~ Choice and Consequence ~

[Frosted Heavens]

A/N: *gasp* can this be what I think it is? PD is updating early! Everybody dance!

*dances*

Yay, the new chappie and early too(something you can't say about me>__>I'm late), now I have to say, this chapter was much more fun than the previous one, even if it was a lot like the original, I still loved it for some reason, guess this chapter had some interesting bits^-^

Now this certainly is a great chapter, and I think it is good to start with Keegan gaping at the celadon university, It seems a very good start to me for a chapter.

This comment about that happening was my particular favorite:

leaving Keegan to wonder whether gym leaders ever actually showed up—she remembered what had come of her going out to look for Morty in Ecruteak.

Now inside the university(which is almost the whole chapter, I think>___<) was also very funny, as the middle-aged man behind the desk, correcting her like in school, ultimately funny in my opinion^-^

I liked the way you portrayed Keegan when she entered class, I could imagine it, spoiled teenagers that brag about their pokemon and skills, and then suddenly noticing a rather dirty trainer(compared to them^-^) and begin to scowl, anyway, everything was perfect

The talk with Erika was also good, it just shows how a trainer feels to talk alone with someone who is your superior(is that spelled right>__<I don't think so?) in many ways.

Now, what really caught my interest in this chapter was the battle between Keegan and Tynan. (I love action, so battles are probably the things that excite me the most in a chapter^-^')

I knew Tynan would make a return in the revised version, although I couldn't remember his pokemon which currently leads me to conclude that he has two pokemon at his disposal; Flareon and Murkrow(the latter only shortly introduced towards the end^-^). Even if Tynan is somewhat an opposite to Keegan, the fact that he has Flareon and she Vaporeon and Eevee makes them similar in training pokemon(also, if my memory isnt playng tricks on me 'Brother' is going to team up with him to get back Tarn, right?)

now the battle was amazingly put, the description was flawless, and the humor was good(mainly the 'little fox' side of Keegan amused me^-^)

Not fair, he didn’t even give her a chance to get out of her pokéball!

Don’t complain, you didn’t exactly play fair when you dumped sleeping powder all over the Rockets.

Oh, shut up.


and


But she really looks like she knows what she’d doing,[/I] the little fox pointed out as Hazel skidded to a guarded halt, ears twitching as she panted and Flareon rolled back onto its feet. And how do you know she doesn’t know any long-range attacks?

Keegan’s eyes widened. That’s right… she could have learned any attacks, before—

very amusing^-^

Now, one little thing that I didn't like is that Shadow Ball AND Dig were introduced in the same battle(I'd say one is fine, but two is somewhat much(I certainly can live with it, I mean, it's not like she used five totally new moves in one battle)), it was just something that occurred to me, please don't let it bother you^-^'

Now some personal commentary^-^:

Tynan seems to me that his talented, rich, and spoiled but has a very calculating mind, and deems weak trainers useless(although that is just a thought that arised, could be that he is a little nice but hasn't shown his kinder streak yet, all posibilities). 'Brother' the pokemon that he maybe was going to get was also a little rebelling no? I recall him as caring brother and wants Tarn back and he'll probably disobey orders if he's in danger or something.

Keegan was very amusing in this chapter, being a little clumsy, didn't really know what she was doing, but was also quite calculating and has a vast amount of trust in her pokemon(I was a little disappointed we didn't get to see Firefoot and Tarn(I keep forgetting that Firefoot is now an Arcanine adn I still think of him like a playful, puppy pokemon^-^'))

Erika seems very good to me, although I always imagined her as a soft person, but sometimes she sounded very firm and maybe a little stern, nothing bad though^-^A little disappointed again that we didn't get to see any of her pokemon, and I certainly hope she'll introduce some in future chapters.

Questions:

1. Will Alyssa or any other school girl reappear in other chapters?

2. What is the next direction Keegan goes?(I'd guess Vermillion to go on a ship and sail to Hoenn)

3. Will Keegan get a new pokemon soon, or will it take some time?

4.(elaborated from previous question) If she gets a new pokemon, will it be an egg, a wild pokemon, a gift or something else?

5. Will Tynan follow Keegan around for very long or is he simply using her as a compass of sorts?

6. Will Tynan follow Keegan all the way to Hoenn?

7. Will Keegan eventually get a travelling partner?

well, that rounds it up, I'd say, keep it going purple-drake, this was a brilliant chapter...

'till next time

~Aimi Hanako~

[Ryano Ra]

^.^!

I'm caught up now!

o_o I'm loving this like I love chocolate pudding. It really has come together more uniquely than the original version, and I somehow find myself attached to Tynan's attitude. There is something about him that makes him likeable, even though I do not appreciate his attitude towards Keegan. I loved the last chapter the most out of them all; again, perhaps it is Tynan, but he's definitely catching my attention more than he did in the original version. The battle was fantastic, I love Tarn the Vaporeon, and just..everything. o_o And Erika. <3333 Even though the chapters are strangely long (which is very acceptable for your type of story, I'm just not used to reading a lot for one single chapter), I love this a lot more than the original. I can't wait for the next chapter!

>3 Post it! ;_; *runs around and chases Tarn*

[purple_drake]

Bay: oooh, new reviewer! ^.^ hi!

Sorry about those long sentences ^.^;; I have a habit of writing sort of like a thought process, which does make for some long sentences, just like a person would think in run-on sentences. And then there are those pesky sentences in which lots happen and I can't find a place to gracefully chop it in half.

I'm getting kind of fond of Keegan too, actually ^.^;; in the first copy, I hated her. I guess that's good, right?

As for the story moving too quickly--yanno, I never thought of that. I guess when you put it like that I can sort of see how it seems to move quickly--but then again, I know what happens later on now that I think about it, this story really is about the Teams just as much as it is about Keegan; the difference is, in CaC their story is being told through Keegan's perspective, because hers is the main plot and theirs is the sub. In the sequel (yup, I said sequel!) the plot is going to revolve around the Teams, with Keegan swept along for the ride.

I guess her first meetings with the Teams were sheer bad luck, not to mention her reckless nature, but it never twigged just how early they began. I suppose that's one advantage of having an insanely curious character with no regard for keeping their nose out of other peoples' business--you can blame it all on them! ^.^;; that said, there will be other meetings with the Teams--but those first meetings and their relatively successful resolutions are going to have a kind of domino effect which will led to her getting unintentionally involved in affairs she really shouldn't be involved in.

As for the legendaries, well... I don't consider Lugia to be a meeting so much as a sighting, since it was only at a distance and there were other people with her. Raikou, however... *winks* as you noted, there is something up with Raikou, and it is an exceptionally big 'something' which is going to keep Keegan (unknowingly) on her toes. She is going to meet other legendaries, but hopefully the way those meetings are planned are unique enough to keep from being cliche.

Finally, that battle--no, you didn't miss anything. It's more along the lines of Keegan missing something; she was so focussed on her own little battle that she didn't notice what was happening across the room until the shout drew her attention. ^.^;; hopefully by the time the story's over I'll be able to write multi-pokemon battles without losing the threads on anyone, eh?


Aimi Hanako: Yup, you spelled superior right

I'm rather pleased with the way Tynan turned out this time... not so spoiled or snobbish. I think I can really work with him now, if I can just keep him toeing the line...

Ah, the attacks... never thought of that, actually. Mostly I needed a way to introduce attacks which Hazel knows, but which Keegan's forgotten she knows. Ergo, a pokemon battle. :P

The thing with Hazel is that she's actually at a fairly advanced level, if you want to think in game mechanics; she's certainly got more experience than either Tarn or Firefoot (which is going to be a problem later on, if Keegan doesn't start training them up). However, for her to start using attacks without her trainer ordering them--or knowing she can use them--doesn't indicate a particularly good trainer, and that would dishonour Keegan in a way Hazel refuses to do. So she didn't use them until such a time that Keegan begins to realize that (particularly since Keegan hasn't been much of a battler in the past anyway--Magmas aside).

On the other hand, there is also the problem of maintaining the battle's fluidity, which I do by allowing the pokemon to have their heads and attack or defend without necessarily needing their trainer's order to do so. Hazel grew up battling fire pokemon, so it would make sense to use an attack with a type-advantage, whether Keegan has ordered it or not. And now that Hazel now longer feels she's barred from using attacks Keegan would be surprised by...

Anyway. That turned out longer than I expected ^.^;; I should really learn not to ramble.

Tynan... is an interesting character. :P in fact in the writing of that chapter, I think he became one of my favourite OCs. I don't want to say too much because I still getting a grip on his character, but he is still figuring out his own place in the world, and that's going to be interesting to play with.

I'm not going to say any more on his pokemon, except that he does get more, and you haven't seen all the ones he already has yet, either.

Heh :P 'vast amount of trust', I thought that was an interesting comment. I suppose that is it, in one way. In another, it's that her pokemon know more than she does about battling! Or Hazel does, at least.

Erika... is Erika. :P she's not really one of my favourite gym leaders, but I don't dislike her either. I imagine her as mostly soft, as you said, but with a hint of steel (so to speak). She's a teacher and a good one, so she knows how to command. I do believe that's the influence of the manga, there...

To answer your questions... in spoiler tags... or I would, if the spoiler tags were working <_< *mumbles about stupid C&P not working*

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1: Actually, I like Alyssa, strangely enough she will reappear at least once later on... however, that particular reappearance is scheduled for the sequel. Whether or not she shows up in CaC again is unknown, but unlikely--same goes for the others.

2: I've actually stated (indirectly) where Keegan will be going. I said that Tynan is going to follow Keegan, and he's planning to go south to Fuchsia. So there you go her immediate destination. Anything after that, however...

3: Keegan will get a new pokemon soon, yes.

4: That one, you'll just have to wait and see

5: 'a compass of sorts' isn't a bad way of putting it, actually. :P in the grand scheme of things, no, he isn't going to follow her for long--although that time does span over several chapters.

6: This is a loaded question, although the answer isn't really that big of a spoiler. fact is, Tynan gets to Hoenn *first*.

7: Yes. Several (although not necessarily all at once or for very long periods of time).

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^.^ thanks for the review, I love answering these questions... although sometimes I don't know where to stop talking -_-;;


Ryano: Yay! You're caught up! ^.^ *glomps*

I'm liking Tynan more too his character is going to be fun to write, hehehe... it's true that his lifestyle has led him to be condescending, and he and Keegan are going to fight like cats and dogs, but really I think he's pretty cool then again, I know what's going to happen...

Reading a lot for one chapter, heh... ^.^;; you know, if you look at the last chapter, it spans a timeframe of, like, an hour. That's really sad...

*gasps and snatches up Tarn* aw, leave the poor baby alone! :P

[Ryano Ra]

XD The timeframe of an hour. XDDDD

Well actually, I like the idea of having long chapters. Now, it seems as though you can't get much covered in a shorter chapter, and since lately, I have been more involved in digging into my character's thoughts and incorporating daily actions by their Pokemon (instead of just mentioning the character and only having the Pokemon make sounds and actions when they are battling...lol), my chapters have become longer. Sure, it takes a bit more time to finish for me, but I think it is well worth it. My first chapter of my fanfiction is twelve pages...o_o;

But yes, I loved it in the old version when Tynan would try to go after Keegan and search for her, it used to be hilarious to me in a strange sorta way. Although, I am suddenly getting a strange feeling that something's bound to happen if they go to Fuschia City...I dunno. I'm hungry, so...^.^;;

[purple_drake]

A/N: Here I am again ^.^ I think some people missed out on the previous chapter... I don't remember seeing everyone's names...

Ah well. Another two-poster--I dunno how that happened, seeing as the original chapter was only 14 pages long and absolutely nothing is different (aside from, yanno, minor details and description etc, typical revamping stuff) so I'm not entirely sure how I almost doubled the page count...

'Nways. One-entry glossary at the end again--darn those traditional gym leaders...

Oh, yeah... warning for language... mostly the repeated, usually mental use of a certain four-letter word starting with 's' by Keegan...

~ VI ~
A BUTTERFREE IN THE HAND…

A YELP.

It rang through the forest, making pokémon tilt their heads to listen or scamper back into the shielding undergrowth with a rustle of leaves. A curse followed soon after, punctuated by random mutterings and the distinct, feline-like titter of a pokémon, before they were both cut off by a semi-irritable shout.

“Stop laughing, Hazel!”

“Bubui!”

A flurry of spiky-feathered doduo burst from a patch of particularly thick foliage, making dewdrops scatter everywhere and leaves slap against the ground. A few seconds later they were followed, more slowly, by a certain blonde-haired girl clad in mud-stained jeans and a long-sleeved grey top, a slightly bedraggled eevee with an amused glint in her black eyes, and the swift blue form of a sleek vaporeon.

“It wasn’t funny,” Keegan whined, wiping her muddy hands off onto the cleanest patch of her jeans she could find, since her knees and shins were now grubby and grass-stained from her most recent tumble.

“Bui,” was Hazel’s only reply.

Keegan subsided with a huff into a quiet simmer of frustration, hitching her bag up onto her shoulder and pulling out her pokégear only to see the same green ‘out of service area’ screen she’d been seeing for the past few hours.

As far as she knew, she should have been somewhere on the outskirts of Fuchsia City.

Obviously, she wasn’t.

This is going beyond funny, the girl grumped to herself, replacing her pokégear and watching Hazel’s damp tail flick almost tauntingly in front of her.

She’d left Celadon behind her some days before, and with it, a sharp sense of foreboding. The thought that she was in the same city as the Rockets—that their lab was there—had given her shivers up until the point she finally walked past the city limits. She’d had a hard time deciding which direction to go, because the water and fire gyms were on completely different sides of the region, but eventually she had decided in favour of Cinnabar for several reasons.

First, she’d have to go on the ferry to get there, and she wanted to get that done as soon as possible. Second, going south before looping up north to Cerulean gave her more of an opportunity to see the rest of Kanto—the legends knew she’d spend enough time on the water, not to mention had spent quite a bit of time being scared to death, so a bout of sightseeing would do her good. Plus, that time spent travelling would enable her to spend some time training, as Erika had suggested.

Third, circling up to Cerulean meant she could detour back through Celadon on her way to Vermillion, and that meant she could find out what had happened with the Celadon Game Corner.

Okay, so the last one was pure curiosity, but she couldn’t resist.

The only problem was, she was having trouble actually finding Fuchsia. The city was surrounded by thick forest, practically bordering on jungle in places, and she’d had to take some shortcuts in order to avoid the intimidating bikers who gathered along the verges of Cycling Road—with obvious and predictable results. I should really know better by now.

On the bright side (metaphorically, at least, because the sky had been threatening rain for the past five days and followed through on it the evening before last) she hadn’t seen a hide or hair of either the Rockets or those strange people in blue, and her fears had eased into slight twinges of paranoid worry whenever night began to settle.

It did help that she had other issues on her mind, Keegan thought as she glanced down at Tarn, brushing past some hanging leaves. The vaporeon slinked after her, his head swivelling this way and that alertly.

The girl sighed. In Goldenrod, she’d felt very hopeful about the vaporeon’s acceptance of her, especially with the way he’d battled in the underground. After Celadon, she’d decided that the travel-time would be a good opportunity for him to get used to her, and maybe Firefoot too—he’d already seemed to bond pretty well with Hazel.

But when she’d released him he’d been unexpectedly guarded, almost as much as he’d been the very first time she let him out of his pokéball back in the park in Goldenrod. True, he hadn’t been afraid like he had been then and he did allow her to pet him on occasion—on ‘special’ occasions, like when she bought him some treats in an effort to precipitate more friendly terms—but otherwise he kept his distance and only seemed truly comfortable when Hazel was outside with him.

At least he’s better than he was. In the beginning he’d stayed a good two feet away from her, and when he moved it had been in cautious stops and starts, practically crawling along with his belly to the ground even when Hazel walked beside him. Now, he still kept low, but it was with a swift, fluid movement that seemed more natural, almost slither-like, and he didn’t stray far from the company like Firefoot did, who gambolled about as well as any six-foot canine could.

He also maintained a slightly wary eye on the blonde-haired girl, but for the most part his attention was focussed at the potential dangers of their surroundings, apparently having accepted Keegan and Firefoot as non-threatening, if not friends.

Which just brought Keegan to the other reason she wanted to be in Fuchsia already—as if being wet, muddy, tired, and running out of clean clothes because she’d spent half the last two nights struggling miserably to keep everything dry wasn’t a good enough reason already.

Unfortunately it was that very rainstorm which had kept her from letting Firefoot get any exercise yesterday, drizzling as it had been the entire time. A metaphorical water-pup he may be, but getting splashed wasn’t anywhere near the same as having several gallons of liquid dumped on you, especially not for a fire pokémon. At least at the Fuchsia City Pokémon Centre he’d be under cover, and keeping him in until they got there meant she wouldn’t have to brush all the mud and sticks out of his ridiculously long fur. I swear he’s got longer fur than Hazel does now.

She’d even been forced to buy some new brushes for him, because the stiff-bristled one she had for Hazel, while appropriate for the small-bodied eevee, was too delicate for a creature of Firefoot’s size, weight and thickness of coat. I’m just glad that Tarn’s short-haired. Remind me not to catch any more pokémon with fur!

“Bubui?”

Keegan was brought out of her rather inane contemplation by Hazel’s questioning tones, almost tripping over the delicate eevee before she realized that the pokémon had stopped. Instead the girl yelped, stumbled, and caught herself on a nearby tree, still wet from sap that a feeding heracross had brought to the surface before they’d crossed its path.

