That's the Spirit! - Chapter 22

[Fenton Works]

Runerigus’s head popped out of his body like a periscope, taking in the area with one sweep. Four--no, five humans. One of them was the girl that tricked him. All dressed… bizarrely. Jumpsuits?

Pointing weapons at him.

He unfolded, his stone arms slamming into the ground and cracking the tile. His tail pushed off the floor, flipping him over until he was upright and facing the humans who dared to draw weapons upon him.

The dark-skinned boy was trembling, but his aim was steady. “M-Mr. Fenton, that eye is nothing but r-red.”

“FIRE!”

Beams of energy similar to the Outsiders slammed into him. Some of it singed, some of it splatted, some of it was like getting punched. All of it made Runerigus furious. He slammed the ground again, throwing himself forward with the intention to bludgeon someone with his body.

The large man dropped his weapon and got between him and the others, and actually managed to stop him in his tracks.

“You won’t hurt these kids on my watch, ghost!”

Runerigus cackled, and wrapped his shadows around him. Strong though the human might be, he couldn’t crack stone. Runerigus, on the other hand, didn’t have that problem. He wasn’t going to kill anyone… just bruise some ribs.

The orange man’s eye bulged from the pressure of the squeeze.

“JACK!”

The woman jumped into action, kicking the Pokémon in his single eye. This, unexpectedly, hurt, and Runerigus reeled back in pain, incidentally letting go of the man as he did. He growled.

A placid woman’s voice said, “You will pay for that. Fear me.”

Distracted, the ghostly slab glanced at the device responsible, sitting on the woman’s hip, which allowed him to be blindsided by the two teenagers with guns. Laser beams struck him in the stone, making him twitch, and he shot them a Mean Look. Then, deciding that these humans needed more than that, his head snaked forward and gave them a Scary Face.

He grinned to himself as they locked up, the slowing effect of the move making the boy stagger backwards until he bumped into the table.

“Try this on for size!” the man shouted, and then grabbed him by the neck.

His neck, which was made of shadow and not physical unless he actively willed it to be. Somehow, this human was grabbing it. Runerigus let out an undignified yelp as he was yanked back. He turned in time to see the woman hoisting a silver bat on her shoulder, and then all he saw was stars.

Runerigus briefly reconsidered his stance of not using attack moves on humans as his head rang from the impact. On reflex, he pulled himself together, a complete slab once again, and opened up a Protect as the two adults began to assault him. The man had slipped on a pair of metal gloves which he was using to punch; based on the energy coming from them, they were probably what let him grab the Pokémon.

As he waited out the Protect, Runerigus took a moment to gather his thoughts. This was highly unusual, actually. Why were these humans doing the fighting? Where were their Pokémon?

…Was this one of those Teams he’d heard about?

And where was the trickster?

As if in answer to both his questions, the redhead girl suddenly appeared, diving out from behind a computer console. The dark-skinned boy had knocked something over when he stumbled into the table, and it had rolled towards the edge. She dove for it as it fell, rolling to her feet and pointing the device at Runerigus.

“I’ve got it!” she declared.

Runerigus observed, curious and slightly dreading, as a white light built up inside the device after she removed the cap.

The man shouted in delight. “Get’im, Jazzy-pants! That’s my girl!”

The device sparked, jumping in her hand. Something inside it went pop, and the light inside it died. The girl’s face fell. “Oh…”

A small, red, and hauntingly familiar body fell out instead.

Runerigus pointed angrily. “You!”

“Me?” Rotom answered, nervously.

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Maddie frowned, backing off as the two ghosts yelled at each other. They were making incomprehensible noises at each other, but… they clearly weren’t getting along. Which rather made it less likely that they were in league with each other… She briefly entertained the idea that this was a ruse to get them to lower their guard, but she didn’t see the point when they were already struggling against the Stone Slab.

She pulled the Ghostly Gabber off her belt.

“You. Me. Fear me. Do you have any idea how humiliated you made me? Fear me. You shouldn’t have been so easy to trick. Fear me. We have been fighting those outsiders for weeks. I assumed another {untranslatable} was trustworthy. Fear me. Why is that device repeating what we say? Fear me.”

Jazz frowned, slowly lowering the Thermos to her side in confusion. “Uh, Mom? Are you sure that thing is… finished? Somehow I don’t think they’re actually saying ‘fear me’ all those times.”

Maddie slapped her palm against the Gabber.

“You do not know what I have been through. Fear me. {Untranslatable} that thing is so annoying. Fear me.”

“She might have a point, Jack,” Maddie said.

