2011 Fanfiction Awards Results

“You’re right Perry, ” Phineas said “We live in a fan fiction now.”

“Does that mean a child controls our destinies?” Irving asked

“Yes, yes it does, ” Isabella answered “And please, stop with all the fourth wall breakage. Seriously, there are other forms of humor to work with.”

“Don’t blame us, ” Baljeet told her “Blame the writer! He thinks it’s funny!”

“If the author breaks the fourth wall one more time, ” Isabella began “I’m seriously gonna hurt him.”

“I think that line breaks the fourth wall, ” Phineas said

“That’s it, ” Isabella said “The author is going down!”

“That also breaks the fourth wall, ” Baljeet said

“What is the fourth wall?” Buford said

“I wait eight chapters to appear and as soon as I arrive, all my chapter is is just a bunch of fourth wall gags, ” N complained

“Seriously, ” Buford said “What’s the fourth wall?”

I can’t see anything. Am I blind? Dead? No, I can’t be dead; why would Death chase me if I was already in his grasp? I keep hearing Andrea’s screams. God, I have to help. I can’t just lie here and do nothing. I have to open my eyes. Wake up, Claude! Wake up, damn you!

Pokulok knew that something was wrong the second he opened his eyes. He saw nothing but darkness, and he couldn’t move his legs. He had a cold feeling all around his skin, like something was crawling above and inside it. And it wasn’t just his skin. It was eating at his brain and his eyes…

Wait – that’s not a cold feeling…

He felt the area around his eyes with his fingers, dread working its way into his body. Normally, his eyes would have closed at the intrusion, but he immediately noticed that no matter what he did, they wouldn’t shut. He had a horrible feeling that there was something missing. His quivering fingers brushed against the upper part of his eyes, and he nearly emptied the contents of his stomach when he realized what was missing.

My eyelids! Oh, GOD!

The cold feeling that he had earlier had returned, but this time it seemed very tangible around his left hand. He grabbed at his left hand with his other hand, and he felt something squish against them. His eyesight was beginning to improve in the darkness. He felt around for the thing that he had crushed. When he finally found it and saw what it was, he let out a very high-pitched screech.

“Maggots! ****!”

Pokulok flung the crushed maggot away from him, revulsion racing through his body.

I think I'm a corpse, but why? Why am I dead? I can’t believe this is happening…

“Why is it so hard to believe? You’re already dead inside. Why can’t you be dead on the outside as well?”

The Queen did not say anything, continuing to walk forward as they made their way into the town square. Before she knew what she was doing, the Queen turned to the man and embraced him, holding onto him tightly the way she had always hoped to as a child and he had always hoped to hold his beloved as a child as well. "I'm sorry, " she whispered quietly. "Love is a good thing, something that brings peace and happiness to all that it touches. Never should I have outlawed it in this fair kingdom."

The man smiled at her, breaking the embrace and walking towards the execution stand in the middle of the town square. "Fear not, my Queen. There must be a reason why my love is met with death while yours shall be met with praise once it is found."

The Queen watched as the man she had loved since her youth stepped onto the execution stand, surrounded by crowds of her loving, jeering subjects. Before her eyes another young man stepped onto the execution stand, holding the hand of her beloved and kissing him gently on the lips as the executioner made his way through the masses.

And as the crowd cheered at the death of the young, loving couple, not a single soul noticed the crying Queen in the midst of the revelry.

“Good idea, ” Rui remarked after Espeon had followed his brother. “Hopefully they won’t take too long…”

“It’s what we did in the old days in fact, ” Wes admitted with a slight smirk. “But meanwhile, if you don’t mind you could tell me more about what you were saying when we were so rudely interrupted.”

“Ah, ” Rui replied, looking at her feet. “Well, sure, there’s the stuff I said already, but I suppose those are not the only reasons why because I suppose when I get down to it you could say that I like you, but not just like you but maybe-” she tried, before being interjected by Wes holding up a hand.

“Rui, you’re rambling again, ” Wes said slowly as Rui pouted.

“Well, I’m not sure I can put it in words that easily…well!” she suddenly piped up, and before Wes knew what happened she had kissed him.

“Well indeed, ” he said at length.

Instantly, the cool wind whipped his hair around and tossed Meghan’s sunhat off of her head as if it had a mind of its own. Luna took flight next to them, struggling to keep pace with the massive bird. Meghan had both of her Pokémon, Emory and Vesta, out of their Pokéballs, both flying at top speed at the incoming blotches. They were starting to come into focus.

He felt drops of water on his hands, thought briefly, ****, its raining, but then noticed the silent tears streaming down Meghan’s cheeks.

“It’s going to be alright, ” yelled John over the roar of the wind.

Her response was inaudible; all he could make out was “Blackthorn, Blackthorn.”

He seized control, somehow, some hidden instinct kicking in, and started talking to Charles.

“The hard part is going to be the approach, ” he shouted, the previously formless blobs now showing the clear shape of men riding on the backs of black, hawk-like Pokémon.

They looked like Staraptor, not that it mattered; the other looming black shapes - obviously other Pokémon - meant to do the dirty work.

They were rapidly approaching, fast and furious. The faces of their attackers came into focus, probably twenty of them, their dark, bloodshot pupils and five o’clock shadow suddenly appearing.

“Dive, ” John shouted, and the Pidgeot obeyed, narrowly missing the lead attacker.

“Bilbo, Water Gun at anything you see; Luna, Hypnosis!” John called, assuming Charles would act on his own. Meghan was busy commanding her Pokémon. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a giant grey bird gnawing on a Pellipper with a man hanging on for dear life.

