Shadows and Sunlight: Shady's Origin

Ammy sought out Kai in an ominous, unwelcoming snowy location somewhere beneath the Celestial Plain. The area emitted nothing but bad vibes, the unnatural calm paired well with the chilling air and softly packed powder snow. The shiny Kantonian Arcanine had to be nearby.

She called out for him, knowing he must be there. Given their relationship and history, it’s not hard to see why she didn’t speak politely. Her voice was sharper than a freshly forged knife.

"Kai, I know you're here. Stop hiding like a coward and face me."

Atop a snow covered embankment behind the desecrated shrine to Ammy herself, the aforementioned shiny Arcanine poked his head out into view. His response was frigid, much like their location.

"And what in Arceus' name do YOU want? Come to extend my eternal suffering with more of your magic?"

Ammy scoffed, unamused with his wordplay and already losing her patience with him.

"The spells I cast on you to confine you here and always leave you hungry were all I needed to use. However, that's not why I took the time to seek you out in this frigid wilderness."

He took notice of her front side, which prompted a particularly tasteless comment on his part.

"Ooooooh, pregnant again? Man, you ARE insatiable! Let me guess, you came all this way for me to cool you off?"

The goddess held onto at least one scrap of restraint, but it broke apart at the mention of her bodily state. She hurled her reflector as hard as she could, landing a bullseye on the Arcanine’s chest. It knocked the wind out of him and he tumbled all the way down from the hilltop, landing on his stomach with a thud, making powder snow scatter into a cloud. Her face was hell-bent with rage, not something that you see very often.

"YOU HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO RIGHT TO TALK ABOUT MY LAST PREGNANCY! YOU FORCED YOURSELF ONTO ME, YOU BASTARD!!"

The level of anger only seemed to increase following her explosion in his face; it could almost kill on its own. Kai failed to stand up, the snow giving way under his weight. He barked back at her snidely.

"Hmph. The only bastard is that purple furred twerp that you birthed out. And me putting him inside you was a favor. You looked so desperate for attention while disguised as that Alolan Ninetales~"

That didn't go well for him, since Ammy’s temper flared to new heights once more. She pounced, instantly pinning him down with her claws poking against his throat, ready to draw blood, or worse. Insults were one thing, but talking down about her or Shady was a suicide mission, especially in his position. She could strike at any moment, breathing hard and eyes burning. For once he actually dropped the tough guy act and was genuinely fearful.

"SO THAT WAS A FAVOR?! DO I NEED TO REMIND YOU THAT THE PURPLE FURRED TWERP ABSOLUTELY WRECKED YOU WITH ONE ATTACK?! OH I OUGHTA SLICE YOUR NECK WIDE OPEN AND WATCH YOU DROWN IN YOUR OWN BLOOD!!"

However, after a few moments of intense breathing from the adrenaline surging through her body, she stood back up, releasing his throat from her claws, and recomposed herself.

"...but I can't. If I did kill you, I would never know what your motives were or why in hell you were sent after me in the first place. I won’t stoop to your level, not after you trapped the spirit of an Incineroar inside Shady in hopes that he'd die."

Kai took the opportunity to get a word in, and the first thing that vocalized was an insult.

"Aren’t goddesses supposed to be more dignified than this?"

He paid for those words with the light sentence; a deep scratch across his face. The blow left behind a mark on his cheek that would likely scar, blood trailing down and turning the white snow a deep red hue where it landed. She furiously barked at him again.

"DIGNITY?! IT HAS NO PLACE HERE. CHOOSE YOUR NEXT WORDS VERY WISELY, LEST YOUR LIFE ENDS AS ABRUPTLY AS IT BEGAN!"

They stared at each other dead in the eyes, each panting for a solid minute without a word between them. Ammy broke the silence, staring down at him sternly and unyieldingly.

"So tell me then. What were your motives? Why were you sent after me? Why did any of this have to happen??"

Kai began to nonchalantly explain himself and the whole situation. At this point, he had nothing else to lose other than his life.

"I was a member of Cipher, an organization based in the Orre region. But I already told you that over twenty years ago. I was one of the highest ranked Pokemon, my skill to bring victim Pokemon back to the Key Lair so that they can have the doors to their hearts shut had a miniscule failure rate. Not to mention my ALMOST perfect IVs."

