Emergence (Final Update - 28.03.12)

[GreekGeek]

I gotta tell you; Cobra has left for military service so it might take a very long while before he writes another story.
So you know

[Cobraroll]

Here it is! What you've all forgotten been waiting for! The thirty-ninth chapter of Emergence!

I know it's taken a while. To be more or less exact, three months and four days, minus almost an hour. But I have an excuse: the military service. First, six weeks of recruit training. Then, lots of different courses, LAN-ing with friends, and general negligience of any writing projects. But I've put in some minutes of writing now and then, and here's the result: the longest chapter so far, at about 33400 characters (or 33 kB of text). Please welcome back:

Chapter thirty-nine: The dragon trio

It was Monday, March 29, in Geography class. For the first time in ages, I felt bored at school. I had
planned to go Pokémon hunting the previous weekend, but the weather had been so bad that I had spent my time
catching up with school instead. I had even done the homework for today, and for once didn't feel like I
was eternities behind the others in my class. Usually, I spent the Geography classes catching up with Maths
or Physics, but now I had nothing sane to do. So like the rest of my class, I had hid an MP3 player under my
clothes, and sat and listened to something else while the teacher kept talking about various kinds of
stones. However, unlike the rest of my class, I wasn't listening to music. Metagross and I had been working
on decoding the TLA internal radio, and last night, we had finally succeeded in transferring their signal
directly to my MP3 player. In other words, I was now able to monitor TLA activity while doing my daily
chores. I listened to the radio as often as I could, but there was rarely any activity on it, save for a few
connection tests. So for now, I had to listen to the teacher.
"...but this, on the other hand, is a sedimentary rock. See the difference?", the teacher said. A few
people nodded slowly. I had almost forgotten the feeling of boredom, but I quickly realized that I had never
missed it. It was only about half an hour left of the school day, but the past half hour had felt weeks
long. Emily, who sat beside me, didn't look bored at all, but appeared to be the only person in the room
taking notes. Greta, a row behind us, listened intently to the teacher, while trying to keep Andy awake. The
rest of the class appeared to be thinking about anything but rocks. "Something better happen soon", I
thought.
Then, something happened. There was a short buzz, then the radio sparked to life:
"HQ, this is strike team Bravo! Strike team Bravo, van 1 calling HQ, over!"
"Bravo one, HQ here, over"
"We've got contact! Multiple monsters encountered at the Langsford quarry. We're in urgent need of backup,
over!"
I tried to hide my excitement. Something was happening, and Langsford was just a quarter of an hour away, if
I fled.
"Calm down, Bravo one", the HQ operator's voice continued. "Elaborate. What kind of monsters are you facing,
over?"
"Hard to tell. It looks like we've driven straight into some sort of cloud here, with near zero sight. We've
been hit by something big a couple of times, and the car is dented, but we're fine for the time being. I
sent a couple of grunts out to investigate, but they haven't returned yet. Over"
"Do you have any radio or visual contact with Bravo 4, over?", HQ asked.
"Nothing. But it looks like van 7 is on fire, over"
"We're sending an armoured team and a chopper to assist you. They will be there in ten minutes. Good luck,
Bravo. Over"
"We might need special support as well. Is field agent Theta available, over?"
"HQ calling field agent Theta. Are you available, over?"
"Agent Theta is busy for the next twenty minutes, over", a familiar voice said. It was unmistakably Julia
who had spoken, but as far as I could tell, she hadn't moved a muscle where she sat, two rows in front of
me.
"Agent Theta, will you assist us, over?", the man from the Bravo team asked.
"Bravo one, I'll come as fast as I can, over"
I didn't need to hear more to find out that this was more important than rocks. The Pokémon appeared to have
done well out there, but if the TLA got reinforcements, things could take a turn for the worse. I pulled the
earplug out and put my hand up.
"Yes, Rob?", the teacher said.
"May I go to the rest room?", I asked. Emily looked at me, puzzled.
"Hurry, then. I have some pictures to show you later, which might be very relevant for next week's test", he
replied. I got up, trying to signal to Emily to take care of my bag. Then I left the room, walked down the
corridors and out of the building. Lucario and Mismagius were waiting at our rendez-vous point, behind the
bike shed.
"What do we do? We won't be there before them", Lucario said. He had been outfitted with a radio as well,
and spent even more time listening than I did. Now, he took out the earpiece and put it in a small backpack
which he handed to me.
"We'll go there. We might be just the last-minute reinforcements the TLA don't expect", I said as I opened
the backpack. "Besides, Julia is headed there too, but she waits for school to end first. Her new image as a
perfect student has some downsides"
"What if she decides to spend the waiting time messing with Emily again?", Lucario asked.
"Emily has got Gardevoir in her school bag. In a worst case scenario, she can defend Emily until we get
back. But I don't think that would be necessary"
"Let's go, then", Mismagius said. She enlarged the invisibility bubble we had been concealed under, while I
called out Salamence and put on an extra jacket. It was still a bit cold, despite that April was just around
the corner.
"I don't want to miss a minute of this", Lucario said before I called him into his ball. "Send me out as
soon as we get there, okay?"
I nodded and put the backpack on. Behind me, Salamence rose up and began flapping his wings. A minute later,
we were high up in the air. School already felt hours away. I realized that while the predictable safety of
school was nice, it couldn't beat the thrill of flying at several hundred kilometres per hour, held in the
clutches of a dragon.
 
