Child of Thorns - A Pokemon Sinnoh Reimagining

They were the first group to enter, not due to luck but because Niss plunged into the darkness of the tower's maw the moment Fantina asked who wanted to start things off. Barry followed behind their two new friends, a jolt of excitement running through him. This would be his chance to prove himself.

They took the stairs leading down the underground path, according to what Fantina told them. With each step he felt the light from outside vanishing and by the time they made it to the base the only thing illuminating their path were a row of iron torches hanging from the stone walls of the first subterranean floor.

The room couldn't have been bigger than the Pokemon Center lobby; entirely empty except for the aforementioned sources of light and a few round, white rocks scattered across the feet of the walls. He narrowed his eyes; there was something familiar about-

Oh dear God those are bones.

"Cheery," whispered Niss.

"The path lies that way." Percy took a few steps forward and pointed at the south wall, where a small opening led to a narrow corridor.

They headed for the opening, the sound of their feet echoing, and Barry knew something was wrong the moment he was a couple feet away from that hole in the wall. Again, for only a moment the warmth came back and he felt like he could truly see. The darkness covering that passage was too thick for the lanterns not to breach it. He also felt a strange sense of claustrophobia which accentuated the closer he walked to Niss.

The warmth disappeared again, but this time he was able to remember how it felt.

"There's something in there," he said before realizing it. "I mean… I think there might be something."

Percy and Reiko turned towards him, the first one being a lot more subtle about the fact that he found that statement odd. But Niss didn't even flinch at his words, instead her eyes studied the corridor from up close. She took one of her Pokeballs and released Enma, whose tail lit up the moment he materialized. This light, however, didn't seem to penetrate those shadows either.

"Huh..." she whispered to herself. "Enma, use ember on the corridor, make sure you get all of it."

Enma inhaled deeply, arms raised to the side, and breathed a striking torrent of flames towards the darkness in front of him. A gust of burning air hit all of them and forced them a few step backs, the exception being Reiko who stood still staring directly at the attack, her long fiery waving behind her like a flag.

It took him a few seconds to run out of breath, and by then the attack had managed to scorch the walls, floor and ceiling of the corridor. A pale steam came out of them, and part of it seemed to start taking form. He narrowed his eyes, were those…?

"Two Gastly," Percy's voice made him jump. He set a foot inside and approached the two unconscious ghost Pokemon who now floated aimlessly close to the walls. "I'm guessing they were supposed to lay an ambush for us."

"Nice one, blondie." Reiko gave him a thumbs up..

"We'll need more light than that Pokemon's flame…" Percy whispered, looking at Enma, "if we want to have a good idea of what's around us. Prince, come out."

He took an Ultra Ball out of his pocket and opened it, releasing a flash of light that materialized into a tall, chubby yellow Pokemon with thin arms and legs and a long tail which ended in a glowing red sphere. The creature looked at them and formed a goofy smile.

"Ampharos here will light the way," Percy said. "Let's go."

Niss followed along with Enma, elbowing Barry gently as she passed and giving him a quick smile. He was the last to enter not because of chivalry or anything of the like but because he was still confused about what had just happened. How'd he know those two Pokemon were in there? And what the heck was that feeling behind his eyes that'd been appearing so often lately?

"Does anyone else feel like it's getting colder?" Reiko asked after what seemed like an entire minute of walking through that passage.

"Yeah, it's called we're getting away from the sun and going underground," Niss replied, her voice not lacking in sarcasm. "It's a fascinating natural phenomenon, you should look it up sometime."

"You know what I mean, jackass." Reiko tried to hide a laugh and tilted her head towards him. "How do you stand her, string bean?"

"It's… Barry, actually," he stammered, trying his best to avoid looking at her. "And don't let Niss fool you, she's super sweet once you get to know her."

"How dare you spit such disgusting slander in front of me," his friend replied. "I'm honestly offended."

The conversation came to a halt when Percy stopped, extending one his arms to the side so he could get everyone's attention.

"If you're done playing out your favorite cheap sitcom…" he said, "we're here, and you might want to take a look at this."