“Ha-zel!” Keegan groaned, levering herself upright and wiping the sticky residue onto her already filthy jeans. Hazel didn’t even look over at her; her head was held high and long ears cocked forward attentively. Tarn came to a halt beside her, his finned ears twitching and paws kneading the ground in restless apprehension as he listened to whatever had captured her attention, his serpentine tail flicking this way and that.

All this alerted Keegan, and a pang of fear made her irritation evaporate. “What’s wrong?”

“Eebui!” Without warning Hazel broke her standstill and dashed into the thick underbrush, bounding over a mottled grey tree root as she went. With a resonant growl in response, Tarn followed, his slim body almost seeming to undulate through the mulch coating the forest floor.

“H— hey, wait up!” Impatiently tugging her bag more comfortably up onto her shoulder, Keegan chased after them both, raising a hand against the branches that swatted at her face, her legs already beginning to ache because of the uneven ground as she hurtled over roots and logs. Hazel’s bobbing, white-tipped tail was just barely in view, Tarn’s quick glide making him a blue shadow on brown and green.

It wasn’t long before Keegan began to hear the deep boom of a waterfall, the sound echoing through the woods, growing louder and vibrating the ground beneath her feet. Abruptly the forest peeled away before her into sky and the girl staggered to a halt on the grassy edge of a short cliff, her chest heaving with gasping breaths and one hand clamped to the intermittent stitch in her side.

“Vuubreen!”

It was Tarn’s distressed keen which caught her attention this time, and her eyes found the vaporeon just as Hazel darted in front of him, cutting off his headlong rush into the fast-moving river. Stumbling towards them with rubbery legs, Keegan saw, over their backs and through the white spray of the unseen pond below, a pair of scruffy men roughly jamming as many mesh cages as they could fit onto the back of their dirty truck, its wheels sinking into the soft turf beside the lake beneath its three-cage-high load. Contained within them were pokémon of all shapes and sizes; prickly-looking nidoran, polished pink exeggcute, even the dull, soft purples of a venomoth. Some were struggling furiously with the mesh, their eyes narrowed with rage and bloodlust—a victreebel puffed itself up, yellow body pulsing and broad leaves quivering with rage as it threw itself at the walls of its pen with a piercing shriek that cut through the roar of the falls—while others lay injured on the blood-soaked floor of their enclosures.

They— they’re hurting them—

Keegan found herself shaking; in anger, in grief, in sick realization, her stomach twisting so sharply it made her breath catch and tears prick her eyes, one hand pressed to her mouth to keep herself to crying or screaming, she didn’t know which. I have to—I have to—

I have to play a game.

Before she’d thought anything more than that, her hands were fumbling for the pokéballs at her waist, pulling first Tarn’s and then Hazel’s from her belt. “You guys—I’ve gotta—”

She hadn’t even finished, but Hazel was already in front of her, tail swishing urgently, and Keegan obeyed her unspoken command before turning to the vaporeon crouched at the muddy, overflowing bank and holding up the pokéball in silent request. For a moment Tarn stared at her, tail lashing the air, skating across water; then he moved, one paw in front of another, away from the river.

He had just vanished into red light, the pokéball snapping shut around him, when there came a shrill, resonating cry from the woods below.

“Frii friii!”

What the—

Keegan instinctively ducked, scrambling towards the edge in time to see a blue and white blur burst out of the trees, knocking the startled, skinny man wearing a green beanie aside before colliding with the stack of cages with a sickening crunch. The pile shifted with the scrape and shriek of metal, several of the enclosures on the opposite end toppling off with protesting screeches from steel and pokémon alike.

As the man picked himself up, his vest and threadbare jeans now mud-stained and his heavy brow overshadowing squinty eyes in a deep scowl, his more portly companion swore fiercely. “It’s that damned butterfree again!”

Scarlet compound eyes screwed up with determination, the butterfree swooped down on the truck a second time, long toes trailing, while the cages on the ground rocked, the pokémon inside struggling to get free.

The thickset man with the flaxen thatch of hair expanded a grubby-looking pokéball, releasing a pokémon atop the cages with that familiar warp of red light. The thick purple sludge that was a grimer rose up, black maw gaping and its formless paws reaching for the butterfree.

“Frii!”

With a twist of its lavender-coloured body and a tilt of its broad, black-veined wings, the butterfly pokémon banked sharply, narrowly missing the sludge as it melted back into a formless shape, ooze slapping against the surface of the cages and dripping between the mesh. Even from the cliff Keegan could smell it, forcing her to take a deep breath through her mouth or risk gagging.

Okay, so we’re not the only ones trying to get these guys free, but the butterfree can’t go at this alone—

Keegan looked down to the expanded pokéball still in her fist, at the shape of the vaporeon distorted by the thick red surface. “You want to help,” she whispered. “So do I. I’ll do my best, if you do yours.”

It wasn’t exactly what she wanted to say—she wanted to comfort him, to try and convince him that she wasn’t really that bad a trainer, to make sure that he would fight as earnestly as he had that day in Goldenrod, whatever his reasons had been for doing so then—but it was as close as she was gonna get, the words failing in her mouth. Instead she rose up on her knees, drew back one arm, and lobbed the pokéball as far and as accurately as she could towards the truck, over the head of the scrawny poacher as he hurriedly shoved crates back onto the vehicle’s bed and lashed them down using wiry rope. With a loud thud the pokéball bounced off the roof of the cab, splitting open and unleashing Tarn onto the muddy, dusty surface. Yes!

“What the f—”

Porky caught sight of Keegan, crouched at the height of the waterfall with the gleam of a second pokéball expanding between her fingers, her blonde hair and grey shirt damp with spray. His bulging eyes narrowed and he snarled, showing yellowed teeth, but he and his companion were abruptly distracted as his grimer was caught in a crossfire of a Water Gun and a Gust attack. Liquid splattered over the ground, lashing at any and all uncovered flesh as the squall cast it about, leaving the grimer clinging desperately to its perch with dissolving appendages.

“Damn it all!” The gaunt man hissed in frustrated urgency, shielding his face from the wind, water and sludge as he snatched up the pokéball hanging from the front of his vest and pitched it towards the cab. It exploded into red light with the crack of a releasal, shaping into the squat form of a pink-skinned lickitung.

“Get that bloody thing!” Gaunt hollered, gesturing violently at Tarn as the pokémon jumped aside to avoid a barrage of messy sludge bombs, the brown droplets splattering everywhere behind… and as Firefoot materialized on the matted turf.

“Arrcth!” the arcanine howled, launching himself at the lickitung with his teeth bared and orange fur bristling wildly in a mane around his head. Startled, Tarn jerked around, the mud and water making him slide precariously on the grimy roof—right into the thick, slimy tongue which snapped around him and squeezed. An instant later Firefoot cannoned into the lickitung and sent it flying, causing its tongue to lash the air like a whip with Tarn on the end.

The butterfree’s Whirlwind hit the truck with all the force of an act of nature, sending the vehicle into a vicious three-sixty-degree spin. Tyres kicked up waves of mud, steel groaned in complaint, the windows cracked beneath the stones and debris pelting the glass. The poachers threw themselves to the side to avoid it, but Firefoot was knocked over by an explosion of mud, staining his fur brown. At the same time, the lickitung kicked its stubby legs and heaved itself to its feet, hurling Tarn violently aside.

He rocketed over the top of the truck, was caught momentarily by the howling winds, before blasting from the hurricane like a stone from a slingshot, colliding brutally with the butterfree. They hit the ground hard at the same time as Keegan, the girl dropping her bag as her legs collapsed from her hurried descent, her arms and face scratched by the hard rock of the cliff and the unbandaged scabs on her wrist weeping slightly with the effort.

Creaking horribly, the truck skidded to a complete stop as the winds dissipated, now resembling nothing more than a gigantic, screeching pile of mud and debris, with purple gloop mixed in.

For a split second it seemed as though time stood still as everyone gathered themselves in the wake of the Whirlwind: Keegan, Tarn and the poachers staggered to their feet, the butterfree fluttered dazedly into an unsteady hover a foot above the ground, the stunned grimer gathered itself from atop its perch, and Firefoot struggled against the muck that sucked at his paws.

Then the lickitung lashed out at Firefoot, binding one paw with its tongue to wrench him into the air in a splatter of mud, and the clearing once again became a rush of action.

“Tarn, Water Gun ‘em!” Keegan shouted, pointing sharply towards the poachers as she pushed herself off the bit of cliff she’d been using as a support and made a dash for the cages, leaving her bag where it was in relative safety.

“Vuubuon!” Tarn darted beneath her feet to get around the truck and drew in a deep breath to obey, liquid beginning to gurgle in his throat.

“Sludge Bomb!” Porky roared to his grimer, stumbling in the direction of the vehicle, and the ooze that was sloshing over the tops of the cages peaked into a semblance of a head, opening into wide jaws.

Before the grimer could complete the move, the cage rattled under yet another ferocious wind from the butterfree, making Keegan’s hair and debris whip her eyes and mud splatter over the hems of her jeans. The girl flinched and jerked away from the Gust, automatically raising an arm to cover her head even as she worked at a thick knot of rope tying down the cages.

Unhindered, Tarn fired a watery torrent towards the poachers, just as the lickitung brought Firefoot down with all its strength. The ground’s momentary tremor was enough to make Tarn stumble and the Water Gun went wide, catching only Porky in the side in an explosion of spray and sending him skidding and spluttering back to the ground with a thud.

A second later the vaporeon was forced to twist aside to dodge Gaunt’s vicious kick as the poacher ran past, headed straight for Keegan. Tarn hesitated for a moment, torn between Porky’s snarling face and Gaunt’s vested back; then his decision was made for him in the form of a barrage of sludge bombs which blasted the ground around him, making him leap backward in surprise—away from the truck.

Keegan had just worked loose one knot, her fingers numbed and grazed by the coarse rope, when rough hands grabbed her arms and wrenched her violently away from the cages. “Shit!” she cursed in explosive surprise, stumbling to keep her balance from the abrupt change in position and automatically jerking away from the tight grip.

She didn’t expect the man to actually let go.

The girl tripped over her own feet and hit ground with a mud-splattering, breath-stealing thump, a spark of pain up her arms and ribs marking their complaint. She lifted her head in time to see Gaunt draw back one foot to kick her in the side, and instinctively flinched away.

Gonna hurt—

“Brii!”

The butterfree plummeted out of the sky, eyes and antenna flashing blue. The Confusion slammed into Gaunt’s mind like a sledgehammer against a brick wall, making the poacher stagger back, swearing harshly and gripping his temples. He would have been knocked down a second later by the pokémon’s Tackle, except for the gobbet of sludge which splacked across the butterfree’s wings, the grimer’s head already melting into the dripping, formless mess after its attack. The butterfree jerked violently, tumbling on its own slipstream to the ground with a shrill cry of pain, wings stained purple by the acidic goo.

“Little nuisance!” Gaunt hissed angrily, still holding one hand to his head as he lifted his foot to bring it down on the butterfree’s delicate wings.

No—! Keegan jolted into action, one hand flashing to a spare pokéball at her belt, hurling it at the butterfree struggling, with scrunched up eyes, to move away. Return—

A second later, as the butterfree dissolved into red light, Keegan remembered that she didn’t actually own it, but then Gaunt’s boot crunched on the muddy turf beside the pokéball, the shift of the ground making it roll towards Keegan.

Too late now—

She snatched it up just as it locked down with a ping, scrambling to her feet and getting a quick glimpse of the rest of the battlefield as she turned around to run.

Out of the corner of her eye she caught the burst of flames Firefoot had just aimed at the lickitung, then the sweep of mud the pink pokémon raised with its tongue to block the fire, splattering over Firefoot’s already filthy coat, weighing the arcanine down even more.

She saw Tarn as he sank his small fangs into Porky’s ankle, eliciting an almost amusingly girlish shriek and a spew of curses, the poacher’s automatic kick catching the vaporeon in the ribs and sending him sprawling as the man limped hurriedly towards the driver’s side of the cab.

Then she felt an iron grip seize her wrist and yank her back, eliciting a twinge from her shoulder. Unthinkingly the girl whirled around to backhand the scrawny poacher with the closed fist still clutching the butterfree’s pokéball.

It felt like something had exploded in her hand and wrist, but the girl was so far beyond the point of thinking that she didn’t even register it; not until after she’d jerked her other hand away from the poacher, who fell back dazedly, hand going to cup his bloodied nose.

It took moment before Keegan realized that the half-sob, half-groan had come from her, her injured limb already cradled against her chest even as she staggered away, her throbbing fingers feeling as though they were locked around the pokéball.

Need help—need Hazel—best battler, know what to do—

Or so her fragmented thoughts went, swirling around in her overwhelmed mind.

She never managed to put thought to action, however, because her attention was caught by an urgent yowl from Tarn, right before she was hit by something that felt like a car.

It may as well have been. For the second time in as many minutes, Keegan hit the ground, this time on her back and with a bone-jarring blow that made her head swim, leaving her gasping for air and momentarily paralysed. Firefoot twisted his body just enough so that he fell mostly on the matted grass and not his trainer, skidding a short furrow in the muddy lawn and rolling against the girl’s arm.

OhGodcan’tbreathe—

Panic slammed into Keegan as her complaining lungs refused to take in air, curling in on herself, one hand clenching in Firefoot’s long fur. It was only a second or two, but it felt like an eternity before she could take deep, shuddering breaths.

“Sludge Bomb!”

The command was distant to her ringing ears, and the girl couldn’t have moved to avoid it anyway, but she did manage to push herself up just enough to see over Firefoot’s back as a swirling ring of frost and ice flurried the space between them and the truck, freezing the aforementioned bombs in midair. They smashed into useless icicles on the ground, and Tarn had just leapt for the poacher leaning unsteadily against the truck when a long, muscular tongue lashed out to catch him, wrapping him up like a meowth on a string.

“Tarn,” Keegan croaked anxiously as Firefoot managed to stagger to his feet, standing over her protectively with his long fur dripping and lips rolled back over his canine in a snarl.

The truck’s engine rumbled and roared to life, followed by Porky’s victorious yell.

We’re losing…

“You,” Gaunt snarled. “Have been damned nuisances.”

C’mon, gotta move, gotta move, gotta move… Keegan pulled herself up using Firefoot as a support, hardly listening to the poacher’s words; her conscious mind had stopped working some time ago, and right now all she was thinking that she needed reinforcements, she needed Hazel, groping at her belt for the eevee’s pokéball.

Something flashed, cutting the air between them. Almost instantaneously the lickitung shrieked in pain, its tongue bucking violently enough to toss Tarn up into the air, but Keegan didn’t understand why until she saw the blood that cascaded over the slimy surface.

“What—”

The object—a pokéball—rebounded off the cages, opening with a burst and releasing a purple golbat in the same instant that two other pokémon dematerialized into red light, one in midair and the other sitting, shuddering, on the grass.

“Supersonic!” a calm, slightly harsh voice ordered. The bat opened its huge mouth, fangs glistening, and let out a shattering, drawn-out screech which rippled the air, pressuring everything that heard it into the ground, stealing their breath, making their heads pound. Keegan clutched at her ears with both her filled hands, burying her head in Firefoot’s fur, scrunching up against the shaking arcanine even as he whined, unheard, for the pain in his head.

Abruptly it ended, leaving nothing but ringing in their ears—at least until Keegan lifted her face and her vision swam dizzyingly.

A second later she almost choked on a horrible stench, what she could see of the surroundings taking on a vaguely purple haze as the panicked grimer oozed a thick cloud of gas from its every pore. The girl turned away from it, pressing her dirty sleeve to her nose to avoid breathing it in. She heard the slam of a door, then the squelch of tires on mud and the roar of the engine as the truck fled, spraying mud all over her and Firefoot.

After that there was only the sound of beating wings, and slowly the fog cleared.

Coughing, Keegan pushed herself up, one elbow braced against Firefoot. Even then, it took a moment before she realized that he was shivering violently, his body heaving as he choked, the foam already bubbling from his mouth tainted purple.

Oh no, no, no no no—

“Shit, shit, shit shit shit—” Keegan cursed, her eyes pricking with frustrated, helpless tears as she replaced Tarn’s pokéball so she’d have a spare hand, clenching a fistful of the arcanine’s fur. “Hang on, I’ll get some—I’ve got some—hang on—”

Thank God, thank God, if nothing else I’m prepared for that—

Thank Pete, he was the one obsessed with being prepared.

She was just about to push herself up onto unsteady feet when a flask dropped by her leg, making her jump and flinch, the hand still clutching the butterfree’s pokéball automatically lashing out to throw it—except that her fingers twinged when she flexed her hand, making her hiss.

Instead she craned her head to look up at the tall black-haired man who had approached on silent feet, his face lean and slanted eyes narrow. “Make him drink that,” he ordered, turning away to catch his golbat as the pokémon flared to a halt to perch on his armguard, the end of the long red scarf around his neck fluttering over his shoulder.

Should I, should I not—I know I have some, can I trust him?

What the hell. It means I don’t have to walk to my bag, and I’m tired of being suspicious all the time…

Keegan fumbled with the container, one-handedly flicking aside the cap and awkwardly forcing open Firefoot’s jaws to give him the yellow-hued antidote. The arcanine choked, spitting half of it out and coating Keegan’ fingers in slime, but he managed to gulp down enough of it that his shivers soon subsided, shaking off the sick tinge his fur had taken.

“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you,” Keegan breathed, her voice breaking as she gave the arcanine a one-handed hug before turning to look up again at the thin stranger.

Not a stranger. I know him from somewhere.

He was dressed in a rather old-fashioned uniform, a dark olive-green in colour and inherently loose in style aside from where the hems of his pants were held in by his high boots and the long-sleeved, mesh-textured shirt he wore beneath the short-sleeved tunic. Looks almost like something an old-day samurai would wear.

