Hi everyone, SK here.

First off, a note: this chapter is probably going to be short, just like with the last chapter I've been having writer's block despite me having planned out each chapter with *very specific* bullet points, so my apologies if this seems a bit rushed.  Hope these chapters aren't disappointing for you guys.

Also, not sure if you've checked my bio recently, but I've updated the total chapter count for this book.  The final chapter will be chapter 46, meaning we're nearing the end of the book pretty quickly.  

Anyway, enough of my rambling.  Let's start, please try to enjoy despite my lack of motivation probably showing.

(If you guys wonder why I'm forcing myself to write it's because in April my school schedule switches meaning I no longer have a spare.  So I'm trying to save my reserve chapters for the weeks when I actually don't have time, rather than no motivation.  Also sorry for the ridiculously long A/N.)

!!! WARNINGS: Bad Language, Violence, and Layra sarcasm ahead

Layra

So it seems that while Heliux and the others are laying back at the Colony trying to figure out a war plan, I'm tasked with bringing my daughter home.  

A sigh escapes me.  I don't know the whole story as to why she left in the first place, but I do know that her leaving was completely unnecessary.  She herself agreed that she was going to take the Queen's tests as soon as possible (even if I don't want her to do them) in order to cancel the spell she put on the humans.  

"Whatever," I mumble.  What's in the past is in the past, it can't be changed- or at least, it shouldn't be anyway.  She needs to come home and I will do everything short of slapping her to get her back to the Colony and the Queen's Castle.  

The skies are a little cloudy as I set out on my journey.  Long black hair (mine, obviously) finds its way in front of my face as a cold, empty wind blows past.  No matter what, something drastic is going to happen today.  Valerie is definitely going to take the first test, which is world-changing enough; the sky changes to be crazy colours and everything.  

My wings flap and I begin to fly- it's faster to do that anyway.  The sooner I bring her home the sooner all of this ends.

I shiver.

Some part of me doesn't want her to come home.

If she does, she has to take that test.

Potential successors have died during the tests before.

Well, the first test at least.  Less the second.

No, if I think about the dangers surrounding my daughter than I'm going to be slowed down. I need to act quickly, I remind myself as I zip past trees and shrubs.  I'm still in the fairy side of the forest, but I'm going to have to cross over soon- not using the Route, obviously.  The second they see a fairy come out of there the Colony might as well disappear.  We can't have that happening.

An odd thumping noise sounds through the forest, which is strange because the only living creatures in this forest are fairies.  Not even Pokemon live here, so what...

My thoughts trail away as I see human faces poke out of the trees.  I hide behind some trees with large-ish leaves as my breath hitches.  Humans in the fairy forest.  This can only mean- did they find the Route?  Well of course they had to have found the Route, duh, there's no way a fairy would randomly teleport malicious humans here, especially on the verge of war.  Besides, the only person that can really do that well is Heliu-

and Valerie.  However, despite what Heliux told me she said, I don't think she would intentionally cause us our doom.

Still, I can't let this slide, despite my other mission.  It's my duty to protect our home.  I'm a Minister, dammit, this is my job just as obeying the Queen is also my job.

"Absol, I need you," I whisper and promptly summon my  Mist Pokemon.  Absol appears in her misty form but I quickly motion for her to be quiet... and I'm too slow because my Pokemon and all her outgoing stubbornness jumps out instantly, turning human-sized as she lands on the ground.  There's two humans here who instantly become alerted by the odd-looking Pokemon (to them) and their hands instantly go to their own Pokeballs.

"Night Slash!" I cry out, still remaining in my hiding spot.  Fortunately and unfortunately for me my voice can be heard by both Absol and the humans, who promptly begin to search for me, the hidden fairy.  

The two humans both have Poison-types; one has a Galarian Wheezing and one has a Salandit.  "Strange Seam," the first one commands, while the other one proceeds to shout "FLAMETHROWER!" really loud for some reason.  Unless his Salandit is partially deaf I don't think there's any need to yell, but whatever.

"Dodge and use Psycho Cut on both," I command.  Poison-types are weak to Psychic moves and I'm glad I have one, because I'd be fucked if I didn't.  This just causes the guy with the Salandit to withdraw his Pokemon and run away from the scene, leaving me to fight this gas ball with a top hat and his supposed trainer.

"Strange Seam," the human calls out of nowhere, and as the pink fairy fog fills the area I have to leave my hiding spot, I have to check on Absol.  She's strong but not that bulky.  I fly down, ignoring the human's eyes widening at the sight of me (fuck off, I've got a boyfriend idiot), and go to check on my Pokemon.  

