. 

thanks to the pressure of u-turn, gengar was knocked back down to the ground whilst scizor used the momentum to make a quick u-turn, returning back to his poké ball. soonyoung murmured his thanks before pushing the button of his luxury ball twice, releasing the pokémon confined inside it.

“wobbuffet, go!” from the poké ball, a tall, cyan pokémon, with four stubby legs emerged, solidifying, his flat arm bent towards his forehead, right above his scrunching eyes. he let out a cry before turning to look for soonyoung. as he managed to locate his owner, he wobbled towards him, arms on soonyoung’s waist, before turning to hide himself behind soonyoung. soonyoung chuckled. wobbuffet hated fights and battles, and soonyoung almost never wanted to send wobbuffet out for battles. but wobbuffet was, beyond expectations, a bulky fighter. among all his pokémon, wobbuffet was probably the only one with close to zero knockouts. then again, soonyoung could count with one hand the amount of times wobbuffet has been in battles.

“it’s okay, buddy,” soonyoung said, patting wobbuffet’s head soothingly. from across the battlefield, soonyoung could hear morty laugh. it’s okay, soonyoung thought, for not everyone knows wobbuffet’s potentials.

“i’ll get you your favorite ice cream later, okay,” said soonyoung. “and i promise, it’ll be a quick battle.”

he knew it’ll be quick, because it was wobbuffet battling. but he hated sending wobbuffet out, knowing how the patient pokémon disliked battling. that’s why he only uses wobbuffet when it urgently calls for it, and this was one of the times.

wobbuffet only nodded timidly, and soonyoung guided it back to his place on the field. gengar was snickering — a mock snicker, soonyoung guessed. it was a risky move — sending wobbuffet out, especially because against gengar's ghost typing, wobbuffet’s psychic typing was vulnerable.

“well,” morty said, “i guess it’s time for us to make our attack now.” gengar lifted himself to the air, thanks to its ability, levitate. “gengar, shadow ball!”

“wobbuffet, mirror coat!” the comical shock in morty’s eyes almost made soonyoung laugh out loud. no one, especially a gym leader — a ghost-type gym leader, in particular — should ever underestimate a wobbuffet.

the shadow pokémon was already forming a purple orb of dark energy in between its hands, and fired the orb at wobbuffet. soonyoung smirked as wobbuffet glowed beautifully — the glow resembling that of a reflecting mirror — and as the shadow ball came in contact with wobbuffet, instead of dealing damage to wobbuffet, wobbuffet’s mirror coat caught it, and reflected the orb towards gengar with two times the attack power. soonyoung’s eyes glanced over towards morty, who was so dumbfounded, he had absentmindedly shouted at gengar to attack with another shadow ball.

but before gengar could form another orb, the orb it had created earlier came whirling back towards it, hitting it square on its stomach, creating a small explosion as smoke engulfed the shadow pokémon. the damage dealt was doubled — and gengar’s hp meter lowered drastically until there was no hp left. as the smoke cleared, soonyoung could see gengar’s body on the field, finally knocked out.

“morty’s gengar is unable to battle. victory goes to challenger, kwon soonyoung!”

from the audience, soonyoung could hear jeonghan and eevee cheer — they were the only audience, after all. soonyoung didn’t realize he was panting hard until he fell down on his butt, legs giving out, but the adrenaline was still pumping in his veins. wobbuffet had wobbled over towards him, crying out in worry, placing his flat arm on soonyoung’s head, as if he’s trying to see if soonyoung’s head was still working or not. soonyoung laughed and hugged wobbuffet. wobbuffet was soft and squishy — he’s been soonyoung’s sleeping buddy since soonyoung was still a kid and wobbuffet was still a wynaut, after all.

“we did it, wobbuffet! we won because of you!” wobbuffet perked up at soonyoung’s words, and blushed. oh, the love soonyoung held for his pokémon. he’s gonna have to thank ampharos and scizor later on too.

“good job, kid.” soonyoung let go of wobbuffet to stand up and shake morty’s hands. wobbuffet was still holding onto his left hand, his stance wary. “i gotta admit, i was impatient to win,” said morty with a laugh. “should’ve gone for a hypnosis instead of a shadow ball. you were lucky, but you’re good, too. you have potentials.” soonyoung beamed at the gym leader’s words, bowing to express his thanks.

“this one here,” morty pointed to wobbuffet, “you did a good job choosing it as your final pokémon. i didn’t think it would be able to win against my gengar.” he nodded. “you did a good job raising it, kid.” 

“wobbuffet’s been with me since we were kids,” said soonyoung, rubbing his sweat with his sleeve. “i know i can win battles with it easily, but it’s not a couragely pokémon.” he let out a soft laugh. “in fact, it hates battles. so i only use it when i desperately need to win.” 

