Equilibrium Chapter 11: Epilogue, a pokémon fanfic

WELL. Thank you to everyone who's read the story. This will be the last chapter, the epilogue. I decided I could just stuff everything in here and be finished with the darned thing. x3 I MAY want to make a sequel, to help explain what the heck happened here – there's a poll in my profile. Voting takes roughly five seconds. I'd greatly appreciate it if you use that five seconds of your life to help me finish my debate. The sequel would start in December, since… I'm doing the NaNoWriMo right now. Anyway, without further adieu…

Equilibrium

Epilogue

He sat in the corner of the room. He just didn't have it in him to really fly – he hadn't eaten, hadn't slept, hadn't done much of anything, productive anyway, in a week, and he wasn't about to break the trend. So he sat, legs extended before him and bent at the knee. He was hunched over them, his elbows on the joints and his forehead on top of his arms. He'd been sitting like this for at least four days. The other three days of the week, he'd either been traveling. The residents of Alamos had rallied up and gone to the nearest town, Durnsmark, some twenty miles away. It was another small town, but it was large enough to accommodate them all, if not comfortably.

Currently, he was in their Pokemon center. It was larger than Alamos', more comfortable. Every hour, nurses came in and checked Cresselia's vitals, sometimes they changed bags filled with clear liquid that were attached to her. He hated seeing the needles, the medical paraphernalia. But worst of all, he hated the smell. The floors were cleaned with a horrible antiseptic that burned whenever he breathed, and it smelled like death.

Cresselia's prognosis had been dim. At the scene, Alamos' own Nurse Joy had assessed her. She'd lost almost half of her blood, was in shock, and had – officially – been pronounced as comatose. She'd broken several bones, burned parts of her chest and her stomach, not to mention her wings, and was overall in poor condition. They hadn't expected her to live at all, but she had.

But that wasn't the worst of it. When they arrived at Durnsmark, the doctors gave her a long-term prognosis, if she survived the worst of it. The very thought made Darkrai's throat sore, and it seemed to swell, until he could no longer breathe. The doctors said she was lucky that she wasn't brain dead – the explosion had done so much damage to her body that they were surprised that the lack of oxygen hadn't killed her. It had, however, along with multiple compression injuries, completely destroyed her ability to move. She was paralyzed below the neck. The doctors had, however, said with extensive rehabilitation – granted she even woke up – she would be able to move again. She would, if she were even luckier, be able to regain her full extent of mobility. If she woke up, anyway.

Then there was the seventy-eight percent chance that Cresselia would just be a vegetable forever. The doctors weren't optimistic about her waking up at all.

The constant beep of her respirator and heart monitors were the only thing that reassured him. Every so often, her face would twitch. She'd been thrown into the ward furthest from the rest of the injured or ill Pokemon, simply because he refused to leave. He knew Cresselia suffered from it – whatever was going on in her head probably only rubbed salt in her wounds – but he couldn't bring himself to leave. So, he'd pretended that maybe the nightmares would coax her into waking up. So far, they hadn't.

And so, he waited.

He'd been in there for two weeks. The majority of the able-bodied men from Alamos had returned back to the remnants of the town and were working on clearing it out. Women with small children were staying in a temporary fixture in Durnsmark. In general, life was horrible. Darkrai shifted and glanced at his arm, which was missing its bandaging. He'd had it taken off three days ago, and although there were still signs of injury, the threat of infection was gone. The nurse said it would only be a few days, and if he took care of it right, there would be little scarring. Somehow, it didn't seem important.

He had two weeks left. The doctors said that most coma patients were in the state for four or so weeks, after that, the likelihood of them waking up decreased significantly. At some point, they'd had him talk to her – they said that it would help, and although he knew very little about medical conditions, he doubted them. Still, he tried. Alice brought him a newspaper every few days – but he couldn't read half of it. Still, whatever he knew, he told her. He prattled on about how everyone was rebuilding, and even went so far as to saying that when she woke up, she had every single right to rip him limb from limb. But, no matter how hard he tried to coax her from her living death, the only responses he got was complete stillness. She only moved when she had nightmares. The doctors assured him she probably wasn't even aware she was having them – it was just her brain's response to the stimuli of terror. So he continued his vigil, despite how hungry he was. The nurses brought him food, some disgusting, generic sort of blocky thing. He didn't know what it was, and it didn't taste very good, but he ate it anyway.

And then he waited some more.

He had been waiting for twenty-four days, seven hours, and eighteen minutes. Alice and Allie had persuaded him to leave the room for a few minutes, at least to eat and get something to drink so he himself didn't die. They talked to him, though he really didn't answer them. Sometimes they dragged him out so the bandages on his chest could be changed, but the wounds were almost done healing. His arm was fine.