A second later her breath caught in realization, her eyes widening as she watched him frown after the truck, absently stroking the golbat on the head. Or a ninja.

That’s Koga, the Fuchsia City gym leader!

That’s when he turned, his dark eyes meeting hers, and Keegan shivered with the chill that ran down her back. Empty…

“Well?” he asked impatiently with a raised eyebrow. “Have you finished interfering? Or would you like to impede my capture of those poachers a second time? Come now, there’s no hurry, I have all the time in the world.”

He was—he was after them?

And I—

Oh.

Keegan flushed and dropped her gaze under his scathingly sarcastic tones. “Sorry,” she mumbled. “I just—I just—”

“I would suggest,” the ninja cut in flatly. “That you end your Safari Game immediately and return to Fuchsia City.” The golbat screeched, flapping its leathery wings as though to punctuate its trainer’s words; then with a tiny jerk he released it, letting it zip into the air with an odd, meandering flight-path. Without another glance at Keegan he followed its general direction, running with sure, silent steps into the trees.

For a moment Keegan stared after him, a little shocked by his abrupt departure, her stomach twisting with embarrassment. Then she looked down at Firefoot, whose ears were half back in uncertainty. “I guess we know where we are now,” the girl said a little weakly. She was just becoming aware of the fact that her clothes were almost completely mud-stained, clinging her to her wetly; her hair was clumped together by dirt, her fringe hanging in straggles around her face; her entire body was one huge, aching muscle.

But all of them were sensations she was somewhat used to. With her habit of playing games with Ross and their pokémon, she was used to straining herself, especially after she began travelling; in Alto Mare, it was common to get splashed and wet. The mud was new, but the rest was easy enough to put aside.

And put it aside she did, she had to, because she still didn’t know where the hell she was—her general location of the Safari Zone was all well and good, but she didn’t know which direction she was supposed to be going in.

That was when the pokéball in her hand rattled, and wearily Keegan lifted it to blink dumbly at the butterfree inside, who had apparently recovered its energy enough to attack the sides of the device. It buzzed furiously inside, tiny claws moving, antenna bobbing, as it motioned in the direction of the truck.

“You want to go after them?” Keegan asked uncertainly, and the pokéball rocked in confirmation, the butterfree doing a twirl of approval inside.

Of course we want to go after them, ‘little fox’ snapped. The game’s not over yet, and we were losing. We can’t just give up halfway.

Oh. Yeah. But Koga said to go.

Since when have you obeyed the orders of a stranger, and a freaky stranger at that? I don’t like leaving things unfinished, I want to know what’s going on, I am not going to let a pair of stupid poachers beat me, not after the Rockets.

But we messed up his plans…

We didn’t know. Maybe we can make amends by going to help. Besides, if nothing else following the poachers gives us a direction. They need to get out of the Safari Zone somehow, right? Maybe we can get out the same way.

Keegan hesitated, looking around at the thundering waterfall, ignored until that moment; at the muddy bog that the pond-banks had become; the trees, sparse as the clearing opened up before becoming nothing more than a blur of green in the distance.

And the twin tracks, vanishing off into the thinnest part of the woods in a slew of mud and grass.

It was the only thing she had to go on.

There was no other way to go.

And if she did see them again, and found herself with an opportunity, how could she, in good conscience, pass it up?

Well, I guess that decides things. With a sigh the girl staggered to her feet, brushing ineffectually at her filthy clothes, prying the butterfree’s pokéball out of her fist with winces and soft curses at her twinging hand.

“Firefoot, I know you’re tired, but can you track that truck?” she asked apologetically. Maybe Koga’ll have caught them by then and I can ask directions, at the very least.

“Nnnnrth,” Firefoot snorted confidently, heaving himself to his feet as his mistress retrieved her bag, hauling it up onto her shoulder with her uninjured hand. She still cradled the other one close, even though the throbbing had died down into a faintly numb buzz, as long as she didn’t move her fingers too much. Then she looked back in the direction of the tracks, knowing that if she saw the poachers she would wind up getting herself in trouble yet again.

Guess that’s why they call me the little fox, she mused idly, briefly touching her pendant for good luck before trudging after the arcanine who was bounding into the forest.

[purple_drake]

I cannot believe I’m doing this.

Keegan slid further down the ridge against which she lay, the damp ground soft beneath her weight, soaking into her filthy clothes. The truck was just over the rim, parked at the base of the short, sloping hill on the bank of a wide lake. It wasn’t difficult to hear the clamour erupting from the cages on the back, but it overshadowed the poachers’ voices so she only caught a few words whenever they spoke.

Words such as ‘nuisance’, ‘they’, ‘ship’ and ‘Koga’.

Guess I was right about that…

Carefully she peeked over the crest again. Both the men were waiting edgily by the truck, Porky checking the watch on his thick wrist while Gaunt tapped impatiently on the tailgate, looking out over the grey water through the bruises that were purpling across his face. The sight of said bruises made Keegan feel a brief pang of satisfaction, hastily squashed.

The girl’s eyes shifted from side to side as she visually scouted the tree-line, but she didn’t see any hint of Koga’s presence, not that she seriously expected to. He was a ninja, for God’s sake.

Still, she fingered the butterfree’s pokéball nervously, now attached to her belt along with all the others. She hadn’t had a chance to name it—her, she’s a her—yet, but that was the first thing on her ‘to do’ list as soon as she got to the warm, dry Pokémon Centre.

For all that, it was the butterfree she was relying on. She didn’t want to bring Firefoot or Tarn out unless absolutely necessary, injured as they were, but she also wanted to avoid a battle if she could. She remembered Goldenrod; sleeping powder was effective as hell. If it worked once, it would work twice, so even though the butterfree wasn’t exactly in the shape to fly more than a couple of feet, she had powder in abundance.

But only if there’s no other choice, Keegan reminded herself. She didn’t particularly want to draw Koga’s attention again—just thinking about that icy lack of expression in his eyes gave her chills—but she simply could not turn around and walk away without knowing how this would end—that it would end.

So while the poachers watched the lake, so did she, waiting for whatever sign they were, anxiously scanning the trees for Koga, reinforcements, anyone.

Someone has to be here, she thought worriedly. He said he was going to capture them, he has to be here… so where is he?

Gaunt whacked his companion on the arm, his eyes riveted on the lake as he gestured in its direction, and both Porky and Keegan turned towards the water. There, drawing nearer, was a small, flat-decked barge, cruising beneath the grey skies.

Keegan’s stomach tightened, her gaze shifting frantically from tree to tree is search of the elusive ninja. He’s still not here. What do I do? They’re going to get away!

For several long seconds she agonised over the approaching boat, absently flexing her aching hand to massage the stiffness out of it in case she needed to use it—although she doubted it would be much help, it was difficult to move it—and unfastening then refastening the butterfree’s pokéball from her belt in uncertainty.

By the time the boat was close enough for her to see the distorted figure through the glass of the control booth and the poachers had begun moving to prepare the truck for transport, she couldn’t take it anymore. Gotta do something. She snatched the butterfree’s pokéball up, sitting back on her heels to pitch it down the hill. For the second time that day, a pokéball sailed over the oblivious poachers’ heads, although this one missed the cab and instead rebounded off the mud-streaked bars of the top layer of cages.

It burst open in a swirling cascade of sparkling green powder, dousing the two men in its glittering waves before they had become fully aware of its presence. Both of them drooped to the ground, one slumping against the rail of the truck’s bed and the other sprawled out of the damp grass not far away, the cacophony of captured pokémon punctuated by loud snores.

The butterfree landed on the topmost cages, wings moving weakly but scarlet eyes ablaze with satisfied glee, tiny claws waving in triumph. Keegan let out a relieved breath, pushing herself up to scramble over the ridge and down the slope, casting an anxious look towards the ferry. Her heart skipped a beat when she saw a figure on the deck, but they didn’t seem to be looking her way and she sped up, clamping Bill’s handkerchief to her face as she kicked up the glittering dust, stepping around the sleeping men.

She didn’t see the few specks of rain drizzling down from the gloomy sky.

“Keep watch,” Keegan hurriedly instructed the butterfree, head turning once again towards the boat, trying to judge the distance between it and the shore before giving up. They’re so close, though. I don’t think I’ll have time—not unless—

Not unless you take the entire truck.

Oh boy.

Dashing towards the cab, Keegan peered in through the cracked window, trying to see past the spider-web fractures dotting the glass. She just managed to catch a glimpse of the keys dangling from the dashboard before two things happened.

One was a distant, warning shout, making her jerk in surprise towards the lake, only to swear heavily when she saw the figure on deck pointing towards shore and calling out to his companions.

The other was an ominous rumble as the sky dumped an ocean of rain on top of them.

Keegan jolted, shocked, as the cold water hit her like a ton of bricks, instantly soaking her to the skin, the liquid pouring off her weatherproof bag in rivulets. The butterfree trilled in irritation, shaking her wings in an attempt to keep them from becoming sodden, and Keegan dug at her waist for the pokéball she’d replaced there, hastily returning the pokémon as the sound of a groan filtered through the noise of the rain on the lake, pattering over the grass.

Oh, shit—

Keegan scrabbled for the door handle, her back prickling with awareness as the rain washed away the sleep powder, the chill waking the poachers behind her. She tugged open the door, sliding into the driver’s seat and tossing her soaked bag onto the passenger’s as a shout cut through the downpour. Frantically she thumped down on the locks as Porky’s snarling, saturated face appeared at the window, shouting profanities at her through the cracked glass.

Step one: get in car accomplished.

Step two: turn car on.

Brushing wet hair out of her eyes with shaking hands, Keegan fumbled the seatbelt into its nook before twisting the key, making the ring jangle with the movement. The engine roared, her heart leapt with hope… right before it spluttered and died.

You’ve got to be kidding!

Stomach tight with urgency, her eyes flickered to the grim-faced scrawny man outside the door, his beanie soaked with rain and water trickling down his sallow, bruised face, having replaced his companion and now focussed on some unknown task which would no doubt end up with an unlocked door.

Not good. Come on, step two…

Swallowing through her heart in her mouth, Keegan turned the key again and again, her frayed nerves winding tighter and tighter until the truck finally rumbled to life.

Finally! Now for step three: figure out how the hell to drive car.

Not to mention not kill myself in the process of driving it…!

She pressed her foot randomly down on a pedal, gripping the wheel so tightly that her knuckles went white and her bad hand twinged. The truck surged forward abruptly, wheels spurting on the muddy grass, and she just saw the poacher jump back with a curse before she was past, water leaving streaks on the glass, the landscape a grey blur outside the windows.

A second later something loomed out of the darkness in front of her and with a terrified oath she yanked on the wheel, swerving aside before she hit it. Another dark shape seemed to come at her from the right, and another from the left, leaving her veering away from every figure visible through the pounding rain, squinting desperately through the thick, rippling tracks of water streaming down the windshield and the cracks which spider-webbed across it.

Don’tlikethismusthavebeencrazy—

Light, I need light—how do I turn the damned headlights on?! And why the hell are they off in the first place?!

She flinched whenever branches or leaves whipped the cab, the truck bouncing over rocks and debris beneath, the engine whining loudly every time the vehicle skidded on mud and mulch. She didn’t dare take her hands off the wheel long enough to search for the headlights; the poachers probably had them off to minimise detection. Which may have helped them.

But it sure as hell ain’t helping me!

The engine made several terrifying noises, like metal turning over a grindstone, and Keegan’s heart stopped. Oh, God, don’t die on me now!

Ease off, you idiot, you’re going too fast!

Oh. Right.

She made herself take a few deep breaths and forced her foot to relax, to stop pressing the pedal right down to the floor as it had been. The engine’s whir slowed, the shapes flashing past now visible as actual trees—what she could see of them through the thick drops splattering over the glass, the thin fissures that remained from their battle, the leaves and debris which skated across the windshield.

Okay. Better. Maybe I won’t die after all…

Famous last words.

There was a jolt, a bump, as the truck abruptly powered over the lip of an unseen ridge, kicking up mud, water and debris lashing the windows. Keegan’s stomach lurched along with the frightening sensation of weightlessness a moment before the vehicle hit ground with a bone-shuddering crunch, skidding and spinning in the slick ground. The girl wrenched at the wheel desperately, struggling to regain control, but she merely sent the truck fishtailing from side to side, the forest a swirl of grey and green and brown outside the windows.

Please please please pleasepleasepleaseplease—

Brake, brake, brake, dammit!

Her foot went from the pedal to another, pumping on it uselessly before moving to the next and pressing down. The truck jerked, sending up a spray of mud and debris in front of her as the wheels locked, but the slippery ground and the downward slope kept its momentum. It swerved to the side, skidding along at an angle up until the point that a massive tree came out of nowhere right in their path.

Oh shit— was all Keegan managed to think before they hit. Her world exploded into the shriek of metal and the shatter of glass, in counterpoint to the thin animal screeches somewhere in the back. The girl was thrown violently around, the seatbelt wrenching taut and drawing a ribbon of pain up her chest and shoulder, chafing her bare neck raw.

Then there was silence, silence aside from the drip of water and the dull thud and groan of settling debris. For several moments Keegan just sat and trembled, her breaths quick and ragged, her heart pounding, her stomach threatening nausea.

We’ve stopped.

We’ve really stopped.

The rain drummed through the canopy to trickle through the now completely smashed windshield onto the crumpled dashboard, the steering wheel half caved in to the engine. The passenger’s side had received the worst of the blow—the dash had met with the seat, now looking as though it was one object, and the door and hood were wrapped so closely around the bleeding tree that they may as well have been married.

Numbly Keegan forced open her clenched fists, prying them from the wheel—both of them ached, now, her knuckles covered in tiny cuts and scrapes from the glass. She clasped them to her chest in a vain attempt to still the tremors shaking her body, unaware of the stunned tears which tracked down her grimy cheeks. The seatbelt bound her tightly, almost suffocatingly, to the chair, forced at an odd angle by the steel crushed in huge wrinkles across the way.

That was about when the daze began to lift enough for her to start feeling things. For the second time that day, her body ached from the beating it had taken, and she knew she’d have bruises by the next morning. Her neck twinged abominably every time she turned her head, and when she raised a trembling hand to her stinging cheeks they came away wet with watery blood—she’d been cut by flying glass, probably more than once.

Her feet were being squashed by the metal of the dashboard, so all she could feel down there was a heavy weight and the pinpricks of sharp edges. Gingerly she wormed her way out, swallowing a cry of pain when she grazed long scrapes down her shins. When she drew her legs up onto the seat, it was to find her jeans were soaked with oil, ripped and torn, and judging by the sting the metal had drawn blood beneath the heavy denim.

Keegan took a deep breath and almost choked on the sob which came out instead, her eyes pricking with hot tears, her throat closed by a lump.

I can’t, there’s no time, I have to get the pokémon out, some of them might be hurt, I can’t stay here—

But for long moments all she could do was hug her knees and struggle to contain the sobs—and fail.

When she finally managed to take several deep breaths in a row without one of them catching—shaky though they were—she fumbled for the button of the seatbelt, only for her hand to scuff hard plastic. When she looked down, it was to find that her seat had been shoved out of position enough to crush the lower end of the belt.

You’ve got to be kidding. She tugged uselessly at the switch, but only succeeded in tightening the band across her chest.

Not kidding.

She closed her eyes, biting hard on her lip to keep new tears at bay. Okay. Okay. I’m alive. I’m fine. I can’t get out. No room for a pokémon. What do I do?

Maybe I can break it. Up near the shoulder. Her eyes flickered open and she twisted around to see where the clip was attached to the side of the truck, but the sudden pain that lanced down her arm made her hiss and flinch away from the chair-back. She abruptly became aware of the liquid she could feel trickling down her arm, making her long-sleeved shirt cling to her wetly, accompanied by a dull throb. A quick look proved that she’d been cut, at some point or another, by the glass of the side window—although it was still mostly intact, if made completely opaque by the white fracture-lines.

Don’t look too bad. Just that I’ve got so bloody many of them, not just on my arm…

The clip on the side turned out to be out of reach, the seatbelt pulled too tight to give her any leeway to wriggle into a new position.

Okay. I can’t do that. Maybe I can cut it. She glanced towards the passenger seat, covered in glass and debris, and stretched so she could root through it to find her bag. Pocket knife’s in there… not much… but it’s better than nothing…

It took a few moments for her to actually find the pocket knife, and when she flicked out the blade it looked puny compared to the wide black material of the belt, but she felt better to actually be doing something, no matter how useless.

She didn’t get far—didn’t seem to have made a difference at all—before the soft crack of a pokémon being released cut through the beat of the rain. Keegan froze, her heart ricocheting off her ribs and into her mouth, and her hand clenched on the knife as she tensed.

“Use Acid, then your tail,” a familiar, cold voice ordered from outside over the downpour, and Keegan felt a chill run down her back, her stomach twisting.

Oh hell, not him.

She heard a splat, as though something sticky had just hit the door, and then a low sizzle, almost lost beneath the other sounds. A long, serpentine shadow rose up behind the broken window; then there was a deafening thud and the door buckled off its damaged hinges, showering her with glass remnants and water as she recoiled, brandishing the knife defensively.

“Air Cutter,” came another curt command, and Keegan peeked through half-closed eyes in time to see the air ripple, see it cut. She flinched back from the ear-splitting whistle as the draught of blades sliced through the seatbelt and the worn leather of the chair behind it.

The band across her chest slackened but before she could do anything, someone plucked the knife out of her hand. She blinked wordlessly up at Koga as he lifted it by the tip, one eyebrow raised, his spiky hair looking rain- and windswept. “I believe,” he said coolly, with a steely undercurrent that made her shiver and look away. “I told you to leave.”