“i could see that,” said morty, moving a hand to pat wobbuffet’s head. the patient pokémon stiffened, not used to strangers touching his head. his grip on soonyoung’s hand tightened, and soonyoung squeezed it slightly. “it’s nice to know that i still could impose such a challenge on you that you had to use your hidden card to battle me.”

“yo, soonyoung, you did well!” soonyoung turned around to see jeonghan walking towards them, eevee pacing right next to him. eevee approached wobbuffet and cried happily — as if she’s praising wobbuffet for winning. wobbuffet visibly blushed. besides from soonyoung’s other pokémon, jeonghan’s eevee was the only pokémon whose companionship wobbuffet didn’t mind.

jeonghan stopped his steps to stand next to soonyoung, his head nodding towards morty in acknowledgement. “it’s nice to see you again, morty.”

“likewise, jeonghan,” said morty, smiling towards jeonghan. unlike hoshi, jeonghan was almost done with his challenge — only the blackthorn city gym challenge remaining. so it meant that jeonghan had challenged morty before, and had won against him.

“well,” morty clapped his hands, and as he separated them, a small purple pin appeared on his palms. “since you have defeated me, i have to give you your newest gym badge.” he passed the badge to soonyoung, who accepted it in awe. “congratulations on earning the fog badge!” soonyoung placed the fog badge in his badge case, and bowed at morty, thanking him earnestly.

“so, where are you headed after this? the cianwood city gym?” soonyoung shook his head. 

“there’s somewhere else i have to go first here in ecruteak.” morty nodded in understanding.

“well, don’t let me hold the two of you back then. have a safe trip!” he said, and both soonyoung and jeonghan bid their goodbyes before heading out of the gym, wobbuffet’s hand still tightly holding soonyoung’s hand, and eevee strutting happily in between jeonghan and wobbuffet.

the sun was slowly sinking down the horizon, the sky surrounding them turning gold. they were currently seated in a cafe, wobbuffet munching happily on his green tea ice cream, for ecruteak city was famous for their green tea. scizor and ampharos were both outside of their balls too — soonyoung was celebrating their victory, and instead of eating ice cream, soonyoung was eating a waffle instead. jeonghan was watching them amusedly, slowly nibbling on his pistachio ice cream that he bought for himself. 

scizor had a chocolate ice cream on one of his pincer, and a green tea ice cream on another. he looked scared to crush both ice creams and get his pincers all sticky, so he gobbled them in two consecutive bites — causing him to have a brain freeze, his pincers holding his head to calm himself down.

ampharos, on the other hand, had a vanilla ice cream on one of her hands. she was licking on it happily, offering eevee a little bit of her ice cream. jeonghan had bought eevee a vanilla ice cream earlier, but she already finished it. since eevee eats two times the portion of a normal eevee, she happily accepted ampharos’s offer. 

after years of being friends with soonyoung and observing, jeonghan could see how, between soonyoung’s team’s dynamics, ampharos was like the caring sister, whilst scizor was like the protective brother. jeonghan could also see how the two of them cared so much for wobbuffet, for the three of them had been together since they were still young, and since soonyoung was still very young too.

jeonghan had to admit, whilst soonyoung thought he was still way ahead of being a good pokémon trainer, to jeonghan he was already one. soonyoung didn’t see his pokémon as weapons of battle — he saw them as his friends, hence the reason wobbuffet was still in soonyoung’s team even though he hates battles. aside from that, if the three of them — scizor, ampharos, and wobbuffet — were to battle alongside each other, they would have executed perfect teamwork. while jeonghan was the better trainer skillswise, he was going to have to admit defeat to soonyoung’s teamwork with his pokémon. jeonghan could imagine how his crobat and houndoom would just attack each other instead of attacking the opponents were they to battle together.

“so,” jeonghan spoke up as he lowered his ice cream to give the rest to eevee, who hopped back towards jeonghan happily and munched on the ice cream, “where are you planning to go here at ecruteak?”

“the burned tower,” said soonyoung, still munching on his waffle happily. jeonghan’s eyes bulged out.

“you do know that’s not for entry, right?”

“that’s why we’re going to enter at night,” said soonyoung as he put the last of his waffle inside his mouth. “i need to go there — i feel like i saw a sign in my dream.” jeonghan raised an eyebrow. he’s never heard of this story before.

“what dream?” 

“basically,” soonyoung wiped the crumbs off of his hands, “i think i saw ho-oh in my dream, and i think it’s telling me to come to the burned tower.” jeonghan’s eyebrows furrowed.

