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The void within him, normal at first in the absence of Lugia's blessing, expands to a great chasm that claws in his chest. More physical than before, less an emptiness and more a portal from which something is trying to escape.[break][break]

He doesn't respond to Temp's attempted humour, too busy struggling within with whatever was trying to get out.[break][break]

"Something's wrong."[break][break]

Cillian shudders. His willpower is strong, but this presence feels stronger. It reminds him of a psychic press against his mind, except in place of one influence there are dozens. His weakened psyche begins to falter.[break][break]

"Temp." He sounds scared, now, his voice rising in pitch. "What's happening?"[break][break]

It would be Temp, this time, to see the phantoms shifting beneath skin.

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Maybe Temp had been able to ignore it easier. The presence that had been throwing itself against his mind had left claw marks- but it had never been able to do more than leave those gouges. It had fed into his heart, tore at the void and tried to widen it. Trapped, without anything to cling to.[break][break]

But Cillian Quinn is different.[break][break]

The natural fear that leads his life is easy to grasp between dozens and dozens of fingers. Pulling and trying to fray Cillian and his subconscious like threads.[break][break]

Then they pull.[break][break]

Tempest sees his own skin writhe in impossible ways, fingerprints pressing up and outwards from under his skin. Cillian would feel something else- as the force of pressure tried to drag him down. This was something trying to control him, take a seat in the driver's side to force it's will over him. Leave Cillian as nothing more than a passenger forced to watch as it piloted his body. All without the comforting pressure of Lugia to grasp onto in his mind.[break][break]

"I don't... Cil!"[break][break]

Tempest's heart beat quickens. Instead of running away, he runs for the other, to grab a hold of his shoulders and keep him steady.[break][break]

The temperature drops to an icy chill.[break][break]

Their breaths puff between them.

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Cillian grasps his head with a low, terrified moan as the spirits try in earnest to tear him apart from within. One shaking hand reaches for a pokeball, desperate for the companionship of one of his shadows but instead fumbling around a different sphere.[break][break]

The GREAT TUSK is a new member of his arsenal. It will not respond to clicks, whistles, or unspoken commands.[break][break]

It does, however, respond to his distress.[break][break]

With a snort, the massive elephantine paradox paws at the ground, then lets out a TAUNTING bellow.[break][break]

All at once, Cillian feels the spirits retract as their attention snaps to this new target. Like a puppet with its strings cut, the sudden flood of weakness sends Cillian to his knees, trembling from the pain in his skull.[break][break]

He is possessed of great fear, but he is also a being of sheer WILLPOWER.[break][break]

He wills himself to escape the prison of a body that does not belong to him, to go back to the way things were, and suddenly he is standing over his husband's collapsed body. Absent of spirit, it does not breathe.[break][break]

He looks over at himself, uncertain if Temp can even see or hear him.[break][break]

"We need... to do something... about the spirits..."[break][break]

Every word is a great effort, as if remaining in this incorporeal state is taxing him.

[break][break]

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Freedom[break][break]

They realize it as soon as Cillian Quinn if free from this world. Instead of having to push him out and take the wheel, they can slide into the driver's seat with ease. Hundreds of fingers all grasp for purchase in Tempest's empty body.[break][break]

Tempest's body twitches, limbs twisting in unnatural ways as the little-more-than-a-corpse drags itself to it's feet. It is not Cillian inside, it is not Tempest- it something else. A legion who seek purchase in a new vessel.[break][break]

Tempest can not see his lover. But he doesn't need to worry about it for long. The Marshadow, dormant in shadow, reaches up to slam Cillian's knee. It makes Tempest falter in his borrowed body- falter so much that when he falls, Cillian is left as a heap on the ground.[break][break]

This ghostly form hurts. The tether to their bodies thin and straining with every false breath they take.[break][break]

The thing inside of Tempest laughs and laughs. It is foreign and it claws at his face, feels skin under fingers. Takes a wobbly step forward, intending to leave the two men behind.[break][break]

The Marshadow slams a fist into it's stomach.[break][break]

Temp's body drops with a strangled noise, one-hundred-and-eight spirits flying out in a flood.[break][break]

Warriors, decaying and ancient, in old battled and warped armor. Some of them still with arrows or knives sticking from their bodies. The memory of blood cascades down faces and bodies. Their hateful eyes lock onto the two men when the confusion passes.[break][break]

Like a hoard of zombies, they lurch for Cillian and Tempest, intending to force them into the hoard.[break][break]

"Cil, I think we need to get the fuck out of here. Like, now." It hurts, it hurts! He chokes on the words. Tempest wants to press close to the other but that is something dangerous, too. So instead of he goes to touch try and shake his own body awake to no avail.

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Like Temp, Cillian tries desperately to return to corporeal form. Bizarre as it had been to watch his husband pilot his image, it's far more chilling to stand above his motionless body. With the stillness of the grave, it looks half a corpse.[break][break]

Loathe though he is to leave without it, he nods in agreement to Temp's frantic suggestion.[break][break]

"Tusk will stop them from following us."[break][break]

The Great Tusk bellows, swinging its head in a motion that would've cleaved a living man in two. The spirits only dissipate, reforming a short distance away. But, thanks to the TAUNT, they remain focused on a singular prey.[break][break]

Frowning, Cillian nods toward the strange spirit that had gotten them into this mess.[break][break]

"Is it trying to get us to follow it?"[break][break]

Giggling, the Marshadow flits a few paces away, then looks back at them.

