"Mama, read us a story!" a small girl with black hair in a low ponytail cried out as she tumbled onto her mother's bed. The mother with long hair of the same shade and pale blue eyes smiled. She was fairly young for a mother of three, only twenty-eight years old. She closed her book of poetry, putting it aside, and leaned over the six-year-old.

"A story, Aini?" the woman asked with a teasing smile at the young girl. Her eldest child of eight years, a girl named Celina, hopped up on her hands and knees, grinning.

"I want a romantic story!" she cried out.

"A story? But isn't it bedtime for you three?" she asked as the woman stood, getting off the bed as she walked over to where her son was. She tapped her chin thoughtfully, faking ignorance as to his whereabouts, until she heard silent giggling. She ducked down, pulling up on the blanket and grinning. "Gotcha, Iri!" she exclaimed as her hand grasped a little ankle and dragged him out, laughing and kicking his other leg.

"Story, Mama, story!" She bent over and picked up her little boy, three years old. She pried a plastic action figure from his grasp, she carried him over to the queen sized bed, plopping him down with his sisters.

"What about bedtime? What kind of mother would be if I let you stay up past your bedtime?"

"The best kind!" the exclaimed in union. She sighed. How could she deny such cute faces?

"Alright, then." she leaned back in the pillows, smiling. "Once Upon a time..."

"No Mom!" Celina cried out. "Tell it different!"

"Different?"

"Tell us a story about... um..."

"Blue and Green!"

"Blue and Green?" she repeated, blinking. Slowly, she smiled, thinking about the two dexholders she briefly met when she and her husband had been invited to White's wedding a few years back. Blue was a bridesmaid, the one who kept teasing the bride and groom about their nervousness. Green, if she recalled, was in the audience, holding onto the hand of an equally loud and mischievous daughter.

"Alright, then." she smiled. "Blue and Green it is."

o.0.o.0.o

The Monster and the Thief

Once upon a Pokéball, there was a handsome prince who ruled over a small amount of villages in the mountains. While being handsome was good and all, the prince was very cold and very selfish. His subjects very much hated him, so much that they loathed the color that was his namesake, green.

Prince Green Oak saw his subjects as obstacles in the way of gaining power, and he was more than willing to plow them down in order the achieve what he wanted.

One cold and snowy night, Prince Green was watching as his servants were setting up the Christmas decorations. He planned on throwing a huge ball in order to invite the rich from neighboring villages with hopes of impressing and discussing business deals and land negotiations. Only the best of the best would attend.

"Sir," the captain of his guards, Red, said, approaching him. "A woman has come selling roses."

"Send her away, we don't need any roses." Prince Green responded coldly, not taking his eyes off of Sapphire, one of his maids who was known for her... anger issues... as she carried a box of ornaments towards some of his other maids. Red nodded, turned on his heel, and left, only to return a few short moments later.

"She refuses to leave until she speaks with you directly, sir."

Green sighed in annoyance, running a hand down his face. He honestly did not have the time to deal with such trivial problems, but if he had to go and directly greet the woman in order to get rid of her, so be it.

Red led him through the corridors of his lavishly decorated castle until they reached the front foyer. He raised an annoyed eyebrow at the snow that littered the rugs. Slowly, his gaze moved up to a little old woman hunched over, cloak covering her form, a covered basket in her grasp. He narrowed his eyes at his head Chef, Diamond, feeding her one of the Poffins he had made with his elder sister, Daisy, standing beside her with a small smile on her face. Had he not told him those were exclusively for the guests of the ball?

The woman's head shifted upwards to look at him. Diamond glanced over his shoulder with a bright grin, Daisy offering a wave.

"Hi, sir!" he said cheerfully. Green closed his eyes, brow furrowed in irritation.

"Step away from the woman." he said. "Had I not told you specifically those were for those attending the ball? Don't go giving them to beggars."

"But-"

"Diamond." he said sharply. The young man gulped, then stepped back.

"Sorry sir." he murmured, moving to stand beside Red.

"You didn't have to be so harsh." Daisy murmured, taking her stand beside him.

"It doesn't matter. I'm the master of the house." Green responded curtly.

"The prince, I presume?" a raspy old voice asked.

"I am." Green said, turning his attention back to the old woman. He watched with mild interest as she shuffled into her basket and pulled out a single red rose, holding it up to him.

"Buy a flower from she who is most unfortunate?"

"I have no need for your useless flowers." Green responded coldly.

"Green!" Daisy chastised.

"I see..." she tucked the rose away. "Would you at least offer a room to this old, frail woman? A blizzard is on the horizon, and I fear I won't make it to morning if I travel in this weather."

