#wallace2k19

        Many faces he’s remembered fondly.         Aside from his dearest clawitzer and         empoleon, two powerhouses on two         different battle teams; the gourgeist         had barely seen a taste of extraneous         activity since a certain festival held         by himself a few Halloweens ago.         Similar to the aurorus, who was         desperately sought after by him         after seeing a friend of his training         an amaura. In the end, the ice type         was merely an aesthetic choice         during a winter ball. These two         spent much of their times aiding         around the chateau for all of the         elite’s pokémon back in Kalos.         Unique in their rare colors, it         would be a crime to not bring         out the potential hidden deep         within those two.         Here in brings the final two. The         two that called out to him in a twist         of destiny. An Alolan bruxish he’s         saved from the clutches of hatred         and abuse. She was raised with         the intention of someday placing         her in Mordreame, the MOST         FORMIDABLE battling team he         trains. Her natural power deserves         as much recognition.   Finally,         the newest pokémon he has         recruited, the now aegislash.         A stray honedge that snuck into         the palace-museum from Palais         Lane. As most wild pokémon were         usually forcibly removed off the         premises, Siebold had taken it         upon himself to take the pokémon         back home, though had little         knowledge of steel or ghost type         pokémon.         SIX POKÉMON. A full team of         those from completely different         background. If he was able to         impress with this lineup—         Suddenly, a pink glow emanates         as he approaches his crowd of         teammates. His thought interrupted,         worry painted their face, and         clawitzer had acted with his         healing move. Siebold returns         with a look of slight pity.            ( Hm? Hey, don’t you worry, I am fine! )         “Hm? Hé, ne vous inquiétez pas, je vais bien!!”         Despite the many close calls,         especially in the midst of the         slip-up that may just as well         have killed him if not for the         split second decision of the         clawitzer ( a Heal Pulse stronger         than the membrane of any         alomomola ), Siebold turned         out unscathed. To quell the         unrest, Siebold looks upon         them with a confident grin,         acting as if he always would.         Without his mask, it could be         seen his face was clean of         wounds, the weariness         seems to subside from the         pokémon as they had finally         been able to get a good look         at him after the performance.         A hand waves in the air, and         Siebold continues to walk         with a strut of utmost conviction.                 ( You all did a great job.  Now, let’s go. )       “Avez fait un excellent travail, vraiment. Bon, allons-y.”         He promises a feast fit for kings         during their remaining days in         Sootopolis. After expanding his         horizons to a few other locations          in Hoenn, they would set back         to Kalos. When they returned,         there would be someone he         needed to face in regards to         the events that transpired         here. In the end, the entire         purpose of his participating         was related to his mentoring         of performers back in said         region. Surely Aloutte had         watched the entire thing,         perhaps had even  a few         choice words of her own.         Though in the end, the departure         would be solemn. The reason         was obvious. Like a pang of         loneliness and worry carries         over from somewhere after the         first round. His partner had been         absent since. It would have been          a pleasant closing to spend time          with HER in Hoenn, he thinks.

“Thank you, Megan.” The woman adjusted her glasses before taking a deep breath. She stood in front of a large building, one that continued to spill water onto the street. “It was a quiet night in Lumiose City, but no one had expected for tonight to go down as the largest escape from jail in Kalosian History, one that would be executed from a Legendary Pokémon from Hoenn no less!”

“Lumiose City has always been a peaceful town, one that has the lowest crime in its area; however, this town also holds the largest jails in the Kalos Region. Various high criminals from Pokémon thieves to former Flare members reside here, spending time until they await their retrial here. It was also here that held one particular member: Ursula Derosier, a Pokémon Coordinator who attacked her fellow Coordinator. She had been sentenced to 1 year in jail, where she awaited until just last night.”

A montage of the damage of the jail was shown. Water was everywhere, from the floor to the walls. Large holes in the walls and ceilings laid rampant while jail bars laid in waste along with scraps of metal, bedding, and other various materials. “What you see before you today is but an aftermath of a large series of battles, resulting in the escape of one Ursula Derosier. The culprit? A reformed Team Aqua, led by a woman who claimed to be none other than the Legendary Pokémon, Kyogre.”