[break][break]

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Tempest gives one last thump of his body. But the hoard closes in; it is only thanks to Cillian Quinn's quick thinking and his strange paradox pokemon that they have an opening.[break][break]

The Marshadow motions to follow.[break][break]

Tempest isn't sure he wants to follow it. Yet, the other option is assimilation as a form of death. He'll take the shadowy spirit that started this over the ghosts.[break][break]

It leads them to a small shrine. Knocked over and broken, little more than rubble. Whatever god it served has long abandoned it. In the middle, though, of faded rock is a small and cracked stone.[break][break]

The stone glows faintly in his hand. Tempest can feel it pulling at his being. But he is tethered to something. His body that still breathes, for now.[break][break]

Turning, Tempest shows the stone to Cillian.[break][break]

"I think it wanted to show us this?"[break][break]

The hoard has collected around the Great Tusk. Ghostly fingers reaching out to claw and tear and bloody at the creature.[break][break]

Unsure what else to do, Tempest throws the stone as hard as he can at the mass of spirits. There is a loud CRACK and a flash of light.[break][break]

Then they're gone. Where the stone sits, a Spiritomb that writhes and screams before fading into it's new prison.

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To walk in the form of a spirit feels strange. There is no sense of impact of his feet against the ground, no gravity behind his movements. He feels as light as air. It should be freeing, perhaps... but not for Cillian.[break][break]

What if they couldn't return to their bodies? What if this was it?
[break][break]
The anxiety is muted. Without a physical form, his chest cannot constrict. His heart cannot pound. The worries are little more than thoughts. Yet they circle in spirit as they would in life, repetitive and straining.[break][break]

Led to a stone, Cillian recognizes it immediately.[break][break]

"This is an Odd Keystone. They're used in binding spirits. Have you ever seen a Spiritomb before?"[break][break]

Unfortunately, though his passion for history and ancient Pokémon granted knowledge of what the stone was, Cillian had no idea how it functioned. Was this an empty vessel from which the spirits had escaped, or one meant to bind them?[break][break]

As they turn back to the mass of spirits, Cillian witnesses his Great Tusk curl into a ball with the aid of its ROLLOUT, groaning as it desperately tried to fight back the clawing horde. Its shell was strong, but not invulnerable, and the TAUNT was beginning to wear off. What were they meant to do?[break][break]

Temp, in classic fashion, does something Cillian never would've fathomed.[break][break]

"What are you doing?" he hisses. "We might need that!"[break][break]

Yet apparently, this action was just what was needed.[break][break]

The ODD KEYSTONE cracks, flashes. The blinding light doesn't affect his incorporeal form as it should; Cillian watches the split-second in which dozens of spirits are dragged into their prison. The Great Tusk bellows as it uncurls, but Cil recalls it before it can attack the dormant spirit, worried it might cast them back out of their new 'home'.[break][break]

Cillian steps toward his unconscious form. No sooner has the slightest brush occurred between physical and spiritual form than he finds himself waking as if from some uncomfortable sleep, memories fuzzy as to what had occurred. His head is pounding.[break][break]

"Ngh..." Gingerly, he prods at his temple. "Love? Are you OK?"[break][break]

They'd been in some kind of danger, hadn't they?

[break][break]

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Tempest groans, his arm asleep from the awkward angle his body had collapsed in. Cotton pounded in his skull; mouth dry, eyes gummy, and eyelids heavy as well. It was like waking up from a bad nap, feeling worse than you did before you went to sleep.[break][break]

Cillian Quinn's voice rouses him, bringing some semblance of thought back to Tempest.[break][break]

Confused and fuzzy, the memories muddle in his mind. Later, he would remember small snatches of this event. Enough to put together a rough idea of what had happened.[break][break]

Pushing himself up, Tempest sags to the side as he tries to rub grit and dirt from his eyes. The dust of the Border rises with a sudden gust of musty wind, making him wrinkle his nose.[break][break]

"I'm up." Groggy, thick with sleep. He shakes his head as if that will push the odd thoughts from his mind. Bring him some relief.[break][break]

He starts when the keystone is pushed into his palm by a shadowed paw.[break][break]

The Marshadow looks at Tempest with unblinking red eyes. She doesn't move much beyond that, not interested in him any longer without his ghostly hitchhikers.[break][break]

He frowns, brows squinting, as he looks down at the heavy stone in his hand.[break][break]

"I don't... uh...." Confusion still bites at him. "Maybe we should leave."

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Aside from confused, Cillian feels strangely lonely. Lost.[break][break]

He can't quite place why until Lugia lands before them with a force that quakes the dusty earth, and he is filled with a sudden and overwhelming tide of Infinity Energy. It's a shot of adrenaline into his exhausted body, reassuring and dizzying all at once. Miasma swirls around him as it had years ago, when at first he'd been marked worthy.[break][break]

His breath catches, and his eyes burn.[break][break]

He is right.[break][break]

Lugia's voice presses into his mind.[break][break]

We do not belong here.[break][break]

This was a place for the dead, and they've overstayed their welcome.[break][break]

With trembling hands and shaky legs, Cillian gets to his feet. The miasma moves with him, and he draws comfort from it. Vaguely, he remembers the distress of its absence, like waking from a bad dream. His head aches.[break][break]

Yet above all else, his concern is for Temp.[break][break]

He takes his lover's hands, squeezing them with what strength remains in him, before they turn and make for home.

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