Hi everyone, SK here.

So this was originally going to be a part of chapter 36, but it was WAY too long so I split it up.

Anyway, let's just continue, shall we?  I hope you enjoy.

!!! WARNINGS: Bad Language

Valerie

The pain in my chest has only worsened since gaining the Earth Element and losing Rosa. Goddammit she was smiling even as she was left behind. My shoulders still tremble when I remember the sound I heard when the portal closed, the sound of rocks falling behind her.

Now I have to say goodbye to yet another one of my friends. Ethan of course, and Star. I've grown to like her witty personality and I'm going to miss her, and I'm in disbelief that Ethan wanted to stop here. He probably doesn't want to face the wrath of the other stages, I realize with a stab of guilt.

Brendan walks up to his best friend and sorrowfully hugs him close for a few moments before letting go. "We'll see you on the other side," he says to the person that could be his brother at this point. "Promise."

"Promise," returns Ethan to Brendan as I go up hug him. My eyes are still hurting quite a bit from this stage, as is my skin. I feel blinded to the point where everything I look at might as well be covered in sun spots, and my skin feels like it was roasted over a fire... and I have the sinking feeling that that's what's coming in a future stage.

"Star..." I my voice trails away when I look at the now-dying Spirit Soldier.

She just gives me that signature Star-smile of hers. "Don't worry, I'll take care of your friend here," she assures me. "You just hop on to the next stage, will ya? Just promise me one thing though, Valerie," she adds suddenly, her gaze darkening. "Living for as long as you will gets... rather boring. Be sure to find ways to laugh every single day." A smirk returns to her face. "Why do you think I teased your father so much? His reactions always make me laugh- I think they make everyone laugh. Laughs are important, and you'll see that the longer you live." Star shakes her head, letting out a small huffy sigh. "I'm keeping you, aren't I." She drags Ethan back into the white abyss of blinding sunlight. "Go claim your Element."

Before I can respond to any of that, both Star and Ethan disappear from view, Star for the final time. I let out a sigh of my own, and my feet wobble as I walk up yet another flight of stairs. My friends are tired themselves yet they still find it in their hearts to prop me up. My heart hurts when I think about the fact that after each stage, there will be one less of each of them. The Light Element sits in front of me, lime green waves pulsing from it in an almost electric-like fashion.

Bracing myself for the pain, I reach my fingers out and bite my lip hard to repress my scream- some of it escapes though. The Element of Light pulses through me as I fall to my knees. Everyone is by my side in an instant. "I'm okay," I tell them, even though I am clearly not okay and they know that. "We... need to keep going."

"We can take a break, no?" Brendan questions, but I shake my head.

"I claimed the Element," I remind him almost sadly. "Which means in a few seconds-" as if I've summoned it, a portal to the next stage opens up and swallows us inside. My eyes don't know how to process going from blinding light to blinding darkness. The entire stage is pitch-black.

"GUYS? GUYS!?" Kris shouts loudly, and I know her well enough to predict that she's flailing her arms out wildly searching for us. One of said arms hits me and after a small "ow" escapes me, she finds my hand and grabs it strongly. More footsteps ring out beside me, although their sound makes it seem like they're walking on glass.

"So I'm sure you're wondering how this stage works," comes the mysterious voice of Mlm. I can't see her, but I'm just going to assume that she's there.

"How are we going to see in the dark?" asks Brendan almost a little fearfully.

All of a sudden a small ember lights up, that light belonging to a lantern held by Mlm. A sly smile is on her face as her eyes light up. "You won't." She begins to walk away with the warm light source in hand, the blackness once again returning. After taking a few steps away, she pauses, and turns back to us.