The room they entered was easily twice as wide and cold as the previous one. The walls seemed to be made of darker rock and this time there weren't any bones around, thank goodness. The walls at his right and left had two person sized holes which led down towards something he couldn't see even with Ampharos lighting the way, and the remaining wall at the other side of the room had another three, even bigger entrances which also led to darkness.

In the middle of the room stood a wooden pedestal with a metal plate bolted on top of it. Some words were written on it, although he couldn't make them out from that distance.

"Anyone else thinks this looks like it's overdoing it a little bit?" Barry mentioned as he walked inside the room, cold clinging to his body. "Like okay, there's no way all this stuff was here before, even as a memorial. The bones, the carvings, the pedestals, the tunnels, they probably added all that later to make the trial creepier, right?"

"Well I'd like to think our ancestors didn't have such a tacky sense of decoration." Inyssa nodded. "So I'd say that yeah, this was all Fantina's work."

Percy took a tentative step forward, eyes set on the wooden pillar. The moment he was close enough a powerful gust of wind erupted from the four openings at their sides, almost knocking them off their feet and obscuring the light coming out of the Ampharos' tail.

"Fuck, what's g…!" Reiko started talking but the wind turned her ponytail around and it hit her in the mouth. "Blegh!"

"Prince, use Flash!" Percy screamed, his voice barely audible over the sound of the wind.

The Ampharos stomped the ground with his tiny feet, a furrowed brow appearing on his adorable face. He let out a high pitched scream and his tail lit up like never before, bathing the entire room in such a strong light that Barry could even feel the intensity of it through his closed eyelids. The dark wind evaporated almost immediately, revealing four floating figures close to the ceiling. Three of them were familiar; the same orbs of darkness that had attacked them earlier; but next to the Gastly was a Pokemon he'd only seen once in a book. Small, dark green and with flowing, gaseous hair and wearing a strange red necklace. The Misdreavus stared at them with glowing, piercing eyes.

"There they are!" Inyssa pointed at them. "Enma use…!"

"Stay put," Reiko interrupted her. She walked forward, Pokeball in hand and a wicked smile on her face, and released one of her Pokemon. "These are mine. Stain, Night Slash!"

A flash of green flied by them with a speed that made him dizzy and turned the creature's form into a blur. The only thing he saw was the gleam of a sharp blade before it crashed against one of the Gastlys, knocking it out instantly. It landed on its knee, one of its scythes extended to its left and the other one buried in the ground. Its four wings moved furiously, and as it stood up Barry saw the burning, bloodshot red of its eyes set on the three remaining ghosts. Fear and excitement ran through is body as he recognized his favorite Pokemon right in front of him, and he couldn't help but form a huge smile.

"Scyther!" he curled his hands into fists and leaned forward, voice high pitched. "Oh my gosh that's so cool! Where did you get one!?"

Reiko formed a smile full of pride. "He's just a childhood friend, nothing special. Now, Stain! Use..."

"Wait!" Percy put a hand on her shoulder. "Tell him to back up. We should all attack at once to…"

"Don't insult us! I can take care of this myself," Reiko complained, her voice more a growl than anything else. "Stain! Get rid of them!"

The Scyther jumped with his strong legs towards the ghosts, reaching them before Barry even had time to blink. He extended one of his scythes back, brimming with dark energy, and with a forward slash he sent the remaining Gastly flying towards the wall where their bodies disappeared. His wings changed direction and he veered in mid air, preparing a second attack. The Misdreavus' collar started glowing.

He didn't know what he expected; perhaps to see the poor, small ghost Pokemon cut in half or be hit so strongly that its form would entirely dissipate. What he didn't expect was that the moment Scyther touched it his entire body went limp, and the bug Pokemon fell to the ground with a loud thump.

A few heartbeats of silence passed, and he didn't move again. He was completely unconscious.

"W-wha…" Reiko stammered next to him, the cocky attitude she'd displayed a second before gone. "What... the hell?"

Inyssa pressed a hand against her mouth in an attempt not to laugh. Enma on the other hand, had no problem chuckling loudly at what had just happened. Reiko's face turned almost as red as her hair and she was surely about to say some less than flattering things to both of them before Percy interrupted her.

"That Misdreavus must've had Destiny Bond, and it took Stain down with her," he explained, scowling at her. "We should have analyzed our opponents before attacking blindly."