“the burned tower? but ho-oh resides at the bell tower, no?” soonyoung shrugged. next to them, scizor was whining — he may look like a scary pokémon, but once his pincers get dirty he’s back to a baby. 

“well, true, but the tower i saw in my dreams was covered in flames. there’s no other tower besides the burned tower, right?” he said as he cleaned the table up, taking a wet tissue to wipe scizor’s pincers. ampharos stared at the tissue, before taking one to wipe wobbuffet’s green tea covered mouth. wobbuffet snuggled ampharos, which jeonghan figured was wobbuffet’s way of saying thank you. the sight of them made jeonghan’s heart flutter. they really do look like family.

“besides,” soonyoung continued, “there’s a possibility that you might be able to train there, you know? eevee’s bound to evolve soon, too.” jeonghan’s gaze turned to eevee, who was still nibbling on jeonghan’s pistachio ice cream. 

jeonghan caught eevee after finishing his olivine gym challenge — which means eevee hadn’t been with them for long, unlike jeonghan’s other pokémon, who had been with jeonghan for his entire journey (save for crobat, who jeonghan had saved as a zubat when he was still a young lad). jeonghan had pondered, of course, what to evolve eevee to — but eevee had shown no interest in evolving through the evolutionary stones, and if he wanted to evolve eevee to glaceon or leafeon he’s going to have to travel far away. that leaves only espeon, umbreon, and sylveon. and jeonghan didn’t want eevee to feel like she has no choice. if eevee doesn’t want to evolve, then so be it.

“fine,” jeonghan decided. “but let’s wait until it gets darker. we can’t have people find out we’re sneaking in the burned tower.”

soonyoung snickered. “that’s more like it.” 

“but if anything happens, i’m not covering your four—badges ass.” soonyoung gaped at jeonghan, but jeonghan ignored him, wiping his table clean.

“that was mean.”

“you’re the one who wanted to go to the burned tower, knowing fully well the consequences!”

scizor only looked at the two trainers, letting out a small groan as he shook his head.

humans. such noisy creatures.

even though it was dark outside, the burned tower stood out magnificently against the bright moonlight.

it was dark, probably around ten or eleven in the evening. soonyoung and jeonghan, alongside soonyoung’s ampharos and jeonghan’s eevee, were walking around the complex of the burned tower.

the burned tower was shaped like a pagoda, previously built out of golden brass with gleaming golden panels, in contrast to bell tower’s silvery panels. there were staircases that people would have to climb to before going inside. had it not burned, jeonghan was sure the three-story pagoda would’ve been the main attraction of the town. sadly, the only thing left from the previously golden tower was just the structure and ashes. 

the four of them climbed the staircase silently, with jeonghan motioning to eevee to be quiet every so and then. on the entryway, instead of a golden door, a sign that said “dangerous: do not enter” was placed. soonyoung ignored the sign and motioned for the four of them to enter quietly. whilst jeonghan, ampharos, and eevee had managed to enter quietly, ironically, soonyoung had kicked his own foot onto a boulder, causing him to yelp in pain. jeonghan turned to glare at soonyoung, meanwhile ampharos hurried over to soonyoung in worry. after soonyoung assured ampharos it was fine, the four of them continued their way inside. soonyoung couldn’t believe that, four years later after his dream, he was finally inside the burned tower. 

his happiness was cut short when a flock of zubat flew over towards them.

“ampharos, flash!” cried soonyoung, and a bright light shined from ampharos, lighting up the room that otherwise would’ve been dark, for even though the moonlight shone through the hollowed roof, it wasn’t enough light for them to recognize their surroundings. thanks to ampharos, they could now see that the floor beneath them was made out of wood — why was it not burned down, soonyoung didn’t know. 

jeonghan’s hand went to his belt and he grabbed a poké ball, pressing the button twice before releasing the pokémon inside it.

“crobat, go!”

from the poké ball, a purple, bat—like pokémon emerged. he had a small, round body with two pair of wings — the upper pair slightly larger than the lower pair. the upper wings had two claw—like fingers near the middle. as he solidified, crobat’s face could finally be seen clearly — long pointed ears, yellow eyes with red pupils, and a small mouth that usually had his teeth bared. on the bottom of crobat’s body was a pair of stubby feet.

crobat flew in the air as soon as he was let out. he was capable of flying silently on the air — something they desperately needed right now. years of being with jeonghan had helped him recognize what jeonghan wanted without jeonghan having to give out commands. he flew over to the flock of zubat, and looked to jeonghan and soonyoung that he was communicating with them. the flock of zubat finally flew back to where they came from, clearly knowing that even though crobat was outnumbered, he would overpower them in a battle.

jeonghan held out his arm for crobat to perch on, and crobat flew back to jeonghan, descending on his arm. jeonghan used his other hand to rub crobat’s head as a way of saying thanks, and crobat purred in delight.

the five of them headed deeper into the tower. thanks to ampharos’s flash, they managed to avoid the huge pit that stood in the middle of the first floor. unlike the outside view, there were actually four floors — the upper three stories that could be seen from the outside, and an additional basement floor. jeonghan figured the pit was previously part of the first floor — the wood that burnt down in the fire making a huge hole, thus the pit came into existence.