The scene changed back to the reporter. She was standing in front of a cell, whose bars seemed to have been cut. “Throughout the chaos, reports claim that the members of Team Aqua had cut through Ursula’s bars with ‘sharp water’. After breaking the bars; however, the leader of the group reportedly summoned a large waterfall to stop the officers. In total, 8 guards were injured, with one in critical condition. The members of Team Aqua are still at large, with a warrant out for the leader’s arrest as well.”

“At the same time, there are also sightings of a girl with the Legendary Pokémon, Rayquaza, battling groups of Team Aqua. No one is quite sure of the woman’s motives or relation to the incident, but reports claim that the woman is Higana Zinnia from the Hoenn Region. If you are aware of anything of what is going on have any information of either the culprit or vigilante, then please reach out to the Kalosian Police. This is Malva, Gogoat News.”

~

Flannery got up. “What!? Why didn’t Zinnia say that she was there!?” She started to storm away.

Both Eos and Demetri turned to Flannery. Demetri tilted his head. “Flannery. Where are you going?”

“To Winona, obviously! She has to hear about this!” She stopped to look directly at Demetri. “Are you not heated too after your--”

She paused. The three of them looked at Mr. Moore.

“...Ugh. Forget it. I’ll be back!” She headed to the door again. 

“Get some cookies for Eos on your way back?”

“Yeah! Yeah! I got her!” 

The door slammed. 

Demetri slid over the Eos. Eos looked back over towards where Flannery was before leaning on Demetri’s shoulder.

more than fifteen minutes have passed. the audience has no idea what’s going on. the surface of the water is still, and the bite of the night air is starting to nip at their faces. some say perhaps there’s been a mishap backstage. are they experiencing technical difficulties? is he telling off an unruly coordinator? there are a few snickers in the crowd as they imagine the drama that the papers will sing of next morning, but more of the audience is concerned. many of them, however, just want to hear the scores and go home. two days of fifteenth anniversary excitement is more than enough.

the lights go down. the crowd quiets. some think they’re going to be treated to another show. then, a gasp--the moon is gone, the stars are gone--it seems as though all of sootopolis is plunged into a blackness deeper than night. they seem to be in a space where light itself cannot penetrate; the audience cannot see, do not dare to move. 

and then--the music.

the opening four seconds of wallace’s theme--the one he composed himself--spirals out into the inky sky. the sound seems to come not from a speaker but from the darkness itself, all-immersive, all-encompassing. [0:05] then the song picks up, two triumphant notes announcing the change in speed--and there is STARMIE, not a creature, but an incarnation of the sun itself, shining with the yellow aura of a combined thunderbolt and dazzling gleam. LUVDISC hovers there as well with starmie’s psychic, it and all of its double team copies forming a ring of black silhouetted hearts around the pulsating star. bolts of lightning radiate upward and down into the water as starmie hovers there with psychic as well; from the golden halo of light surrounding them pour stars upon stars, little beads of light swarming out in a galactic swift. 

the illusion of the vanishing sky is now as clear as the light that replaced it. no other star can shine when the great wallace kasai makes his show.

[0:15] THERE HE STANDS, master of masters, atop the head of his milotic who had soared from the waves. the thunder claps behind them, illuminating their silhouettes as the serpent spirals into the air and he does a corresponding twirl on her head. [0:18] sheets of rain dance pour down, a heavenly waterfall illuminated by rainbows from a hidden VAPOREON’S signal beam as GYARADOS, the one who brought the torrent, spirals into a dance around milotic. he gives a roar; milotic gives her sonorous call; the water storms with ten whirlpools, ten doorways to the deep. wallace extends his hands, and his voice booms from the clip-on microphone--

      ❝Now RISE!❞

[0:23] there! spinning their way through the depths, illuminated by starmie’s light alone, ALL OF WALLACE’S REMAINING POKÉMON! WHISCASH, the fish that shakes the bedrock of the world. SWAMPERT, the wise ground-type who has lived for longer than any human alive. LUDICOLO, the dancer of many blooms and many weathers. VAPOREON, the embodiment of feline grace and feline power. GOREBYSS, one of his lesser-known--but still one of his oldest friends. TENTACRUEL, the hex master, the closest thing to a ghost that any living being could be. PRIMARINA, bold and shining, a shiny received over wonder trade whose talent is as rare as her color. LAPRAS, sweet and gentle as her breed can be, always looking to repay the kindness wallace showed her from the egg. and LURANTIS, the only non-water type, but a dear award-winner and a precious friend. 