"Are you fine back there?", I asked Mismagius. She wasn't as convenient to bring with me as Espeon; as she
had to hang on rather than being in the bag, psychically attached to Salamence's right hind leg.
"It's awfully windy, but I can manage", she replied telepathically. "Though, bring Espeon as often as you
can in the future"
"I had to test the alternatives, remember", I thought back. "Can't risk being without invisibility if she is
taken out again"
Beneath us, residential blocks fled past in a blur. I was so used to flying by now that almost hitting tall
buildings was an ordinary thing. Salamence loved to fly close to things. Eventually, the houses became
smaller and gathered in clusters, with more and more trees along the roads. Soon, we were flying above a
winding forest road. The town of Langsford was a kilometre or two to our right, and the quarry just ahead us
us, down into a small valley. It took a while before I realised it was not a valley, but rather a hole in
the ground. It was large and square, more than twice as long as it was wide, almost a kilometre in total.
The walls of the hole were completely straight, and almost thirty metres tall (or deep, depending on how you
were looking at them). A tall, graffiti-filled wooden fence went all the way around the hole. Various
"Danger" signs were plastered all over the fence. There might have been barbed wire on the fence once, but
all of it had fallen off by now. Apparently, the quarry had been abandoned for a while, as evident from the
run-down look of the area. But there were someone here today: Even from up here, I could see smoke rising
from the farthest end of the hole.
"Looks nasty", Mismagius said, echoing my thoughts.
"Let's go down at a safe distance", I thought back. "A hundred metres should-"
Suddenly, a large thunderbolt emerged from the cloud of dust and smoke. Parts of the walls near the cloud
fell into the hole.
"Heck, what Pokémon might that be?", I shouted out loud. Salamence ignored my proposal and landed at the
nearest end of the quarry, as far away from the cloud as possible. I released Lucario as soon as I got my
arms free.
"There should be a guard here somewhere", I said. "There's always a guard..."
"Over there", Lucario said and pointed. To our left lay parts of a black van, with three grunts and lots of
debris scattered around it. "Taken out already" For some reason, I didn't quite believe him.
"The angle doesn't match", I said. "Look at how the debris is spread out. The guards are probably up there"
- I threw a glance at the concrete ramp going down the hole, some fifty metres to our right - "The van has
been thrown from over there somewhere" I pointed an arm in the general direction of the smoke cloud, several
hundred metres away. There must have been quite some force involved.
"Guards taken care of", Mismagius' voice echoed in my head. She hated wasting time. "Let's take care of the
TLA now, shall we?"
We started walking towards the cloud. As we approached it, we could hear clanking and scraping sounds from
inside. There lay bits of scrap metal and torn tires everywhere around it.
"Who wants to go in there first?", I mumbled. "I think I've got Aggron somewhere here..."
Suddenly, there was a roar of an engine from the cloud, and a heavily armoured truck drove out of it. It
didn't look much like a TLA vehicle. The windows were a matte white, and the truck was a metal grey colour
rather than the usual black. It drove slowly towards us. As it came closer, I could see that it missed a
wheel on the right side. Suddenly, the engine made a clanking noise, and smoke started billowing from its
front grille. The truck stopped, and the door on the driver's side opened. A grunt fell out, followed by a
cascade of sand. He was wearing a hazmat suit, but the visor was a milky white colour and he obviously
couldn't see a thing. He got up, walked around a little and waved with his arms. I wondered why he didn't
make any attempt to take off the suit. Now well, I thought, it would be easy enough to interrogate him on
what had happened...
Suddenly, something flew out of the cloud at a blinding speed, and stroke the grunt hard. The impact sent
him rolling several metres across the ground. When he stopped, I noticed that there was a huge slash in his
suit, and a deep wound over his back was closing. He was down for the count for sure.
"Who's there?", I shouted at the something, which had vanished into the cloud again. "Lucario, be ready to
take out whatever comes out of there", I whispered. In response to my call, the cloud stopped to swirl. I
could now see that it had been quite a vicious sandstorm. The sand hung suspended in the air for a split
second, then it fell to the ground and revealed a veritable collection of TLA vehicles, some lying on top of
each other. There were regular vans, armoured vans, some vans looking like tanks without a cannon, a few
trucks and the scattered remains of a helicopter. Most of them were slashed open like tin cans, but some
were burning and a few were coated in a layer of ice. None of them were the regular black colour, and every
window I could see was a dull grey - the sand had brushed the glass and torn off the paint. And in the midst
of the heap were three Pokémon.