“there,” whispered soonyoung, pointing towards the northeast corner. “there’s a staircase over there.”

due to the huge pit, and a boulder blocking their way to the right, they had no other way to go except to circle over the left side of the floor in one straight line, walking slowly, for one wrong step and the four of them could dive down to the basement (crobat would probably just fly away). 

eevee was whimpering in fear, the atmosphere scaring her to bits. jeonghan bit his lip, pondering over before moving crobat to perch on his shoulder instead, and carried eevee on his arms. crobat didn’t seem to mind — both being on jeonghan’s shoulder and the dark, for the dark was crobat’s natural habitat, and being on jeonghan’s shoulder means he could nuzzle jeonghan’s cheeks whenever he wanted to.

they were halfway there when something jumped out of a boulder, causing ampharos, who was leading the way, to halt suddenly, her flash gone in a flash (no pun intended). soonyoung knocked into ampharos and fell to his knees, while jeonghan stumbled on his steps, his grip on eevee tightening in case the evolution pokémon fell. crobat fluttered its wings in surprise, and screeched at the intruder. 

“why are you the one agitated, crobat? i should be the one agitated, you know.” the figure spoke in such a fancy manner, jeonghan raised his eyebrows, suspicious. 

soonyoung was cursing as he stood up, grumbling at how his knees hurt, for it had scraped the pebbles. when he finally collected himself, he could see the figure in front of him clearly.

it was a man, probably around his late 20s, and he was wearing a purple suit with diamonds etched on it over a white buttoned shirt. on his neck was a red butterfly ribbon, and he was also wearing a white cape around him. he had light brown hair, a few strands in front of his eyes. he looked too comical to be taken seriously — like, who would even wear that to visit the burned tower?

“who are you?” asked soonyoung. ampharos’s orb that was attached on its tail beamed red — ampharos was on full guard. eevee was growling at him.

“i should be the one asking you that. the burned tower is not for entry, you know?” 

“it isn’t, but you’re also here, so that makes all of us.” jeonghan pointed out. the man only sighed.

“my name is eusine, and im on the trail of the pokémon, suicune!” he said. “also, im here because my good friend morty, who, by the way, is ecruteak city’s gym leader,” he emphasized on the word gym leader, “gave me permission to come here as long as i come out alive. and what about you kids?” jeonghan rolled his eyes at the last word.

“well,” soonyoung spoke up, “we kids are only normal pokémon trainer who defeated your good friend morty slash ecruteak city’s gym leader.” jeonghan snickered at soonyoung’s words. 

eusine tsked in annoyance. “such disrespectful kids. do you want to battle it out? i’m stronger than morty.”

“no thanks, we’re not planning to get stuck here or cause a commotion.” jeonghan said, but eusine didn’t budge from his spot.

“mr. eusine,” soonyoung said, gritting his teeth, “it’s night and we would want to get this over quickly and go back to our lodge to sleep, so will you please let us go on our way?”

“and let you guys meet suicune before i do? nope, absolutely no way.” jeonghan didn’t want to cause a ruckus, but this peculiar man was making it hard for them to do it. crobat had screeched in warning twice now — crobat would never screech unless it feels agitated, and right now, jeonghan was also feeling agitated.

“look, before we wake up all the other pokémon living here—” but before jeonghan could finish his words, a loud roar came from the basement. the three of them whipped their heads towards the pit, and eusine jumped up and down in delight, causing the wooden floor beneath them to start creaking. eevee yelped in surprise, whilst ampharos fell on her knees due to the violent shaking.