Ammy chimed in, not sheathing her claws.

"That explains who you really are. Go on. What's their goal? Not like you'll be going back there anytime soon to say you told an outsider~"

He rolled his eyes, annoyed by her statement but figuring the only option was to continue to comply.

"The ultimate goal is to figure out how to create a truly unpurifiable shadow Pokemon, to use an army of them to take control of the world. We thought we figured it out with shadow Lugia, known internally as XD001, but were proven wrong after he was snagged by a human and purified."

She stepped in once more, wanting to get as much information out of him as she could. He kept her in the dark for far too long.

"Alright, but what about me? How do I fit into all of this?"

Kai's face lit up, almost in an evil kind of way.

"You see, being disguised as an Alolan Ninetales made you a perfect candidate to try and shut the door to your heart. At that point, an Alolan Ninetales would’ve been our first foothold in Alola, but we didn't know that underneath the fake fur was really a goddess. That's why none of our practices worked on you. But rumors were going around from other Pokemon and from a few admins, notably Ein, that a new method was proposed: breeding.”

“What if you bred two shadow Pokemon together? Or a shadow and normal? What would happen? This was right before you decided to flee. Since an Arcanine and a Ninetales are compatible in egg groups, they sent me after you, not wanting the mysterious specimen to get away. And now that Shady is around, he's living - and admittedly I hate that he lives - proof that breeding works. But like you said, I just lack a way to inform them that it works…"

Ammy rolled her eyes and put her claws back against his throat.

“Well congratulations, Kai, because not only did you breed a shadow Pokemon, I cannot remove it! So I dear hope you’re satisfied with yourself. You’ve flat out ruined his life!”

Kai smirked hardcore.

“Heh~ Now I KNOW that it works. The girl that birthed him can’t even open the door to his heart! The next time that twerp comes to see you, let him know that he’s a wanted Pokemon across all regions where we have a base of operations. Even now, Cipher is still aware of the power level he possesses. If he returns, he WILL be hunted down. He’s the true XD002.”

Kai kept his smirk following the end of his monologue, though it became much worse. As it became worse, Ammy could feel some kind of power building inside his body, as well as a dark aura emanating from his eyes. She pressed down on him harder, but that was mere moments before he became cloaked in a veil of shadow energy. The expansion of the darkness sent her flying away, and she skidded to a halt on her side, minorly injured.

"Is this some kind of… secret evolution? It's not mega… There’s no way it could be…" She thought to herself while gazing upon the sphere of darkness before her.

The veil eventually faded and what stood before her was an Arcanine that hasn't been since the Sinnoh region was called Hisui. Kai had transformed from a Kantonian Arcanine into a Hisuian Arcanine, making the size difference between them even greater. Ammy normally stands around five-sixths of Kai's height when she's anthro, but this form change made him more than three times her size, roughly eighteen feet (six meters for you international peeps) high.

Ammy laid there bewildered and at a temporary loss for words, unaware that he was capable of such a feat. The sheer size difference struck genuine fear into her heart like a thunderbolt. It intensified further with the appearance of the dark aura around him. The new appearance had her scooting away from his general direction, unable to find her footing. Her whole body shook.

"H-How long have you been able to do that?? WHY can you do that??? I was around when Sinnoh was known as Hisui, but nothing about you screamed Hisuian!"

He got a cocky smile and gladly explained the trick he performed.

"My dear Amaterasu… I've been able to do this since I had the door to my heart shut. I didn't want to have that done at first, in fact the process is quite painful, I must admit. But once I felt the immense power that the darkness gave me… I learned that I was a close ancestor to Arcanines that were raised in Hisui, and I could use the darkness to become one! I'm more powerful than you've ever seen me!!"

He slowly stepped his way toward her whilst spouting the explanation. Ammy finally found her footing and hastily stood back up and held her ground, but the panic she felt did not dissipate. The amount of energy flowing from his body was greater than her own!

"You may be more powerful, but surely you're still no match for the power of an actual god!"

She drew a straight line across his body using the Celestial Brush and attacked him with the sharpest Power Slash she could muster. It left a giant, deep cut down his side, but it didn't phase him. Kai looked down at the cut and then back to her, very much amused.