I know you did, but I couldn’t, and I don’t know why I should listen to you anyway—

She swallowed, preferring to study the lithe arbok wound halfway up a nearby tree than look at him, see the recrimination in his eyes. Not that it helped; the purple pokémon simply glared back at her, narrow forked tongue flickering in and out accusingly. Her stomach felt hollow with embarrassment, with guilt, with sheer exhaustion. “I was lost,” she mumbled. “I didn’t come in from the gates, I came from the Cycling Road, I needed to follow them and then you didn’t come and I couldn’t let them get away—”

“Foolish girl,” Koga growled, flicking the pocket knife shut with a practised snap and tossing it back onto her lap. “I’ve been tracking those poachers for a week now—did you think they were random thieves, darting in and out? No, their scheme was more elaborate; catching them is nothing if I don’t catch their accomplices as well. Now you’ve just ruined any chance of that.”

He was… waiting… deliberately waiting…

Oh, God. He wanted the ferry to land—he wanted to catch them in the act—all of them!

Keegan felt sick, swallowing with difficulty through the lump in her throat, her vision blurring with tears. Oh, God, I’ve screwed this up so badly.

You didn’t know.

I should have trusted…

You saw what you saw. You acted as best as you could. You didn’t know. How could you have known?

It’s not my place…

Not your place to help some injured pokémon? You wanted to help. You thought he wasn’t going to be there in time. Your intentions were good.

She took a deep breath, reaching out to yank the key out of the slot, making the other keys jingle, and shoved her pocket knife into her pocket. “I didn’t know,” she repeated to herself aloud, as much to her as to Koga. “I didn’t—I didn’t know—how could I have known? I couldn’t see you… I didn’t want them to get away… I didn’t think—”

“That much,” Koga said with exceptional asperity, “Is obvious.”

He didn’t let me finish. She managed to summon a glare from somewhere, but the disdainful look he gave back—in triplicate—made her flush and turn to grab her bag, shaking debris off the soft material. “I didn’t think you’d get there in time,” she said shortly, channelling the frustration building in her gut into anger instead. I need the energy, I’m not sure how long I can last, I wanna get to Fuchsia…

“Think who you’re talking to, girl,” Koga growled, but Keegan just ducked her head and pushed past him, scrambling out of the mangled cab. She’d only taken a step when his comment triggered a thought and she whirled around, chest heaving, kicking up mulch, eyes blazing.

“Well, if you’re so good, why the hell didn’t you stop me before I did anything?!” she demanded, but didn’t even wait for an answer before she spun about once again, ignoring the arbok’s hiss, the pokémon rearing up indignantly at her rough manner towards its master. Koga flicked his hand and it settled down again, narrow, unblinking eyes locked on Keegan as the girl struggled up the muddy hill, ignoring the sting of her various cuts and the ongoing ache in her muscles, the water dripping from above, having faded to a slight drizzle which barely penetrated the thick canopy.

“Because, girl, I had people and pokémon to coordinate, a position to keep, and very little time between realizing you were there and your idiotic decision to play hero to get you out of the way.”

Keegan twitched. It’s not like I was trying to hide from anyone except the poachers, she thought angrily, her frustration and guilt unhinging the usual walls between her thoughts and her mouth, her next words coming before she could stop them. “You’d think a gym leader would be better prepared,” she scoffed, pulling up alongside one of the cages and jamming the key into its lock. Inside, the round, spiky blue nidoran watched her with wide eyes, huddled, shivering, at the back of her enclosure.

The next second someone had grabbed her arm and pulled her around, making her skid in the mud with a curse. She almost fell, but found herself being held up, automatically lifting her head only to meet Koga’s dark eyes, flashing with annoyance and making her flinch. “Idiot,” he hissed. “We couldn’t—risk—being—seen!”

Then he released her just as suddenly and she stumbled, managing to catch herself on the truck before she went sliding down the hill. “I am not accustomed to being disobeyed, girl,” Koga said in such icy tones that Keegan shivered, struggling to keep up the tiny bonfire that was her anger. “I did not see you because I was not looking for a foolish teenager with a hero complex!”

I’m sorry, I’m sorry, don’t talk like that, I’m sorry—

Tears pricked her eyes once again, but Keegan swiped them away furiously, angry at her own mistake, at her own fear of the reprimand. I did what I thought I had to, you can’t change it, you can’t change it, don’t be a coward, you need to face up to him—

“I just wanted to help,” she faltered, and cursed herself for the hesitation. You helped. You helped. You saved them. Be proud. You did something. You made a choice. It’s the thought that counts.

If I can remember that…

I can take anything he says.

She lifted her chin. “I was trying to help.” she said more firmly. “I tried—and I did—I saved them—you can’t blame me for not knowing—I just did what I could—and I saved them—”

“The way you were driving, that remains to be seen,” Koga replied coldly, with just a touch of the sardonic humour which had marked his words up to a few moments ago. “You’re lucky you didn’t kill yourself, let alone the pokémon.”

Not fair, not funny, why does he seem like he’s laughing at me, he was angry just a minute ago—

She turned away to struggle with the lock, flipping between keys to try and find the right one, but before she did the entire ring slipped through her cold, numbed fingers and dropped into the debris underfoot. Keegan cursed, but Koga stooped and picked it up before she could do so herself. “I think,” he said coolly, holding the keys back from her. “You’ve done enough damage here. Now this time do what I say and go back to Fuchsia.”

“I can’t,” Keegan said stubbornly. “I can’t, I don’t know which way to go, I told you I was lost, I’m here by accident, I can’t—”

Her gibbering excuse simply made her raise his fingers to his lips to let out a piercing whistle, making her flinch and automatically cover her ears. A second later came a responding screech, a golbat bursting through the foliage in a breakneck dive before it flared its leathery wings sharply to alight atop the cages. “Golbat can show you the way.”

It wasn’t a suggestion. Koga fixed her with his steady, unnerving gaze, the expression in his eyes ordering her to do what he said but at the same time daring—expecting—her to argue.

And so she did, one last-ditch effort to remain involved. I can’t give up now, I’ve come this far, I have to make sure, I don’t want to give in—

“But the—” she began, gesturing towards the truckload of wet, bruised and injured pokémon.

“I will take care of them,” Koga cut her off shortly, fisting the keys, and his calculating eyes bored into her even more intensely, as if to say, ‘well? Any other ideas, or are you actually going to be a good little girl and do what I say now?’

Hell, she could almost hear him saying it.

She shivered. I don’t trust him, I don’t trust him at all, but he was trying to find the poachers, and I’m tired, and I hurt, and I’m wet and cold and my pokémon are injured—

Her weariness caught up with her, what was left of her anger melting away into exhaustion, overtaken by the shock of the afternoon.

Why do I get myself into these things?

“Okay,” she whispered dully, hugging herself. The goblet punctuated her words with a screech and a sharp flap, letting itself tumble off its perch to wing mockingly past her head, the tips of its wings scraping her messy hair even as she jerked instinctively aside.

She hesitated for only a moment, casting one last, uncertain glance at Koga before trudging off after the golbat, too tired even to swat irritably at the leaves and water which dripped annoyingly in her eyes.

Koga watched her leave, the metal keys digging into his palm, still as a statue aside from the tiny sway of his scarf until she was out of earshot.

It was only then that he chuckled grudgingly; the girl had nerve, he had to admit that. Foolish, impulsive, pigheaded nerve, yes, but it was there nonetheless. It’s almost a pity that people like that can’t be trained. Too stubborn.

With his spare hand he reached into the overlapping fold of his gi, pulling out a round device shaped much like his signature golbat and cupping it securely in his grasp. With a touch of his thumb on the eye-like button at the top of the device, the reflective surface within the gaping mouth of the golbat shimmered with static. “Report,” he snapped into it, still gazing thoughtfully after the girl.

I have never met her; I’m sure I would remember someone so irksome. And yet…

“The poachers are in custody, sir,” a slightly frustrated-sounded voice answered, the sound waves making the now opaque surface flicker. “But the ones on the ferry turned tail and ran before they hit shore. They’re gone.”

Koga snarled a little in annoyance, his grip on the comm. device tightening. Very irksome. Damn that girl. And it’s unlikely they’ll return—not here, and not for a while.

“Monitor the lake,” he ordered anyway as rain dripped onto the mirror-like screen in shimmers and ripples of static. “The police in Fuchsia have taken an interest in these poachers—we’ll let them deal with them. Meanwhile, there’s a truckload of pokémon for shipment.”

“Yes, sir. We’ve got a lock. Is there someone we should look for—any idea who interfered?”

Koga’s eyes narrowed, staring into the trees where the girl had vanished. Familiar, yet unfamiliar…

“No. None at all.”

He didn’t wait for a reply; with a second touch on the eye, the surface faded into its original state and he tucked the device away, raising one of his bladed pokéballs to return his arbok. Like it or not, girl, you now owe me twice over—and if I ever do have the misfortune of meeting you again, rest assured I will collect.

With that he tossed the keys carelessly onto the back of the truck, striding calmly away from the screeching, restrained pokémon to vanish into the wet forest with a flutter of his crimson scarf.

A/N: gi--a loose shirt or tunic which is worn in combination with hakama during training. Less formal than a kimono; basically a training uniform, whereas hakama can be worn during formal affairs.

[Sike Saner]

Looks like a number of noteworthy characters have recently come into the picture. Tynan’s a prime example, someone about whom I find it quite interesting to read. Alyssa stood out too; she can be fairly nasty, yes, but her personality made for some entertaining reading.

    Spoiler:- Alyssa:

Show Spoiler

 
And you say she’ll be making an appearance in the sequel? Cool. ^^
 

And then we have Koga. Oh Lord… he rather scares me, and at times I really want to kick him (despite the fact that an attempt at such would fail VERY miserably, I’m sure XD), but nonetheless (or perhaps because of those factors o.o) I really like that guy. Oh, plus the fact that I like his character so much might also have something to do with the fact that I consider him to be one of the coolest gym leaders EVER. XD At any rate, his character is definitely done justice here. I loved reading about him.

Speaking of the latest chapter, I love that Keegan wandered into the Safari Zone without even realizing it. Her sense of direction is a thing of majesty. XD

… Considering that I found myself on Main Street and wondering how in the hell I wound up there a few months ago, maybe I shouldn’t poke fun at her sense of direction. XD; Or, maybe having goofed up likewise is precisely what gives me the right to have a good laugh about it. o.o …Bah, I just confused myself. XDDDD

Those were some sweet battles there, both in the latest chapter and the one directly preceding it. The vs. Tynan match was cool, due in part to the fact that it enabled us to see Hazel show more of what she can really do. That same battle also contained a great employment of Flash Fire on the part of Tynan, his Flareon, and the author who decided that they would do such. The battle against the poachers had a number of neat qualities, as well, such as lots of action, very cool use of Grimer (especially with regards to its gloppy, oozy, virtually amorphous properties), and the way that the poachers were referred to as “Gaunt” and “Porky” in that scene (I liked that XD).

Yay for Keegan’s acquisition of that Butterfree! Said Butterfree was positively adorable, yet fights like hell—an awesome combination. ^^

And Keegan’s stealing of the truck… damn, that was cool. Very exciting—her panic in that scene came through excellently. Of course, I might also add that my mind, astonishingly morbid thing that it often is, kept imagining the bangs, thuds, and crunches of Pokémon mowed down by the truck as it went crashing through the Safari Zone. O~o;;; Not that I believe without a shadow of a doubt that Keegan actually did hit or run over any Pokémon with said truck, mind you, but nonetheless my twisted brain decided at once that it fancied the notion that she did and ran with with that notion. Thanks, brain. XDDDD

Plus, as is ever the case, things came from Keegan’s mind that I just loved the hell out of. That said, following is a gallery of some of my favorite of her thoughts from the past two chapters:

    Spoiler:- The Mind of Keegan:

Show Spoiler

 

Erika’s eyebrows shot skyward. “From Bill?” she echoed, but her expression wasn’t surprise—not exactly. It was more like she’d just received unpleasant news that she wasn’t expecting—or rather, was anticipating some unpleasant news. “What would Bill want to talk to me about?”

“Um…” Automatically Keegan looked around to find half the students’ eyes on her, some discreet, some not. “Can we—can we talk about this somewhere else?”

Oh my God, I feel like I’m in a bad crime movie. Keegan flushed, catching the sound of s******s somewhere behind her, but Erika didn’t laugh.

“Pokémon battles are important,” the girl shot back. “What if we got attacked? Are you going to teach us how to defend ourselves? But then,” she added quickly, eyeing the white bandage Keegan had replaced Bill’s handkerchief with at the Pokémon Centre, “You don’t seem to have had much luck in that regard either.”

“I’m not a teacher,” Keegan said stiffly, wishing desperately for the familiar, winding streets of Alto Mare where she could—and often had—so easily hide, and for Ross to act as a foil for her as he had so often done. Not this time. This time she was on her own, faced with one of the trials she’d thought she’d left behind: the scathing barbs of a teenage girl.

I’m supposed to have trouble with rampaging pokémon and getting lost in random places, not be verbally attacked by some arrogant twit, Keegan thought in frustration.

“Fire Spin!” Tynan ordered before Hazel had even materialized properly, and with a roar of flames the eevee was enveloped in a writhing orange inferno. Keegan jumped at the speed of the attack, flinching away from the heat as the pokéball flew back to her hand, but she instantly dropped it with a yelp, the outside surface uncomfortably hot. “Now follow up with Quick Attack!” She heard, and the fluffy eeveelution flashed across the dusty field, vanishing into the blazing tornado like a rock into a river. A second later Hazel exploded out the back in lashes of fire, smoke pouring off her blackened fur in ashy ribbons.

Not fair, he didn’t even give her a chance to get out of her pokéball!

Don’t complain, you didn’t exactly play fair when you dumped sleeping powder all over the Rockets.

Oh, shut up.

The flareon drew back its head and opened its mouth, fire roiling in the back of its throat to explode towards Hazel in a thick streamer of flames, but the eevee flipped over in midair, landing lightly and springing away into an evading Quick Attack. Keegan ducked at the fire coursed overhead, the heat making her skin feel tight and dry, and her knees hit ground, one hand coming down to balance herself. I hate it when they aim at me! What was I thinking?!

Hazel tried to dodge the roaring flames but they twisted about her, enveloping her for a second time, and Keegan unknowingly crushed the handkerchief in her fist, her teeth gritting. Why did I ever think this would be fun?!

Unfortunately it was that very rainstorm which had kept her from letting Firefoot get any exercise yesterday, drizzling as it had been the entire time. A metaphorical water-pup he may be, but getting splashed wasn’t anywhere near the same as having several gallons of liquid dumped on you, especially not for a fire pokémon. At least at the Fuchsia City Pokémon Centre he’d be under cover, and keeping him in until they got there meant she wouldn’t have to brush all the mud and sticks out of his ridiculously long fur. I swear he’s got longer fur than Hazel does now.

She’d even been forced to buy some new brushes for him, because the stiff-bristled one she had for Hazel, while appropriate for the small-bodied eevee, was too delicate for a creature of Firefoot’s size, weight and thickness of coat. I’m just glad that Tarn’s short-haired. Remind me not to catch any more pokémon with fur!

Coughing, Keegan pushed herself up, one elbow braced against Firefoot. Even then, it took a moment before she realized that he was shivering violently, his body heaving as he choked, the foam already bubbling from his mouth tainted purple.

Oh no, no, no no no—

“****, ****, **** **** ****—” Keegan cursed, her eyes pricking with frustrated, helpless tears as she replaced Tarn’s pokéball so she’d have a spare hand, clenching a fistful of the arcanine’s fur. “Hang on, I’ll get some—I’ve got some—hang on—”

Thank God, thank God, if nothing else I’m prepared for that—

Thank Pete, he was the one obsessed with being prepared.

Swallowing through her heart in her mouth, Keegan turned the key again and again, her frayed nerves winding tighter and tighter until the truck finally rumbled to life.

Finally! Now for step three: figure out how the hell to drive car.

Not to mention not kill myself in the process of driving it…!

She pressed her foot randomly down on a pedal, gripping the wheel so tightly that her knuckles went white and her bad hand twinged. The truck surged forward abruptly, wheels spurting on the muddy grass, and she just saw the poacher jump back with a curse before she was past, water leaving streaks on the glass, the landscape a grey blur outside the windows.

A second later something loomed out of the darkness in front of her and with a terrified oath she yanked on the wheel, swerving aside before she hit it. Another dark shape seemed to come at her from the right, and another from the left, leaving her veering away from every figure visible through the pounding rain, squinting desperately through the thick, rippling tracks of water streaming down the windshield and the cracks which spider-webbed across it.

Don’tlikethismusthavebeencrazy—

She flinched whenever branches or leaves whipped the cab, the truck bouncing over rocks and debris beneath, the engine whining loudly every time the vehicle skidded on mud and mulch. She didn’t dare take her hands off the wheel long enough to search for the headlights; the poachers probably had them off to minimise detection. Which may have helped them.

But it sure as hell ain’t helping me!

The engine made several terrifying noises, like metal turning over a grindstone, and Keegan’s heart stopped. Oh, God, don’t die on me now!

Ease off, you idiot, you’re going too fast!

Oh. Right.

It took a few moments for her to actually find the pocket knife, and when she flicked out the blade it looked puny compared to the wide black material of the belt, but she felt better to actually be doing something, no matter how useless.

She didn’t get far—didn’t seem to have made a difference at all—before the soft crack of a pokémon being released cut through the beat of the rain. Keegan froze, her heart ricocheting off her ribs and into her mouth, and her hand clenched on the knife as she tensed.

“Use Acid, then your tail,” a familiar, cold voice ordered from outside over the downpour, and Keegan felt a chill run down her back, her stomach twisting.