"Friend or foe?", the closest of them snarled. It didn't sound very friendly. It looked like a hybrid of a
shark and a dinosaur, with blue skin and very long and very sharp claws on its arms.
"Garchomp, don't you recognize me?", I asked.
"Don't you pull that trick", another of the Pokémon said. It was green, with small wings flapping so fast I
could hardly see them moving. Its large eyes appeared even larger because of red half-transparent covers,
making it look like it was wearing goggles. "We've had enough of disguises and tricks"
"He's honest", the last one said. It was an orange and large dragon, and looked way more battered than the
two others. Its skin was full of scraps and dirt. "I can see it on you. You're not one of them"
"Thanks, Dragonite", I said. "But well done, Flygon. Paranoia is good. Now, how are you doing?"
Garchomp replied: "We've spent the past five months or so taking down these wuzzes. We started to wonder
when you'd make contact. We've heard that you've been doing great hunting the black suits, but we figured it
out we could be as effective by operating independently"
"You've become better at organizing, but a lot of potential and time is wasted waiting in that cave of
yours", Flygon said. Its voice was a low hiss, almost snake-like. "We decided that we could go find you, and
spend time digging and waiting, or stay out of your sight, and fight"
"Though, we're under your command, so if you ask us to come with you, we will", Dragonite said.
I was confused. "Wait, how have you found out about all this?" I turned to my Pokémon: "You haven't told
them, have you?"
"Of course not", Dragonite said. "There are plenty of other Pokémon still out there, or what? Don't you
think they could find out stuff? Or that we communicate with each other?"
"Umm... no? I've been doing my best to find you all, and it turns out you all avoid me?"
"More or less", Garchomp said. Dragonite sighed.
"It's a question of efficiency", Flygon said. "If you want to take the black suits out, it's better to work in
several small teams"
"I just want to get you all to safety!", I shouted. "I need to gather you all first, then we'll see what
we're going to do with the TLA. Annoying them more is the last thing I want to do. If you want to help me,
you can tell me what Pokémon are out there, and where they are"
Flygon and Garchomp looked to Dragonite. It sighed again, and started to tell:
"Well, we don't know about every one of them. As far as we can tell, you or the TLA have picked up most of
them. The core gang consists of us, Alakazam, Gengar and.. Magmortar... help me out, please" Dragonite
looked at the two other Pokémon.
"Aerodactyl, Machamp, Heracross, Typhlosion...", Flygon continued.
"Ninjask, what about him?", Garchomp asked.
"The black suits got him, remember?"
"He broke free again. Stupid black suits, thinking they could catch a Ninjask. I think he managed to
liberate a fair few others too"
"So, where do I find all these?", I asked Dragonite. "Would you help me? I know you might be more successful
hunting on your own and all that, but I want to keep control of where you are, then when everyone's back and
safe, we can deal with the TLA"
"We will come, and we will help you", Dragonite said.
"Good", I said. "Now, let's see if we can find anything useful in these vehicles. You can start with..."
I stopped mid-sentence. Mismagius had contacted me telepathically. She had heard a short message, apparently
from Gardevoir, and sent it further to me. It simply said: "Emily. Come now. Fast"
I turned to Mismagius.
"Was that all? Ask Gardevoir what has happened!"
"I do. She says that she's still in her Poké Ball, but that she felt a presence of shock in Emily, upon
which she fainted. There are no other persons in the room, but still a presence of shock"
"We'll leave. Now", I said. "Salamence, or anybody, really: incinerate these" I waved my arm in the general
direction of the TLA vans. "Mismagius, can you make a bubble big enough to cover all of us?"
"I could, but... it would be of no use. They have seen us", Mismagius replied. For some reason, I
immediately knew which way to look. A black TLA van was driving down the ramp into the quarry at breakneck
speeds. The Pokémon all followed it with their eyes. Garchomp crouched down, ready to leap at it. Lucario
raised his right paw, which began to glow slightly. Flygon hovered slightly above ground, its wings making a
high-pitched buzzing sound. Salamence flapped his wings and raised his tail. Suddenly, the van screeched to
a halt, and a figure jumped out of it. It rolled towards us on the ground for a few moments, then raised up.
Unsurprisingly, it was Julia. She had tied her hair in a knot at the back, and wore the standard TLA blue
battle suit. The unusual thing was the object she held in her hand: a gun.
"Don't move a muscle!", she commanded.
"I thought you preferred close combat?", I said, trying not to move a muscle. People had pointed guns at me
before, but those were never people I knew, or expected to hit.
"Fun, but less effective", Julia replied. She almost sounded bored, as if she preferred to listen to the
teacher rather than being here. "Now, want to come with me without any hassle, or should I shoot some of you
first?"
"You wouldn't dare to...", I began, glancing nervously at the Pokémon. They were subject to the physical
laws of whatever hit them, so bullets would harm them as much as me.
"I would", she replied calmly. Behind her, two grunts wearing hazmat suits jumped out of the van, not half
as elegant as Julia had done.
"Julia... I've known you for years. You're mean, bully-ish and a little too violent, but you wouldn't kill
anyone. That's not-"
"Call me agent Theta", she interrupted me. "My old identity has played its role now"
"What do you... 'old identity'? Are you planning on going wholeheartedly into the TLA, now? What about your