the whirlpools were not whirlpools, but columns of spinning water that stretch to the sootopolis sea bed; the pokémon, positioned in precisely those locations, now rocket to the surface contained in bubbles of gorebyss’s aqua ring. this is his way of thanking them, letting them all rise so that their greatness can be honored and acknowledged. 

they hover in the air below starmie, filling the space behind them in their bubbles with color--starting from a darker blue on the edges to white in the middle--the official color gradient of the wallace cup. then, silhouetted against their colors, they sink back into the water. the rest of the ceremony may now proceed.

[0:32] milotic bends down her head. wallace steps onto the very water itself--the water has been hexed by tentacruel to behave like a walkway. he speaks before the cheering crowd, barely able to be heard above the din.

      ❝beloved guests, you have been extraordinarily patient; well, you shall WAIT NO MORE. of our six remaining contestants, all will walk home with a prize-and all prizes have most certainly been earned. now--LET THE PLACEMENTS BE REVEALED!❞

[0:41] the water begins to pulsate to the rhythm of a beating heart, intricate geometric patterns forming on its surface thanks to the control of whiscash’s water pulse. these patterns glow bright white like a lost message from an alien civilization, but they seem to stop at three circles drawn in the center of the stage. in the middle of the circles are the outlines of three peoples’ faces: sixth place on the left facing right, fifth place in the middle staring straight ahead, fourth place on the right facing left. three outcroppings of white rock emerge from the sea, all of them the creation of swampert’s earth power, with one each labeled 6, 5, 4--sixth, fifth and fourth place. all of them had people standing on them surrounded by protective aqua ring air bubbles--the honorable mentions!

[0:52] then the stars themselves begin to form words above the contestants’ heads. the entire universe before the crowd clear space and reshaping itself to spell out the names and point totals.

ANN PETERS 276 POINTS

MURASAKI 278 POINTS

ACEROLA 287 POINTS

the crowd cheers as wallace gestures to the three outcroppings; starmie’s light pulses to the beat of the music, glowing even brighter with the swelling energy of the crowd. [1:17] but it’s not long before the next display goes forward. in front of the honorable mentions, vaporeon and gorebyss leap out of the water like dolphins from opposite sides of the water, and primarina leaps over them from the center; each leaps much higher than the height of a man. they draw rainbows of ice across the scene: behind them trail iridescent ice beams that arc above and between where third and second place are supposed to appear. an ethereal voice harmonizes with the music--primarina’s sparkling aria forms moving half-dome backgrounds on the overhang. both contain details from two of the appeals: the left background has a samurott with a missing leg swiping his sword at an invisible opponent, whereas the right one features a thorny cage whose boundaries swell and eventually burst into a swirl of abstract colors.

[1:30] she’s not done there. the song lifts two giant, glowing lotus flower buds out of the water, each in front of the honorable mentions’ podiums, each one placed in the spaces between the podiums to form the base of a triangle. each were formed by a combination of ludicolo and lurantis’ synthesis and grass knot. the one on the left shines a solid, bioluminescent bright blue with the number 3. the one on the right sparkles with a similarly bioluminescent blue-and-white that light up in different patterns, alternating to the beat of the music--this one bears the number 2. standing atop these lotuses are lurantis on the left, ludicolo on the right; ludicolo poses his arms in ballet’s third position, whereas lurantis does the same thing but in mirror image. [1:37] the stars begin to form into the names of third and second place as the petals unfold, revealing the silhouettes of the contestants; lurantis and ludicolo each kick a leg outward to opposite sides. [1:46] as the petals lower, each grass-type springs off their single standing leg to do a front flip into the water. then, just as the petals unfold to their lowest and the stars finish forming their message, starmie’s dazzling gleam makes spotlights revealing the faces of third and second place.

DAISY SKETCHIT 293 POINTS

FABIEN LAFAYETTE 306 POINTS

some of the audience knows who is in first by now, but they don’t know the display that will follow.