"Search for the light in the darkness, if the darkness doesn't suffocate you first."

~~~~~~~~~~

The Light Minister glances back at his partner in shock. "What!?" he exclaims sharply. "WHAT!?"  This Queen, no, he cannot call her a Queen anymore.  Not if she has betrayed her people.  Heliux knows better than most what qualities a good ruler should have, and this Queen... why, she reminds him of his father.

Layra returns his expression with a warning look. "Ssh," she whispers. "None of the other fairies know, and I don't want them to find out because of you shouting."

"My apologies," he mutters, pinching his brow. Heliux lets out a sigh, feeling utterly defeated. He's had to witness yet another one of the people he's held close become tainted, become corrupted. "How long have you known?"

"Not long." Layra is quick to assure him of that. "I was going to tell you earlier, but you didn't seem in the state for it..." she trails off, letting the unsaid hang in the air.

Heliux grunts, beginning to feel slightly uncomfortable of the mention to his breakdown. "What has she done?"

The Dark Minister pauses, thinking to herself. "I... don't actually know." Heliux glances at her, clearly shocked as Layra is usually the type to question someone until they crack. "I wanted to get to you as quickly as possible, so I didn't get a chance to ask her."

"What did she say exactly?"

"All she said was that she was our enemy," Layra replies, tilting her head as she thinks. "This gives us two possibilities: one, she's allied with the humans, or two-"

"- she's a potential third party in this conflict," finishes Heliux, now also in deep thought himself. "We need to talk to her, but Alara easily knows how to lie and manipulate others by now. You could technically read her thoughts, but there is no doubt in my mind that she would put us on a wrong path by thinking something obscure. Dammit!" The Light Minister pulls at his hair feeling frustrated, but then a small ding! hits his ears. Both Ministers turn just in time to see the third gem light up, meaning that Valerie has just passed the third stage.

"Next is Darkness," the Dark Minister whispers. She shakes her head, trying to clear her clearly-worried thoughts. "Go talk to her Heliux, try and get something from her. I'm going to watch the torches myself, and I'll come and find you if anything goes wrong."

"Alright..." He's uncertain, but by now he's learned that Layra is one of the most trustworthy people he knows and he can rely on her for absolutely anything. In a flourish he exists the throne room and, using his Elemental powers, makes his way to the traitor that is his Queen.

~~~~~~~~~~

My mind is still reeling from that last stage, and the fact that I had to say goodbye to yet another one of my friends. I will forever have trauma of that black abyss, I was trapped, we were all trapped. Constant searching and more searching and there was no way out, we were all trapped there while Pokemon like Darkrai and Yveltal only made things worse. All I could see over and over was black, endless darkness, and it shook me to my core. Even climbing this set of stairs now I'm still shaking, I never want to see that place again, even in (especially in) my nightmares.

Lo and behold the Element of Darkness is sitting there. My fingers still tremble, we're all shaken up from that stage and the tearful goodbye we had to say to Brendan. I don't know what will happen to him from there.

"Valerie, wait a moment," calls out Hilbert before I can take in the Darkness. He gently lowers my arm. "Just rest for a moment. Take a break."

"No, I can't," I snap at him unintentionally as I pull my arm away. "We can't. The fairies are all depending on us and... you saw the look on Brendan's face. Look at us. There's only five of us left including me. We have to finish quickly so this pain can end... for all of us." I give them all a hard look, knowing that they've all been through the same shit as I have- at least in this test.

"If you're so certain..." Hilbert trails away now. "Do you know what the next stage is?"

"Life, but it's all water, so we're back at a stage that requires physical effort." Bracing myself for the pain, I reach out and claim the Element of Darkness. A tremor makes its way through my body and my spine feels like it's going to split in two.

The next portal is quick to open, and once again we find ourselves falling.

This time, we fall right into what seems like an endless ocean. I'll admit, the feeling of the cooling water around me does feel quite nice. I can't really hold my breath for that long, but when I try to swim up an ocean current pushes all of us down toward the depths of the sea. Panic fills me, is the stage of Life an instant death trap!?

Sylkie swims up from out of nowhere and takes a deep breath to signal to us that yes, in fact, we can breathe. Relief replaces the panic as I inhale, and I calm down just a little. "You can breathe," she says, "for now at least." There's a glint in her eye that I don't like but it disappears pretty quickly. "Anyway, so you're who's left. Are you ready?"

Why would you ask us that, there's literally no way for us to escape? "Yes," answers Hilbert before I can. "What do we have to do in this stage?"

"You'll have to find your way to the surface and find me," she explains. "But, the thing is, you only have one chance. If you arrive to the surface and I'm not where you come up, then that's the end for you!" her voice sounds sickly sweet as she says that line, and I gulp. "You'll get a clue though. You need to write with a pen of the sea."

With a flick of her wrist the ocean current kicks in again, this time pushing us further and further to the bottom of the sea. Strangely, there's no Pokemon living in the water, it's completely empty.  Wow, way to be unsettling. When we hit the bottom with the lightest of thuds, a wave of pain spreads through me, starting at my chest. I grind my teeth as the extra Elements are trying to make me hurl.

"Valerie?" Hilda's uncertain voice comes out as a bubbly burble. "You okay?"