She's human-sized but I refuse to let the human get a better look at me.  "Absol, are you okay?" I ask, rubbing her behind her ears, but before she can reply more thumping sounds surround the area.  About five more humans come up and surround me, all armed with Pokeballs.  I gulp- one or two is fine, but six is out of the question.

There's only one thing I can do now.

I quickly withdraw Absol and fly for my fucking life.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck!" I shout as I crash through shrubs and bushes, their thorns catching on my dress and scratching my legs.  My heart stops as my long black hair is grabbed, gruff hands pulling be backward and out of the air.  Gruff human hands.  I look back into the eyes of the human who grabbed me, his eyes twisted with rage and insanity.  Without hesitation I take out a knife and slash it through my hair, cropping it short and setting myself free.  Me and my new hair cut fly away, my heart still pounding a million times a minute.  As I fly I catch my reflection in a nearby puddle for a brief second and admire my new look.  Not bad for a literal knife cut.

Since there are humans in the fairy forest I figure that it will probably be safer to be in the human world at the moment.  I promptly make, enter, and close the portal before any of the humans from before can follow me through.  I still have the knife in my hand, and it gleams in the pale sunlight as I turn around... to face more humans.

FUCK.

MY.

LIFE.

I don't know why I'm so sarcastic today, but I get like this when I'm stressed and of course I'm running for my life so of course I'm gonna be fucking stressed.  There's about twenty humans in this area, all beelining right toward me.  

"Fuck it," I say, and summon twenty blades, all of them the same ones that I used to kill the corrupt man that hurt my child.  There are multiple of them held between each of my fingers.  I've killed hundreds before, I can do it again, I think, then do a quick summary of the souls in the area.  The knives escape the firm grasps of my fingers effortlessly, all of them making simultaneous contact with my victim's hearts, and souls.

There's going to be a war anyway, I think, then continue my journey over the dead bodies.  There's almost zero chance that someone like a Queen would find them important anyway.  Besides, they were in my way.  I need to get to Valerie as quickly as possible and they were slowing me down.  

I keep flying, but I either get stopped by more humans with their Pokemon trying to have a battle with me, or humans just trying to straight-out murder me.  I deal with them, but it takes time, precious time that I should be using to actually complete my mission.

First things first, I need to find Valerie.  My eyes burn as I use my powers, but it doesn't take much effort to spot the tri-Elemental soul that belongs to my daughter.  I can spot a large amount of human souls with her, but since I recognize one of them to be Red, I'm assuming she's safe and not trapped by a squadron.  That is, if Red hasn't changed his allegiance, I think grimly.  The thought only makes me fly there faster, but before I can fully escape the forest my wing catches on a tree branch and tears.  Shit.  I won't be able to fly for much longer.

My wings falter and I wobbly fly over the slope that guards the forest.  I spot some houses in the near distance and the one that is supposedly housing my daughter.  My top right wing, the one that got torn, is beginning to give out, putting off balance.  I need all my wings to work if I have to fly and my anxiety builds when I see some humans notice me.  

I will myself to fly faster despite my wing beginning to give me stinging pain like I got a paper cut.  The houses draw closer as I hear some humans shouting slurs at me, and I end up crash-landing onto a windowsill when my wing finally gives out.  Thank Zagan it was the right one, I can spot Valerie frozen inside staring at a TV screen while eight others, including Red, watch her worriedly.  Knowing the crowd that's approaching me I frantically knock on the window, hoping she'll hear me.  

Luckily, my daughter turns and notices me in time, probably because one of her friends shouted at her.  She opens the window and turns fairy-sized.  "Layra, you're-" she breaks down and hugs me, and I'm put in a sudden shock.  Something clearly happened, but what?

"We- uh, we need to go inside," I tell her, and quickly add that there were other humans who were chasing me.  She gets the message and lets go of me, dragging me onto the inside portion of the window sill.  She uses her magic and promptly closes the window panes shut.  

Her breathing is staggered and heavy, and something is clearly wrong.  "Valerie, are you okay?  What happened," I press.  

"Leaf, my best friend, die-"

"I'm so sorry for your loss," I tell her, expressing all my sympathy, but to my surprise she just waves it off.  Her best friend died and she's not... upset?  Something is definitely wrong- well duh, I knew that already.

