Title: Twilight
Author: Shadow/Phantomness
Pairing: Championshipping (Lance x Ash/Red)
Fandom: Pokémon
Theme: #44, Twilight
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Pokemon belongs to Nintendo and Shogakukan Comics. This non-profit, non-copyright infringing fanfiction belongs to me under international copyright laws and taking it is plagiarism. Thank you. *Phantomness bows*

Notes: <> for telepathy, ** for thoughts, italics if a pokemon talks

Warnings: AU, Shonen-ai, vampirism

In the twilight, it is bluish-purple, with a hint of sunshine as the glowing orb sinks beneath the mountains, bringing the cloak of night as cover. Lance holds Red close, laughing softly. They are free, free of the chains that bound them to duty forever and a day, and the demon lies slain before their feet.

They are children of the shadows, not quite of the day or of the night either, a mix of gray in between pure shades.

The others are coming, with torches and pitchforks. The mob had good intentions, perhaps, but it was a foolish gesture.

Lorelei leads the way, a hand on her poke belt. She smiles as she sees them alive and well.

“You managed to kill her?”

“Yes.” Red grins.

Lance nods, not saying more, and the ice master does not pry. She knows well enough not to. She doesn’t want to think about what dark power they had to tap into to kill one of MissingNo’s spawn.

The rest of the villagers dissipate, though Lorelei stays a bit longer.

“Lance? What did you trade in exchange? Because kind as Lugia-sama is, even he wouldn’t grant you the power to destroy her for free…”

Lance smirks, and she sees the slight elongation in his fangs. “This.”

Red tugs at Lance’s arm, and Lance sighs. “You’d better leave, Lorelei. Otherwise, when the sun goes down fully and the moon is high, we will have to hunt, and I’m not sure I can control it…”

Lorelei shakes her head. “I know. Be safe, you two.”

She leaves and then they fly away, wings rising from their shoulders. That night, they kill a Noctowl and split it.

Normally, eating raw meat would disgust Red, but now…

“We did what we had to do, right?”

“Yes.” Lance responds, and Red snuggles into his arms, ignoring the blood smeared on his cheeks.

“As long as I have you, I’ll be all right.”

“I dearly hope so…”

Lorelei burns incense for her cousin and his lover, because she knows what they have become. No one else in the village understands, but when they do not return, they are counted among the dead and given a worthy funeral.

She knows that it is too dangerous to see them again, and so she writes their tale in her diary.

Five hundred years later, two boys walk into one of Kanto’s leading museums, and see, written in the ancient letters of Johto, the tale of their life.

And they laugh.

End Fic

Completed 9/10/06

Yatta! Done! Pulling teeth… but now that I re-read it, tis actually quite good…