"I don't know what I should be more insulted by." Green said, crossing his arms. "The fact that you came hobbling here trying to sell me useless roses or the fact that you had the audacity to ask for room and board." he turned to Red. "Get her out of my sight."

"Green!" Daisy exclaimed in horror. Green glared at her.

"You hold no power here. As the eldest male, I reign supreme over you." he stated coldly. As much as he adored his older sister, she needed to know her place.

Green turned as Red stepped forward, an obviously uncomfortable look on his face as he tried to gently take the old woman out of the castle. Diamond looked like he wanted to say something, but simply bowed his head in submission. Suddenly, he heard Red cry out and saw his lead knight fly past him, landing painfully into a wall. Diamond let out a gasp of awe as Daisy screamed.

"Red?!" he exclaimed, looking from the unconscious knight to the old woman behind him. But instead of a hunched over old woman, he saw a beautiful young woman with midnight blue hair and platinum colored eyes, donned in a pale lilac dress with transparent sleeves with beautiful white wings coming out her back. Her disguise gone, she glared coldly at him.

"My name is Platinum, fairy of knowledge and the understander of all that exists," she said, the raspy voice replaced by a melodic one. "Yet I fail to understand why you so selfishly refused to help a woman in obvious need. Answer, Prince Green Oak, why were you so cold? Why did you not treat me with respect?"

Prince Green, for once in the short seventeen years of his life, was at a lost for words. He hadn't the slightest answer for the fairy. He simply prayed that, whatever she had planned, she would be a bit merciful on him and his soul.

"Please, Lady Platinum!" Daisy suddenly exclaimed, bowing low. "I know he's foolish! But he's good at heart, I swear! Please forgive him!"

The fairy's stern glare slowly turned into a humored smirk.

"Now you seek repentance? Pitiful." she murmured with her head bowed. "Prince Green Oak of Kanto, I curse you to be what you truly are on the inside. A selfish, cold, merciless beast."

"Wait!"

Platinum turned her gaze back to Daisy.

"I'll take his place. I'll be the beast!"

"Daisy!" he exclaimed, widening his eyes. Platinum cocked her head.

"No. But you will be his lifeline."

With a flash of light and a wave of overwhelming pain, Green felt himself change. Slowly, the pain faded, and he flopped on the ground, something akin to a fish, trying to figure out how to walk again.

"Prince Green?"

"Prince Green, are you unharmed?! Should I fetch Yellow?"

Green blinked at the two beings in front of him. Sure, he recognized the voices, but not the beings the voices were coming from. Instead of his chef blinking confusingly at him and his knight asking concerned questions, he saw a munchlax and a pikachu. Slowly, he moved his gaze to where they were. A pile of clothes sat there for each of them.

"Where's Daisy?" he asked, failing to see another pokémon around. The two looked back and forth. Red widened his eyes on a certain spot.

Slowly, he looked back to where the fairy was, but saw only a glowing daisy, small orbs of magic mockingly floating around it. Next to it was a beautiful silver mirror, glinting brightly.

"Prince Green," Platinum's voice echoed around them. "I have cursed you. You are the beast the rules the domain. Your servants are the pokémon at your beck and call. Your sister, bless her soul, has become your lifeline. In order to break the curse you have to do but one simple task. Why, I even left you an enchanted mirror to help." he could practically see the smirk on her face. "You have to get someone to fall in love with you in this form before the last petal on the daisy falls. If you do not, your sister will die and you and your servants will remain as you are now. I wish you luck."

There was a long moment of silence as her voice faded out. Green felt his rage bubble and boil inside him.

Daisy...!

And then he snapped.

o.0.o.0.o

Blue Ao was rather plain, when it came to appearances. With straight brown hair that fell to her mid back and average skin tone, she blended in with most of the average village girls in town. The only thing that she really had going for her was her above average bright blue eyes.

But Blue Ao was not an average village girl.

For you see, Blue came from a family of mismatched kids, all taken from the street by their father, Masque de Glace. If that is what one wanted to call him. He constantly left his children to find some 'new and whimsical way' to make money. But Blue knew better.

Masque de Glace, overall, was a conman. And he had intended one thing and one thing alone for his children: thieves. Blue knew how to pick locks and was the best at sneaking around. She was trained that her pokémon were weapons instead of friends; though she treated them as friends. Blue loathed and hated Masque for his lies and cruelty. She, in fact, sought out for better work, thus getting a job a local tavern, though she did sometime return to her old way of thievery for old times sake.

"Why don't you just leave him already?"

Blue turned her attention to her friend, Jade Ishi. Jade was a very pretty young woman with pale blond hair and green eyes of her namesake. Though blind, she could handle herself well enough on her own, and if she ever needed help, she could just call upon her doting husband, Onyx.