"Thank you, but that's not what I was upset about, or at least, not now anyway," her words come out all at once in a jumbled way.  "The Colony.  It was attacked by humans.  They destroyed it, they took August and the Advisors and some of the others away, the ones who didn't get captured ran away and I didn't see where."

I gape at her.

What?

The Colony-

The fairies-

"Who did you see escape?" I press.  The Light Leader has already been compromised, as have the Advisors.  Which means- "Heliux and Verity.  Did they escape?"  Shit, he had to do the panic button by himself.  He had to get the stronghold boxes out there by himself, all by himself, and I wasn't there to help him.  He has to lead that group by himself, he might have an anxiety attack.  

"I don't know," she says worriedly, a frown on her face.  My stomach drops.  What if Heliux got captured?  What if Verity did too?

What if we're the last two of the high-command fairies left?

No no, Heliux wouldn't let himself be captured.  I have to have faith in him, and in Verity.  "Valerie," I tell her, trying not to let my voice shake, "you need to come home.  We need you back at the Colony, you need to take that test."

Thank Zagan she doesn't seem opposed to the idea.  "I agree, I need to get back there and help you guys," she says, shaking her head after.  "I shouldn't have left, but it happened and we can't change it.  But-" she adds, gesturing to the eight people behind her, "I'm going to bring them too.  They want to fight for the fairies and I want them to be safe for when the war really starts."

I'm not exactly in a position to deny her request right now, we need her to come back.  "Of course.  If they-"

"You're hurt!" Valerie exclaims, proceeding to use some healing magic on my wing.  She fixes up the tear pretty quickly, although the worried expression on her face doesn't seem to leave.  "What happened?  Also, you cut your hair?" she adds, sounding a bit confused when she asks her question.

Her confusion almost makes me laugh a little.  "I cut it on the way here so it couldn't be used against me."  I decide to leave it at that.  "But I was chased, and if we're going to go back then we need to go now."

"Is your wing okay though?" she questions, running her fingers over it which makes me sliver slightly.  She glances at me when I do this, and I have to smile at her when I nod.  Despite all that's happened to break her, she still has a good heart inside.  Even if she's not worrying about me because I'm her mom, it still touches me that she worries about me at all.  She's a good person.

"We should probably turn human-sized," she think-says to me.

I agree, I return.  How does it feel talking to me telepathically?

She head-giggles at me.   "Well, this is one of the first times I've done it, so I guess it's pretty cool."  Valerie's eyes look very beautiful when they glow.  The yellow specks in them really do start to look like stars, like how we originally named her.  We smile at each other then turn human-sized which freaks out some of her friends.

"Hello," I greet them cheerfully, waving.  "My name's Layra, and I'm one of the fairies second-in-command.  I'm pleased to know that you want to come with us back to the Colony-" well, the Queen's Castle I guess because the Colony's been levelled, "- but if you'd like to come, then we need to leave right now.  Humans are going to start pounding on these doors at any second."  As if I've summoned the sound, the doors start to shake as fists beat them.  

"You're the one from the video!" exclaims the boy with fluffy dark brown hair popping up from above his visor.  Video?  What video?  Luckily Valerie looks just as confused as I am.

"There was uh... camera footage of you and another fairy in a blue suit murdering Valerie's dad," explains a girl with rather large pigtails on either side of her head.  "It kind of went viral near the beginning of this whole mess."  Both her and the boy sound rather sullen, I suppose it's because their friend just died.  My sympathies go out to them all, especially Red.  Leaf was his girlfriend, after all.

Wait, so Heliux and I... oh no.  "So you're Valerie's fairy mom?" questions the aqua-haired girl, and if I was eating something I'd definitely choke on it.  So they must've assumed I was because of the video... they're smart.  Trust Valerie to make smart friends.

"Kriiiiisss!" exclaims Valerie as the pounding gets louder.  It's a little amusing to see how flustered she is.  "Stoppp!"  

"You didn't answer the question-"

"Open up, you're under arrest!" comes a loud, clearly female, voice from the outside of the house.  I roll my eyes at the officer's attempt.  We're not even being held at gunpoint?  Is this how soft the police are these days?  I guess that's a good thing for us, but jeez.  If the police from my time were here, we'd already be dead because this house would be up in flames.

"Yes, she's my mom," Valerie snaps before promptly opening a portal.  "Now go through, we need to escape from here."  This is the second time she's called me that, I think, but there's no time to get deeper into it.  Like she said, it's time to get out of here.