family?"
"I have no family"
"Julia...", I said.
"We both know that's not my name. Stop calling me that". She sounded angry now. "Come with me, or I'll have
to make a few holes in your friends first"
"Sorry, but I don't have much time", I said. "I swear, if you've done anything to Emily..."
"Not that I know of", Julia said. "We could use her, of course, but why? I mean, you're high on our
'priority target' list, but you're not exactly that difficult to corner. Besides, we don't want to mess with
your emotions too much. Too risky. As long as you believe you've got control, you're predictable as well.
Now, come with me"
"Not so fast, miss", Mismagius croaked. I was a little shocked. She actually had a voice capable of human
speech. It sounded like a stereotypical witch, deep and rusty. With a screeching sound, the gun in Julia's
hand suddenly bent like a banana. Julia dropped it as if it had been set on fire. The grunts behind her
looked puzzled at each other for half a second. That was all the time my Pokémon needed. To my right,
Lucario fired a large blue ball at one of the grunts, while Garchomp darted past me on the left. Julia
managed to throw herself out of its way, while the other grunt behind her wasn't so quick. In less than a
second, the Pokémon had surrounded Julia.
"Listen: I would gladly have knocked you out, but I don't have time for that now. Dragonite, Garchomp,
Flygon, you guard her, the rest of you: ready to fly off in thirty seconds. Hurry!"
"Why don't we just take her down?", Garchomp growled.
"We can't bring her with us, and the TLA would just have woken her up when they came anyway. They will be
here any moment, and she would just be even angrier once she woke up. Besides, it would be unfair to
outnumber her and knock her out. Julia, I expect you to do the same for me once"
"Fool", she muttered. I unclipped a Poké Ball from my belt, and called back Lucario.
"You can all fly pretty fast, or what?", I asked the dragons as I put my backpack on. Dragonite and Garchomp
just snorted. Flygon, on the other hand, seemed a little unsure. He walked over to me, bent down, and
whispered so Julia couldn't hear us over the sound of his buzzing wings.
"I can move around undetected. I'm good at that", it said, without moving its gaze from Julia, who was
intently staring at an unspecified point in the wall of the quarry, away from me. "While you fly, I can
contact a few of the others, Alakazam's gang, and tell them to find you. Go to your house, or some other
rendez-vous point. I'll be on your doorstep at seven, at latest"
I nodded. "Good. That will add some speed to the progress. Perhaps I'll have you all back in a couple of
weeks. But stay away from my house, please. Long story. Instead, go to the forest, and to..."
"I'll be in the ravine at seven, then", Flygon said. He obviously knew about the place.
Salamence got up behind me, grabbed me, and lifted me off the ground. To my right, I could see Dragonite do
the same with Mismagius.
"Fly off, now. I'll watch her as you take off", Flygon said.
"Don't stay too long. They will have reinforcements here before you know it. And don't knock her out. That
will just piss them off, and intensify their search for me", I said. "Now, to Emily!" Salamence kicked off.
We flew for a few seconds, before Dragonite and Garchomp darted past me at speeds I had thought only jet
fighters could reach. They were hundreds of metres ahead of me within a couple of seconds. Then they slowed
down, allowing me to get within an acceptable distance before Mismagius put up the invisibility bubble.
Salamence flew as fast as he had ever done, still Dragonite and Garchomp appeared to fly in a leisurely
pace, keeping up with us with no visible effort. Dragonite was flapping her wings all the time, while
Garchomp's means of flight was quite mysterious. It looked like it was just lying in the air, floating away,
with no means of propellant. It just flew, and it looked natural to it.
"Mismagius, do you hear me?", I asked by thinking hard.
"Loud and clear", she replied, a little shaky. It was clear that she wasn't quite used to those speeds.
"We're headed for those blocks over there, then we follow the motorway for some minutes before we turn right
at that hill. Tell the others to slow down and circle that hill when we get there"
As we flew, my head was filled with thoughts. I wondered what could have knocked out Emily, and if she was
still all right. I felt both sad, angry and scared at the same time. What if the TLA got her? The anger
built up in me. If so, I'd get all my Pokémon with me, and level their lair completely. Though, for some
reason I felt that what Julia had said was true. If my emotions resulted in another emergence, the TLA would
just get a more difficult job. Using her as bait was not a sensible way to do things. I felt that whatever
Emily had encountered, was not under TLA control... Yes, what if it really wasn't? What if a demon Joe had
helped catch, had escaped and was hungry for revenge? The anger vanished, replaced by fear. "Oh no", I
thought. Demons were more serious stuff than I used to handle. Then again, from what I had gathered, demons
went on killing sprees when angry. Emily was still alive, according to Mismagius. No, it couldn't be that
either. Suddenly, a voice echoed in my head: "You have to hurry. Save the girl". A message? It sounded a
little like either Azelf or Uxie. I was puzzled. Didn't they pay attention? Of course I was hurrying! I
looked down, and realized that we were flying over the motorway already. The train station where I had
encountered Magnezone could be seen not far away. We were twenty minutes away from home by train, which
meant that we'd be at Emily's house in less than two minutes. Whatever she had met... I intended to meet
myself.