"Hey-o! Guess who's home from a successful hunting trip!" Blue turned her attention to the young man who decided to so loudly make his presence known, and smiled.

"Hey Onyx," she smiled. "The usual?"

"Please." the brunette grinned, pecking his wife on the cheek before sitting down beside her. "There's a blizzard a-brewin'. What are we talking about?"

"Blue, and her lack of courage to leave Masqu." Jade said, closing her eyes.

"It's not lack of courage, per say," Blue said, placing a mug in front of Onyx. "But more of something along the lines of being unable to support myself and my brother on this meager salary."

Blue smiled fondly at the thought of her younger brother, a sixteen-year-old redhead who's kept a cold personality for as long as she could remember. Out of everyone in her 'family' she really only cared about Silver and his wellbeing. He, after all, sought out an honest living as well by working as a blacksmiths apprentice at the moment.

"We told you before," Onyx said, setting his mug down. "We'll take you in."

"I couldn't do that to you, though!" Blue said, shaking her head. She couldn't put her two friends at risk of a man like Masque especially Jade... "You've got enough trouble already, what with your little bundle of joy coming soon." Jade smiled lightly, a rare sight indeed, as she placed a hand on her large stomach. "Speaking of which, have you decided on names yet?"

"Olive if it's a girl and Pine if it's a boy." Onyx smiled.

"Aaw, cute." Blue smiled warmly. "Hows Opal?"

"As good a hunter as always." Onyx grinned. "Though she's still hanging around that magician."

"You only don't like him because he's older than her." Jade said calmly.

"My, my, quite the stickler, huh?" Blue cocked her head with her finger thoughtfully to her chin. "Isn't it just a two year age difference? Nothing to scandalous if you ask me. That's pretty rare, having such a close age in these times.

"So?!" Onyx slammed his fist on the bar. "No one's taking my little sister away unless we go through some serious evaluations!"

"Geez, he may not be a noble, but he's not a criminal." Blue rolled her eyes, taking an order than returning to her conversation.

"Even a prince wouldn't be good enough for her." Onyx said, crossing his arms with a huff. "I don't care if it was a god who proposed to her, he'd have to get my approval first."

"At this rate, I'm never going to have a niece of a nephew." Jade sighed.

"We better not!" Onyx exclaimed. "God, prince, noble, or crazy magician, I'll murder the bastard who tries myself, I will!"

"Strange that Carnelian hasn't been scared off yet." Blue mused. "Anyways," she undid her apron and folded it up neatly. "I've got to go pick up Silver and head home to see if Masque is home and what he wants for dinner."

Grabbing her threadbare jacket, she gave a quick wave to the happy couple and walked out the door. It was only a short walk down the cobblestone streets until she saw her brothers bright red hair tied back in a ponytail and... a girl?

Yes, indeed, talking to her emotionless void of a brother was a girl with light brown hair pulled into pigtails, holding out a basket to him. Blue cocked her head to the side as the girl scampered into a building next door, leaving Silver with the basket. Silver continued to stare at the door as it shut behind her, giving her the perfect opportunity to sneak up on him.

"Wasn't that the bakers daughter? Soul, right?" she asked with a hint of laughter behind her voice. Silver flinched slightly, whipping around to look at her. Glancing at the breadrolls peeking out of the basket, Blue grinned. "It was! Do you liiiiike her? Oh, am I gonna have little nieces and nephews running about?!"

"Shut up." Silver grumbled. "I didn't ask for these, she just gives them to me."

"Well then, she likes you!" Blue exclaimed as they began walking towards their little house. "Seriously, she's a good girl."

"I can't do that and you know that. Masque would put her father out of business, wether through faulty business deals or constant lootings. Maybe when I get enough money to move out..."

"And we're gonna do that. I'll make sure of it." Blue nodded in promise, opening the door to the shack, noticing that some of her older adopted siblings gathered around the fire. Silver hurried up to his room to hide the basket, leaving Blue with her siblings.

Trying to think of something to say that would distract them long enough to buy time for Silver, Carl stood with a smirk.

"So, Blue." he said with a smirk as she turned away and hung up her jacket. "I wonder what Masque would think of your little friends from the bar."

"Well, one of them's not so little." Sham smirked. "How far into the pregnancy is she? Seven months? Eight?"

"I swear to Arceus almighty that if any of you even approach them..." Blue trailed off, glaring a them.

"Dear, dear," Will said, holding up his hands in mock surrender. "Do give us mercy, we were only jesting!"

"Can't take a joke, dear?" Karen chuckled behind her hand. Blue glared. Karen sighed. "Seems not."