Reiko lowered her head and bit her lip, and Inyssa had to remind herself that making fun of her wouldn't help when they were all trying to work together. She still laughed internally because honestly, seeing that blood-thirsty beast fall to something as small as a Misdreavus was one of the funniest things she'd seen all month.

"It's okay, we still have eleven usable Pokemon between all of us," Barry said, working in that charming smile of his that was surely meant to raise the mood around him. "We can still do this."

"Y-yeah…" Reiko whispered and returned the Scyther to his Pokeball. "That was a fluke, nothing else."

"Let's hope it doesn't repeat, then," Percy said as he turned around towards the pedestal. "Now, let's see what's written in here."

They all approached it, and thanks to the light being emitted by the Ampharos' tail they could read the message clear as day. It was written in what seemed to be oily, purple ink and the calligraphy was perfect and beautiful. It read:

Three paths lie before you:

The Path of the Unwary; he who is blind to all except those in need.

The Path of the Victorious; she who weaves rage with vine-shaped flames.

The Path of the Guardian, he who patiently waits, forlorn.

Only one of these holds a light at the end of the tunnel.

Four other paths lie at your side.

One of them contains a clue, the rest hold nothing but more shadows.

Choose wisely.

Inyssa rolled her eyes. Dear god did Fantina have a dramatic streak, even worse than hers or Johanna's.

"So there's one correct path and the rest are probably dead ends," she summarized to the rest of the group.

"And one of the tunnels at our left and right must hold a clue over which path we should choose," Percy nodded, his eyebrows knit together.

"So we can either choose one of the paths at random and hope we get the right one or we explore those openings and try to find the answer." Barry said.

"Either way we'll be here for a while, huh." Reiko scratched the back of her head.

Silence settled into the walls like dust as they all stood there, thinking over their options. Inyssa didn't like the idea of leaving the choice of the main path to luck; this was a trial for them to prove themselves after all, but she knew those side corridors must've be packed to the brim with even more ghost Pokemon ready to weaken their team. It wasn't an easy choice.

Which is why she was startled when Percy started laughing. It was just a couple chuckles, but it sounded almost musical coming from his soft voice. Still, it caught Inyssa off-guard, and for a moment she felt that same dissonance as when she'd spoken with Metchi for the first time and realized there was some gender fuckery going on with her. Was Percy also...? Well, she supposed this wasn't exactly the right time to ask; maybe later, once they'd emerged victorious from the trial.

"We don't need to do any of that," he declared, moving another Ultraball between his fingers. "I'll find the way myself. Pierre, come out!"

From the explosion of light emerged a… thing, that she had trouble identifying. It looked similar to a Butterfree, but its wings were bigger and more colorful, showing an uniform blue and white square pattern, and its body and eyes were smaller and thinner.

"That's so pretty…" Barry whispered, a small gasp escaping his lips. "What is it?"

"A Vivillion. There's lots of them in my home region."

"You're from… Kalos, then," she deduced, and then turned her head towards Reiko. "And you… judging from your name and that Scyther you must be from… Kanto."

She tried to suppress any sort of anger at pronouncing the name of that region, but some of it must have slipped through judging by the sour look Reiko gave her.

"Any problem with that?" She perked up her nose, arms crossed.

"No, of course not," Inyssa lied. "Anyway Percy, you were saying?"

There was a small, awkward pause before he cleared his throat and continued speaking.

"Yes, right. There's no need for us to look for any clue." He turned toward his Pokemon. "Pierre, use Supersonic on all three of the main paths. Tells us which one leads to the deepest part of this dungeon."

Oh, thought Inyssa, so that's what he… damn, that's pretty fucking smart. The bug Pokemon flied towards each one of the openings and released a strange sound wave into every one of them. She deliberated for a few seconds before flying to the one on the right.

"That was really cool." Barry said.

"Thank you," Percy replied dryly. "This will probably save us around twenty minutes, so let's make use of the time we have."

So down they went, for the third time. The path was even narrower and darker than the ones before, but although that would've been a perfect chance for an ambush none came. They simply traveled through what seemed to be about half a mile of a path in complete silence.