"Careful when you land! We must not be seen!", I hissed as we slowly approached the house. "Don't make
tracks in the ground either"
"How?", Salamence grunted. "Land without landing?"
"Just come up with something!", I shouted, probably in a way too loud voice.
"It's the roof, then", Salamence replied. "Looks awfully slippery, but the alternative is dropping you down
from here. I can't go further down without breaking a few branches off the trees in the garden"
"Okay. You two circle the area, ready to pick me up, or take out anything if things go the wrong way", I
shouted to Dragonite and Garchomp.
"There's a problem", Mismagius said. "I can, in theory, make a bubble large enough to cover both you on the
roof and the dragons circling up there. Problem is, it would make every living being within the bubble
invisible to the outside world"
"That's what the bubble is for", I said. "The problem is..?"
"People would notice the birds suddenly disappearing and reappearing"
"Okay, I'll take the chance. You stay with Dragonite. I'll rather be seen crawling around Emily's roof than
you hitting the front pages all over the country"
Salamence dropped down carefully, then hovered still above the chimney. I put my feet down, then he let me
go. I almost lost my balance for a second, then I managed to stay still. My legs were still numb from the
flight, so this was probably not the smartest thing to do. However, I had enough motivation, to put it like
that. I climbed down from the chimney, and crept across the roof. There was a small balcony outside Emily's
room, and I knew Emily had used this way down back when she had received Umbreon and Gardevoir from her
cabin, so it should be possible to get down there. When I reached the edge, I dropped down and landed
quietly, if a little hard, on the balcony. Hopefully, nobody had seen me. I got up and peered through the
window, which was a little open. I could see Emily lying on the floor, still with her school bag in her
hand. My bag lay in a corner at the other end of the room. I couldn't see anything unusual in there. There
was no blood either.
"Good", I whispered to myself. "Now, the door better be open..."
It turned out to be open. I hurried across the floor, and sat down on my knees beside Emily.
"Emily! Are you all right? What happened?" Her face was red, and she breathed in short, shallow puffs. It
couldn't possibly be more than a quarter of an hour since Gardevoir contacted me, but that still meant she
had been knocked out deeply. In most cases, a fainted person will wake up by him/herself within a minute or
two.
"Emily?" I tried to pinch her arm, to see if there was any reaction. To say the least, there was. She
screamed, sat up, and lashed out. She hit me in panic, her eyes completely wild. I was so baffled that I
didn't even try to dodge. Then she jumped backwards, still screaming, and hit the wall. She stared at me for
several seconds, before she jumped at me again, burying her face in my jacket.
"Rob!" She was shaking and crying.
"I'm here", I said, trying to sound calming. "What happened?"
"Didn't you see it? Is it gone?"
"What? Where?"
"Up"
I looked up. And instinctively recoiled in shock. No wonder why Emily was scared. A giant emerald green
dragonfly, more than two metres from eyes to tail, and with a similarly large wingspan, hung in the
ceiling. It had three black backbone fins so large that I would have hit them if I hadn't bent down as I
rushed to help Emily. Its six black legs were larger than the arms of a primary school child.
"It's not dangerous", I said as soon as I had gathered myself. "Not at all"
"How do you know?", Emily cried. She was still shaking.
"It's a Pokémon. And a harmless one at that. Right, Yanmega?"
"Chirp?"
For once, I had a hard time understanding what was being said. It could have been affirmative, or a
question. Or even an excuse for being so scary. Bug Pokémon were hard to understand.
"Make it go away!", Emily squeaked. "Bugs absolutely terrify me!"
Yanmega chirped again. I decided that this was too hard for me to decipher. I reached for Emily's bag and
pulled out Gardevoir's Poké Ball.
"I need some translation help here", I mumbled, activating the ball's microphone. In a brilliant light,
Gardevoir appeared. Her head almost touched Yanmega's wings when she stood upright.
"Yanmega, why are you here?", I asked. A long series of chirps followed. As far as I could translate, it was
all a misunderstanding, but I waited for Gardevoir's full translation:
"Yanmega was out flying, finally using his wings again for the first time since the first snowfall last
year, when he noticed Pokémon activity from this house", Gardevoir eventually said, probably referring to
Umbreon, who spent a lot of time here guarding Emily. "He assumed that it was your house, and crept in
through an open window waiting for you to appear. He didn't know it wasn't you who lived here"
I glanced at the pink wall paper, the near perfect tidiness and the teddy bears residing on a shelf. Yanmega
apparently didn't know me very well.
"When Emily came home, screamed and fainted, he decided to wait until somebody arrived with Pokémon, or flee
if somebody else appeared"
"Good decision", I remarked. Emily made a funny sound. "OK, Yanmega, time to go. If you just fly out of the
door, and straight up, you'll probably bump into some of the others. They will take you back where I live.
Okay?"
Yanmega made a buzzing sound, and let go of the ceiling. He dropped ten centimetres or so, before backing
off. I was pretty impressed that he managed to fly out to the balcony backwards, even upside down.
The next hour or so was spent calming down Emily. Luckily, nobody had been home and heard the screaming.
Eventually, Mismagius joined us, telling that the dragons had gone to the ravine to wait for Flygon and the