Oh hell, not him.

 

And now…

    Spoiler:- Other highlights and et cetera:

Show Spoiler

 

The gym had been next, but Erika wasn’t there, leaving Keegan to wonder whether gym leaders ever actually showed up—she remembered what had come of her going out to look for Morty in Ecruteak.

XD

This time she was on her own, faced with one of the trials she’d thought she’d left behind: the scathing barbs of a teenage girl.

A formidable force, indeed. *shudders*

How was it that a bunch of half-schooled trainers could make her feel more anxious than a pair of Team Rocket agents?

XDD

The outside swirl of sparks dissipated into the air, but the fire remained, the flareon’s orange and red fur blazing with thick veins of molten flame, and for an instant Keegan panicked, even while a part of her noted the occurrence. Flash Fire: a fire pokémon’s attribute, in which their elemental powers are enhanced by storing the heat from other fire attacks.

It used its own attack to power itself up!

Again, great use (and depiction) of the Flash Fire ability. ^^

“Shadow Ball!” Keegan retaliated instantly without thinking, feeling as though it was someone else saying the words but knowing it was right, that if Hazel knew any other attacks that would be one of them—because she’d considered teaching it to her once, back when she had gotten tired of running and hiding from the school bullies. If she thought it was a good choice now, wouldn’t she think it was a good choice then, too?

“Eebuuu!” with a joyful mew, as though Hazel had just been waiting for the command, the eevee sucked in a breath to obey, a writhing mass of shadows gathering in her mouth as dusty veins wreathed about her, mixing with the dark smoke still drifting off her fur. In the same instant as Flareon she released the dusky ball, shadows streaming away behind it as it shot towards her evolution and met the sparking Flamethrower in a brilliant explosion of ash and mist.

Shadow Ball’s one of those attacks I love to see in fiction because it just lends itself so well to really cool descriptions—and this instance is no exception. ^^ Plus, it was cool when said attack collided with that Flamethrower and they exploded into ash and mist.

It was true that Alyssa was very hardworking; her assignments were legendary among the staff for their length, depth, and exceptional research. Unfortunately, she was the most popular girl in class, not to mention one of the richest, which meant she was one of the leaders.

And all that meant that she could be unbelievably catty.

XD Indeed.

Then the girl’s brow furrowed, and she raised a hand to touch her cheek in reluctant, irritable thought. “She was a good battler, though.”

And willing to give someone their due, Erika reminded herself with a small smile. “Oh? Did she battle someone?”

Illustrated there is another thing I really like about Alyssa: she’s not an absolute jerk, a fact which makes her more three-dimensional as a character.

Now that’s interesting, Erika thought. Tynan was cut from the same mould as Alyssa—rich family, a strong sense of self-worth, and enough confidence to choke a persian.

I love that phrase.

What good were words while Team Rocket was taking over half the economy through the fear of their retribution? What good were words when you were being charged at by a wild rhyhorn?

And I love that, too.

A YELP.

It rang through the forest, making pokémon tilt their heads to listen or scamper back into the shielding undergrowth with a rustle of leaves. A curse followed soon after, punctuated by random mutterings and the distinct, feline-like titter of a pokémon, before they were both cut off by a semi-irritable shout.

“Stop laughing, Hazel!”

“Bubui!”

A flurry of spiky-feathered doduo burst from a patch of particularly thick foliage, making dewdrops scatter everywhere and leaves slap against the ground. A few seconds later they were followed, more slowly, by a certain blonde-haired girl clad in mud-stained jeans and a long-sleeved grey top, a slightly bedraggled eevee with an amused glint in her black eyes, and the swift blue form of a sleek vaporeon.

“It wasn’t funny,” Keegan whined, wiping her muddy hands off onto the cleanest patch of her jeans she could find, since her knees and shins were now grubby and grass-stained from her most recent tumble.

Heh heh… “It wasn’t funny” is an almost magical* phrase, with the amazing power to emphasize the fact that oh yes, it was funny. XD It works on the same principle as that which causes “don’t laugh” to be one of the funniest things a person can say.

It was Tarn’s distressed keen which caught her attention this time, and her eyes found the vaporeon just as Hazel darted in front of him, cutting off his headlong rush into the fast-moving river. Stumbling towards them with rubbery legs, Keegan saw, over their backs and through the white spray of the unseen pond below, a pair of scruffy men roughly jamming as many mesh cages as they could fit onto the back of their dirty truck, its wheels sinking into the soft turf beside the lake beneath its three-cage-high load. Contained within them were pokémon of all shapes and sizes; prickly-looking nidoran, polished pink exeggcute, even the dull, soft purples of a venomoth. Some were struggling furiously with the mesh, their eyes narrowed with rage and bloodlust—a victreebel puffed itself up, yellow body pulsing and broad leaves quivering with rage as it threw itself at the walls of its pen with a piercing shriek that cut through the roar of the falls—while others lay injured on the blood-soaked floor of their enclosures.

Wow… o.o Quite a potent image, especially with regards to the enraged Victreebel trying desperately to bash its way out.

The butterfree’s Whirlwind hit the truck with all the force of an act of nature, sending the vehicle into a vicious three-sixty-degree spin. Tyres kicked up waves of mud, steel groaned in complaint, the windows cracked beneath the stones and debris pelting the glass.

That’s an aspect of Whirlwind (and wind-based attacks in general, especially the stronger ones) that I was glad to see brought into matters here: the fact that the debris it kicks up and whips around would be an especially great hazard presented by the attack; perhaps the greatest hazard thereof, in fact. Especially in situations such as that where there’s a lot for the wind to throw around, such as that one with its rocks and such. It’s no wonder that that truck took a beating with debris like that in the equation.

“Sludge Bomb!” Porky roared to his grimer, stumbling in the direction of the vehicle, and the ooze that was sloshing over the tops of the cages peaked into a semblance of a head, opening into wide jaws.

Again, Grimer was depicted quite nicely here. Its sludgy properties, the way it can shift, deform, and reform, shaping whatever parts it needs for the situation from the sludge that comprises it and melting them back down again when it’s through with them… Grimer was really done justice in its appearance in that chapter.

She saw Tarn as he sank his small fangs into Porky’s ankle, eliciting an almost amusingly girlish shriek and a spew of curses, the poacher’s automatic kick catching the vaporeon in the ribs and sending him sprawling as the man limped hurriedly towards the driver’s side of the cab.

XD

It took moment before Keegan realized that the half-sob, half-groan had come from her, her injured limb already cradled against her chest even as she staggered away, her throbbing fingers feeling as though they were locked around the pokéball.

Need help—need Hazel—best battler, know what to do—

Or so her fragmented thoughts went, swirling around in her overwhelmed mind.

She never managed to put thought to action, however, because her attention was caught by an urgent yowl from Tarn, right before she was hit by something that felt like a car.

It may as well have been. For the second time in as many minutes, Keegan hit the ground, this time on her back and with a bone-jarring blow that made her head swim, leaving her gasping for air and momentarily paralysed. Firefoot twisted his body just enough so that he fell mostly on the matted grass and not his trainer, skidding a short furrow in the muddy lawn and rolling against the girl’s arm.

OhGodcan’tbreathe—

Panic slammed into Keegan as her complaining lungs refused to take in air, curling in on herself, one hand clenching in Firefoot’s long fur. It was only a second or two, but it felt like an eternity before she could take deep, shuddering breaths.

Great portrayal of what she was going through there. Damn… that was surely a very scary experience, especially the matter of not being able to breathe there for a moment—that’s always a terrifying experience.

“Sludge Bomb!”

The command was distant to her ringing ears, and the girl couldn’t have moved to avoid it anyway, but she did manage to push herself up just enough to see over Firefoot’s back as a swirling ring of frost and ice flurried the space between them and the truck, freezing the aforementioned bombs in midair. They smashed into useless icicles on the ground, and Tarn had just leapt for the poacher leaning unsteadily against the truck when a long, muscular tongue lashed out to catch him, wrapping him up like a meowth on a string.

Nice use of that ice attack there. ^^

The object—a pokéball—rebounded off the cages, opening with a burst and releasing a purple golbat in the same instant that two other pokémon dematerialized into red light, one in midair and the other sitting, shuddering, on the grass.

“Supersonic!” a calm, slightly harsh voice ordered. The bat opened its huge mouth, fangs glistening, and let out a shattering, drawn-out screech which rippled the air, pressuring everything that heard it into the ground, stealing their breath, making their heads pound. Keegan clutched at her ears with both her filled hands, burying her head in Firefoot’s fur, scrunching up against the shaking arcanine even as he whined, unheard, for the pain in his head.

Abruptly it ended, leaving nothing but ringing in their ears—at least until Keegan lifted her face and her vision swam dizzyingly.

Ooh. o.o Very nice depiction of Supersonic.

Coughing, Keegan pushed herself up, one elbow braced against Firefoot. Even then, it took a moment before she realized that he was shivering violently, his body heaving as he choked, the foam already bubbling from his mouth tainted purple.

And there is a nice depiction of being poisoned. ^^

That was when the pokéball in her hand rattled, and wearily Keegan lifted it to blink dumbly at the butterfree inside, who had apparently recovered its energy enough to attack the sides of the device. It buzzed furiously inside, tiny claws moving, antenna bobbing, as it motioned in the direction of the truck.

I love the image of a furious Butterfree—and a furious, miniaturized Butterfree, no less. So cute! ^^

By the time the boat was close enough for her to see the distorted figure through the glass of the control booth and the poachers had begun moving to prepare the truck for transport, she couldn’t take it anymore. Gotta do something. She snatched the butterfree’s pokéball up, sitting back on her heels to pitch it down the hill. For the second time that day, a pokéball sailed over the oblivious poachers’ heads, although this one missed the cab and instead rebounded off the mud-streaked bars of the top layer of cages.

It burst open in a swirling cascade of sparkling green powder, dousing the two men in its glittering waves before they had become fully aware of its presence. Both of them drooped to the ground, one slumping against the rail of the truck’s bed and the other sprawled out of the damp grass not far away, the cacophony of captured pokémon punctuated by loud snores.

A great move on the part of Keegan and that Butterfree. ^^

She pressed her foot randomly down on a pedal, gripping the wheel so tightly that her knuckles went white and her bad hand twinged. The truck surged forward abruptly, wheels spurting on the muddy grass, and she just saw the poacher jump back with a curse before she was past, water leaving streaks on the glass, the landscape a grey blur outside the windows.

A second later something loomed out of the darkness in front of her and with a terrified oath she yanked on the wheel, swerving aside before she hit it. Another dark shape seemed to come at her from the right, and another from the left, leaving her veering away from every figure visible through the pounding rain, squinting desperately through the thick, rippling tracks of water streaming down the windshield and the cracks which spider-webbed across it.

Man, that would be scary, seriously scary. o.o And that’s a nice touch there with regards to the negative effects of the rain and the cracked windshield on the visibility. ^^

Her foot went from the pedal to another, pumping on it uselessly before moving to the next and pressing down. The truck jerked, sending up a spray of mud and debris in front of her as the wheels locked, but the slippery ground and the downward slope kept its momentum. It swerved to the side, skidding along at an angle up until the point that a massive tree came out of nowhere right in their path.

Oh shit— was all Keegan managed to think before they hit. Her world exploded into the shriek of metal and the shatter of glass, in counterpoint to the thin animal screeches somewhere in the back. The girl was thrown violently around, the seatbelt wrenching taut and drawing a ribbon of pain up her chest and shoulder, chafing her bare neck raw.

Oh ****, indeed. o.o Crashes are pretty damned thrilling to read about as they occur (by which I don’t mean it’s fun to read about a crash while actually being in a crash XD), that’s for sure. Also noteworthy is the attention to detail with regards to the effects of the crash on Keegan, the pain brought on by the seatbelt doing its job; good work there. ^^

When she finally managed to take several deep breaths in a row without one of them catching—shaky though they were—she fumbled for the button of the seatbelt, only for her hand to scuff hard plastic. When she looked down, it was to find that her seat had been shoved out of position enough to crush the lower end of the belt.

You’ve got to be kidding. She tugged uselessly at the switch, but only succeeded in tightening the band across her chest.

Not kidding.

Oh damn, that had to suck for Keegan. XD Surviving a crash only to find yourself trapped by the damned seatbelt… damn. XD

“Air Cutter,” came another curt command, and Keegan peeked through half-closed eyes in time to see the air ripple, see it cut. She flinched back from the ear-splitting whistle as the draught of blades sliced through the seatbelt and the worn leather of the chair behind it.

That is a seriously cool depiction of Air Cutter. o.o

She lifted her chin. “I was trying to help.” she said more firmly. “I tried—and I did—I saved them—you can’t blame me for not knowing—I just did what I could—and I saved them—”

“The way you were driving, that remains to be seen,” Koga replied coldly, with just a touch of the sardonic humour which had marked his words up to a few moments ago. “You’re lucky you didn’t kill yourself, let alone the pokémon.”

Ooh… *winces* Man, he really burned her there. That was scathing. Of course, much of what he said to her was, but that… wow.

Of course, there I was, unable to help but imagine Pokémon falling victim to that truck as I read the scene in which Keegan was stealing it, so maybe I shouldn’t be saying anything about his comment there. XD Or, maybe for that very reason I CAN… Agh, not that dilemma again! XDDDD

“But the—” she began, gesturing towards the truckload of wet, bruised and injured pokémon.

“I will take care of them,” Koga cut her off shortly, fisting the keys, and his calculating eyes bored into her even more intensely, as if to say, ‘well? Any other ideas, or are you actually going to be a good little girl and do what I say now?’

Hell, she could almost hear him saying it.

I could almost hear him saying it, too. XD
 

So. Those were two very enjoyable chapters, with a nice, big dose of excitement and lots of pricelessness courtesy of Keegan’s mind. Oh, and KOGA—God, I enjoy the hell out of that character. Boss work yet again. ^^


*Earlier in this review, when I had typed the word “magical”, I initially mistyped it as “pamgical”. O.o Wtf. XD

[purple_drake]

Well, finally! Every time I went to reply the page refused to load properly, so there's my excuse for the lateness, Sike, sorry. And, yeah, I was waiting to see if anyone else reviewed too, to minimize posts *pouts* was the last chapter really that bad, peoples?

Yeah ^.^ Alyssa and Tynan were both kind of two-dimensional in the original copy--I believe it was Negrek who pointed that out. And I kinda liked Alyssa even then, so I didn't really wanna get rid of her, so that meant I had to beef up her character. I like her even more now, and Tynan's gonna be interesting to write.

*squeals* YUS! Another Koga fan! ^.^ I like most of the gym leaders, but Koga's been near the top of my list--if not at the top of my list--for ages. He's sarcastic and a ninja, what's not to like? :P I'm so glad you liked him in this, he's one of the characters you just want to do justice to 'cause they're so flippin' cool.

You're right, though he is kinda scary... stand by for more appearances, he's actually a fairly major character

I figure the Safari Zone doesn't have any actual borders, so walking into it from the forest around wouldn't be too difficult, right? :P And getting lost in forest would be a fairly easy thing to do... she'll get better over time, though. Hopefully.

Thank you, thank you ^.^ Hazel's actually got quite a bit of experience in battling, now she gets to show it. And I love pokemon abilities, they can offer such strategic options... thanks! As for the names, well, it was getting boring calling them 'the poachers' all the time, and even more so to distinguish between them. Giving them nicknames was better--although they do actually have names, and I have every intention of bringing them back for the sequel as well...

Said butterfree has a hero complex the size of Everest she's going to be fun.

XD lol, that is morbid, although I'm sure if she didn't run over them it's not because she was careful about it, considering she could hardly see where she was going. *shudders* seriously, that would be terrifying though, 'specially for the first time in driving.

Pamgical?! XD lol!

Thanks again for the review ^.^

[Frosted Heavens]

*wanders in*

Hi there! (Gee, what an original greeting>__>) I'm very sorry for not reviewing earlier, although it was because I was on vacation in France and I didn't have internet there (I missed Serebii.net for two weeks!) so I review now, one day after coming back from the land of Swimming and Sunburns. Now that my pathetic excuses are done and I want to get on reviewing because I loved this chapter to no end^-^

First of all, Keegan really should know better by know, taking a shortcut to evade the bikers, and of course, the result becomes quickly known. I can't imagine that someone can get lost that easily (although that could be because there are no woods or halve-jungles close to my home^-^') like Sike Saner said, her sense of direction IS indeed a thing of majesty^-^

Getting herself lost in the Safari Zone was an idea of brilliance, she has no idea how she gets to Fuchsia but stumbles into the Safari Zone unknowingly. I actually hoped that Tynan would make an appearance, but he was probably smart enough not to follow her (or he just lost her as easily as Keegan lost her way)

The dialogue that Keegan constantly had with herself in this chapter was hilarious, I found myself laughing my head off more that one time, she really is an amusing person. And 'Little Fox' sure is a troublemaker (or she gets Keegan in trouble) SHE'S A MINDCONTROLLER, getting Keegan in so much trouble so easy.

And another Gym Leader gets spotlight, not sweet and wise like Erika, researching and with freaky powers like Morty but a KICK*** ninja. I'd constantly wanted to save Keegan from that icy look and his stern attitude. BUt no can do, I'm not written like her (OH boy, I wish she was real, it'd be fun^-^)

I'm actually surprised that the pokemon of Keegan's team with the most experience was not used in any battle and all the rest was. Speaking of Keegan's pokemon, YAY!!! She got a new one (at least I think, she could always release it later onT__T Oh I hope not!)

Eevee
Arcanine
Vaporeon
Butterfree(???)

