“Move! Move!”

  “Mama!”

  “We’re stuck!”

  “Waah! What is going on?!”

  The small cape leading out of the cavern was filled to bursting with Magmar families and their Magby children. The crowd's noise was overwhelming, and Larry saw multiple Magmar families try to climb the steep embankments of the body of water with little success.

  His mother strode past them confidently, squarely into the middle of the cape. She struck the ground with her tail, instantly quieting the panicked Pokemon crowd. She began to stir up the slightest bit of a sandstorm before announcing to the crowd, “The legendary Pokemon is waking up! I’ll fight it!”

  Cries of congratulation and happiness sounded out and the crowd took to her advice as quickly as they could, but she didn’t seem to care as she looked at Larry in her arms with a serious expression, “Larry, you leave too. I can’t protect you while fighting. You know how I get when I’m serious.”

  Larry's heart dropped as she let him down onto the ground into her growing sandstorm, “Mom! That's suicide!”

  She quickly checked behind herself to see the families of Magmar run in single file along the precarious walkway she had created, before looking back down at Larry, “Dig yourself to safety,” She advised as pointed at the cave with a layer of fake nonchalance, “I’ll deal with this. I’ll meet you on the other side of the lake when I’m done.”

  ‘That’s so stupid! What can I do?!’ Larry thought about every single approach he could take to get his mother to think logically and flee, he knew she wasn’t the fastest and also that she didn’t have any moves that could help her in this moment. The sandstorm around her spun faster and faster as Larry searched her eyes for a second, she still wore the same serious look of a concerned parent, but Larry knew there was more behind her eyes,

  ‘She’s committed…’

  He wanted to protest, cry his eyes out, stay here, and fight alongside her, but he knew it wouldn’t make sense. So Larry made his choice as well. He quickly forced a smile onto his face as he patted her leg. “Alright, Mom! You show it who’s boss. We’ll meet back at the other side of the lake.”

  “Good.” His mother turned back to the cavern. The stone she’d dropped into the hole could be seen through the cave entrance; red hot and beginning to bubble and hiss.

  Coursing Ground-TE through his body as he’d done many times before, Larry looked up to his mother one last time, “Mom?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I love you,” Larry spoke with an honest smile on his face.

  “I love you too,” His mother returned with a slight smile, closing her eyes in concentration and kicking up the storm another notch as Larry finally dug himself into the ground, leaving her alone to face Moltres.

  She closed her eyes.

  …

  She had grown up without a mother, as she had passed away shortly after her birth. It wasn’t ideal, as male Tyranitar are far more aggressive than their female counterparts, leading to a worse upbringing for any Pupitar forced to endure it.

  Her eyes opened.

  “Again!” Her Tyranitar father barked out.

  “Hargh!” She threw another rock, gasping for lungfuls of air as she launched the stone above her head. It impacted heavily on the gigantic boulder, but the stone stood resolutely. Simply remaining upright seemed to take all of her concentration as she wobbled unsteadily.

  “AGAIN!” She flinched at the voice and began to pull at the practically empty reserves of Type-Energy in her body. Another rock lifted out of the earth behind her, floating above her head, before it faltered and turned into gravel on top of her, showering her with a smattering of debris.

  “Aah!” Showered in her own rain of rocks and gravel, she simply tipped over and lay there as her eyes fought to stay open.

  The calm was broken far too quickly though.

  “Wake up!”

  WACK

  Spinning out of control, her hard-shelled body skidded across the cavern floor before knocking into a wall with a dull THUD.

  “A-Awake!” she called robotically as she lifted herself back up onto her tip to stand. She almost fell backward in exhaustion as she raised herself, only just managing to stand tall. Every breath hurt in her lungs, every place she could still feel hurt in some way, and if she had any more tears to cry she would’ve cried, but crying had been a bad choice last time, so she held strong.

  “AGAIN! YOU’RE NO WEAKLING!” Her father commanded.

  A far smaller stone raised itself out of the ground behind her and shakily floated out above her head, it solidified far more slowly before flying at the stone far slower than before, it harmlessly bounced off of the rock. She barely even registered the hit, as just keeping her eyes open felt like a losing fight.