"Still being as moronic as always." Silver muttered, coming down the stairs and standing beside Blue.

The night followed by a long, heavy silence. Blue stared worriedly at the fire that crackled away in the fireplace, huddled under a blanket with Silver. Silently, she prayed that her older siblings wouldn't decide to tell Masque about Jade and Onyx. Nothing all that eventful happened. Her elder siblings talked about who they would rob tonight. Silver stiffened slightly when the mentioned the baker, though they quickly brushed the idea off as the baker 'was hardly worth robbing blind since he was poor enough to begin with'.

Suddenly, however, the door burst open with a flurry of snow and wind. Silver quickly jumped up to close it, somewhat desperate for an excuse to get away from the conversation, only to have a hand grab his shoulder.

"Let your father come in, my boy."

Everyone snapped their head up at the voice as a figure cloaked in black walked into the room.

"Father!" Karen and Will cried out gleefully.

"You're back." Sham said, relieved.

"I am." Masque said with a grin. "And I bring good news."

"There's a first." Silver muttered, moving back to sit next to Blue while their four older siblings fawned over Masque. Blue remained cold and stone-faced. She didn't trust a word from this mans mouth.

"Still don't believe me, you two?" Masque grinned, reaching into his pocket. "Perhaps," he reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of sparkling, glittering diamonds. "This will change your mind?"

Everyone gawked in awe at the gemstones. Those were no fakes, everyone knew. Three of those would be enough to get her and Silver out of this house, hell, out of this town with money to spare.

"Where on earth did you get those?" Blue immediately asked.

"I didn't steal them, if that's what you're asking." he said with a smirk. "I'm much to intelligent for that. No, I made a little bargain."

"Bargain? With whom? And for what?"

"It's actually kind of funny, now that I think about it, but let me tell you." he grinned at them. "I was walking through the woods, and got terribly lost. I came upon a castle. I was let into a life of luxury by strange talking pokémon, who treated me as if I was a king. As a Pikachu dressed my wounds, I noticed the ornate decorations. They were old, mind you, but incredibly valuable. So I made up a little white lie about how I was in terrible financial ruins and how I had six children to raise on my own since my wife had died. Stupid fools took pity on me, and offered me an unlimited amount of jewels and gold, stuff they claimed to have no use for and just had laying around in bucketfuls."

His eyes glittered at the memory.

"But suddenly, the master of the house appeared." he shuddered slightly. "What a beast he was. A monster, through and through. But he said he'd give me all the wealth I'd ever wish for, if I only gave him one thing in return."

"What was that one thing, Masque?" Carl asked with a grin.

"That I give him the first thing I touch once I'm on my property."

There was a long pause. Then it hit Blue. She turned her gaze to Silver, who blinked in surprise.

"Oh... Oh dear." Masque said in mock pity. "My youngest son, it seems that thing is you!"

There was a long pause. Some of the four eldest congratulated Masque, telling them how they didn't need useless Silver and how they couldn't wait for a life of luxury. Masque shot her a cunning smile under the praise of his eldest children. Silver stood stock still, trying to figure out exactly what had happened. Blue narrowed her eyes. Was this a challenge?

...

She wouldn't let that bastard send her little brother off to a beast.

"Silver." she said coldly, lifting her chin to meet her father's gaze, resisting the urge to unleash her true hatred for the man whom called himself her father. "I'll take your place at the beasts castle."

o.0.o.0.o

"What happened? What happened?" Aini asked frantically, shaking her mothers arm. The woman smiled slightly.

"I can't tell you. Besides, look at your brother," she nudged the three-year-old, fast asleep against her arm. "He's fast asleep."

"But I wanna know what happens to!" exclaimed Celina.

"Maybe if you get ready for bed like the good little girls I know you are," the mother said with a smile, placing the book aside and scooping up Iri in her arms, watching as her daughters trailed behind her. "I'll read you the next part tomorrow night."

"Promise, Mama?" Aini asked, climbing into the bottom bunk of her bed while Celina went across the hall to her room after a brief hug. The six-year-old tried to hide a yawn, though ultimately failed as she climbed under the covers. The mother smiled.

Carefully cradling her son, she leaned down and pecked the small girl on the forehead.

"I promise."

o.0.o.0.o

Amy47101 does not own pokémon.

So, the polls are in and the voters tied between Specialshipping and Oldrivalshipping. Considering that Oldrival is easier for me to write, I say, lets start with that. I'm not sure if I should start this, what with my other stories, but I'm exited to continue it.

Anyways, review, stay tuned, and don't forget to vote for the next shipping!

Amy47101 signing off! ^.^