"Yeah. Let's get swimming," I tell her unexcitedly. Everything hurts and I'm only halfway (well, not halfway, I claimed four and there's five more), my head is starting to spin and though I can tell that Sylkie relieved some of the water pressure, my ears are beginning to pound. Swimming also sucks when you're a fairy apparently, I'm just learning. Wings are good for flying but they're the complete opposite for swimming. They're slowing me down immensely.

Kris notices my slowness and grabs my hand. Hilda grabs my other side, and when the guys notice all five of us become linked and swim together.

Please, please let this be over quickly.

~~~~~~~~~~

Heliux strides over to the Queen's private chambers and loudly knocks on the door. "Alara," he calls, no longer using the title of "Your Majesty" because in his eyes, she does not deserve it anymore. A monarch must be loyal to their kingdom, a monarch must protect their people, a monarch must give up everything for their kingdom and people to thrive. He knows these principles first hand, and now he realizes something is scaring him. Alara is turning into the monster that was his father, and he is going to do everything in his power to not let it happen.

"Come in." Her voice is distant and he practically throws the door open and enters.

"What is this," he seethes, "that Layra tells me about you betraying us." He doesn't ask it as a question, because there is no question about her allegiance.

"I'm your enemy, yes," she says. Alara is sitting on her bed, looking at her nails. The Queen looks incredibly bored for someone who is about to face the wrath of Heliux Lithius. "That's what I told her."

Heliux is doing everything not to lose it at this very second, after all, he needs the facts first. "What have you done against us?"  He looks at the rose-coloured eyes staring back at him, those eyes looking utterly dead.  When he looks at her, he doesn't see Alara.  He sees his father come back from the dead, and that very idea is messing with his mind.

"Well, I started this whole war in the first place." She counts on her fingers. "I said I made Valerie perform that spell for a reason, didn't I? I knew it would backfire, and you and your wife helped greatly by killing that guy. I made Valerie force you to let Serena die, because she knew what would happen if she didn't... me. I would've happened. I plotted with the humans behind your backs- I also told them to come for the Colony and to capture some of the fairies. Oh, and the last thing, I triggered your panic attack." She glances at the Light Minister unapologetically, and the "sorry" that comes after is as dry as can be.  

"What would you have done? Killed everyone?" Heliux is angry, rightfully so. "What would you have done if peace was signed?"  This woman is just like his father, he knows it.  Everything she's done, especially about the panic attacks, his father has also done.  The familiarity is beginning to make him wonder whether his father's spirit really did come back from the grave to haunt him and his family.

"I would've made everyone suffer, let's leave it at that."

The Light Minister is angry. This Queen, no, not this Queen, this person made his daughter do these terrible things and manipulated her because she was vulnerable. This person triggered the bad memories from his past. This person made perfectly good fairies get taken by the humans, including August- his Leader who is suffering so much already due to the death of his parents. This person forced two perfectly good people to die early.  Most of all, he is angry that there was another person like the corrupted king that was his father, and like his father, he did nothing to stop it.

"How dare you still think you are worthy of that Staff?" he questions, pointing to said Staff that is laying at the base of her bed. "How dare you do these things? Why? Why must you do this?" Heliux wants to smite her into the sun, but that won't look good in the eyes of the other fairies... at least, not until the truth is told.

Alara looks at him. "You must have felt it at one point, haven't you? You're immortal, even more than I am. You must have tried all sorts of things, or at least wanted to, right? This is what I'm doing. I'm going to die soon anyway, it won't matter. I won't have to suffer the consequences, and for once, I wanted to try being the unrighteous Queen. I wanted to know how it feels."

"And how does it feel?"

To his disgust, she smiles. "It doesn't feel as bad as I thought it would, but you didn't answer my question. I know you and Layra have done immoral things before."

Heliux has to be honest with himself, while he's certainly thought about the possibility, he would never go through with something that would actually hurt other fairies. He has killed before, but that's beside the point. "You sicken me," he says through gritted teeth instead of answering. "Alara."

The Light Minister walks out the door as his blood begins to boil. What kind of Queen would do that? Heliux liked Alara, he had good memories of her. He knows that deep down, she is a good person, but that doesn't answer the question as to why she's doing this.

He quickly rejoins Layra in the main hall, and to his astonishment, both the fourth and fifth gems have began to glow. He shivers at the thought of his daughter being on the stage of Warmth, where fire is her enemy.

Layra looks back at him and smiles. "Four left to go," she says optimistically, but her smile fades when she sees Heliux's expression. "What happened? What did she tell you?"

"That woman," he answers through gritted teeth, "manipulated our daughter into causing a war between humans and fairies, and forced her to let Serena die because if not, Alara would have killed them all herself. She told the humans to come for the Colony and to capture some of the fairies. It was her, all her."

It only takes an instant for Layra's eyes to harden, and her hands curl into fists. "No one hurts our daughter," she mutters angrily. "No one gets to burn down the Colony and get away with it either." Both of them are angry, but alas, unlike with that wretched old man, they cannot murder Alara. Alara will stay alive until Valerie completes her Queen's tests, and even though Layra is a literal grim reaper, nothing can be done.

This doesn't stop both Ministers for wanting revenge against the Queen who has fallen off her throne.