“it’s suicune, it’s suicune! it must know i’m here! i have to go down there, now!” eusine made no sign of noticing that the floor was shaking, and was so delighted that his immediate instinct was to run for the staircase, causing the wooden creaking floor to shake heavily once more. and before soonyoung could open his mouth to warn him, the floor underneath them crumbled, and all of them fell through a newly opened hole.

jeonghan rolled to his side quickly in the air to cover eevee from the bits of wood that were raining down on them, which caused him to land on his side. he accidentally landed on a rock the size of a fist, and he let out a half-moan half-groan as he felt pain jolting from his rib. eevee yelped in surprise, squeezing herself out of jeonghan’s arms, poking jeonghan with her paw as she let out whimpers of worry. crobat managed to detach himself from jeonghan’s shoulder earlier, now flying in circles around their heads, before diving to jeonghan’s side, nudging his head on jeonghan’s head to make sure jeonghan was okay. there wasn’t much distance between the floors, thankfully, but there’s still enough to cause jeonghan incredible pain when he tried to sit up.

soonyoung, meanwhile, wasn’t so lucky. when he fell down, he somehow landed feet first, and it felt as if ampharos had fired a thunderbolt from the sole of his right foot. he managed to twist his left foot before it hit the ground, but the pain from his right foot was enough for him to squeeze out tears of pain. he tried to suppress the pain, crying out for ampharos instead.

“ampharos! ampharos, where are you?” soonyoung panickedly cried. his hand fumbled for his belt — almost crying in relief when he could feel all the other five still intact.

“crobat, go look for ampharos!” jeonghan cried, staggering to stand up. crobat shrieked in response before flying over, using his supersonic to detect ampharos’s location. when jeonghan did manage to stand up, he tried moving his feet. there were slight pain on his thighs, but otherwise he could walk almost perfectly well, his left leg limping slightly. he rushed over to soonyoung, whose face was covered in all the debris. jeonghan doubted he looked any better, to be honest.

“ampharos!” soonyoung was still crying out for ampharos, pressing both his palms on the ground, trying to lift himself up, but the pain on his legs stopped him from doing so. he wanted to cry. he can’t lose ampharos — he wouldn’t forgive himself if ampharos was nowhere to be found.

as if sensing their best friend was missing, scizor and wobbuffet came out of soonyoung’s poké ball unsummoned. wobbuffet wobbled towards soonyoung in worry, whilst scizor, after making sure wobbuffet went to soonyoung, immediately flew over to where crobat went. soonyoung didn’t realize he was sobbing until wobbuffet came to check for his injuries, his eyes scrunching in worry at the sight of his owner. soonyoung didn’t know what he was sobbing for — the pain or the thought of ampharos being gone.

when jeonghan finally reached soonyoung’s side, he was holding a first aid kit on his hand. he took a look at soonyoung’s legs — his right feet was covered in purple bruises, shaping a big lump on his ankle. jeonghan fumbled for his poké ball, calling out for the only pokémon with an ice-type move that he owned. he pressed the button twice, and a pokémon that resembled a duck emerged from the ball. it was round around the edges, with the main body being somewhat pinkish. it has a relatively flat bill and large round eyes. its legs were simple ovoid growths along its sides, and its tail widened towards the middle. its bill, legs, tail, and underside were all blue colored.

“porygon2, ice beam around soonyoung’s right ankle.” porygon2 squeaked in response, before a stream of ice shot from its bill, covering the bruise on soonyoung’s leg. soonyoung yelped in surprise at the sudden coldness, wincing a little bit, but signalled jeonghan that the pain was slowly numbing.

a few metres from them, crobat’s cry could be heard. the two of them turned towards the direction of the cry, and they could see crobat flying in the air right above scizor and ampharos — the former had his pincers around ampharos, helping ampharos walk. ampharos was limping on her right leg, but otherwise, she looked okay. 

at the sight of both his pokémon, soonyoung sobbed in relief. the pain in his foot subsided a little bit, thanks to porygon2’s ice beam. jeonghan was busy wrapping soonyoung’s foot in bandage when crobat flew over and perched on jeonghan’s head, whilst ampharos and soonyoung had a tearful reunion, with soonyoung saying, “bless, bless.” over and over as ampharos bent over soonyoung’s body, hugging him.

after making sure soonyoung’s leg was wrapped tightly, jeonghan moved to spray potion over ampharos’s limping leg. ampharos winced in pain, but she seemed visibly better a few seconds later. jeonghan sighed and dropped down on the ground, wiping out beads of sweat off of his forehead. eevee climbed over to his lap and jeonghan pulled her over in a hug, trying to slow his beating heart down.

