The Dragon Master: Chapter Eight

	We were running away, wondering how we were going to get out of this 
predicament, when an ice beam came out of nowhere and formed a wall stopping 
the mob. I looked from where the ice beam had come from. There was a woman 
standing on top of the roof of the Goldenrod City gym wearing a light blue 
Master's cloak. She saw my gaze and ran away. We ended up right in front of 
the Goldenrod City Gym. Whitney was watching us from the window and opened 
it.
	"Come on in," Whitney said hurriedly. "We have to get out of here." As we 
got in, we saw that she was wearing a gray cloak.
	"Ah," Morty said as he walked through the wall. "Whitney, the Normal 
Master. One of the Masters that cannot defeat me."
	"Hey," Whitney retorted, "The only reason that I can't beat you is because 
we always get into a stalemate."
	"We have to get out of here," I said, cutting them off. "Whitney, is there 
any way out of this town without going past them."
	"Well," she said, "it depends where we're going. If we're going to 
Ecruteak, which I don't think we are since Morty is here, just go through 
the gate. But I guess we're heading to Azalea, so we're going to have to go 
straight through them."
	"Great," I said as I sat down on the floor. "There's no way that we can get 
past all of them."
	"Maybe there is," Morty said, "If we scare them." He had a devilish look on 
his face.
	"What do you have in mind," Brock asked. He was intrigued.
	"What are the biggest thing that non-Masters are afraid of," Morty asked 
everybody. He waited for somebody to answer. As no one did, he continued. 
"Ghosts." His eyes grew a light purple color, and hundreds of Gastlys, 
Haunters, Gengars, and Misdreavuses appeared all around them.
	"Ok, we know how to get them away," Misty said, "but how are we gonna get 
past that big ice wall?"
	"I have the answer to that," I said, "Morty, come with me." I sent out all 
of my pokemon. "Scarlet, Dragon, Dragonite, Flare, Puff, use Flamethrower on 
that wall on my signal. Aeroy, use your Fire Blast on that same 
signal...NOW!" Their flame attacks combined and hit the wall. Soon it was 
nothing but a huge puddle of water.
	"Go," Morty commanded his ghost pokemon. They went and they scared all the 
people of the mob. "Now's our chance." We ran through all the scared people 
and went right through the gate. After we had left, the ghost pokemon left 
and the townspeople were left there, wondering where the Masters had gone 
off to.
	We were still running towards Ilex Forest while the crowd was wondering 
where we had gone. Once we had reached it, we stopped running because we 
knew that we had lost them.
	"How are we ever going to get through this forest," Duplica asked.
	"I was hoping that someone had a pokemon with cut," I replied to her. 
"Anybody? O well, we'll have to improvise." I generated my teal katana and 
twirled it around my hands. I then started slashing at the brush stopping us 
from getting through. After about an hour of slashing, I realized that this 
was getting us nowhere because I saw cut marks from a half-hour ago.
	"Don't tell me we're lost," said Erika
	"Okay," I told her. "I won't tell you."
	"I should have just done this from the beginning," Erika said waving her 
hands up in the air. She pointed the trees and they bent aside, leaving us a 
path to Azalea Town.
	"Maybe you should have done that from the beginning," Brock agreed.
	"Don't start with me," Erika snapped at him. None of us even talked to 
Erika on the way there. After about 10 minutes, I realized that there was 
beside the Ilex Forest shrine. I ran over to it, and looked at it. It was 
the G/S ball!
	"Hey," I called to the others. "I found something." I decided that it must 
have fell out while the others ran over to me.
	"What is it," Duplica asked, "it looks just like a gold and silver 
pokeball."
	"Hey it's the G/S ball," Ash exclaimed. "Kurt never did tell me what to do 
with it."
	"It must have fell out of the shrine," Sabrina said, intrigued.
	"I guess that I should put it back in," I said, while I put it back in. The 
G/S ball started to glow, and it opened. Inside was a letter:
		I used to be here when I was young,
		But I moved on to a different time.
		You will most likely not see me,
		For all of your lifetime.
		Many years back, and many years forward.
		That is where I live.
		Yet I am not in the present,
		But I have a gift to give.
		The gift I have is timeless,
		Nothing that you've ever seen.
		The reason that it is timeless,
		Is because that the gift is me.
		You have discovered a mystery,
		That is solved and yet it is not.