One by one her friends enter through the portal.  Valerie insists on pushing me through first, and after I come out the other side I'm greeted with a rather... quiet forest.  I can tell clearly from my surroundings that we're in the fairy side of the forest, but although I can tell that there's been some tampering, the greenery looks relatively untouched.

I don't even want to imagine what the Colony looks like, I shiver, still feeling immensely guilty for not being there to help Heliux.  He had to do it all by himself without the benefit of having an experienced Leader there.  Plus, his own Leader got taken.  I know him, I know he's beating himself up over it.

Valerie comes through a second later and closes the portal behind us.  "This is the closest spot I could teleport us to," she tells me, and I nod.  Her friends look confused, so she explains further.  "There's about a half an hour walk to get to the Castle.  There's no way we can go to the Colony now, besides, there'll probably still be humans there.  Even if we don't know where people are, our best bet is to make our base the Castle."

Something inside me always smiles when Valerie's inner strength and leadership skills break through to the surface.  "We shouldn't waste any time either," I tell them all.  "We need to get there as soon as we possibly can, Valerie needs to take a very important test, and we need to find the rest of the fairies."

I'm met by nine nods, one of them being more grave than the others.

I know she's worried about August, but clearly something else is troubling her.  She doesn't have the same aura about her after she left the Colony in the first place.

I'm worried about Heliux.  I can't... I can't lose him, especially knowing that he is the one with the three stronghold boxes.  We've been apart so much and I can't go through with that anymore.

Just the thought of him being captured or in trouble is enough to make my legs walk that little bit faster.

~~~~~~~~~~

At last we arrive at the Castle, that thirty minute walk being stretched out to the point where it felt like were walking for days.  We had to move slow to avoid the many humans that were still in the area, and since the humans we have with us can't fly, it's a problem.  I hope Heliux has been okay without me, I've been gone a long time so I have a feeling that he's getting worried... especially with what happened to the Colony.

I go up and knock three times hard on the door, desperate for anyone to open it.  The Castle looks untouched by human hands, because if they could do what they did to the entire Colony, one castle is nothing.

Thankfully Reza opens the door.  "Thank goodness," he says when he sees Valerie and I, although his eyes grow a little wary when he spots the eight other humans standing with us.

"They're friends," Valerie tells him quickly.  "They're allies.  We can trust them."

"Okay..." Reza clearly is unsure, but he opens the door anyway.  I rush inside, doing a quick scan of everyone in the entrance foyer.  There are a lot of fairies huddled here, so thank goodness Heliux and Verity- I can see her- helped everyone escape... wait.

Heliux.

I don't see him.

Where is he?

I begin to panic.  No.  Zagan tell me he didn't sacrifice himself for them, because I know he would do that.  One hundred percent he would do that.

My footsteps are quick as I run up to Verity.  "Verity," I pant, and she turns.  The new Leader gives me a quick hug, clearly relieved to see me.  

"Thank Zagan," she says in a relieved tone (wow, who would've guessed?), and lets go of the hug.  "Did you- oh," she breaks off, clearly answering her own question as she spots Valerie enter the building alongside her human friends.  For a brief moment out of the corner of my eye I spot Calem panic briefly and hide.  

"Verity, where is Heliux?  He made it here with you, right?"  Please please please please.

Thankfully she promptly nods her head.  "Yes, he's... um, somewhere in the Castle.  Strange, I thought he was here with the others," she says, growing confused when she also can't spot him.  "Please go find him, he has all those boxes with him."

He rescued the boxes too, of course he did.  I love him so much.  "I will," I tell her quickly and run off.  I feel like I've been using my powers a lot today, but once again my eyes begin to burn as I search for his soul.  It doesn't take that long to spot, but he's alone and that only signals one thing to me.  

He's having an anxiety attack.

I'm about to run to him to calm him down, but a voice stops me when it calls my name.  "Layra."

As I turn around, I'm met with a pair of sparkling rose-coloured eyes.

"Alara."

Yes this chapter was shorter I apologize, but it was nice for a change to write in Layra's POV.  I hope you enjoyed her wittiness, especially near the beginning XD.  Despite its length, I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

As of now, everyone (well except the captured fairies) is united at the castle.  The events with Val have finally caught up to where the fairies ended off in chapter 31, so I hope that was clear-ish for you.  Let me know your thoughts!

Anyway, I'm going to head to bed now because it is currently 12:10 AM when I am first writing this chapter... so that's been fun.  Catch you next week with a very important chapter... the initiation of Valerie's first test.