“speaking of which,” soonyoung suddenly spoke up, “where’s that eusine guy?” jeonghan looked up, frowning. he was too focused on getting everyone back together that he forgot the weird guy existed.

he signaled for crobat to look for eusine, and crobat looked annoyed, as if he didn’t want to go after him, which jeonghan could actually relate to. crobat had already flapped his wings, ready  to fly in search for eusine, when they heard another roar — identical to the first one they had heard — from behind jeonghan. soonyoung was looking over jeonghan’s shoulder, his jaw dropped. jeonghan whipped his head around as well, and gaped at the sight in front of him. 

in front of them, three creatures were towering over them, and jeonghan immediately recognized them as the three legendary beasts — the beasts that had originally died in the fire, but had been resurrected back to life.

on the left side was a massive, leonine, quadrupedal pokémon covered in brown fur and a long, light gray cloud of smoke running along its entire back. it had gray plates on either side of the cloud and a plate beneath the cream belly fur on its chest. entei, jeonghan remembered its name. the volcano pokémon, representing the fire that had engulfed the tower they were currently in more than a hundred years ago.

on the right side was a quadrupedal, yellow, tiger—like pokémon with black stripes and a white underside. it had a thin, light blue tail with sharp angles and spark—shaped formation at the end. most of its face consisted of thick, white fur and shorter yellow fur around its red eyes, with a muzzle that’s shaped like a light blue "x". it also had a black faceplate with two bumps that covered its forehead, nose, and ears. raikou, the thunder pokémon, representing the thunderstorm that had happened on the night of the fire — the one that had caused the fire on the first place.

and on the middle was a slim, quadrupedal blue mammalian pokémon with white, diamond-shaped markings. its face and underside were white as well. it had a thick, purple mane that resembled the aurora borealis and two white, streamer-like tails that wave forward. it also had a large, hexagonal, cerulean blue crest on its forehead with two prongs on either side of the base. now that jeonghan could look at the pokémon at near proximity, he could understand why eusine the weird guy was so obsessed over the pokémon. it was the epitome of beautiful. suicune, jeonghan named it. the aurora pokémon, representing the downpour that had washed the fire away on the night of the fire.

if soonyoung hadn’t shouted at him to run, jeonghan would’ve probably gotten burnt by entei’s fire blast.

“hyung, run!” jeonghan jumped over to the side, landing on the same side as he did when he fell from the first floor. he groaned in pain, wincing as he tried to get back on his feet. eevee ran towards him, yelping in worry.

as entei’s fire blast hit the ground in front of soonyoung, soonyoung yelped in surprise, and wobbuffet — dear, lovable wobbuffet who would never fight battles willingly — stood in front of soonyoung, arms opened wide as if trying to shield soonyoung from any oncoming attacks. crobat was now flying on the air, waiting for a command, and whilst jeonghan knew eevee was scared, but she was in her battle stance, growling at anything that tried to attack jeonghan. jeonghan reached for his poké ball and recalled porygon2 back, before calling out another pokémon.

this time, a quadrupedal, canine pokémon that was mainly black in color came out of the poké ball. he had a long orange snout and an orange underbelly, along with small, red eyes and a black nose. around his neck was a white band with a small skull—shaped pendant on his throat. there were two white bands on each of its ankles, as well as three rib—like ridges on its back. he had a long, skinny tail with a triangular tip and three clawed toes on each paw. on top of his head was a pair of long, curved gray horns. as soon as he got out of his ball, he growled — he was half a meter shorter than the legendary beasts, but he showed no sign of fear at all.

“houndoom, i need you to get soonyoung on your back!” houndoom barked in response and pranced over to soonyoung, lowering his back for soonyoung to climb on it. soonyoung held onto it’s neck, and, with ampharos’s and scizor’s help, managed to climb onto houndoom’s back safely. scizor was using his wings to slightly levitate into the air, whilst ampharos was on alert mode — the orbs on her body all lit up.

the beasts, however, did not wait to give them any peace. not long after entei’s fire blast, raikou let out a roar, a gray cloud of storm forming right above their heads.

“crobat, get away from the cloud!” jeonghan cried just in time as a lightning struck from the cloud, and had it not been for crobat’s speed, he would definitely have fainted there. the lightning struck the ground, breaking a boulder into pieces in the process.

“ampharos, use thunderbolt on suicune!” soonyoung commanded from houndoom’s back. ampharos cried out, bolts of lightning covering her before they rushed towards suicune. suicune, however, only jumped to avoid the thunderbolt. soonyoung choked back a sob. sure, with all their pokémon combined, they have twelve, but what’s the point of it when their opponents were legendary pokémon? even worse, three of them?

on the other side, jeonghan was having no luck trying to fight against raikou — jeonghan was commanding eevee to use swift against raikou, but eevee alone wouldn’t do any damage against raikou. crobat was also hovering on top of raikou, trying to poison the thunder pokémon with his sludge bomb attacks, but to no avail — for no matter how fast crobat was, his opponent was, again, a legendary pokémon.

during soonyoung’s moment of pondering and figuring out a strategy, he had let his guard down for too long. entei had noticed and, at that moment, decided to strike them with another fire blast. houndoom opened his mouth, releasing a red-orange stream of fire — which soonyoung recognized as flamethrower — to fight against entei’s fire blast, but entei’s fire blast overpowered it as if it was nothing, and soonyoung could only watch helplessly as the fire came closer to them, bracing for the fire to engulf him like it engulfed the tower hundreds of years ago. jeonghan had shouted at houndoom to dodge the fire blast, but soonyoung knew houndoom couldn’t dodge fast enough.