		For I have seen all the corruption,
		Of all the battles that have been fought.
		I leave you with these wise words,
		That have helped me through my life.
		Never try to make peace,
		Unless you are prepared for strife.
		Now I must leave you,
		As it is my time to go.
		The question is who am I?
		As of this, you may or may not already know.
	"What does it mean," Erika asked. I had my face looking directly at where 
the League was located at.
	"What it means," I answered. "Once we took upon the weight of the world, we 
can never put it down. We have to continue with our quest. What happens when 
you drop something fragile?" They looked at me, not understanding what I was 
saying. "It breaks." I then picked up the G/S ball, and let it slide out of 
my hand. It shattered when it hit the ground below us. They were all looking 
upon the shattered remnants of the G/S ball. For the G/S ball wasn't a 
pokeball at all, it was a model of the Earth, and what would happen if the 
Masters fell, and dropped the fragile world with it. We had to stop the 
League, there was no way that we could fail. We couldn't. I walked on, 
though the others were still standing at the shrine. Soon, one by one, they 
left and followed me. Until, only Sabrina stood there, as a single tear ran 
down her unemotional face, for she understood. She then walked after the 
rest of us.
	We entered Azalea Town solemnly, after what we had witnessed at the shrine. 
I proceeded directly to the gym, where Bugsy was located. The others 
following me, in the same mood as I was. The bug trainers that ranked below 
him in his gym did not try and stop us, though they recognized that we were 
Masters. They showed me the way to Bugsy, who was training his bug pokemon.
	"Bob," Bugsy asked questioningly as I walked in. "What are you doing here? 
You're supposed to be in jail for murder."
	"I was framed by the League," I explained as I generated my Masters cloak. 
The others walked in behind me and generated their cloaks, too. "I didn't 
kill Delilah."
	"I knew it," Busgy exclaimed, "I knew you weren't a cold-blooded killer."
	"Yes," I hastily agreed. "But we have to take you with us."
	"Why," he asked of me.
	"Because," I told him, "you're a Bug Master."
	"How do you know that," he asked as I pulled out the HED and pointed it at 
him. It beeped and said Bug at the top. "Fine, I'll come with you." He 
generated his light green cloak, gathered up his bug pokemon, and led the 
way out of his gym.
	"Where are we going next," Duplica asked as we walked down the street out 
of town.
	"Violet City," I replied to her. "We just have to get Falkner and we're 
done getting our Masters. She took a quick count of how many people we would 
have.
	"But that means that we would only have thirteen Masters," she said, 
sounding worried. "The League has been abducting all of those others 
Masters. They must have at least a hundred."
	"Your point," I asked her, getting a little annoyed.
	"We won't have enough," she continued, not noticing that I was becoming 
annoyed.
	"How many we have doesn't matter," I assured her. "What matters is that we 
take over the League without any fatalities if possible. Now, let's just go 
through Union Cave as quickly and as quietly as possible." We continued 
until we got to the entrance, where we entered.
	"I've got an idea to make this trip shorter," Brock said. He held his hands 
against the rock wall and his eyes glowed brown. The rock started to morph 
and a hole appeared. The hole grew larger until it was big enough for us to 
go through. It looked like we were right at the exit.
	"Nice one Brock," Ash congratulated him as we all proceeded to the exit. It 
was quite bright outside, considering that it was nine o'clock.
	"If we hurry," I said, "we can still make it to Violet City in time." We 
ran and didn't stop. Unfortunately, we didn't make it in time and stopped at 
a PokeCenter for the night. There was only nurse Joy and her Blissey there, 
so we hoped that they wouldn't ask many questions.
	"There's beds in the back," Nurse Joy said cheerfully. We quickly walked 
back to the beds. I got into one of the top bunks and Misty went under. Ash 
took the bottom bunk on the other side and Brock took the top. The other 
eight Masters went off to different rooms. Janine, Erika, Sabrina, and 
Whitney went off to one room, and Morty, Jasmine, Duplica, and Bugsy went 
off to another.
	We awoke very early that morning, as we wanted to get out of the PokeCenter 
before Nurse Joy was up. Alas, she was already up and her Blissey was making 
us breakfast. Sabrina tried to persuade her, but the rest of us had not 
eaten for a while and were quite hungry. After we ate and were about to 
leave, Nurse Joy called me over to the counter to talk to me.