Jack took the Gabber from her and pried its screen off, poking a screwdriver into its circuitry.

“Fear me. Zzt. Fear me. Zzt. Fear me. Zzt.”

The gremlin ghost groaned loudly and zipped forward, entering the Gabber and making sparks fly out of it. Jack dropped it in surprise.

“Agh, Maddie! It’s a trick to make us drop our guard! Fire!”

“Zzt! Fe-Fe-Fearrrrrrrrr me you idiots I’m not attacking you!” the Gabber said, its voice rising in pitch and becoming scratchier.

“That’s what someone who’s tricking us would say! BONZAI!”

Jack pulled a bazooka out of his pocket and fired.

“Jack, we need the Gabber!” Maddie yelled.

The Stone Slab raised its arms and clapped, trying to catch the gremlin between them. It failed, flitting around it.

Tucker screamed when it got too close and fired rapidly, the possessed Gabber avoiding every blast.

“Stop shooting me! You guys are the worst trainers ever!” Jack fired again. It clipped the Gabber, sending the gremlin spinning. “OW! Jerks!”

“Guys! Stop it!” Sam yelled over the noise. “We need it to tell us where Danny is!”

“Who the {censored} is Danny? What? Aww, a swear filter? That’s no fun, let me see if I can remove that--”

“Oh no you don’t, there are children here!” Maddie protested, raising the Anti-Creep Stick threateningly.

“Ki--Mrs. Fenton, we’re teenagers,” Sam said incredulously.

“Even so.”

“Everyone shut up!” Jazz shouted.

The Stone Slab hissed. Its tail lashed out, and Maddie raised her weapon. It only ended up hitting the gremlin as it passed too close--not even, actually, the shadowy material that made up most of the limb passed straight through the Gabber. Curiously, though, both the gremlin and the Slab glowed briefly, and then the Gabber fell out of the air while the Slab began to hover a few inches off the ground.

There would be time to ponder that later, though. Jazz demanded attention.

“I think we all need to calm down and actually talk to each other. This guy,” Jazz said, pointing at the Slab, “didn’t attack until Dad shot him first, and the gremlin clearly isn’t the advanced scout you thought it was--”

“You thought I was a what, roto?” the Gabber asked, incredulous.

“You know what? Jazz is entirely correct,” Maddie said, lowering her weapon.

Jack blinked. “She is?”

“I am?” Jazz was no less surprised.

Maddie nodded. “She is. Jack, we got a little overexcited and, well, jumped the gun, so to speak. We forgot what’s really important.”

Jack frowned in thought, before realization dawned. He gently smacked his forehead. “Of course, how silly of me.”

Jazz glanced over at Sam, who was watching the scene with a coiled tension and waiting for things to go wrong. She turned her attention back to her parents.

Between one blink and the next, Maddie had approached the ghost and slammed the Anti-Creep Stick into its face, knocking it to the ground. In the next instant, a very large gun was pressed right up against the ghost’s eye.

“Where is our Danny, you overgrown tombstone?!” Maddie demanded.

Jazz groaned.

The Slab, after a moment of stunned silence, grumbled something.

The Gabber chirped. “Zzt, he says he doesn’t know who that is.”

“We’ll get to you later!” Jack shouted, shooting at the Gabber. It missed, but it surprised the ghost inside enough to leap out of the device. It hopped on its little knob, still seemingly unable to float.

While this was going on, Tucker’s body slowly untensed as the stress of the brief fight caught up to him. He backed up, trying to become unnoticeable to everyone in the room, and ended up next to the containment unit housing the motorcycle.

He leaned against the bike--

The lights flickered. The air chilled. The door to the basement slammed open so hard it flew off its hinges, clattering down the stairs to the floor below.

“Don’t. Touch. My. Bike.”

“More ghosts?!” The Fentons exclaimed, whirling to meet the threat.

Two ecto-blasts shot out from the shadows, knocking the gun from Maddie’s hand. Jack’s gloves weren’t so easy to knock off, but it still forced him to back off from the Slab. The biker ghost floated down over the stairs, looking angry. Tucker threw himself away from the motorcycle, desperate to get out of the ghost’s crosshairs.

“I knew you were trying to get the jump on us! You were just softening us up for your buddies!” Jack accused.

The Slab growled, indignant. The Gabber squawked, before a rough and gravelly voice filtered through. “Buddies? That punk? Mate, you gotta be kidding me.”

Sam almost dropped her weapon. “Wha--Why are you British?”

“What’s British? I’m {untranslateble}.”

“Don’t ignore me!” The biker ghost raised his hand. 