just then, a blur of red flashed right in front of his eyes. before soonyoung could shout anything, scizor had stopped in front of soonyoung and houndoom, letting himself take the hit instead of soonyoung. soonyoung screamed. scizor was four times weak to fire, for arceus’s sake! without much thinking, soonyoung hopped down off of houndoom, gritting his teeth as the pain on his ankle shot up. he endured the pain, crawling his way towards scizor, fear clouding his mind more than the pain. 

soonyoung heard houndoom bark in warning, trying to warn soonyoung for the upcoming attack. during the chaos, raikou had switched places with suicune. right now, jeonghan was dealing with the aurora pokémon, who proved to be distracting. jeonghan had cried for eevee to use shadow ball against it, but eevee’s shadow balls only ended up hitting the ground. thanks to crobat’s speed, he managed to land a sludge bomb to suicune — but the legendary pokémon recovered almost as quickly, as if crobat’s poison was nothing. jeonghan wanted to scream. it was unfair — how were they going to win?

from raikou’s storm cloud, another lightning bolt emerged, and houndoom wasn’t so lucky. it got zapped and fell to his side, his head thumped to the ground. soonyoung cried. scizor’s head was on his lap and houndoom was knocked out behind him, and raikou’s gaze was fixated on him. he felt a jolt of fear — he was going to die, he was going to die, and it was all because of his dream.

raikou opened his mouth, a yellow orb shaping in between its jaws — soonyoung recognized it as thunderbolt. soonyoung couldn’t run — he couldn’t even stand up. he tried to return scizor into his poké ball, but he couldn’t find his belt. it had fallen somewhere along the rubble of rock and pebbles, he realized. soonyoung gulped, bracing himself for the attack, when a bright blue light came in front of him. 

wobbuffet had absorbed the thunderbolt attack with his mirror coat, and returned the thunderbolt towards the creator with double the power, but raikou only jumped to the side effortlessly. wobbuffet was panting hard, desperately low in health after absorbing that thunderbolt attack. to soonyoung’s right, ampharos was single handedly facing entei, but one flamethrower from the volcano pokémon immediately knocked ampharos down. soonyoung screamed. scizor, houndoom, ampharos — he couldn’t let wobbuffet get knocked out too!

“crobat, go and help soonyoung!” crobat shrieked and flew towards soonyoung — jeonghan hadn’t realized that they were literally half a kilometre apart now. however, before crobat could reach soonyoung, raikou roared. a lightning bolt from his storm cloud blasted, and this time, crobat wasn’t fast enough to dodge. crobat dropped down to the ground, and jeonghan cried for crobat’s name.

we’re not gonna make it out of here alive, jeonghan thought, choking back a sob. wobbuffet was still shielding soonyoung, who still wasn’t able to stand up, no matter how hard he was trying, the pain in his ankle was hindering him. jeonghan’s hand flew to his belt — and only then did he realize it was gone, probably got detached when jeonghan had flown to avoid entei’s first fire blast. 

noticing that jeonghan’s guard was down, suicune took it as a good chance to attack — an aurora beam right towards jeonghan. jeonghan fell on his butt on the ground in shock, and instinctively squeezed his eyes shut. during the good couple of seconds, he tried to apologize to his parents and to everyone he had done wrong during his life. instead of the freezing cold ice, however, eevee’s cry snapped his eyes open.

however, eevee was nowhere to be seen — instead, a glowing blue light in the shape of eevee stood in front of him. jeonghan gaped, and at that moment, all the legendary beasts’ attention turned towards the blue light in front of him.

eevee’s fluffy body shrinked, and her fluffy feet lost its fluff, turning slender instead. it’s bushy tail slimmed down too, and when the light vanished, jeonghan couldn’t help but stare in amazement. instead of eevee’s brown fur, she was black with yellow rings around her ears and tail, and each on her feet. instead of brown eyes, her eyes were red — and jeonghan could see how she resembled the shining moonlight, for she had evolved into umbreon, the moonlight pokémon.

umbreon growled at suicune, opening her mouth to form a light purple orb surrounded in black and purple circles, before firing the beam of black and purple circles from the orb inside her mouth. suicune had elegantly dodged it, sadly, but, to jeonghan’s surprise, the aurora pokémon did not attack back, watching the two of them intently instead.