"A papercut? Come on, Ammy. You're better than that. Do some DAMAGE to me."

He continued closing the gap in convenient slow fashion. Even as powerful as he is, electrocuting him would work, right? She resorted to Thunder, which is a stroke drawn in a bolt shape. It was a direct hit! The electrocution from the attack lasted much longer than Ammy was expecting, which was when the dark aura came out in the middle of it. In the aftermath of it, Kai was glowing yellow and white. Ammy’s divine lightning had inadvertently frenzied the Arcanine.

Each step he took made the snow melt instantly, and the sight of Kai in such a destructive state of power terrified Ammy more than she’d ever been in over 200 years at the very least. Every survival instinct she had was screaming at her to run, but she was frozen in place. Her face had turned grave. With the gap between them three-fourths closed, Kai started monologuing in traditional villain fashion. As he neared, her feet fumbled from an escape attempt and she fell flat on her rump.

“It’s a shame, really. You’re a very, VERY sexy girl, Ammy, especially with that belly. But you’re the one canine preventing me from leaving this world, and I finally have the chance to break this spell!! I’M NOT WAITING ANOTHER 25 YEARS!!!”

Kai opened wide and charged up a Hyper Beam. Ammy could do nothing but stare up at the energy ball that built in his mouth, tears pouring down her face as she was at a loss for words. The sphere was blindingly white, but she simply couldn’t look away from what was about to disintegrate her to dust.

All hope was lost. She saw no possible way out of this situation. That is, until the impending Hyper Beam stopped in its tracks. Kai was sideswiped with a large shadowy blast from left field, interrupting his attack and directing his attention to the source. Shady was there, and Ammy was never happier to see him. He was full of vigor and overflowing with mega energy. From a distance, he called out to Kai.

“HEY!! STAY AWAY FROM MY MOM AND PICK ON SOMEONE YOUR OWN SIZE, KAI!!”

Kai snarled at Shady in response, quickly taking notice of his more divine appearance and dialing into the necklace around his neck.

“Wait, you have a MEGA EVOLUTION?? I can only BEGIN to guess who gave that to you and when, but it doesn’t matter! You’re still way out of your league, Inktail! LOOK WHAT YOU NEED TO MIMIC FIVE PERCENT OF MY POWER!!”

Shady snorted, amused by his attempt at intimidation.

“You can’t be serious… if THIS is what it takes for you to withstand more than one hit from me, then honest to Arceus that’s pathetic! What was that whole spiel about having excellent stats and almost perfect IVs?”

While Kai’s intimidation failed completely, Shady got under his skin and he attacked in response, enveloping himself in flames and charging at him full speed. Shady was able to nimbly roll dodge out of harm’s way in the nick of time, the flames melting off a couple of hairs from his body. He quickly regained his footing and fired an Ice Beam that was infused with shadow magic, known as Shadow Chill. Being the after-product of a powerful shadow Pokemon and a goddess somehow gave him the ability to use any shadow move at any point, rather than being limited to four moves. How this works is a mystery even to me. The concentrated ice attack smacked the Arcanine dead in the face, inflicting frostbite and briefly stunning him.

This was a long enough window to rush in on all fours, covering himself in his shadowy aura. Generally speaking, it was near impossible for the aura to show itself while in his mega evolution. Flower trails followed behind him as he ran, and if that doesn’t scream that he’s the son of Ammy, then I don’t know what will. With the speed he gathered and the density of the aura, it looked like he was going for Shadow End. A reckless ram attack that damages the opponent and the user heavily.

He made contact with Kai’s face with a badass kick, causing a ripple in his cheek and vastly changing his expression in response. Shady bounced back quite a distance, stuck the landing and skidded to a halt, but fell onto one knee. He was out of breath and panted hard. While his attack did a considerable amount of damage, it also cost him over half his HP. The frenzied Arcanine was able to stand back up and shook his head to gather his bearings.

Shadow attacks only do half damage to other shadow Pokemon. Shady knew that, but wanted to send the message that he was not the Growlithe to mess with. While he kneeled, Kai got within fifteen feet of him, surrounded by a fiery vortex. He charged up another Hyper Beam, but aimed for the purple dog instead. He stared at the Arcanine dead in his eyes, and Ammy, still unable to move due to her injuries, could only watch in horror as he was about to be disintegrated into dust.