others. As the clock ticked towards 6:30, I decided to go home. I would just manage to get down into the
cave and use the old tunnel to get to the ravine, provided that the Pokémon had dug open the shaft again. I
was excited. How many would turn up? How many ticks could I make on my "still left to catch"-list? I broke
into a jog just as I was out of sight from Emily's house. I got home about ten minutes to seven, told mom a
short story on how much I had to work on school stuff, and disappeared into the basement. As I got into the
damp tunnel leading to the cave, Mismagius and Lucario appeared behind me.
"This doesn't sound good", Lucario said. "There is too much panic in the air here. Something hasn't gone
according to the plan"
"What do you mean?", I asked as we exited the narrow tunnel and entered the crescent-moon shaped chamber
before the shaft. The answer gave itself around the bend. There, we met Tyranitar, Aggron and Golem,
stacking huge boulders up against the leftmost wall. Tyranitar had a mere-long slash across his left side,
and it appeared that his arm was hurt.
"Ambush", he gruffed. "They were waiting for them"
"What?!?", I shouted. "That can't be! Nobody knew we were there!"
"Emily", Lucario said. "She was there when you talked to Flygon"
"But I only told him to go to the forest. He made the rest of the suggestions himself..."
Aggron interrupted us. "Luckily, the TLA attacked before everybody had got there. There weren't that many
Pokémon in the ravine, and most of them got away. I think Dragonite managed to warn the rest, so we had no
big losses. Still, we're blocking the tunnel just in case.
"Where are they now?", I asked.
"Down there", Golem said and pointed down the shaft.
"We'll come after you soon. Just a few more rocks, now...", Tyranitar said as he slammed a boulder the size
of a fridge into the wall. I hurried down the shaft with Lucario and Mismagius in tow. Well down to the
cave, I was met by nearly all the Pokémon I was in command of.
"Are everybody all right?", I asked Garchomp, who stood nearest.
"Affirmative", he said. "Though, I wish we had had a little more time. It wouldn't have taken ten seconds to
slash the throat of that girl friend of yours"
"Was Julia there?"
"Among others", Flygon said. His left wing was wrapped in a giant leaf of some plant.
"Tell me everything", I said, and sat down on a nearby rock.
"We got there about half past six, just to make sure to be there first", Garchomp said. "Eventually, some of
the others turned up." He pointed at a small group of Pokémon: Dodrio, Charizard, Ledian, Sandslash, and a
very singed Exeggutor. Two of its three heads were apparently moaning in pain. The third was simply staring
interested at me. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that all the Pokémon in the group had burns of some
kind. Garchomp continued:
"We had spent the afternoon waiting for everybody to turn up. About ten minutes ago, our dear friends, the
blacksuits, showed up. And to say the least, there were many of them. Against us and Dragonite. Luckily, we
managed to make some sort of smokescreen by setting fire to whatever was inside the range of a Fire Blast.
We got back into the tunnel, and Dragonite closed the ravine behind us with an Earthquake. Hopefully, she's
still okay. She was supposed to warn all the others who were on the way, then return some time tonight.
"But how could they know we were there? Only Julia heard us, and she can't possibly have understood what you
were saying", I said to Flygon. "Or...?"
"I'm afraid that's the only possible explanation", a gruff voice said from somewhere in the crowd. "If that
is the case, we have very little time"
"How come?"
"The TLA now knows that the Pokémon are gathering in two organized groups: Us here, and Alakazam, Gengar and
a group of other quite powerful Pokémon. If the groups come together and cooperate, they'll be much harder
to take down. Thus, they put extra resources into taking out the weakest groups, the others, as fast as
possible. I've tracked some TLA traffic, and things don't look pretty. TLA branches all over the world have
transferred their folks to this district by the thousands only today. In terms of countries involved, this
has actually just become the world's largest international conflict. Until a couple of weeks ago, you were
just a routine case. Tons of people all over the world are locked in never-ending conflicts with the TLA.
Then the stuff ran through the paper mill, and you appeared on the list of the top 200 priority targets.
This afternoon, you were bumped from 167th place to 14th. A new post on the list; 'Pokémon_group2', sailed
straight into the 8th place. They have really decided to end this now"
I took a deep breath. "But why just now? I mean, we have made bigger splashes before, for example when we
broke out of their lair..."
Metagross replied: "TLA executive Omega, the international top leader of the TLA, died of natural causes
last night. You're free to guess who replaced him as the leader of the organization"
"Alpha?"
"Exactly. You've been a thorn in his side for too long now. This has become a personal issue, and he's using
all his newly gained influence to clean this up once and for all. Several people from this district have
gotten hefty promotions too. You noted that Julia has been promoted and given a new name?"
"She made it pretty clear, yes"
"Anyway, only today, we've managed to get away from the TLA twice. I think you know Alpha enough to know
what that mea-"
Suddenly, there was a bright flash, and a large floating shape appeared just above our heads. It appeared to
be the head of a Pokémon, though slightly transparent. It was Y-shaped, with large ears and a giant
moustache. A telepathic message from Alakazam, I thought. A booming voice sounded through the cavern:
"They have found us. Hurry"