jeonghan stole a glance towards soonyoung — he was still hugging scizor’s head on his lap, wobbuffet in front of him, body shaking in fear but not backing down. raikou and entei, however, weren’t attacking soonyoung either. the three beasts looked at each other — as if they were communicating to each other — and then entei jumped towards the hollowed roof, before disappearing into the night. raikou followed suit, until it was only suicune left with them.

umbreon was still growling at suicune, and jeonghan took it as an opportunity to stand back up. when he did, however, suicune only ignored them and went to approach soonyoung, leaping gracefully once towards him. jeonghan, alarmed, ran towards soonyoung in fear.

suicune, however, unlike earlier, was gentle. as he walked closer towards soonyoung, soonyoung shivered — for some reason, wind was blowing towards him. wobbuffet was still shaking, but suicune did not attack wobbuffet. it gently nudged it’s snout on soonyoung’s palm, and soonyoung felt something on his palm — something soft, like a feather?

you. soonyoung jolted in surprise and turned towards suicune. was it speaking in telepathy with him? 

our master has been keeping an eye on you since you were young, suicune said. at the corner of soonyoung’s eyes, jeonghan stopped in his steps. so jeonghan could hear suicune too, soonyoung deduced.

he had tried to summon you here once, in your dreams. when you come, our master had told us to test you. and you and your friend have proven yourself worthy — for eevee would not have evolved into umbreon if not, and your pokémon would not have risked their lives to protect you if not. soonyoung gaped, and his grip on the item suicune had pushed into his hand tightened.

when you are ready, come face my master. he will be waiting at the other tower. suicune nodded once, before jumping towards the sky, disappearing into the night alongside its brothers, its tail leaving a trail of northern lights behind.

when suicune disappeared, soonyoung opened his hand. in it was a rainbow-colored feather — soonyoung recognized the color, for it was the color of the bird he had seen in his dream.

so it’s true. the bird pokémon he saw in his dream four years ago was the legendary rainbow pokémon, ho-oh.

due to the ruckus they caused, several people were forcibly awaken, and they had reported to morty. the two of them were rescued by morty and his gengar, and immediately rushed to ecruteak city’s pokémon center — along with eusine, who had woken up as soon as morty arrived.

eusine was groaning and whining, mad at himself for losing consciousness when suicune was so close to him. morty had berated him for jumping up and down on the vulnerable wooden floor and apologized to jeonghan and soonyoung, once they were settled down in their room at the pokémon center. morty had let them go lightly with a warning to never go back to the burned tower unsupervised again, though, he had a hard time believing that the legendary beasts had appeared inside the tower. jeonghan and soonyoung had decided it would be better if they told no one about what suicune had told them.

all their pokémon were, thankfully, alright. as soon as they reached the pokémon center, they were brought to nurse joy, who had recovered them from their injuries. in no time, crobat was perched on jeonghan’s head again, and umbreon was in his arms, purring in delight as jeonghan ran his hands through her body. jeonghan was on the right bed, whilst snuggled inside the covers of the left bed was soonyoung, whose right leg was covered in gyps. wobbuffet was snuggled to soonyoung’s left side, whilst scizor had his head on soonyoung’s lap, and ampharos’s head was on soonyoung’s right shoulder. the sight of them made jeonghan’s heart warm. so it wasn’t only jeonghan who was touched by their friendship — even ho-oh had approved of their friendship, that it decided soonyoung was worthy enough to face it.

“so,” jeonghan spoke up, “are you going to face ho-oh?”

“with crutches? no thanks. if ho-oh really decided on me, the least i could do is go there wearing a suit,” said soonyoung, scrunching his nose. jeonghan laughed at the younger boy.

“and not now, not when i still have a long way to go,” murmured soonyoung. “but when i’m ready, like suicune said, i’ll go there and face him. and hopefully catch him. wouldn’t it be cool if i have ho-oh in my team?” jeonghan made a face at soonyoung before throwing a pillow at him, telling him to keep on dreaming. however, scizor had caught the pillow in his pincers, causing the pillow to burst into a cloud of fluff in his sharp metal pincers.

“hey!” jeonghan cried, but scizor only buzzed in return. crobat defended his owner, screeching back at scizor. the room was covered in fluff, but soonyoung only laughed, and smiled at the sight.

the future ahead of him was scary, and he felt the burden of being ho-oh’s chosen one. but soonyoung knew he wasn’t alone. he has his pokémon by his side. he has his best friend jeonghan by his side. and when the time to face ho-oh comes, soonyoung knew he wasn’t going to be alone. soonyoung would have them by his side, battling alongside him.

soonyoung smiled and stroked on the rainbow feather. he thought about how lucky he was to have them by his side.

for there was magic that had brought them together, and that magic is called hope.

[ —proofread. ]