I see that she gets a rather balanced team, and I sure hope the Butterfree stays, I think this one has a dynamic personality, something Keegan doesn't have in her team yet. A playful, young pokemon that is an experienced battler, a confident, but maybe a little laidback pokemon that can run way fast and a quiet pokemon that is distrustful of humans, If the butterfly stays then I think it s gonna be good friends with Hazel.

Now, the sheme where she dumps Sleep Powder in their faces, takes the truck full of pokemon and drives like a madman...madwoman^-^' That was hilarious but also very thrilling and exciting, I was just glued to my screen, laughing sometimes between all the crazy action.

This is now by FAR my favorite chapter of you yet, action, hilarious thoughts and an icy ninja and poachers, you combined this all to create such a brilliant piece of writing that I can't help but be jealous, I wish I had a wider, English vocubulary, I still having trouble with understanding some of the words you type...

*sighs*

oh well, it can't be helped, good luck with your future chapters, and don't forget, I will review every chapter, no matter how long it takes^-^(I can't believe myself sometimes I sound like a fan girl^-^')

'till next time,

~Aimi Hanako~

...





I'm not gone that fast
I still have my ultimate thing...

QUESTION BARAGE ATTACK???

1. Will Tynan appear in Fuchsia?

2. If he does, does he challenge Koga or Keegan to a battle?

3. Will Keegan get to Fuchsia in the next chapter?(who knows, she could always faint or something, or be attacked and the Golbat gets wounded)

4. Will Keegan go south now to Cinnabar or will she loop back to Lavender town after Fuchsia city?

5. Butterfree will probably stay, this will also mean that she won't catch anymore pokemon soon, right?

6. Does Koga meet Keegan again in the next chapter?

7. Has Koga connections with Maxie or anyone of Team Magma?

8. If he does, is he a close friend or something?

9. Will Tynan team up with 'Brother'?

10. Will Tynan team up with 'Brother' soon if he does?


Info:

Question Barrage Attack???

increases the question every post^___^

Have a nice day^-^

[purple_drake]

Eheh ^.^;; I really am a lazy bum, aren't I?

That's okay and they're pretty good excuses, really, even though I was getting a little worried. Hope you had fun--France is on my list of 'places I wanna go when I have the money'.

Well, I dunno if people do really get lost that easily--but in the middle of the woods, for someone who isn't woodsy, you'd think it would be pretty easy to get turned around, right? Tynan's sense of direction isn't nearly as bad, and he was about a day behind her too, so...

As for little fox, Keegan should... eventually... get a grip on that reckless side of her. Just not for a long while some things have to happen before she starts realizing how irresponsible she's being.

Hee, Koga = luff. 'Nuff said.

In the original copy, Hazel did battle, but I figured it was odd for the battle to go so badly if the best-trained pokemon was battling. And I wanted to give Tarn and Firefoot some limelight, and they needed the training, so... *shrugs* although Keegan did try to get Hazel out once she realized she was in over her head, she just kept on getting interrupted...

And yes, she keeps the butterfree although I find your thoughts on her interesting... actually, I started laughing my head off... because I know what's going to happen and that's all I'm going to say.

The really ironic thing is, of all the chapters I've written so far, this is probably the chapter that changed the least, and if I recall, you weren't so fond of the chapters that were most like the original lol. Although the action and introspection was really beefed up, so maybe that made the difference... but in terms of what actually happened, it's pretty much exactly the same.

Although now you've made me curious to know which words you're having trouble with... www.thefreedictionary.com is a good site to go to if it's really bad, it's where I always go whenever I come across a word I don't recognise while I'm reading :P

Hee, and I don't mind you sounding like a fangirl I just have to remember to pop my swelling ego every now and then, before I float away...

For anyone else who just happens to be reading this, there are spoilers ahead, and my copy and paste still doesn't work, so there's still no spoiler tags.

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
1. Yes, Tynan will appear in Fuchsia. Next chapter.

2. Perhaps.

3. Keegan does get to Fuchsia, but we won't see her there before she leaves again, because of the way I've spearated the chapters.

4. I suppose you'll just have to wait and see

5. Keegan won't catch any pokemon anytime soon, no

6. Koga might meet Keegan again, but if he does, it won't be in the next chapter. The readers, however, will see him several more times before the end of the story

7. I think I dropped hints about this in HotM... not to mention the spoilers from the original copy :P yes, there are connections there, and it won't be long until they're explained.

8. No comment, because like I said above, you don't have long to wait...

9. Yes.

10. Yes. I think I already answered something to this effect in a previous post...

Now then... *signs an email ordering a large titanium shield* Just so I have some protection against any future Barrage Attacks

Thanks for the review, even though it was late there's no statute of limitations on reviews, after all. So to speak.

[Air Dragon]

w00tness on your latest chapter! Keegan catches a butterfree and gets Koga ****** off at her all in one stroke!

I noticed you misspelt faint attack. you spelt it feint attack. other than that i'd say you're clean!

well, gotta go!

L@er!

[jirachiman876]

Okay. So I'm back. ^^; I totally failed at trying to like quit serebii. I blame the awesome authors here and the fact i wanted to read some stuffs today. ^^; And now that the loading isn't as bad as before, I'm back.
So now to the review. I SO REMEMBER THIS PART!!!! It was pretty much exactly the same as the last version as you said. But I did notice you made it better. I don't know how yet but I'll figure it out soon. ^^; I hope the next one won't be a long wait. I'll give you errors in that one since i had to read 2 chapters. ^^
jirachiman out

[Ryano Ra]

^.^;;

Another fantastic chapter. I think this is one of the best chapters I have read thus far (though you haven't updated since the Dragon's Age of Destruction), solely because it involved one of my favorite bug-type pokemon--Butterfree. ^^ There isn't much to say at this point, for I'll be repeating myself several times throughout this story. Fantastic job && keep updating my dearest friend.

[SnoringFrog]

And here I thought I'd been away for so long I'd be way behind. Looks like I only had one chapter to catch up on, but that's fine.

Tarn followed, his slim body almost seeming to undulate through the mulch coating the forest floor.

I love how you used undulate to describe Tarn, a water type,'s movements.

That's all I've got for anything specific, the rest was great, and I think I liked this chapter alot more this time around.

[purple_drake]

A/N: *waves sheepishly* Hello, people, please don't kill me. I have various excuses for not updating in so long, some good, some bad. I won't get into them. Suffice to say, I'm not happy with the chapter but it's been too long and now it's done and edited, I may as well put it up, right?

Firstly, to those reviewers I never replied to--thank you for letting me know you were still reading! ^.^;

Secondly, this chapter has upped the story's rating to PG-15 for excessive language use, so be warned--there's a lot of swearing in here. I didn't intend it, but Tynan just wouldn't shut his mouth, so blame him. Plus, I've gone back and revamped some stuff in previous chapters (or will have, eventually. The idea of having to reformat all those bold and italics tags is... ehhhh). Nothing major, really; just stuff like... now Tarn and Keegan don't seem to bond as easily as they did before, that kinda thing. Noticeable if you were to go back and read it, perhaps, but not terribly important in the big picture.

Finally, I want to dedicate this chapter, despite its suckiness, to two members of this forum: Flannery and Arwen, because they both cared enough to take the time and PM me with encouragement about this chapter (even though it probably didn't help as much as we all hoped).

Unfortunately, the next chapter won't be out quickly either. It won't take as long as this one (I hope/promise/Godhelpme) but some of the upcoming plot needs rethinking and I'm in my final semester of Uni (as in, I'll be graduating at the end of this year, eep!) so... yeah. Sorry! ;_;

To make up for it though, here are some pictures of my OC characters, including one who will appear in about chapter 22. :3 I have more, but they're not inked, so you don't get to see them. Yet.

http://purple-drake.deviantart.com/a...on-OC-93638677
http://purple-drake.deviantart.com/a...on-OC-93638867
http://purple-drake.deviantart.com/a...on-OC-93638997

That's it. ^^ Enjoy, and have fun pointing out all the suckiness, especially towards the end.

~ VII ~
TO RECOVER WHAT IS LOST

STORM CLOUDS.

Brother could hear them, taste them, feel their chill in his fur, their blinding illumination making his vision flare white every time lightning flashed.

He licked the air almost pathetically, hoping beyond hope that the Wish-Giver might have answered his prayers, but all he could taste was water, water and trees and soil. There was nothing to follow. There was no trail. There was nothing.

“Brrreeeenn!” he keened in frustration, dark paws kneading the ground in little showers of dirt every time he pulled up with his claws. The bush under which he was sheltered kept on dripping, leaving his short fur sodden, his long ears drooping on either side of his head beneath the weight.

The Woodland of Bondage was nearby, and with it, the Town of Ensnarement. They were the icons of the area—that girl, that human, she was sure to have gone there.

But the legends-damned sky-water washed away any chance of picking up that familiar and loathed scent, warm and spicy, tempered by the tang of salt. He couldn’t follow her through the Path of Turning Circles, had lost her trail in the Woodlands because of the weather, could only assume that she had been to the Town of Ensnarement.

Now she was gone, and Bairn, sweet, frail Bairn, had gone with her.

And he didn’t know where.

O Guiding Light, show me where the Stained has walked, so I may seek my pack, my litter-mate, my brother, he thought despairingly, casting the prayer up to the heavens for the Guardian to hear.

He would wander forever if he had to, but he couldn’t afford to waste the time; there was no telling how she could hurt him, subvert him, if Brother got lost, if Bairn was left in her clutches for too long.

The sky roared, water began to fall, and Brother could only flop miserably down to the semi-dry ground, at a complete loss, his lithe body beginning to shiver a little in the cold.

And then came running the human answer to his prayer.



Thunder boomed overhead, the wind lashing at the foliage, whipping the leaves. Rain pelted the ground like bombs, the crackle of lightning casting an eerie, intermittent glow over the path.

Damn—damn—damn—damn!! Tynan cursed inwardly, one arm raised to stave off the downpour, the other clutching his bag close, his boots pounding the wet dirt as he ran down the path which supposedly led to Fuchsia City. How people can stand this—I can’t believe I left home for this!

His sleeveless green coat flicked and flapped around his legs, the material heavy with dampness, dripping in his wake, its hem peppered with mud that flecked onto his trousers with every step.

Cover, I need cover—damn this storm, anyway, no wonder no one ever goes travelling—

Well, no one worth knowing, at any rate.

The path dipped, making him step through a puddle before he could detour, water splashing up to drench the tops of his boots, but he didn’t do much more than curse; there was no point in stopping, he’d only get wetter.

I’ll probably reach the gym sooner than the Centre, it’s on the outskirts—I can wait there until it stops raining, the city proper isn’t far after that.

Thank God for that, at least. He’d left Celadon City several days ago, but after having travelled Cycling Road and been confronted by those idiot bikers, he was more than ready to get into a real city. He didn’t know whether what’s-her-name, Keegan, would still be there or not—or whether he’d beaten her there—but he figured if she’d left then someone would’ve seen which way she went and he could trail along.

He did, briefly, contemplate the thought of travelling with her—but he didn’t want her to start getting expectations and he didn’t intend to follow her for long anyways. Just until he got on his feet, so to speak. Or until he managed to get a clue as to her and Erika’s secret.

Although he’d be damned if he was gonna keep on if it was still raining by then…

“Bruuuun!”

The abrupt howl made Tynan recoil in surprise as a darting figure of yellow and pitch-black exploded from the foliage lining the thin path. The young man swore heavily, instinctively dodging away from it with soggy footsteps, casting up sheets of mulch and water.

The figure—an umbreon?! Tynan thought incredulously—skidded across the width of the track, fur bristling wildly and fangs bared in a snarl, its tail and swept-back ears quivering with hostility. Without pausing for breath it launched itself at Tynan in a flurry of leaves.

Shit!

Tynan jerked aside, his boots slipping on the slick terrain to send him crashing to the ground with a breath-stealing thump, the pokéball he’d just managed to snatch up arcing through the air to bounce off a wrinkled tree nearby. The umbreon landed at the same time that a black-feathered murkrow coalesced into existence, sending herself into a shallow stoop with a powerful thrust of her wings.

What the hell…? Tynan rolled over with a groan, pushing himself up onto his elbows, the sleeves of his white shirt soaked through and clinging to his skin. He lifted his head, shaking back his damp fringe, in time to see the umbreon leap away from his murkrow’s Peck attack, the flying pokémon flaring her wings just enough to angle her back upwards with a series of flaps.

The umbreon came down on soft paws, head drawn back as shadows built in its throat, wisped over its muzzle, and Tynan’s heart jolted in recognition. Shadow Ball—

“Murkrow, dodge!” he shouted desperately, rearing up onto his knees, oblivious to the leaves and mulch which clung to his clothes.

“Krrawk?”

The pokémon sounded startled, but at the hollow roar behind her she banked so sharply to the side that she rolled in midair, wings tucked close to her body as the dusty globe shot past, darkness steaming along behind it. The force of the attack sent the flyer tumbling, uncontrolled, even as the Shadow Ball punched through the canopy and writhed into nothingness beneath the downpour which greyed the sky.

She didn’t manage to catch her balance before the umbreon was right there, but before any attack could connect the murkrow dissolved into red light, recalled.

The umbreon hit ground once again, springing instead for the trainer who had just staggered to his feet, Murkrow’s pokéball still clutched in one hand. With a hiss through gritted teeth which may or may not have been a curse Tynan jerked instinctively back to avoid the umbreon who sailed past, boots kicking up mulch as he twisted to follow the pokémon’s path, a red-and-white pokéball in his hand and pitched before the umbreon had landed.

It was a second after that that he realized the pokéball he’d just thrown was empty.

Fuck!

The umbreon skidded across mulch, legs outstretched to slow itself down, and turned around just in time to see the pokéball coming—and to wait for it, red eyes flashing with some emotion Tynan didn’t understand.

Then it dematerialized, the pokéball dropping to the damp turf, vibrating fiercely for a moment before locking down.

Tynan stared, slightly stunned. I caught it? But I didn’t even hurt it!

Although…

It was almost like it wanted to be caught…

Thunder boomed, startling Tynan out of his thoughts, and the teen shook his head violently, hitching his bag up onto his shoulder. What the hell am I doing, I’ll get soaked if I don’t keep moving! Re-energised, the trainer dashed forward, scooping up the pokéball as he passed and continued on his run down the narrow path, casting up leaves and debris in his wake.

And inside the sphere in his hand, a red-eyed pokémon trembled with adrenaline and wild glee, fighting the urge to burst from his prison, scornful at the human’s arrogance to think that he’d be so easily subdued. Take me to her, human.

I will endure this indignity, I will endure being called your Kin, so long as you take me to her.



The storm-pelted trees opened up ahead of the muddied path, and Tynan hissed in relieved triumph as he saw the tall, thick timber barrier fencing the gym’s extensive grounds, the wood darkened by water and the green roof tiles swept with rain. He ducked through the broken curtain of droplets that scattered over the ground at the edge of the clearing’s canopy, the hem of his coat further drenched by the mud splattering up behind him as he ran across the short hard-earthed stretch of ground between him and the mansion.

The tall wooden gate stood open, the long trail leading up to the entrance lined with dishevelled bushes that were only a blur as Tynan hurried past, his only concern getting inside and out of the wet. It was only once the massive doors had shut behind him with a hollow boom that he stopped to relax, leaning wearily back against the timber and gulping down air, struggling to slow his pounding heart.

The corridors in front of him and to his sides were all identical: narrow, the walls and floor plain wood, lit with round lights set into the ceiling. The thought of just waiting here at the doorway like a coward didn’t appeal to the turquoise-haired trainer, but as his breath slowed to something more comfortable Tynan eyed the passageway warily. He remembered reading about Koga and the Ninja Clan for his history class last year, and the Elite was known for booby-trapping the gym.

True, all gym leaders usually set up some kind of obstacle, but the Fuchsia gym had made it a serious custom. The whole ninja thing, probably… they’ve always been really big on discipline.

He could do without it, but considering that the gym doubled as a ninja training dojo, he wasn’t sure he was going to get a choice. The clans tended to be very… focused… when it came to their training. Those that are left, anyway. There aren’t many truly traditional establishments left anymore, let alone pure clan-lines.

The Dragon Clan was very secretive about their techniques, the martial clans less so; but the ninjas tended to practise on visiting trainers.

He shivered suddenly, the insidious cold of his wet clothing becoming apparent now he’d cooled down, and he wrapped his arms around himself, hunching his shoulders to keep his bag from falling. The action made him remember the pokéball he still clutched in his gloved hand, and he lifted it closer to study the black-and-yellow figure inside. Umbreon had good senses, he knew, aside from the fact that they practically had no sense of smell—and their sense of taste more than made up for that.

But, looking at those flashing red eyes and the bristling fur, Tynan decided that this was the last place he should risk releasing a recalcitrant, probably hostile pokémon. It wouldn’t do any good for my reputation to be seen being disobeyed.

Instead he called out his short, dinosaur-like marowak, who did have a good sense of smell and would be able to tell with reasonable success whether another pokémon was nearby.

“Mmarr,” Marowak rumbled, leaning his weathered bone comfortably on his scrawny shoulder and cocking his head enquiringly at Tynan.

The trainer shook his head, hugging himself tightly, brushing off a stray drop which trailed down his neck. “Just be ready,” he said a little wearily, fingering the semi-transparent surface of the umbreon’s pokéball. “I don’t intend on going in any further.” The Fuchsia gym was just about last on my list of gyms to visit. I don’t like the idea of being sneak-attacked.

As if those two nights he’d spent outside hadn’t been enough—he’d hardly slept at all, because of all the damn noises, the paranoid fear that something might attack him while he rested—to say nothing of the damned rain. And then there had been those idiot bikers who’d ambushed him on the Cycling Road—not once, but twice, one gang at the entrance to Celadon and a couple of grimy wannabes nearer Fuchsia.