Cresselia's wounds were healing, too. The burns were better than they had been when she had first been admitted. Most of the deep tissue injuries had resolved themselves, and the lacerations were almost mended. She was no longer covered with thick, blotchy bruises, but she wasn't healthy looking, either. Her once-vibrant down was sallow and sickly, and she was still covered with several different braces to help her bones repair. Every few days she got an x-ray, and the doctors said that although everything was healing slowly, it was healing.

He was still hopeful she'd wake up.

The worst thing he could imagine happened on the twenty-seventh day.

He hadn't even noticed it at first. He'd dozed off, only to be awoken by the incessant blare of the heart monitor. It made horrible, screaming sounds, and he was jostled awake by the flurry of nurses who'd swarmed into the room. She wasn't dying, apparently, but death might have been better. Cresselia's whole body was seizing, and it took the entirety of six nurses to hold her down. One of them had something in a syringe, and injected it into her stomach. Slowly, the movements ceased, and the monitor lowered slightly. The doctors said that her heart rate was reaching a normal level, and the seizure was a good thing – she was moving, at least. They took several tests, most of which where they pinched her with a pair of sinister looking scissors. She reacted. The doctors said that was a good sign, too. If she was moving, then there was a chance she might not be paralyzed, that it may have been temporary paralysis. He wasn't sure how that worked, but it sounded promising enough.

On the twenty-eighth day, the last of the four week grace period, Cresselia woke up.

Since the seizure, her heart rate had returned to normal. It meant that the swelling in her brain was decreasing, and that it was more likely she would wake up. And she did. He'd been watching her for an hour, because every little twitch made him panic. But then, her head lolled to the side and her eyes fluttered open, and she stared at him. Relief glided over him like a blanket, and for the first time in a day, he actually got up. He had to float over the nurses' shoulders to see what they did to Cresselia – some of them pinched her again, and Cresselia reacted. Another one was taking a blood sample, and another was observing Cresselia's pupils. The swan tried to speak, but everything she uttered was complete gibberish. She looked frustrated, because of this, and Darkrai couldn't help but grin. The nurses said it was a miracle – although she couldn't move fully, her limbs did have mobility in them. She looked a little tipsy, whenever she tried to move – she either moved too much, or in the wrong direction, and couldn't do very much at all – but at least she could move.

Within an hour, she could speak.

The nurses said that the memory loss would only be mild, and it was. She didn't remember what happened to her, or much of last day she'd been awake, but at least she knew who he was.

Within a day, she could sit up.

Cresselia's injuries were still bad. Her broken ribs had mended, but were extremely fragile. Her recovery had increased as soon as she'd woken up, and the scrapes along her body were small scars. The burns were gone, too, but the coloration where they had been looked a little off. It was imperceptible to eyes that had not stared at the burns for four weeks. She could hold fluent conversations, to both him and to the humans, and was working on remembering how to use the full extent of her abilities. Her mobility had increased greatly, and they had taken a good deal of the needles out of her. She could eat and drink on her own, although it was a painful and time-consuming process. But at least she could do it.

"How long was I out?" She asked him one day. She'd become increasingly meek since she'd woken up – everyone said personality changes were to be expected. It was strange, having a normal conversation with Cresselia, without the possibility of having his head chomped right off. And sometimes he struggled to keep his temper, but he made sure he didn't step out of line. She didn't deserve it, after all.

"Four weeks, to the day," He said solemnly. She always seemed to hate the way he spoke, how emotionless it was. The truth was, he'd shown far too much emotion in the weeks she'd been out, and that he was too exhausted to really do much more. Emotionally, he was completely spent.

"What happened?" She pressed. She'd become accustomed to staring at the wall as she questioned him. Darkrai wasn't sure why.

"Palkia and Dialga," He paused, because Cresselia furrowed her brows. A moment later, the expression eased. "Are you okay?"

"Mmhm," She said quietly, "Just remembering who they are, that's all."

As disconcerting as this thought was, he continued. "They attacked Alamos. You saved Alice." And nearly killed yourself in the process. He wanted nothing more than to yell at her for it, to tell her never to do such a stupid thing ever again, that he couldn't stand the thought of losing her. But whenever he tried to explain anything with such significance, he found the words just wouldn't come.

Two weeks after she'd woken up, she was still under the watchful eye of the Doctors. Most of her bones were mended, but they wanted to observe her, just in case. "I knew you were there," She said simply. He winced. "I heard you talking to me. I didn't know what you were saying, but thank you."

You're welcome seemed like the understatement of the century. So he simply just smiled at her. He couldn't remember a time he'd been so happy, so willing to actually smile. He was used to being quiet, observant, and unresponsive. But now, they simply flowed like water. Cresselia noticed this, and smiled back.

And it was all he ever could have asked for.

the end.

WELL, there it is. THE END.

I'm not very fond of those words, but yeah. There's a poll in my profile. Should I, or should I not, make a sequel? It's up to you guys. Thank you to everyone who has reviewed this story. I cannot explain how thankful I am that you actually read it – even when it took me forever to update. Thank you all so much! I hope you enjoyed it. It's been a wild ride, but it's been fun.