~~~~~~~~~~

"Hilda," I gasp out, my hair scorched and my skin burned, "I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry." Hilda, in fact, just almost died. I made a mistake and she almost fell into the lava, but luckily Volcanion rescued her just in time... yet she still wants to stay at this stage. I'm so done. I'm done with this. I want to be done. My whole body hurts and my head hurts and my heart hurts, I'm leaving my friends here, I'm a monster.  Nate, Rosa, Ethan, Brendan, Hilbert, and now her.

She smiles at me. "Me and Hiro will take it from here, don't worry," she says, waving goodbye as the ever-so-silent Hiro takes her away toward the pool of lava she almost died from. Part of me knows what's about to happen but I don't even want to think it.

I step through the portal, climb the stairs, same old same old. I collapse at the top step, and both Red and Kris, the last two people remaining, have to help and pull me up. I push back pained tears as I reach for yet another Element, Warmth this time, and bite my lip so hard it bleeds when the pain only gets worse.

"Storm is next," I manage to say even though my chest feels like it's on fire... or maybe that's my brain trying to recreate what just happened in the previous stage. "Storm- storm is nex-"

"We've got you," says Kris, clearly unnerved by my current stage- state. State! Dammit, my mind is going insane if it wasn't already, I don't think I can do this. "You can do this." Wow Kris, did you read my thoughts or something? I thought that was only me and my mom who could do that.

"We'll get you through," Red reassures.

"But the ninth stage-"

"Worry about it when you get there." Red knows as well as I do that there's only two of them left while there are three more stages, something is up. "For now-"

Of course he's cut off by the next portal opening, and we're thrown violently into a windblown stage, this one being kind of a combination between the Air, Earth, Darkness, and Fire stages.

So basically, with the exception of the first one, the worst stages.

"Welcome!" the winds are high again here, and Brooklyn has to raise her voice to a shout for us to be able to hear. "You four alright?"

There's three, I want to say, but now's not the time-

"There's three of us," Kris deadpans, and this makes me almost want to laugh. Almost.

Brooklyn snickers. "Sure, if that's what you want to believe. Anyway, there's no sense in checking that you're ready since you're already here-" THANK YOU FOR MAKING SENSE BROOKLYN! "- so I'm just going to start. This stage is filled with deadly thunderstorms, cyclones, tsunamis, earthquakes- I think you get the idea. You're on the third-last stage, Valerie. From here on out, things will be difficult..."

"Here is your clue. You need to find me where all the storms meet for tea."

In a flash the shortest Spirit Soldier disappears, leaving Kris, Red and I stranded with me about to crumple.

~~~~~~~~~~

While half the fairies are worrying for their soon-to-be Queen, the other half are worrying for their lives.

Their cages were all stacked up against each other, the cage holding the Light Leader sitting at the top closest to the window. He hates it. August hates how he is blessed with the sun while the rest of the fairies, the fairies he's supposed to be leading, his fairies, are drowning in fear and darkness.

He also knows how easy it would be for them to escape, but August knows that it would do more harm than good. One, the humans easily out-number them. Two, the humans already know how to access their forest. August knows where the other fairies must be hiding (at the Castle, where else would they go?), and he does not want to risk the humans going to tear apart the forest and finding the Castle by mistake. If every other fairy got captured, he would never be able to forgive himself.

The humans don't feed them, or give them water. Why would they? The humans, for all they know, think that fairies can just magically craft food. While that's true to some extent, food crafted solely by magic always tastes awful, even when it's created by a chef like Mallow.

They don't have any other choice, and they've been making it work.

August knows they're all scared, and he doesn't know how to fix it.

All of a sudden a small jingling sound fills the air, and the fairies turn to see a human fumbling with a set of keys. She unlocks the cell door and briskly walks up to the cage housing August and a few other fairies. The human gruffly picks it up, and August is quick to shush the fairies who are all crying out for him, Mallow, Lillie, and Clemont.

"Lance wants to speaks with you," she begins in a cryptic voice, and August gets a sinking feeling that his mother's killer is going to be his killer too.