	"Listen," she said, "I know that you twelve are Masters. But I also know 
what the League is up to. If a League soldier stops here, I'll cover for you 
guys. Just get yourselves out of here. Falkner isn't at his gym. He's 
training in the field that you will come to right after Violet. Don't ask 
any questions, just take him and go. You guys are running out of time." She 
then winked at me and went back into the halls.
	"What was that all about," Erika asked.
	"I just got some information that will help us to find Falkner," I replied. 
"Let's go." It took us about an hour to reach Violet City. There weren't any 
League troops there, and that was a good sign. We proceeded to go out of 
town, just as Nurse Joy had instructed us.
	"Mistress Erika," a voice questioningly asked from the bushes beside us. We 
followed the voice and we found a young girl, with some pokeballs on her 
belt. "What are you doing here? Isn't you're gym in Celadon City? That's all 
the way in Kanto." She was evidently a bird trainer from Falkner's Gym. 
That's what her uniform looked like anyway.
	"Cassandra," Erika said as she saw the young girl. "I see that you got a 
position as an underling."
	"Yeah," she replied.
	"Cassandra was an underling for me," said Erika, "but she decided that she 
liked flying pokemon better. So I got her a position in this Gym."
	"Um...Cassandra," Misty said as she approached her. "We're looking for 
Falkner. Can you take us to him?"
	"Sure, follow me," Cassandra answered as she took off into the field. 
"Master Falkner, Master Falkner! Some people are here to see you."
	"Ah," Falkner said as he spotted me. "I was wondering when you were going 
to ask me, the Flying Master, to join your group to take on the League. I 
would assume that that's why you're here, Bob."
	"You assume correctly, Falkner," I agreed with him. "We are here for you to 
join us. Will you?"
	"Yes," he replied firmly. "The League has taken away countless Masters from 
Kanto and Johto. We must put a stop to it. I will come with you." He then 
generated his gray Masters Cloak.
	"Good, then let's head to New Bark Town," I said. "I have some unfinished 
business there and then we will continue on to the League headquarters."
	"I know a shortcut," Falkner said. "Follow me." He then took off for the 
other end of the field. We all followed him and we came to a very large 
tree. Falkner walked up to the tree and evidently said a password. "Zephyr." 
The tree then split down the middle, leaving a pathway large enough for us 
to walk through. It looked at bit like an elevator shaft. We all got in. The 
tree closed again, and we felt like we were moving downwards.
	"Where does this go," Duplica asked.
	"It goes about fifty feet down, then we get out and start walking," Falkner 
replied to her. "When the passage ends, it comes up on the end of Route 46. 
Then, it's only a little walk towards New Bark Town. Bob can finish his 
business, and we will head on to the Elite Four." We continued to walk. The 
passage started to go at an uphill slant, and it started to get hot in 
there. We finally saw light up ahead and we all ran towards the exit. As 
Falkner had said, we were on Route 46. We walked through the checkpoint 
between Routes 46 and 29, and headed off towards new Bark Town.
It was nearly dark by the time we reached there. It looked like it was going 
to rain.  Nobody lived at my old house anymore, so we were all going to stay 
there for the night.
	"I gotta go do something," I said as I left the other twelve at my house.
	"Do you want me to come with you," Misty asked comfortingly.
	"No," I said. "I just want to be alone right now." Misty was going to run 
out after me anyway, but Sabrina stopped her.
	"He wants to grieve for Delilah," Sabina said knowingly. "He hasn't had 
time to since he's been running from the League." Misty just stood there, 
watching me go into the distance.
I knew where I was going. I was headed to the cemetery. Sabrina knew what I 
was going to do. As I entered the cemetery, it started to rain. I noticed 
Delilah's headstone right away. I went over to it and read what was on it. 
It said:

					Delilah Angela Largway
				October 23, 1957-August 1, 2002
					Beloved Mother
			Lance and Bob shall miss her for all eternity

	I read the inscription on her headstone. I would miss her. She was the only 
reason that I am doing this; taking on the League. I generated a teal rose 
from my hands and placed it in a flower holder. I felt a hand on my 
shoulder.
	"I'm sorry that you had to go through this, Bob," a soft voice said as I 
turned around to see who it was. The teal-cloaked man was standing there, 
with his hand on my shoulder...
-                                         End of Chapter Eight               
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