The motorcycle sprung to life. Jack and Maddie tensed; they hadn’t considered that the ghost might be able to control it remotely. If it could pass through the barrier without him, their trap would be useless.

Thankfully, that wasn’t to be. With everyone’s attention elsewhere, the gremlin had attempted to make its escape, hopping towards what looked like the nearest means of egress.

The biker’s nasty smile faded as instead of moving to his whims, his motorcycle grew a face on its headlight matching the gremlin’s exactly.

“Rototo!” The possessed bike’s engine roared as it reared up on its back wheel. The second the front hit ground, it hit the gas.

And slammed directly into the barrier, crashing immediately. The impact knocked the gremlin out of the bike, bouncing against the Fenton Ghost Shield and groaning.

Silence reigned. The biker stared, a look of abject horror on his face as he stared at the ruined vehicle.

“...no.”

“Johnny? What was that noise?” The other ghost poked her head down the stairs. She gasped as what she saw. “Oh my gosh. Johnny--”

“NO!”

Everyone was knocked off their feet by the force of his scream. A windstorm kicked up inside the basement, his trenchcoat flapping every which way as parts and tools and weapons went flying.

“Johnny, it’s okay!” the other ghost shouted. “You can fix it!”

Johnny ignored her. His gaze fell on Tucker. “You. This is your fault.”

“It so is not, I swear!” Tucker said, holding his hands up in surrender as he scrambled backward.

“Leave him alone!” Sam fired her ecto ray. She hit him dead-on in the head, but Johnny just turned his hateful stare on her instead.

Jack and Maddie charged. Jazz went to help Tucker up and away. Sam fired from a distance. But just getting close to the ghost was difficult with all the debris flying around.

The Stone Slab quietly floated back into a standing position behind them.

Johnny raised one hand towards them. Maddie ducked as some unfinished gadget or other flew through the space her head had just been. “Jack, something is wrong here!”

“I’ll say!” her husband agreed. “Our trap didn’t work!”

“No, not that! I mean--” She tripped over something. Maddie gasped as her moment of weakness was taken advantage of, the hostile ghost pointing a glowing finger at her.

Jack tried to get to her to save her, but a storage crate suddenly blew across to hit him in the stomach, knocking him breathless. Sam was too busy trying not to get hit herself, and Jazz and Tucker weren’t in position to get to her in time.

Maddie closed her eyes, bracing for the hit.

Johnny fired.

Maddie wasn’t hit. She opened her eyes and was astonished to see the Stone Slab between her and the ghost biker.

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Runerigus felt entirely out of his depth. Being attacked by humans, no Pokémon to be seen other than him and the Rotom. Getting tossed around by humans. Sure, they weren’t actually able to hurt him in a way that mattered, but Runerigus was not a lightweight Pokémon and being manhandled like that by a human of all things was a new and unpleasant experience.

Despite all that, he was getting the feeling that there were some crossed wires here. They kept asking about this ‘Danny’ person. Runerigus didn’t know who that was, but he had a suspicion, and he couldn’t fault someone for being worried about a friend or whatever.

The Outsiders, however? He knew that those guys were bad news. Giratina said so. So his line of reasoning essentially went like this:

Maybe if I help beat this guy up, the humans will stop shooting at me.

Something was screwy with all this flying debris. It wasn’t nearly as random as it looked, and Runerigus could sense the pervasive wrongness of the Outsiders all throughout the room. It was jumping from object to object, directing them as they flew and changed trajectory over and over.

A metal dreamcatcher clanged against his clay, and Runerigus spotted the culprit. Johnny’s shadow was almost impossible to see in this lighting, but it was definitely bending in odd ways.

Well, if the problem is Shadow Sneak, I have a way to deal with that.

Runerigus used Disable.

Johnny’s shadow jumped off of the ground and shrieked in pain, a light blue aura surrounding it and locking up its movements.

“Shadow? What’s wrong?”

The objects started falling out of the air without the Shadow to control them, and Runerigus attempted to press the advantage. He lurched forward, fingers sharpening into Shadow Claws. He rent the Shadow in two, and Johnny gasped as it dissolved.

Unfortunately, the Outsider was too fast for Runerigus to catch twice, and he dodged his follow-up attacks. The loss of his Shadow seemed to have unsettled him, but Runerigus was simply too slow.

As they circled each other, Runerigus going through his options, he locked eyes with the human called Jack. Somehow, a moment of understanding passed between them, and an option jumped out at him.

It was not the move’s intended use, but when it was activated, there was a split second where the target was frozen in place--Runerigus used Imprison.