[SuperFireKirby]

HUZZAH! Yet another great chapter.

[dahans]

Once again: a very impressive chapter .

[Greg]

Dang... just spent 4 hours reading this.

TOTALLY WORTH IT!

Go on... this topic looks as if it's been forgotten 

[SuperFireKirby]

This story is all but forgotten. Cobra has just been to busy with silly unimportant things like working for THE MAN to write anymore.

[Cobraroll]

Yep, still writing! Just now, in fact. As soon as I get somebody to look over it, I'll put it up. No promises, but it looks like the next chapter will be finished this weekend.

[Greg]

Ah... that's great. Best fanfic I've ever seen... ANYWHERE.

I can't wait for this weekend now 

[Cobraroll]

^Thanks for the kind words!

Yep, as I said, the story was finished this weekend. Unfortunately, the ones who usually read through this before I submit it were both busy, so I read it through myself a few more times before putting it up.
Again, a record broken. Or two, rather: It's never been this long between chapters before (and I hope it won't be any more, either), but on the other hand, this chapter is the longest ever, almost breaking the post character limit (which is currently sitting on 40,000 characters). So be prepared for quite a read. Enjoy:

Chapter forty: A long night

The cave was suddenly full of activity. Everyone started chattering (making a little more noise than your
average jet plane) or running about. I had to scream at the top of my lungs to calm everyone down.
"We have to hurry!", I shouted. "Garchomp, Salamence, Scizor, Lucario, Tyranitar, Roserade, you come with
me!" It became marginally quieter in the cave.
"We can operate on our own", Garchomp said. Flygon nodded. "While you can only command six, some of us can
manage on our own too. That way, we can pack more power"
"Scizor and I can form a team too", Lucario said. I quickly considered the best replacements.
"Okay. Electivire, Metagross and Infernape, you replace those three", I said. "Weavile, you back up Lucario
and Scizor. Watch their backs only, and don't plunge head-first into another bullet storm. You might not be
as lucky next time"
"Got it", Weavile mumbled.
I changed into some warmer clothes, filled the bag with everything I thought could come in handy, all the
while talking to the Pokémon.
"Blissey, you stay here, ready to help us when we come back. Espeon, into the bag, I need invisibility
support. Aggron, Sceptile, Nidoking, you stay in the upper chamber to defend it if need be. Somebody,
contact Xatu and get a bubble around the house"
There was a lot of noise as everybody made themselves ready. Mismagius tried to contact Alakazam again to
find out how things went. Not much later, we climbed up towards the house again. Aggron and Sceptile waved
us goodbye as we left the cave system and climbed up the hatch and into the basement. Then, when things
couldn't possibly get more chaotic, my phone rang. It was Emily.
"I'm kinda busy right now", I said.
"They just came and picked up dad", she said, not bothering to say hello either. "The TLA"
"I know, they are going out. Stay at home tonight", I replied.
"I've seen him go to missions before. But this was different", she continued. "A van stopped outside our
house, dad went out, and instead of dad jumping into the back compartment like usual, the driver opened the
passenger door for him, and even saluted!"
"He's been promoted". I realized it just as I said it. "The TLA has got a new leader who holds a grudge
against me. They've put in a lot of resources in this district. They want to take me out before I can gather
all the Pokémon. I'll try to get there before them"
"Right now?!"
"Mhm"
"Rob! Be careful!", she hissed. "Don't do anything stupid!"
"You know me. I will", I said before I hung up on her, not sure of which of her commands I had replied to.