  She curled into herself in anticipation and flinched when her father yelled,

  “WEAK! AGAIN!”

  Her eyes shut.

  …

  Her eyes opened.

  In front of her, wings of fire raised themselves out of the fountain of magma, her Rock Slide had been melted into a pool of magma by the Pokemon.

  Through the sandstorm and in the cave, she could see the cave walls liquify, also slowly melting into red-hot magma in its mere presence as the bird flapped into frame. Pristine orange feathers lined the bird's body under a layer of red flames. A thin and long beak and an almost gangly and featureless body landed on the edges of the hole it had roosted in.

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  She grinned slightly and exhaled through her nose, if anything, it reminded her of the Fearow she spotted from time to time on the tops of Mt. Silver. Its eyes fell on her and she felt a strange pressure exert itself over herself, like she was once again buried under a bed of soil like in her youth. She was used to pressure though, it wasn’t anything new to her.

  Behind her, the last of the Magmar made it onto the bridge she had made to get here, she knew now there was little chance of collateral damage. With that thought, the sandstorm intensified once more becoming too dense to see anything through, only she herself knew who was where in this mess of storm. The last thing she saw was the legendary launch itself off the ground and into the air. Every piece of gravel she could find, she pulled into the storm, she had to give it her all.

  It wasn’t just Mt. Silver on the line.

  Her child was in danger.

  The heat intensified and she knew the legendary Pokemon must be approaching. Like a morning sun crashing through the night, the Pokemon launched itself into her sandstorm, she felt it enter as the sand in its vicinity turned itself to glass in an instant, falling out of her control almost immediately. Its flames could be seen through the entire sandstorm they were so bright.

  ‘Got you.’

  In the same instant, she slammed her tail into the ground again and Type-Energy was released into the ground. In front of her, a long line of sharp stones emerged from the ground, snaking itself forward straight at the legendary. The bird clearly hadn’t expected retaliation, as the stone smashed into the underside of its head and pushed the beast's flight path back up and above her.

  The bird flew up and above the row of sharp rocks, yet it didn’t seem to need to, as its mere presence melted them dull and useless.

  ‘Got lucky.’ She thought with a huff at the exertion.

  It buzzed by above her, the heat stung her eyes as it passed. ‘Just go,’ She begged in her mind for it to simply leave through one of the many cave exits, but the legendary spun around for a second pass.

  Once it entered her sandstorm, its flames intensified once again. Through the storm, she spotted flames licking the insides of its beak, it was attacking.

  ‘Go big,’ She advised herself mentally. She opened her jaw and a small ball of Normal-TE materialized, Hyper Beam, the ball quickly doubled, tripled, and quadrupled in size. The bird released a spire of flame from its mouth, Flamethrower, as it charged at her form in the sandstorm, she released in turn.

  The beam of pure white met the cone of fire and the sheer amount of energy in the Pokemon’s flames forced her neck backward. Her beam slipped off of the flamethrower and to the side, smashing into a stone wall far away from the legend. The flames reached her just a second later and she yelled out in pain as her outer layer of armor was covered in flames from head to toe.

  “AAAH!” She screamed and thrashed in panic in the hopes of putting out the flames burning her body, to no avail.

  The bird kept its eyes locked on her, as it continued to shoot seemingly endless flames from its beak, instead of passing over and simply turning back, it landed in her sandstorm and kept the attack going.

  ‘Bad Choice, Slacker.’

  Every single piece of TE in her body moved to her head, a gigantic, bony, and grotesque jaw manifested over her normal one and she lunged at the bird. It tried to cancel its attack, hop backward and back into the air, but it had underestimated her. She crunched down just above its shoulder and the bird screeched out in pain.

  It responded almost immediately, but instead of shooting flames out of its beak, its entire body heated up drastically in an attempt to burn its opponent alive. She didn’t let go though, she forced a slight bit more TE into her jaw as the heat turned up and charged another attack at the same time.