The Hyper Beam fired off, and Shady closed his eyes, bending his head downward. Ammy screamed at the top of her lungs.

“SHADY NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

The elongated attack was a direct hit. As it faded, there was a circle of cherry blossoms where Shady kneeled. It seemed that some kind of divine power had somewhat shielded him from the attack. It was obvious that he wasn’t unharmed, since he was much more worn out than before the blast was shot. Since that was the Hyper Beam that Kai managed to get out, it wore him down considerably as well. His legs gave way and he fell to the ground, unable to keep battling. The frostbite effect was also getting worse, chilling him to the core.

He limped his way over to Ammy, picked her up, and mist warped both of them out of there. They arrived back on the Celestial Plain, inside the cottage that Ammy lives in. He laid her on the bed and attempted to catch his own breath, the cuts and bruises combined from the ram attack and Kai’s hyper beam slowing him down. He did his best to calm her down with a constant, elongated hug, making sure his face was touching hers. His main goal was to ensure that she didn’t go into labor from all the shock she just went through. She couldn’t stop sobbing, despite that they were both okay.

“Mom! Mom. P-Please calm down! You’re going to be okay! I’m okay too!”

He spoke softly before giving her a giant kiss on the forehead and standing back up, feeling over her belly with both hands, a greenish kind of glow emanating from them.

“...good. The baby is still okay, too. No abnormal heartbeat or signs of oxygen deprivation. Surprising, given what we just went through. But I’m not complaining.”

She began to finally lighten up on the waterworks, and was able to look at him straight in the eyes.

“S-Shady… you… you saved my life…I was certain you were a goner!”

He looked at her while bandaging up one of her legs that was severely cut, aiming to tend to her other cuts, bruises, and remaining emotional damage after that.

“What kind of a son would I be if I didn’t help my mom when she needs me the most? It would take more than that to keep me down, but... his power definitely threw me a curve ball. He’s not to be taken lightly.”

She looked flustered and blushed, but not in a sexual way.

“Shady… I know I’ve said it before, but you’re the star example of what a son should be… and I love you so incredibly much… From the bottom of my heart, I sincerely apologize for ever thinking you were remotely similar to the bastard that helped make you. You two are polar opposites, and I’m glad you’re the good half. Heaven forbid what it would be like if HE was the good one…”

Shady chuckled a bit, before getting back to serious business.

“I forgave you for that a long time ago. It's not your fault. But… mom. Why on earth were you trying to take him on all by yourself? For one, he’s an immensely powerful Pokemon. For two, he can do THAT. And three, YOU HAVE A BABY INSIDE YOU FOR ARCEUS’ SAKE!”

Ammy’s ears drooped and she explained her thought process.

“Well, being totally honest with you, hun, I didn’t have much of a plan going in, and that’s not like me. I was so miffed from not being able to remove the darkness from inside you that I wanted to go straight to the source of the problem and nip the bud. Or spray the overgrown plant with a flamethrower, rather. I was ready to do it, too! I had my claws at his throat and even drew blood from him! But the idea that killing him would prevent me from knowing why this all happened stopped me cold turkey.”

Shady gave her a reassuring look in the eyes and cupped her right hand in his grasp.

“Let’s not worry about that right now, okay? We both need to rest up and recover. Needless to say that we’ll need to approach this differently if we hope to defeat Kai for good.”

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An ethereal shield covered the entirety of the Celestial Plain, its strength tested by the immense weight of an even larger Hisuian Arcanine, who was trying his damnedest to break through. Ammy stood on the balcony of her home, constantly injecting her magic into it to push back against him. The sky was a red-orange hue, with fire-red flames cascading down from the sky. It appears that even if Kai couldn’t get in, his attacks could. Her face was an emotional mess, combining rage, frustration, and genuine heart-stopping fear. She turned her head back to stare sternly at Shady, who had been assisting her in keeping the shield up, and screamed. Tears plummeted from her eyes.

“SHADY!!! GO GET HELP!!!!!”

An oval shaped collection of cherry blossom leaves and flowers appeared behind him, the pathway inside seemingly endless. Without any hesitation or considering where it might take him, he jumped through, and it closed behind him.