[2:02] much of the light dims to nothing. starmie disappears from the sky, and some of its swift stars fall into the water, fading as they sink into the depths. the only thing left illuminated now by dazzling gleam is the podiums, the lotuses and the contestants; whereas they glowed in many colors before, they now glow a dim reddish-orange—the color of hellfire. a tentacruel’s glowing dome appears in front of and in the space between the third and second place lotuses, the ruby domes on its head flickering in anticipation of something bigger. the music bass rumbles, and so does the stadium; gyarados’ earthquake causes a shuddering throughout the ground while its flamethrowers lace out underwater. the blaze beneath the waves speaks of volcanic ire—the fire burns through paths of oxygen laid out by milotic’s aqua ring. the audience can see the shadows of milotic and gyarados swimming around seemingly inside the conflagration beneath, great dragons of water and fire coming together to create.

[end at 2:11, skip to 6:43] gyarados gives a roar, the sound of stone creaking in the cauldron of the earth. pillars of ground erupt from both sides of the scene: glistening columns of obsidian raised by earthquake and studded by starmie’s power gem containing swirls of water and fire. the glow of the podiums and contestants switch from hellish red to purest gold. sharpedo aqua jets down the middle of the existing podiums starting from the honorable mentions row, sending up a spray of waves right between the columns before he disappears into the water again. also starting from the honorable mentions row, the columns outline the triangle of podiums that wallace was attempting to make—[6:47] and there, in the middle where his tentacruel once was, rises the back of his lapras. she soars above the other contestants, positioned atop what looks like a miniature mountain base; she is the top of the hill that has been created. but lapras looks different. for one thing, her head and flippers have been tucked into her shell, like a turtle. for another, tentacruel’s hex has turned her back from grey to a shining white, and power gem has given the appearance that night-lit buildings stud her back as well as the white stone beneath her. but it’s not just any shade of white—wallace was very specific about how he wanted it to look. her back looks like volcanic rock; the number 1 on her seems to have been grown from the rock itself. 

she is sootopolis.

this is how he chooses to honor the greatness of the one in first: with the creation of the island on which they compete.

[6:52] a combined flamethrower and threads of water gun shoot from the middle of lapras’ back—the moves have been hexed to phase through her stomach and shell as well as the flesh of the invisible person standing on top of her, so that the effect can be achieved without any harm. then, as the column of flame dies down there appears the winner of first place, his very self illuminated by a sun-starmie now hovering above him, his name spelled out by all the remaining stars in the sky:

DIONYSUS 308 POINTS

[7:01] the audience erupts into seismic applause. the pillars shift thanks to swampert’s earth power. instead of showing abstract patterns, the water and fire within them swirl via starmie’s psychic into shapes of siebold’s pokémon: empoleon, bruxish, gourgeist, aegislash, aurorus. wallace pays tribute to not just trainer but also his companions.

[7:12] tentacruel sends out a row of thick black toxic to create a walkway. gyarados lights it via flamethrower underneath, taking advantage of the poison to make the illusion that the ocean itself is on fire. wallace is teleported into place by his starmie at the beginning of the passage, then steps into the hexed flames unharmed, walking on both water and fire thanks to psychic with something clutched in his hand. smiling, he steps onto lapras’ back and presents the AQUA RIBBON to the contest’s winner. he lifts siebold’s hand into the air, and the audience once again cheers.

[7:46] then the music changes. no longer does it play on an endless loop; it segues into an ending. the notes of this end at first sound like some of the notes of the beginning, but the audience can tell that it is the end.

      ❝to my talented performers, thank you for your will to illuminate the soul of magnificence. and to my dear audience, thank you for your patronage of the wallace cup. it is truly your efforts that make this event what it is,❞ he says.

      ❝Until next year, my friends. May the spirit of greatness go with you!❞

the music stops as soon as wallace says the last word. the whole scene goes dark for the final time, obscuring pokémon, contestants, wallace himself. unseen by the crowd, starmie teleports the humans onstage back into the sootopolis gym’s underwater room, then nullifies the poison in the water with psychic; the pokémon that were just performing swim their way back to the gym as well.

slowly, the moon and stars reappear as reality fades back in. they have been permitted to shine again, as though by arceus himself.