So in all, Tynan wasn’t a happy camper.

He was right about one thing, however.

He didn’t get a choice.

From somewhere nearby there came a muffled pop, following by a low hiss, and automatically Tynan whirled around, only to be met with a stream of acrid smoke. He flinched away from it, one hand flashing up to cover his mouth and nose, the air harsh on his throat as he breathed.

“Mmraa!” Marowak cringed, hunching down as though it would be help him avoid the fumes and gesturing insistently down a corridor with his bone, his brown tail cutting through the smoke which billowed around his scrawny form. Tynan grimaced at the thought—deeper into the lion’s den—but then another shallow breath caused him to choke and cough. With a mental curse he turned on his heel and fled the main doors in a cloud of miasma, his marowak a swift figure beside him.

His rain-slick boots slipped on the polished floor when he tried to take the first corner, and with an automatic oath on his lips his hands shot out to snatch for balance. As if on cue there came a howl of warning from Marowak, a second before something hard hit the back of Tynan’s knees, making them buckle.

“Sh—”

He was cut off by an explosion of breath when he hit the floorboards, automatically curling over the twinging shoulder which had landed first. “Maro— the hell—?!” he gasped, head aching slightly with the abrupt change in position.

“Mmmrr,” Marowak rumbled, pointing his bone into the airspace above his trainer. With a slight huff Tynan rolled half onto his back, feet slipping as he tried to push himself up, shoving his bag aside—and finally saw the twinkle of the electrified spinarak web suspended at what had been his chest height.

What… the…? He stared dumbly, unable to reconcile the sight as truth, unable to accept that the ninjas had actually set a trap so dangerous for him. Trick panels and smoke bombs were all well and good, but outright electrocution…?!

“Mmarrr!” Marowak jabbed him impatiently on the shoulder, causing the young man to automatically jerk away with a hiss when the club hit developing bruises, snapping him out of his disbelief.

I need to get out of this nuthouse, was the first thing to come into his mind, followed by the incredulous thought of: they just tried to kill me!

The idea spurred him back to his feet, his wet coat heavy around his legs, once again remembering the umbreon only when he put his hand out to push himself off the wall. Grimacing, Tynan stuffed the pokéball into its pouch on his belt, slung his bag onto his shoulder, and ducked cautiously under the sparking line to move down the corridor.

He only made the first few steps before Marowak stopped him with an out-thrust paw and a terse grunt. Unthinkingly the trainer froze in place, chest clenching in sudden apprehension and eyes darting around the passageway to find what had given Marowak pause. With a practised flick the dinosaur-like pokémon sent his bone spinning end-over-end down the hall, ripping through glittering spinarak silk with sparks of severed currents, threads trailing like banners behind it. The club struck the wall at the far end of the corridor, dropping to the floor with a clatter and making Tynan twitch.

“Now is it safe?” he asked with a mixture of guardedness and slight desperation, shifting his weight in preparation for movement—either forward or back, he wasn’t fussed as long as he could get out of there. I can’t believe the Association actually supports this place!

A floorboard stirred beneath his foot and his stomach dropped as he froze for the second time in under a minute. You must be joking.

“Marowak…”

Good God, that could not be his voice—his voice wasn’t that high, and his voice didn’t shake—

And then he really didn’t have time to think about it, because there came a wooden clunk from somewhere behind them. Eyes wide in his ashen face, Tynan twisted slightly around to see the rest of the hall, thready wisps of smoke drifting around the corner from the entrance.

He swallowed, his heart beating painfully fast in his ribs as he turned further, trying to see something he didn’t know was there. “Maro— Marowak—what—”

His foot slipped, the floorboard skidding out from underneath him, and with a curse he staggered, struggling to keep his balance. The walls shuddered, groaned, a panel at the near end sliding up into the ceiling, and suddenly Tynan really didn’t care about the fact that he’d almost gone ass-first towards the ground.

He wasn’t exactly a film buff, but he’d seen enough movies to know what was going to happen next.

Fuck.

“Mmmarrr!” Marowak tugged urgently on his trainer’s coat, and without waiting to see what was going to emerge from the opening—although judging by the rattles there were a lot of them—the pair turned on their heels and ran.

“Trrrrrrzzzz…”

A high buzz filled the hall, the air almost seeming to vibrate with the sound, counterpointed by the clatter of many round bodies against wood.

Tynan’s back prickled wildly with fearful anticipation, his boots pounding the floor in unison with his heart against his ribs, but he resisted the urge to look back; he knew what they were.

Voltorb! Why the hell did it have to be voltorb—they’re fucking Bomb Balls!

He pushed himself to go faster, his bag dragging at his shoulder and coat flapping behind him, Marowak’s pattering footfalls an accompaniment to the thud of Tynan’s steps and the slight whisper of dragging silk as it clung to their feet.

The end of the corridor approached in a blur of wooden walls and near-panic, the air behind them crackling with sparks of electricity. The floor shuddered beneath the force of the rolling pokémon, Tynan’s ears ringing with their unending, high-pitched drone to the point that it felt like it was the only thing in the entire world—all except for the harsh rasp in the back of his throat and the stitch growing in his side.

Then he was there, and he was going too fast, and with a curse he slammed shoulder-first into the wall at the far end—

A hidden panel gave way beneath him as he hit and he hurtled into the unlit room beyond, feet slipping on the layer of spinarak silk. Already off-balanced by an expected collision, he crashed to the floor with a whump that left him breathless and wheezing, his previously uninjured shoulder taking the brunt of the blow.

No time no time no time—

Red-faced, Tynan rolled over clumsily, scrabbling into the small room and shoving the hidden door closed with his feet as Marowak darted in, snatching up his bone club when he swept past where it lay. The trainer caught a glimpse of the red-and-white mob packing the corridor beyond—I was right, they’re voltorb—and his stomach twisted violently with a terrifying realization—it’s not gonna stop them, it didn’t stop me and it won’t stop them and they’ll explode and I’m a goner—automatically scrambling back from the crackling juggernaut.

The panel clicked shut, outlined only by the bright glow of electricity.

Marowak snarled from somewhere beside him, barely audible over the ear-splitting buzz which vibrated the close walls.

Something hurtled across the darkened space, striking a tab on the wall with a thud.

A trave fell across the door just as the voltorb hit the other side of the barrier. The small room rocked violently with multiple explosions, the near-deafening sounds making Tynan clutch his ears and curl into himself. The panel was almost blasted off its hinges, slivers of wood bursting inwards, the timber splitting, dust and debris billowing in the confined space.

Then it was over, and for a few seconds Tynan just lay and trembled, struggling to control his gasping breaths. When he finally unfolded himself from his foetal position it was with the twinge of aching muscles, his eyes wide in a pale face as he pushed himself up just enough to look blankly back in the direction of the still-very-much intact barrier, ignoring the cloud of dust settling around him. There’s no way…

“Mmrrr,” Marowak grunted, accompanied by the scrape of tough hide on timber, and Tynan took a deep, shaky breath, deliberately pushing away the thought of just how close he’d been to those explosions. Shit, but they didn’t teach me anything about this at the University!

Another deep breath. Light. I need light. Almost immediately he decided against letting Flareon out; the room was stuffy enough as it was, and even though he’d been cold not long ago he now felt flushed, his clothes sticking to him damply. Instead he fumbled for the penlight keychain he usually kept on his belt, clicking it on so that the thin bean wavered over the timber walls, his hand still not quite steady enough for his liking.

Scrambling to his feet, he hitched his bag onto his shoulder, taking a cautious step forward and kicking something that rattled across the slightly debris-strewn floor.

Fuck!

He flinched and froze, his heart leaping back into his throat after just having settled. Wasn’t he ever going to catch a break?!

“Mmmr,” Marowak scoffed at his trainer’s reaction, waddling into the dim light and picking up his bone, the glow playing across the sharp edges of his sleek skull helmet.

Oh. was all Tynan thought for a moment, recalling the sudden, sharp motion in the air in front of him just before the voltorb had struck the panel. A second later he shook his head as though to throw off the confusion, discomforted by his uncertainty, unnerved by his position. I don’t know what the hell I was thinking when I decided to do this, he thought bitterly as he bent down to scoop up his bag. These people are nuts. That Keegan girl is nuts. The League is fucking nuts!

Scanning the ground with his torch, he approached the door warily, the wood furry with splinters and splits. It was only when he looked closer, shining the light over a particularly deep groove, that he realized the panel was significantly thicker than its weight and ease of movement would suggest, likely due to the matte grey material behind the wood.

Lead. The fucking door is lead-lined.

With something between a sigh and a groan he thunked his head against the door, resting his brow against the warm timber and closing his eyes wearily. I should’ve fucking known. Not even the ninjas are fanatical enough to kill challenging trainers. If Marowak hadn’t dropped the beam then they probably would’ve done it themselves in a second.

Which meant they were watching him—he already knew that.

It was just that he hadn’t exactly behaved in a manner befitting himself.

I hate this fucking gym.

“Mmmarr!”

Something tugged impatiently on his still-wet coat, but still Tynan snatched an extra second or two of motionlessness, aware of his various aches and the adrenaline-weary drag of his limbs. This was not what he wanted to be doing when he left home, this was not how things were supposed to go! When I get out of here…

When he got out of there he didn’t know what he was going to do, but it included putting the Fuchsia City gym on his list of places he never wanted to go again. In fact he was quite willing to imagine the place didn’t exist. Period.

I’ll check out the city, he thought viciously, opening his eyes and scowling at a fuzzy splinter just in front of them. The zoo. Maybe I’ll see if I can’t catch something in the Safari Zone, if I have time—not like I’m short on cash, not with what I had saved and the allowance from the Association.

Anything to expunge my memories of this place!

“Mmaarr!”

“I know, I know,” Tynan grumbled into the panel, and with a huff the trainer raised his head, blinking in the dim light.

Now what? he thought grumpily. We can’t get out this way, the voltorb will be blocking the door—and I’ve been close enough to voltorb to last me a lifetime, I am not going to go wading through them. Besides, how do I know they’re all fainted? I could go out there and get exploded for real!

“Mmaarraww!”

Something hit him on the back of the legs and Tynan jumped, his heart leaping to his throat as he whirled around, his penlight wavering over an impatient-looking Marowak. The dinosaur pokémon grunted as though to say ‘finally!’, pointing impatiently with his bone at the opposite wall.

For a moment Tynan couldn’t see what the big deal was, but then the beam from his penlight played over the wood in just the right way and he saw the fracture-thin shadow that was the seam between door and jamb. He resisted the urge to slap his head, feeling his cheeks warm in embarrassment. A second door. I should’ve thought of that.

Damn ninja.

He and Marowak spent the next ten minutes making sure the door actually was safe to go through, as quickly and thoroughly as they could in the dim light. When they finished, Tynan eyed the timber warily, still skittish, but his desire to get the hell out of that cursed gym overruled his fear. He prodded the door cautiously near the edge, the weight distribution causing it to swing open easily and without a sound.

The room on the other side appeared even darker than the stuffy antechamber, and Tynan’s mouth turned down in displeasure. The beam from his penlight was like a pinprick in the gloom, their footsteps sounding loud on the floorboards as they entered guardedly. Everything seemed muffled and close, and Tynan could swear he could hear something in the walls, but when he paused to listen there was only the faint drum of rain on the roof.

Still storming, I guess.

The surface beneath his feet softened, but angling the penlight down only showed a glimmery silver carpet… which, considering he was in the middle of a ninja’s dojo, was kind of strange.

Make that very strange.

Cautiously, his heart doing a slow pound low in his ribs, Tynan scanned the room with the penlight, but he couldn’t see much of the walls—it seemed to get kind of foggy the further the dim light had to travel. “Marowak, can you—”

He walked into something.

His heart moved from low gear to high and he jerked automatically away from the thin web with a curse, but the threads had already clung to his skin and clothes. A second later they pulled taut and he was yanked off his feet, dropping his penlight, airborne for a gut-wrenching moment before his back hit soft wall with a whoomp. His boots found the floor, his bag bounced against his side, still dangling from his shoulder, and he found himself bound to the thick silver web coating the timber wall.

He snarled uselessly into the dark, hands flexing with adrenaline and resentment, straining against the tough silk holding him still. Shit, I am sick and tired of being flung around!

“Marowak!” he snapped, eyes scanning the darkened room. The beam from the penlight was a soft glow somewhere out ahead of him, illuminating the ‘carpet’—more webs—but other than that there was no movement.

“Mrra-rrr,” Marowak’s stilted, disembodied voice sounded, but Tynan couldn’t tell from where.

I’ve had it with this fucking gym! he growled to himself angrily, tugging at his bonds, twisting his wrists this way and that, to no avail.

“I’d stop doing that if I were you,” said an unfamiliar, female voice, and Tynan jerked in surprise, his head snapping up to search the dark room.

“Stop hiding and show yourself!” he shouted, his tone thick and shaking with anger and annoyance.

“Temper,” the woman chided with slight amusement, but the ceiling flared with over-bright lights, making the trainer flinch away and squeeze his eyes shut against the dazzle.

After a few moments the glow through his eyelids abated and he cracked them open cautiously, squinting a little through the lingering glare, his breath and heartbeat sounding loud in his ears.

The first thing he saw was Marowak ensnared in the corner, the pokémon straining against the silk cocooning him, his eyes narrowed and concentrated as he stretched—futilely—for the bone lying on a bare patch of floor nearby.

The second thing he saw was the massive, red-bodied spider clinging to the opposite wall, its pincers moving slowly. A chill ran down Tynan’s spine, his eyes lingering on the pokémon for several long moments before he managed to tear his eyes away. Shit, that’s a big fucking bug.

That was when he finally noticed the young woman standing a half-dozen feet in front of him, clad in a dark, thigh-length kimono, her pink hair tied in a short, spiky ponytail and her lower face obscured by the magenta scarf wound around her neck, draping down her back. He could only see her eyes, slanted and amused.

The teen bristled. Smoke me out, electrocute me, scare me to death, humiliate me, but don’t you dare fucking laugh and think you’re going to get away with it!

“Who the hell are you?!”

…smooth, Montgomery, real smooth…

The woman raised a hand before her eyes, a pokéstar caught between two fingers, and seemed to smile coyly. “I am Janine, daughter of Koga, gym leader of Fuchsia City.”

The gym leader’s daughter. Shit! Tynan cursed with a particularly savage yank at his restraints, his wrist throbbing when the silk dug into his skin. He didn’t notice—his tingling fingers had unexpectedly brushed the round form of a pokéball beneath his coat.

Abruptly only half his attention was on Janine; the rest was diverted to straining his bonds, stretching for the elusive device as discreetly as he could possibly manage while praying it wasn’t the umbreon’s. Maybe the ninja weren’t actually out to kill him, but they were doing a fucking good imitation and that still made them nuts in his book.

“You know,” Janine said almost conversationally, crossing one arm over her stomach and moving the pokéstar aside so she could study him without it being in the way. “It’s usually good manners for a challenging trainer to introduce themselves first.”

Tynan mustered the best sneer he could manage with his heart pounding in his throat and his hands beginning to throb persistently, threatening to go numb, as he continued to work at the silk. “Then you’re not a very good ninja, are you? I only came into the gym to get out of the fucking rain!”

“Ma-aarr!” Marowak growled an echo to his trainer’s shout, heaving against the web pinning him down and drawing an admonishing chitter from the spindly-legged ariados on the wall.

“Oh my.” The pokéstar shifted back in front of Janine’s face, the flatter side pressed against the cloth over her mouth as though in self-chastisement. It might’ve been convincing, too, except that her brown eyes were gleaming with laughter, their corners crinkling with an otherwise unseen smile. “My mistake.”

Stop. Fucking. Laughing. Tynan snarled inwardly just as he managed to get a hold on the pokéball through his coat. His heart skipped a beat and he had to fight the wave of satisfaction which swept through him lest it show on his face.

“Just as well, I suppose,” Janine mused, apparently not noticing Tynan’s struggles or the reason for them. “Quite aside from the fact that my father isn’t present at this time, you’re clearly not a very good trainer.”

Excuse me?! Tynan snapped back to attention with a snarl. “What did you just say?!” he demanded angrily with a jerk at the ariados silk, wrenching his shoulders and causing him to hiss at the twinges that ran down his arms.

Janine raised a delicate eyebrow, in disdain or amusement Tynan couldn’t tell, but neither sat well with him. “I did warn you not to do that, you know,” she observed mildly.

“Answer the fucking question!” Tynan hissed, feeling stupid as soon as he’d said it, just because the question itself hadn’t been particularly intelligent.

“Well,” Janine said slowly, drawn out, as though debating whether or not he was worth her wisdom. “It’s just that it’s usually the trainer who commands the pokémon, rather than the other way around.”

What the fucking hell does that mean?! Tynan gritted his teeth furiously. “If you’re going to talk, at least make some fucking sense!”

The woman sighed behind her makeshift mask, shaking her head slightly without taking her eyes off him—her eyes, which were suddenly serious and… pitying?

“A good trainer isn’t made through education, wealth or the possession of strong pokémon,” she said quietly, and pointed at Marowak with her pokéstar. “Let me guess—this one belonged to a family member or friend before he started travelling with you, correct?”

Tynan tensed, suddenly on edge, but he still didn’t take the chance to make his move, sensing she had a point to make and curious to know what it was despite her attitude. “What of it?”

“Because,” Janine shook the pokéstar at the dinosaur, the pokémon watching her carefully. “He’s the one making the decisions—he’s the one who warned you about the ariados webs, he’s the one who blocked the door, he’s the one who got you out of the antechamber, all without your help.”