“Luna!” he shouted again, startling the struggling Hoothoot.

<I’m trying! I don’t think I can! > she screamed.

“Do it or he dies!” he shouted frantically. Immediately her eyes glowed red, yellow waves almost exploding from them towards their target. The hypnosis attack caught the man in the grey Galactic uniform off guard. The bird Pokémon, a species unknown to John, fell asleep, falling down, its master flung from her back. John followed the tumbling bodies as they landed with a violent splash in the water far below them.

Their ally climbed back aboard the gigantic seagull Pokémon, waved briefly in appreciation, and dove back downward to catch an enemy.

“Great job, Luna!” he cheered; she smiled.

“Who says you get to have all the fun?” asked Meghan, clearly having regained her composure.

“You can have the next one, ” he joked, in a fake gentlemanly tone.

The mood changed suddenly though.

“Duck!” she cried. John instantly buried his head in the Pidgeot as the bird dove. He felt a searing, ripping pain on his back, as two twin yellow claws gored him. He felt like he was being yanked in the air for a brief moment, and then he was soaked, covered in water, his lower back sticky with blood.

“Bilbo?” he asked frantically.

< I no think he likes water, > he chirped. John couldn’t tell, but he was sure the oblivious Totodile was beaming.

He looked to his left, his eye forced to shut momentarily after a simultaneous wind gust and glare from the sun. He saw the bird that had gored him, a Staraptor, and a rider in a black robe, both of whom were drenched.

“He’s coming for another pass, ” he moaned, trying to shake off the pain in his back. He looked down below. They were only feet from the water, which didn’t look so serene and calm now, instead like staring into the face of death. His stomach lurched. He forgot how much he hated flying.

“Vesta, Comet Punch that bastard out of the sky!” Meghan ordered.

The Ledian did as she was told, meeting the winged assassin head on, dodging a fierce bite from its beak, and using all of her arms to whip the duo down. The two of them were furiously thrown into the depths of the lake, so close to them that they felt the mist from the splash.

He looked up, the city now in front of him. Nothing was burning or seemed damaged, except for Sprout Tower to his left. The elderly structure was partially on fire; smoke billowing from a large hole in the middle of its structure.

As Charles rose in height, he looked for the enemy combatants. After a brief moment of scanning, he saw only a few, all of which were headed in the opposite direction. Struggling to catch up with them was the black hooded warrior they had just encountered. He must have survived. Falkner and Amelia, meanwhile, were charging after them with the rest of the militia that Gabe had gathered. They caught Falkner’s attention, and he waved them back, his face frozen in a sigh of relief.

Charles swiftly turned around, targeting the beach. After a few minutes of flying, the bird began to descend rather rapidly, tired from the advanced maneuvers it had just executed with the weight it was carrying. He landed clumsily, and Luna, Emory, and Vesta landed with him.

They boy got an idea. “One!” The same attack was repeated. “Keep it up for as long as you can!” He dived yet again to dodge the rolling stone, squinting from the heat as the pursuing pup and trail of fire followed. “Good girl!” He glanced at the other man and saw he was screaming at his now-bright red Pokémon, something that had gone unnoticed until now.

Suddenly, apparently by command, the smoking, almost-bubbling boulder stopped. He stopped attacking, he stopped rolling, and judging from the dead look in his eyes, he had stopped caring. What followed happened too suddenly for the boy to comprehend immediately.

The Pokémon exploded.

Whether by the heat or a special technique, it became a living bomb, destroying both itself and the boy’s Pokémon, scorching the land around it, and covering the boy’s screams with a ringing left in the ears of anyone within hearing range. He wore his lungs out after only a few seconds, soon reducing his cries into wheezes and then nothing but sobs. She was absolutely decimated. Aside from a few scraps of hide and guts, she had crumbled into nothing more than a pile of ash.

Adding Pokémon to the battlefield was supposed to decrease the psychological damage of war. If you weren’t the one doing the actual killing, then the burden of murder would not be an issue. Pokémon were considered expendable. The military saw not the importance of the creatures to individual soldiers but rather the value of them as a weapon. It was a controversial view.

The boy ripped a knife from the small case on his belt and ran at the man without delay. Tears burned his eyes and blurred his vision. His target was enormous but there were no stakes left. They would both die eventually.

With this being the dominant thought in his mind, he dived through the air and stuck the blade as hard as he could into the guy’s chubby stomach and they both fell to the ground. Blood gurgled out and ran down his sides.

It was strange. The boy felt no pleasure now. He wasn’t even relieved to have avenged his Pokémon. In fact, he felt nothing now. Why was the anger gone? Where was the fear? He pulled the knife from the flesh and stared at it. He had murdered. He had reacted in a single flash of rage and had murdered another human being.

St. Peter’s Square was eerily quiet as Katharine strolled through it alone. She picked up a few bits of Shadow energy nearby, but that wasn’t what haunted her. For some reason, she felt as if someone was watching her every mood. Suddenly, a chill washed through her, and she was convinced someone was standing behind her.

“Hello, Chosen One, ” a cold voice spoke.

She turned to see a tall, black-haired young woman step across the stones to stand a few feet in front of her. She shivered at the young woman’s cold gaze. There was no mistaking that she was a demon. The bottom of her black dress seemed to recede into the shadows as if they were one.

“I am Nyx, ” she said, smiling a cruel smile. “And this is your last day on Earth.”