Red chains flashed into existence over Johnny. They began fading almost immediately, but they lasted just long enough; Jack seized the opportunity given to him. He ran like a charging Tauros and Johnny barely had time to see him coming before he took a metal-clad punch right in his spectral nose.

Johnny went down.

-----------------------------------

Panting, Jack turned to take in the whole basement. Maddie was okay. Sam was okay but breathing hard. Jazz was okay. Tucker looked terrified but unharmed. The gremlin was… gone, darn it all, the commotion wrecked the containment unit. And the Stone Slab was watching him carefully.

Jack narrowed his eyes, then looked at the other ghost. The green-haired ghost girl was staring at Johnny with a frightened expression. She met Jack’s eye and for a moment it looked like she was going to retaliate as well…

…but then she crumpled. Feebly, she whispered. “Please don’t punch me.”

Jack grunted. He picked up the Thermos from where it lay at his feet and pointed it at both of them. Johnny and Kitty vanished inside.

He felt like he should say some catchy one-liner about now, but nothing was coming to him. Oh, wait. “See you at the DMV, ghost punks.” Yeah, that was good.

Behind him the Stone Slab settled onto the ground. “Rune ri ri gus.”

“Are you going to shoot me again?” the Gabber supplied.

He turned to face it, at a loss. It had saved Maddie, so fighting it now felt wrong, but… ghost. His hand hovered over his gun before ultimately choosing not to grab it.

Jazz cleared her throat. “Maybe I can offer some alternatives?”

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[The Black Keep]

Lord Giratina accepted the status report stoically. It took quite some time to cover everything they had missed.

“--at which point Rebreather escaped through the mirror rather than the portal, and Runerigus was knocked through. And that was when you returned.”

I SEE

Giratina turned towards the mirrors.

THIS COULD BE A PROBLEM  they decided. They poked the nearest mirror and began searching.

Dusknoir shuffled awkwardly, as best as someone without legs could. “With respect, My Lord, things have gotten quite out of hand. We have multiple problems already.”

The mirrors flowed together, forming a greater wall of mirrors. Each of them showed a different image as they searched.

“If I may be so bold…” Dusknoir began cautiously, “What was it that kept you away for so long?”

Giratina glanced at him, making him flinch. The images began to flow into each other as the search narrowed.

…I WAS SEARCHING FOR SOMEONE--SOMEONE WHO CAN HELP ME--HE CAN KEEP AN EYE ON THE BOY WHILE I FOCUS ON THINGS HERE

Dusknoir clasped his hands. He looked next to himself at Mismagius, seeing his own doubt reflected there. “...My Lord… why is the boy important, again?”

I ADMIT THAT I DO NOT YET KNOW  Giratina said. The mirrors all showed the same image now, and they resolved into greater clarity. All the Pokémon present were treated to a fascinating sight.   …BUT THIS IS QUITE THE VALIDATION

On the mirrors, they bore witness to a white-haired boy beating Rebreather into a pulp. The Outsider ghost was thrown into the surface the mirrors looked out upon, and Giratina pounced. They pulled the unconscious diver in, and met the boy’s eyes for just a moment before dispelling the image.

They dropped the ghost unceremoniously on the floor.  TAKE OUT THIS GARBAGE.

Dusknoir hefted Rebreather onto his shoulder. “...And who was the person you sought, My Lord?”

By way of answering, the Wyrm showed him another mirror. The boy was there, in the background, but the focus of the image was another Ghost hiding in the shadows. One that blended in with the shadows themselves.

ONE WHO CAN REMAIN HIDDEN

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[Kukui’s Lab]

On the Professor’s porch, Danny found a notebook and sketched quietly. Corsola patiently allowed him to poke her ectoplasmic branches, and he wrote down his observations.

“Has the same consistency as the stuff I’m used to, but only at the surface level. Feels firmer the harder I push against it.” He set his pencil down and held out his hand. “How are you feeling?” he asked softly. 

She was still getting used to ‘changing forms,’ as Kukui put it.

Corsola smiled tiredly and placed one ghostly nub against his palm.

“Alright, if you’re su--hic--!”

Danny’s head snapped up as mist leaked out of his mouth. He waited, staring out into the forest across the beach. Only after several minutes where nothing happened did he start to relax.

“Probably just one of the graveyard ghosts again…” He sighed, putting the notebook away and standing up. “Wanna get something to eat?”

“Cors…”

“That’s the spirit.”

Underneath the porch, inside the shadows, someone let out a breath.

“This is going to be harder than I thought,” Marshadow muttered.