  Her eyes burned, and her skin felt as if it was close to melting off of her body and her insides didn’t feel much better, but she kept charging. Behind the legendary Pokemon, she could see the body of water she’d made a bridge over boil and begin to steam.

  “YOU’RE NOT GETTING OUT OF HERE ALIVE!” She roared, with the legend's shoulder still stuck in her jaw. Stomping her foot she released an earthquake and in the same moment she pushed the bird into the ground as hard as she still could.

  The earth cracked in several parts around them, splitting the ground around them into several islands that raised themselves and jerked around erratically. More dust billowed into the air around them, bolstering her sandstorm. The boiling body of water was sucked into the cracks in the earth, creating multiple whirlpools in the body of water, and multiple new rivers were created in the process, flowing out of the underground lake.

  The bird, unacclimated to fighting on the ground, lost its footing. A giant spike made of stone shot out of the ground underneath the legendary Pokemon, slicing it across the chest and just missing her own head by hair as it passed by its other free shoulder.

  SKREE

  The beast cried out again in pain, far louder this time. Her eyes were unsteady and her breath feeble, her teeth finally unlatched from the Pokemon and the two of them dropped to the ground heavily.

  ‘Wake up!’ Her dreadful father's voice echoed in her mind, her rocky armor was red-hot and burned her flesh underneath every breath of burning hot air hurting her lungs.

  Yet, she set her arms underneath herself and pushed.

  CRACK

  Her armor cracked and splintered at points all over as she raised herself. Smoke billowed out of the cracks in her armor, and she heard her flesh sizzle underneath her armor while raising herself.

  “Y-Y…” She stuttered out, trying to utter another challenge at the legendary Pokemon.

  The bird had also raised itself as well, but it hadn’t fled. It stood again on its legs while flapping its wings, feathers of TE materialized around it as its wounds stitched themselves back together right in front of her eyes, Roost.

  ‘It heals…’ She thought to herself, dumbfounded, ‘Of course…’

  In that instant, Larry’s words came back to mind.

  ‘That Pokemon is legendary! It has history and stories which have spread over it far and wide. We don’t even know how old it is!’

  She realized this fight wasn’t going to go her way. She just hoped Larry had made it out safely yet. She didn’t care about the outcome of this fight if he was safe and sound.

  The legendary stopped healing and opened its beak, threateningly charging a green ball of TE in its mouth.

  Her skin sizzled underneath the cracks in her armor as she swayed side to side, dazed. She was dead tired.

  ‘YOU’RE NO WEAKLING!’ If she still had the energy for it, she would have flinched at her father's critical voice in her mind.

  ‘Mom? I love you.’ Her son's last words to her kicked her back to reality.

  ‘Let’s end this.’

  In a single second, the sandstorm stopped. Particles of stones, debris, and sand instantly dropped to the ground. She was going to use everything for this one attack. Normal-TE materialized around her, every ounce of TE she could squeeze out of her body, she used. Just like her father had taught her.

  The legendary bird released the Grass-Type attack and the beam of solar energy shot towards her. So she released as well and charged forward, meeting the beam head-on using a Giga Impact. It impacted on her head, right at the tip of her charge. The attack washed over her, almost forcing her out of the attack, but she persevered and continued the charge.

  She charged with reckless abandonment and could feel the attack go right through the cracks in her armor and onto her skin, injuring her body even more. Impacting the legendary, she swung her head downwards, pulling the bird along her charge. It screeched in defiance while continuing its attack, but couldn’t escape her grasp as she charged, straight into one of the cavern walls.

  Its attack stopped on impact, the creature let out a pained squeak as it was crushed under her weight against the wall, the impact caved in the wall atop the two of them. Finding all of the strength leaving her body, she slipped and dropped onto the ground. As rocks fell onto the two of them, the bird found the strength to escape her grasp, managing to flee just before another mass of rocks dropped and leaving a single Tyranitar alone to face her fate.

  She had lied, she knew it would end this way. An avalanche sounded out above the rubble. Underneath the bed of rock, her eyes fluttered closed.

  A promise was going to be broken.