The turquoise-haired boy flushed, opening his mouth to defend himself, but Janine wasn’t finished. “He’s the one who’s done just about everything, and you’ve just been following his lead.” The pokéstar shifted from Marowak to point accusingly at Tynan. “He’s the pokémon. You’re the trainer. It’s your responsibility to lead, not his.”

The pokéstar was pulled back, the woman resting her elbow on her other arm, the bladed ball held next to her face. “It’s just as well you’re not here for a gym battle,” she concluded grimly. “You’re nowhere near ready for one.”

Tynan ground his teeth, his face as hot as a furnace as he struggled to think of a retort—and yet, he couldn’t find one.

Because she was right.

Fuck it all, despite everything, she was right.

What the hell am I doing wrong?

For a moment in which he was stuck in a quandary, that was all he could wonder, suspended between shame and anger and what realisation his pride didn’t immediately quash.

Then he shook his head violently, making himself shake in his bonds. Stop it! I can’t get distracted now—if I’m to save any face at all, I have to get out of here under my own power.

His eyes narrowed. “I may not be ready for a gym battle,” he growled, his heart pounding and head throbbing with tension, determination thrumming in his arms and hands and veins. “But I’m more than capable of taking you on!”

And he heaved at the silk binding him, throwing himself to the side to toss an abnormally warm pokéball forward with a short jerk. It hit the cushioned ground less than a foot in front of him and exploded in a burst of red light and the roar of purple flames, Tynan already hunching away from the light and heat.

“Smokescreen!”

With a swirl of smoke the flames turned to smog, the Smokescreen blanketing the room. Holding his breath and blinking rapidly against the thick, ashy haze, Tynan pulled hard at his restraints. With only a little pressure they snapped, charred and weakened by Flareon’s downplayed Will-O-Wisp. He shook them off, counting himself lucky that it had been Flareon. He had spent a lot of time training with the eeveelution to maximise his speed and efficiency by preparing moves while still in the pokéball and taking advantage of their opponents’ delays and his own attacks.

He chose to ignore the similarity in that method with the ninja’s own techniques.

“Two against one is a little unfair,” Janine’s amused voice seemed to echo through the smog.

“Fuck you,” Tynan snarled, his voice strained as he yanked himself away from the wall entirely, raising an arm to cover his mouth with his shirt.

“Language,” Janine chastised in a singsong voice which resonated into a never-ending laugh, making Tynan’s back prickle and the trainer spin around automatically before righting himself.

Breathing shallowly through the material over his face, he stumbled in Marowak’s direction and almost ended up tripping over the pokémon’s hunched form, who was busy straining against the weakened silk while hiding his nose in his paws to temper the stench. Eyes watering fiercely and throat burning because of the smoke, Tynan caught his balance and snatched up the bone Marowak had finally abandoned, using it to break the threads without them sticking to his hands.

Marowak reared up, snapping the last of his bonds, and Tynan thrust the makeshift weapon at the pokémon, already turned half away to searching the thinning smoke for Flareon. The bone had barely left his fingers before he caught sight of a fox-like silhouette standing watch through the nearest veil of the haze, its ears tilted and straining for warning sounds and long fur wavering like sputtering flames.

Tynan tried to think quickly, but he could hardly see or breathe, the ash thick in his mouth and nose and against his smarting skin. Smokescreen probably wasn’t a good idea, he realised with dismay, because even though it had provided him with cover it was now a burden.

But what else could I have done?

“Ariados, Constrict!”

Tynan’s heart leapt to his throat, his stomach twisting so sharply that for a moment he thought he’d been the target.

Which wasn’t all that impossible, considering she’d been targeting him almost directly since he’d walked in the door.

No, she hasn’t, he realised. Everything she’s done ‘til now has threatened me and Marowak.

Which meant she would target all of them, catch all of them in one attack.

Which meant Flareon wouldn’t be able to burn the cords without hurting him more.

Which meant…

Stop thinking!

“Protect!” he shouted desperately just as the lingering smoke seemed to shift beneath the cutting edge of twinkling silk.

“Mmarr!” For what seemed like the nth time, something hit the back of Tynan’s knees. He buckled with a curse, head spinning with the movement, as there was a flare of green light in his fire pokémon’s general direction. A dully glittering veil rolled over them, missing Tynan’s head by an inch as he pushed himself to his elbows. The silk broke upon it and it shattered into drifting shards of fading light, the threads floating gently to the cushioned ground.

“Mmaaar-a!” With a grunt Marowak pulled back his throwing arm and sent his bone spinning away into the thinning haze on the heels of the Protect’s vanishing glow. Tynan staggered to his feet, coughing and pressing the heel of his palm to his throbbing temple.

“We need an exit,” he said hoarsely, the lightly burned skin of his face pulling slightly as he spoke. Preferably not the one we came in by.

Marowak snorted in an ‘well that’s obvious’ manner, his bone returning to him in a waft of smoke and slapping into his paw. Too late they saw the silk attached, and hardly had the dinosaur pokémon’s stubby fingers grasped around it then the thread yanked and brought the ariados hurtling through the last wisp of miasma, its spindly yellow-ringed legs cocked and braced for a landing.

The sheer suddenness and proximity of a bug that size made Tynan jerk back, his heel catching on a knot of silk in the ‘carpet’ and making him stumble. The sharp movement made his head pound so he wasn’t sure if what came out of his mouth was a curse or a cry or an actual order, but Marowak ducked and tugged hard on his weapon, looping the silk around three of the spider’s legs. The thread slingshot around, hauling the ariados with it on a collision course with the not-so-far wall.

Before the pokémon could hit, air hummed and a draught of wind blades sliced through the silk, passing so near to Tynan’s head that he ducked to the ground with a curse and decided to stay there. With a convulsive motion of its legs the ariados freed itself, shooting a pin of thread to catch the wall and flip itself upright.

“Fire Spin, Bonemerang!” Tynan shouted, jabbing a finger at the ariados while craning his head to find the bat pokémon somewhere above. Fire roared past as Tynan scrambled back, wiping silk off his hands, while Marowak ducked low to avoid the flames, hurling his bone into the inferno.

The ariados shot a thread to the ceiling, gliding upwards on a glistening cord of silk and avoiding the worst of the flames. There came a puff of embers as the bone came hurtling from the roiling streamer of fire, echoed by a blaze of sparks as Flareon exploded out in a Quick Attack, fur ablaze with red and gold veins of fire.

The crobat banked with a silent twist of its lower wings, the blackened club soaring past. With an urgent chitter the ariados tugged on its thread to swing itself out of the way, and Flareon rebounded off the scorched wall with the crack of smouldering embers.

Timber splintered and collapsed beneath the fox’s burning paws, a panel shifting beneath his weight to swivel open, charred ariados silk stretched across the gap like a damaged veil.

Tynan’s head had snapped at up the first sound of wood breaking and for a moment he could only stare at the prospect of freedom only a few feet away, certain it was a trick.

Then: “Protect!” he roared to both his pokémon as Marowak caught his bone with a grunt and Flareon landed on a patch of cleared floor, primly shaking ash off his paws. Two heads cocked towards their trainer in response to his order, and then the corner was cast with double films of fragmented green light.

A second later the first one rippled and shattered beneath the pounding of sludge bombs, purple gunk splattering over wood and web. The second hummed and splintered the way of the other as Pin Missiles hailed down upon it, but shards of light fizzled to nothingness only on shimmering silk, the panel in the wall swinging ever so slightly and the sound of running footsteps muffled by thick walls.

In a hollow across the room, Janine just smiled slightly beneath the mask of her red scarf, recalling both her pokémon with shafts of red light to the pokéstars between her fingers. He has potential.

Potential, but little experience. He’s not worthy. Yet.

She let him go.

Until he was ready, they wouldn’t meet again.

* * *

[purple_drake]

The boat rocked beneath the splash and swell of waves, the breeze sharp with salt. Koga stood motionless at the stern’s rail with his hands clasped loosely behind his back, the wind ruffling his spiky hair and olive-green uniform, tugging at his long red scarf.

Behind him the polished deck was a flurry of movement, black-uniformed agents hard at work with the cargo and ship. Black-uniformed, but not in the traditional sense; their clothes consisted of lightweight pants and sleeveless shirts only, with no sign of any distinguishing marks. A ship was far too public to take risks.

Koga wasn’t paying attention, however. For the thousandth time since he’d come in from the Safari Zone, his thoughts were turned to that interfering (and irritating) young woman. It bothered him—not the fact that she’d meddled in his business, oh no. He was used to that, considering who his associates were and what his occupation was. What bothered him most was that she bothered him, and she bothered him because she was so familiar.

He ran her image over in his mind once again. Slender and tanned, with bright blue eyes shaded by a bobbing fringe, set in a thin face made larger by the blonde, red-tinged hair pulled back into a doubled-over ponytail.

I supposed she could be reminding me of someone else, he mused. It hadn’t just been her looks which seemed familiar, but her single-mindedly passionate attitude and the knowledgeable, determined look in her eyes.

Internally he sighed; he was getting nowhere, and now she was becoming a distraction he couldn’t afford. He pushed the issue from his thoughts to be pondered on a later date and turned back to his present task, running over his recent meeting with his associates in his mind.

“Are you shittin’ me?!” Lieutenant Surge leaned into the vidscreen as though he could loom over Sabrina menacingly as he so often did when he was talking to someone who irritated him, his thick eyebrows drawn forward in an expression of hostile annoyance.

The slender young woman merely sighed and flipped her long blue-black hair back over the shoulder of her short-sleeved dress.

“You heard me,” she answered unemotionally, crossing her arms over the glaring red ‘R’ on the front of her dress, the long black sleeves playing a stark contrast to the white material. “He has no place in my squadron. He failed to complete his mission and allowed his team-mate to be captured with potentially dangerous information in hand.”

Surge growled. “And what makes you think I’d want a pantywaist like him in my squadron?!”

“Now really,” Koga interposed himself before the argument could become truly heated; both his comrades could be stubborn, especially because both of them were dominating and Surge, in particular, wasn’t used to be questioned. “Haven’t you ever heard the saying, ‘discretion is the better part of valour’?”

Surge scowled and Sabrina’s head moved slightly, an indication that she’d shifted to look at Koga’s image on her viewscreen. “If he hadn’t run,” the ninja continued, “We would have no detailed knowledge of the incident.”

For a moment there was silence; then Sabrina lowered her head, conceding the point. “Nonetheless, Koga, I don’t tolerate failure. He’d do better elsewhere.”

That Sabrina didn’t tolerate failure was true, Koga reflected, but Surge didn’t tolerate betrayal, so the redheaded grunt they were currently discussing wasn’t going to have a good time under the former lieutenant’s command.

Then again, it could be good for the man.

“Fine,” Surge grumbled, glowering off-screen at the wall and almost absently cracking his knuckles. “He can learn the meaning of teamwork aboard the S.S. Aqua.”

“It also means we’ll have to forget out plans for the Goldenrod Game Corner,” Sabrina settled back into her chair with a slight, displeased twist to her thin lips. “The Association is on alert there now. However, that is the least of our worries.”

Koga’s mouth drew tight; ah, yes. The ESP: a fragment of technology from a high-class experiment which had recently and inexplicably gone missing. That damnable object which was such a sophisticated piece of hardware they didn’t even know how to use it anymore. Not that it was their fault; almost everyone who had been involved with the original project was dead.

And the one that wasn’t was no longer on their side.

“It was under the scientists’ jurisdiction, wasn’t it?” The spiky-haired blonde on one side of Koga’s vidscreen rubbed his clean-shaven chin, eyes narrowed in thought.

“It was under Blaine’s,” Sabrina answered with more frost than before, and Surge growled slightly.

“Hasn’t he been found yet?!”

“No,” Koga answered flatly, fingers tapping an idle rhythm against the arm folded across his chest. “Harry has had no luck thus far.”

“Well, fix it!” The military man snarled, jabbing a finger at the viewscreen. “Cinnabar’s a god-damned island, how hard can it be?!”

“He has hidden himself well.” Koga answered in grudging monotone. “But I will soon be departing for Cinnabar to supervise the search myself.”

Surge settled back with a slight huff, apparently satisfied that Koga wasn’t neglecting his duty, and Sabrina tilted her head in acknowledgement. It was a little annoying, actually, that Harry was reflecting so badly upon him, but Janine deserved some time in charge of the gym and Koga had seen far too much of the Safari Zone in the past few months.

Fortunately, this wasn’t only on his head. “No leads as to its location?”

The question was directed at Surge; he had been in charge of its transport after its use in Professor Sebastian’s failed attempt at creating a Raikou-capturing system and subsequent retrieval for storage by the two agents entrusted with the mission. It had been delivered to Olivine and then simply disappeared.

“No,” Surge muttered irritably.

“I doubt it’s in their hands,” Sabrina put in calmly. “Erika has had the Celadon Game Corner under watch, but they have made no moves as of yet.”

“Maybe not theirs, but the alternative isn’t much better,” Surge leaned on the desk, keying something into the keyboard with his spare hand until an image of a vaguely ‘A’ shaped emblem appeared in the corner of the screen. “Team Aqua. They raided the Tin Tower soon after it vanished.”

“Why?” Sabrina demanded, and Surge scowled.

“Fuck if I know, woman,” he retorted. “I ain’t the mind-reader here.”

Sabrina’s eyes flashed—literally—but she said and did nothing but stare coldly into the screen. The lieutenant just chuckled lowly, too used to her glares to be too bothered.

“So,” Koga murmured, tucking his chin down in thought, his darkened room shadowing his eyes to the others. “They finally decided that Johto was too much a temptation.” His chest was tight with tension; he didn’t know much about the Aquas, but where the Aquas went, so did—

He cut that train of thought off before it became dangerous, and lifted his face to meet Sabrina’s raised eyebrow and appraising gaze.

“Whatever their reason for being in Johto,” she said, opting not to call him on his unease—to his faint relief—and tapped one finger in vague annoyance on her black-sleeved arm. “We can’t allow them to think they can wander in whenever they desire.”

“Agreed.” Koga tilted his head at Surge. “Ken?”

The burly blonde nodded. “He’s free,” he said brusquely. “I’ll send him to Johto to keep an eye on the Aquas.” He smirked. “And on second thought, the pantywaist can go with him.”

“Meantime Ryu will remain in Celadon,” Sabrina said, before her cold eyes shifted slightly to Koga once more. “And I hope we can trust that the efforts to catch Blaine will be successful in the near future?”

Koga turned off the screen without giving her an answer.

Koga’s eyes opened almost without him realising he’d closed them, and he had to resist the urge to sigh out loud, the wind sharp and cold with spray against his angular face, the overcast sky weighing down on him invisibly.

Things were getting complicated.

And he had a feeling that, contrary to Sabrina’s hope, they were only going to become more so.


A/N: I am aware that Flareon doesn’t learn Smokescreen, but they do learn Smog, which is a similar attack in form (as in, it’s a cloud of thick gas and smoke etc) so I don’t believe it’s too much of a stretch for them to at least simulate Smokescreen.

[jirachiman876]

It's been a year since you last updated??? I hope people are still here. I totally missed this fic forever girl!!!! I'm soooo glad you're back!!!!! *glomps*

Anyway, great chap here. I love the whole scene with tynan in the gym. He got pwned!!! And you did very well in describing everything it was very very good. ^^ Great stuff. Man nothing really more to comment on. ^^; Which kinda sucks but it was great stuff.

I hope we get more in less than a year okay???
jirachiman out

[purple_drake]

Yes, it's been a year since I last updated. *hides behind Lance*

I hope people are still here too. ^.^;; Although I wouldn't blame anyone if they'd given up on me, just be a bit disappointed (in myself, mostly, for being so slack).

I'm glad to know that at least one person still remembers me, though! XD *is glomped*

Yeah, it was really fun for Tynan to get pwned. >D Mostly I just liked how Janine played with him. XD She was fun to write, I can't wait to write her again.

I hope you get more in less than a year too. XD Although it's good, 'cos part of what was hindering me was the knowledge that I had some plot revamping to do. Now that in the past few days I've sat down and considered how to change it, I know what's happening and how things are changing, so that roadblock's pretty much over.

Fortunately, since the first of the major changes will be happening in the next chapter. XD

Anyway! ^^ Good seeing you're still around, and thanks for reviewing! *offers platter of dragonite cookies*

[jirachiman876]

*eats dragonite cookies* So where is everyone else??? lol *goes and attacks them to come and read*
jirachiman out

[Bay]

Sorry for not reviewing the last chapter earlier. I actually did once, but Serebii ate it. >.> Here’s a short version of it though. XD

On the last chapter, like everyone else it’s quite interesting. Cool Keegan got a Butterfree and very fun seeing how she used that Pokemon. Also, love that car chase scene and also Koga’s personality. Ninjas rock. XD

Now, for the latest chapter. Very interesting the umbreon was captured just so he can get his brother. Tynan being in the gym’s booby trap was very fun and also I like Janine in there. Yeah, looks like she was fun to write. XD Lastly, I find this quote interesting:

The question was directed at Surge; he had been in charge of its transport after its use in Professor Sebastian’s failed attempt at creating a Raikou-capturing system and subsequent retrieval for storage by the two agents entrusted with the mission. It had been delivered to Olivine and then simply disappeared.

I assume that’s why Raikou appeared at the beginning of the story?

There’s one thing I was confused about, though. At the ending of Janine and Tynan’s battle I’m confused what happened and who won (though jirachiman876 did mention Janine pwning him XD). Sorry to ask. ^^;

Overall, quite like the last two chapters. Glad you’re getting back at this and also managed to think the plot over. Can’t wait for the next one!