Inyssa would've been quite disappointed if that was the end of the trial and they just won without any further challenge. Unfortunately that wasn't the case, and what waited for them in the next room took the air from her lungs.

"What the…" Barry gasped in front of her the moment he came out of the corridor.

"What? What is it?" She managed to pass to the side of his skinny friend and entered the room. "O…oh. Holy shit."

She could barely see the other extreme of… whatever place they'd just walked into. She figured the room must've had the size of a football stadium, and that was hardly the strangest thing about it.

Rows and rows of what appeared to be metal stakes with engravings on them were scattered all over, covering the majority of the length of that cavern. And in the center…

She felt her throat drying up. That had to be the absolute biggest Pokemon she'd seen in her life. Even when kneeling down its body towered over everything around it, making the stakes look like toothpicks in comparison. It looked like a golem, the actual earthly puppet from the myths she read as a child. Its torso was oval shaped and formed most of his body, made of grayish blue rock and with an undulating scar in the middle of it covered by a patch of leather. Its head was quite small in comparison, with pale yellow eyes that also resembled cracks.

Its muscular arms formed a cross in front of it, and while she couldn't quite see its legs while it was in that position she imagined they would be equally gigantic. Inyssa could feel her lower lip trembling, and she unconsciously took a couple steps back.

"Ha, that's one tall bastard, ain't he?" Reiko scoffed, her voice breaking slightly. "What the hell even is it?"

Whatever it was Inyssa was sure glad it wasn't moving, nor conscious for that matter. The light in its eyes was dull, almost nonexistent. Percy took a step forward and grabbed his Pokédex, which had a different design from hers. A small beeping sound filled the room followed by the electronic voice of the device.

Golurk: The Automaton Pokemon - Ghost/Ground type. It is said they were created by an ancient civilization to protect the people and the land, and they have outlived it by hundreds of years. The energy which fuels them is something scientists haven't been able to identify. If the patch covering its chest falls off this energy will run wild, and Golurk will destroy everything in its path.

"Thank Mew the patch is still there," Reiko whispered. "So, are we supposed to-"

The ground shook. The sound of the Pokédex seemed to have reached the Golurk, since the light of its eyes flickered to life and the dust covering its body started falling around it as the behemoth stood up. It stomped one foot on the ground, and Inyssa could feel the vibration hitting her and traveling to her bones. Its head almost touched the barely visible ceiling now, and the crystals in its shoulders began to glow with power.

"W-we need to get all of our Pokemon out now!" Percy yelled, taking a step back. "This must be the final boss, which means that if we beat it…"

He didn't have time to finish his sentence because something erupted behind them. Enma's body flew up towards the ceiling, the Monferno using the explosions of fire in his hands to propel himself towards the giant in the middle of the room.

"Shit, Enma!" She shoved Percy out of the way. "Come back here! You can't fight that thing alone!"

But her words and eventual profanities did nothing to convince her Pokemon of changing his strategy. When he was less than twenty feet from the Golurk he coated himself in flames once more and turned his body into a ball, headed directly to his opponent's face

The Golurk moved its head slightly, as if it'd just been woken up from a nap and barely registered the rolling inferno about to crash into it. It raised its fist and held it at eye level with the Monferno. A white glow covered its entire body.

"Heavy Slam," Percy's Pokédex came to life once again, startling them, "a steel type attack that becomes more powerful the more the user weighs in comparison to the target."

Her veins turned to ice. She'd felt the vibrations that thing caused just by stomping the ground. If its fist hit Enma…

She opened her mouth to scream a warning that would've been useless, but she never got the chance to. The Golurk's fist clashed against her Pokemon with such force that his flames were extinguished before they even made contact, and Enma went flying backwards like a bullet, landing only a few steps from Inyssa.

He wasn't moving.

"O-oh my god…" Barry whispered behind her. "One… one hit?"

"That Monferno should've resisted that attack," Percy's voice shook with fear. "So if any of our Pokemon gets hit by that thing…"

Inyssa barely listened to him, eyes glued to Enma. Her best Pokemon, defeated in less than an instant.

In the furthest part of her mind, she swore she could hear Fantina's laughter echoing teasingly.