~~~~~~~~~~

Brooklyn watches as Valerie's friend Kris is battered by the storms with a stone-faced expression. She never thought that she'd be in this place, the watcher instead of the person who is in those storms, but here she is. Brooklyn is going to die within a few moments, and although her death will not be as violent as that, she is getting a taste of the future. She's never really liked death, including killing, which is why deep inside she is horrified by the thought of this child dying to her storms... but it is the cycle. Brooklyn knows that one day, this girl will be watching another person be torn apart by these very winds.

The storms subside after a final fatal lightning strike, leaving a battered body on the now-bloodied earth. Brooklyn steps up to the body and takes a deep breath as she prepares herself to say the words that will send herself to her grave.

Legendary Pokemon watch from the side, but do not dare interfere with one of the most sacred of rituals. Brooklyn touches her finger to the Elemental tattoo on her face, and whispers a last goodbye in her thoughts.

"I formally appoint this girl to be the new Spirit Soldier of Storm."

She touches her finger, now alight with magic the colour of lightning, to Kris's cheek and watches her tattoo transfer from herself to her replacement. Kris begins to wake up just as Brooklyn feels herself falling asleep.

One billion years are finally coming to an end for all of them, and Brooklyn has a smile on her face as her long-awaited death finally meets her.

~~~~~~~~~~

"I can't-"

"Yes, you can," insists Red. We're in the Cold stage, climbing what must be a fucking everlasting mountain or something, it's so long and my whole body is numb. I want to die right here and right now. This is torture. I want it to end, I won't make it. "I'm helping you up."

The former Champion is a little bit ahead of me, but still reaches out his clearly-tired arm to lend me a hand. Together, we climb the last of the mountain... albeit very slowly. Red and I can't ask Legendaries for help either; Glastrier already brought us both to the mountain, and it said that we need to climb it ourselves.

Almost... there... I think, and I force myself to grab the last ledge. Red has already made it to the top, looking about drenched in sweat and ready to die himself. Still though, he offers a steady hand to me and pulls me up the final ledge. Luna is waiting at the top, and the portal to the flight of stairs is already open.

"Go on," Red insists. "You only have one stage left, and then we'll all be free."

"I'll take care of him from here," Luna assures me calmly, even though I know what's going to happen to him. "Go claim the Element."

"Red, I can't thank you enough-" he cuts me off.

"Yes, I helped, but that is just me being human. Go!" he insists, sounding awfully pushy. I know he's trying to be encouraging but jeez... I really don't want to leave him here on top of this mountain of silver.

I take a step toward the portal and pause, turning back to the person who's saved my life so many times within the past couple hours. "Red... why? Why did you volunteer to do this, knowing that you wouldn't be able to live your life ever again? Why? Just tell me."

Luna is already in the process of taking him away, but he mournfully shouts back this at me.

"Because you meant everything to Leaf, and I failed to protect her. I... I won't fail to protect you too."

My feet step onto the stairs and the portal closes behind me. Alone this time I trudge up the stairs, each step making me want to end it all even more. My bones feel like they've broken and mended themselves at least ten times during these test stages, and now my head his hurting because I'm alone and there's still one more stage.

Feeling absolutely done, I reach out and claim the Element of Cold. A stinging frosty sensation forces its way through my veins as I shiver and cry out. My chest hurts, everything hurts, and I cry, clutching my arms in an attempt to keep them warm after the grueling frozen wasteland took its tole on me.

However, it's this cold that suddenly shocks my brain into realizing the truth. All the Spirit Soldiers could see this mysterious ninth person, and we couldn't. Well, I could, if they hadn't blocked my Spirit powers...

My eyes burn and I pray that it isn't true, but l see her.

My breath hitches.

I bite my lip.

I scream at her as I cry even thinking of the thought.

She gave up her afterlife for me.

She gave up the most peaceful days in her existence for me.

My fingers tremble, not just from having all these extra Elements.

"Leaf," I sob, "why?"

Valerie has passed through all of the stages except the last one, Time.

Just like Air I'll be going over this one in full detail... and let's just say that if you have questions about Valerie's past... or pasts, they will be answered.

Stay tuned for next week!  I hope you enjoyed this chapter. :)