Darkness. That was what I wanted. That was what I created. Yet now, after all these centuries, someone has appeared who threatened my perfect world of grey. Someone who should not exist; a creature with no innate elemental abilities, an animal that calls itself a "human". A species whose existence is the unnatural result of the world I created.

When I stopped time, the pokemon of the past were frozen in darkness. A darkness they despised. That despair created something I had not expected, nor have a name for. It was a crystal of pure negativity even I could not bear. Shortly after it appeared, the pokemon of that time ceased to exist, and new ones took their place. But these new pokemon were different; many lacked the elemental traits monsters were known for. These typeless creatures, known now as animals, are a plague to me. Most are too weak to pose a threat, but some have managed to create their own magic that rivals that of monsters. And one of those special animals found Celebi.

That pink, time traveling nuisance, one of the few Pokemon who survived the destruction of time, and the only one to remember the colors of the past. Her stories have convinced the humans to oppose my world of darkness. One particular human, a user of weak Mystic magic, found a way to prevent time from stopping, to bring color back to this world.

I cannot have that.

So now I hide in the cover of darkness. Without the flow of time, Celebi's powers are limited. If she wants to use time travel, she will have to come to this place sooner or later. When she does, I'll attack, and that will be the end of it. With Celebi gone there will be no one left who threatens my world.

"Are you sure this is going to work?" Grovyle asked me. He was such a pessimist, always questioning my ideas. Surely he should trust me more. We are a team, aren't we?

"Of course it will work," I heard someone answer for me, speaking in a variation of the ancient Knownun language. A human named Brandon, a Mystic magic user capable of seeing visions of the past. "Two psychics can't both be wrong, can we?"

The other psychic Brandon was referring to is me, Celebi. "No way!" I responded, "My time travel has never failed me before, and I know your visions to be accurate. Grovyle just needs to loosen up, we're almost there now."

Grovyle didn't seem to like my comment. "If you are so confident that the past can be changed, then where are our enemies? Surely you know they will be setting an ambush for us," he retorted.

"I doubt that," I replied, "No one even knows we are going to the past, aside from a few humans who support our cause. And what's this about enemies? The only pokemon who oppose us are Darkrai and Dialga, everyone else is on our side. If we were in danger, Brandon would have had a vision of us getting attacked, right?"

To that Brandon gave an answer I did not want to hear. "Not necessarily. My visions are extremely limited, and while they have never been proven wrong, we can't assume anything from a lack of a vision. Maybe we are safe, maybe we'll be attacked. Regardless, we should stay on guard, especially you two. Even with my light band, I'm not much of a fighter."

'That's an understatement,' I thought. In addition to Mystic, Brandon could also use Light magic. Unfortunately, he lacked any sort of skill with magic. Aside from his unique Dimensional Scream spell, he had almost no control over his mana. The light band was made specifically to help him focus Light magic, which has more combat potential than the Mystic element, but he is still limited to simple bursts of light to defend himself. It certainly isn't enough to compensate for his natural frailty. Still, as long as Grovyle and I stayed battle ready, we should be able to protect one human.

"Speaking of light, think you could do something with your magic? This place is so dark I can barely see. I can't even imagine how you're faring." Grovyle complained to Brandon. Until now we had traveled in darkness to avoid attracting Darkrai's attention, relying on Grovyle's superior vision to guide us. Brandon and I have been completely blind for a while now, and to be honest I welcomed the white glow of Light magic.

Seems I wasn't the only one. Despite his warning to stay on guard, Brandon didn't hesitate to conjure a sphere of light around his hand. "That's strange…" I said as I finally saw my surroundings. "The passage of time is just up ahead; it shouldn't be this dark here-" The sinister sound of a Dark Pulse interrupted me. I dodged the attack only to be plunged into darkness.

A moment later we were illuminated by the green light of Grovyle's Energy Ball. In this new light I saw the cause of the previous blackout: the Dark Pulse I avoided hit Brandon, disrupting his concentration on his lighting spell. As Grovyle's attack flew in the direction we were attacked from Brandon struggled to refocus his magic. Still, we were lucky he was able to survive the attack. Humans are hard enough to protect when they're conscious, he'd be a total liability if the Dark Pulse knocked him out.

"I told you Darkrai would be here!" Grovyle shouted, readying his Leaf Blade.

"I know you did, just focus on surviving! If we get through that portal up ahead, there will be nothing Darkrai can do to stop us!" I responded, unleashing a Magical Leaf attack to locate our shadowy enemy. To my surprise, my attack veered sharply upward before disappearing. 'He's right above us? Worse yet, he didn't even react to getting hit? Just how strong is he?'

"Was that feeble attack all you could manage, Celebi?" Darkrai taunted. Before I could respond, I found myself trapped in a void portal, unable to escape. I began to panic, knowing that this was Darkrai's signature Dark Void attack. He planned to kill me in my sleep!

A moment later the void portal faded, and I was still awake. More than that, I could see again. Brandon must have refocused his magic as I was attacked. With a bit of focus, I could detect his Mind Lock spell was currently active on all three of us, preventing Dark Void's sleep effect. A short distance in front of me, Grovyle's Leaf Blade crashed against Darkrai's Shadow Claw.

"Blind!" I heard Brandon shout as he cast another spell. Suddenly, a ball of white light formed and burst around Darkrai's head. "Celebi! We have to get through the passage of time now!"

"I know! You and Grovyle run to the portal and wait for me to calibrate it to the correct time. I'll tell you when to go through." Darkrai wouldn't stay blinded for long, I had to focus my power quickly…

Darkrai knew this too. "Do you really think you can escape? No matter where or when you go, I will hunt you down! I will never let you destroy the darkness I worked so hard to create!" As he spoke Darkrai constantly traveled through void portals, no doubt trying to locate or distract me.

"The portal's ready, go through-" I was cut off as a Dark Pulse sent me reeling.

"Celebi! Are you okay?" the others asked, clearly worried.

"Just go! Hurry!" I shouted back, "Don't worry about me, nobody can catch me. I'll be fine!" As I began to recover from the attack I saw Brandon dragging Grovyle through the portal. "Ha! You'll never get them now, Darkrai. They're already in the past!" I exclaimed in triumph, looking around to face my foe… until I realized Darkrai wasn't here. 'Wait, where is he? Darkrai should be attacking me right now, unless…' in an instant I knew where Darkrai went: into the portal, after my friends.

Celebi is certainly a fool. Did she really think I would stay behind to fight her and let these two escape to the past? I knew she didn't have the strength to follow us now, as long as I finished the Grovyle and human quickly I could kill Celebi later. For now, I just needed to follow my enemies and attack when they least expected it.

Suddenly, the passage of time began to fade away, and at its end I saw a vicious thunderstorm. "Just hold on, don't let go!" That was Grovyle's voice. Following the sound, I saw my targets struggling in the ocean the portal had let out in. This was my chance. They were in no position to defend themselves; they didn't even know I was there. I prepared my Shadow Claw and flew toward my prey, reaching the pair just after the storm forced them apart. That's just great, now I could only attack one of them. Still, this made the human an easy target. I adjusted my flight and landed a devastating blow on his head. My victim immediately lost consciousness and fell below the waves.

"Brandon! Where are you? What happened? Brandon!" Evidently Grovyle hadn't seen me. Perfect, I'll let the waves soften him up before I attack. The second Grovyle reached dry land, he was doomed.