Somehow, I managed to sneak the six Pokémon out of the house without mom or dad noticing. Scizor's feet made
a distinct click each time he took a step, Dragonite had to squeeze through doors, and Garchomp's claws
constantly banged into walls, but luckily, we weren't heard underneath the invisibility bubble. The sun was
setting and a full moon rising as we got out of the house. It was a clear and peaceful evening, not exactly
a classic background for a battle that might affect the rest of my life.
"Now, where to go?", I asked as I released Salamence. Dragonite grabbed hold of Lucario, while Garchomp
carried Scizor. Weavile clung to Salamence's neck as the dragon lifted me up.
"South-west, towards the old harbour", Espeon's voice echoed in my head. Flygon, the one in the party who
couldn't fly as fast, nodded.
"I'll find the way in myself. You'll meet up with me later"
Salamence kicked off. The old harbour wasn't too far away, so this wouldn't be a very long trip. Hopefully,
we had an option to walk back in case anything went wrong, I thought. It turned out to be not as easy: we
hadn't flown for more than two minutes when we saw the first road block. At first, I was relieved to see
that the TLA hadn't gone overboard with security; the block consisted of three police cars parked across the
road, and a single TLA van was parked a little further down the street. However, that turned out to be only
the beginning. A few blocks further down the road, there was a complete chaos. There was a large crowd of
people being herded into buses. People of all ages were escorted away from the area by police carrying riot
shields. Armoured TLA vans blocked the road, and there were both ambulances and fire trucks present. TLA
grunts held TV teams at bay, while a single high-ranked agent held an exclusive interview with a major news
channel.
"They're emptying the area", Espeon said. "This might get messy"
We flew in the direction of a couple of large loading cranes standing on a pier. The sun was gone, and the
entire area soon fell into darkness. The TLA had apparently cut the electricity in the area. There was a
labyrinth of old brick houses underneath us, with narrow streets between them. This part of the harbour had
been used by shipping companies for centuries, but the buildings were only about 120 years old, thanks to a
huge fire that ravaged the timber houses that had used to be here back then. Unfortunately, the city
planners had kept the original road layout from before the fire, so the area was unusable by cars and was
quickly abandoned once they became commonplace. A few roads and modern warehouses were built in an effort to
keep the businesses, but to no avail. Nowadays, the buildings housed shops and other small enterprises.
"Where to begin...", I mumbled. The pier was all calm. There was a few boats patrolling the water, but
otherwise, TLA activity appeared to be at a minimum. The large warehouses were all quiet. The side streets,
the trailer park... the TLA had a few guards here and there, but where were everybody?
"Let's split up", Dragonite suggested. "That way, we can cover a bigger area, and..."
"That very suggestion marks the beginning of every horror movie", I replied. "We stay together as long as we
can"
"Helicopter", Garchomp hissed. Right behind us, two helicopters rose from behind a building. They were pitch
black, and heading straight for us. We kept circling, waiting for them to change direction. However, they
kept heading for us in a straight line.
"Over there", I thought. Espeon picked up the thought, and spread it to the others. We flew over to one of
the cranes. The helicopters changed direction too, and were still heading for us.
"Thermal cameras!", Lucario shouted. "They can see us!"
"Get to the ground! Hide", I thought.
Salamence dropped almost down to street level, and flew into a narrow side street between two warehouses.
Garchomp and Dragonite followed.
"Drop us off here", Lucario said. "We have to split now" Dragonite let go of him, and Scizor slipped out of
Garchomp's grasp. Above me, Weavile jumped from Salamence's neck and into the shadows. The trio climbed into
a warehouse on our left through a broken window.
"I don't like this", Garchomp snarled. "There are people everywhere"
"Where?", I said. "We haven't seen anyone" Garchomp sighed.
"You need to use your ears better. And your sense of smell, if you had one. They are everywhere inside the
buildings. Waiting. People, vehicles, dogs, and... I'm not sure"
Dragonite apparently didn't have as good senses as Garchomp either, but she seemed uneasy. "Waiting? That
means that we..."
"Are trapped", I finished. "You saw the helicopters. They know that we're here. They have road blocks.
Boats. We can't escape"
"So what do we do?", Dragonite said. She sounded worried. Above us, the helicopters had apparently found us,
because the flapping sound of the rotors was now louder than ever.
"Let us end this peacefully, shall we?", a loud voice said. "Come out of there, with your hands above your
heads. And tell the dragons to behave, or we'll shoot them"
I looked up. There was a loudspeaker mounted underneath one of the helicopters.
"Follow the street, around the corner. You will enter a large, open square. Go there, calmly, with your
hands above your head. We have captured all the monsters in the area, and we have people everywhere, so
don't try anything"
Garchomp growled. "I can devastate a pretty large area with Earthquake, and we can use the confusion to
wreak a little havoc..."
"They have got the others", I sighed. "I don't know if that includes Scizor, Lucario and Weavile, yet, but
we'll just have to assume it"
"How do you know he speaks the truth?", Salamence said.
"It's too silent here. We were too late. Let's face it, we lost this battle before it even started", I said.
"Anyway, the helicopters up there can see us, and shoot us if we try anything"
I slowly started to walk down the side street, angrily kicking pieces of garbage as I walked. Apparently, we
had severely underestimated the TLA, and I was angry with myself for doing so. Behind me, Dragonite and
Salamence walked with heavy footsteps. Garchomp, being considerably lighter, only made a steady clack-clack
as he walked. Above us, the helicopters monitored our every move. I didn't even bother to check for ambushes
as I turned around the corner. The side street kept going for some thirty metres, before culminating in a
large square with a fountain in the middle, surrounded by small office buildings built during the last
century. Several armoured semi trailers were parked in the square. A couple of other roads lead out of the
square, but they were firmly blocked by armoured cars, trucks, tanks and concrete barriers. There were TLA
grunts, agents and even some soldiers all around the area. A third helicopter was hovering above the square,
apparently in the midst of landing. It was smaller and sleeker than the two other, but appeared even darker,
perhaps due to the contrast to the full moon behind it.
"I have to say, you disappointed me, Roberto", the voice continued. "I was expecting you to put up a
spectacular fight, but you were sensible and boring for once. Couldn't you at least have told me in advance,
so I didn't have to pay for helicopter fuel?"
It was Alpha's voice, I realized. I stopped at the end of the side street, allowing the dragons to catch up
with me. We stood still while the helicopter landed, and Alpha jumped out at the passenger side. I could see
another familiar figure piloting the helicopter.
"On the other hand, we've shared many fun moments, haven't we?", The TLA boss said as he lit a cigar.
"Perhaps it's best to quit while it's still fun. Now, go away from the dragons, and let us take care of
them. You can lie down over there, and we'll pick you up later" His voice was almost dripping with glee, but
what options did I have? I'd gladly prefer the humiliation and time to live another day than getting one of
the Pokémon shot. I sighed, and walked over to the spot he had pointed at, lying face down with my arms and
legs spread.
"Look at me when I talk to you!", Alpha snarled. I turned over to one side and looked at him.
"Roberto, while you have cost us a lot of money, you have also been very helpful to us", he continued,
chewing thoughtfully on the cigar. "You see, by resisting that much, you've forced us to operate on a larger
scale than usual, and we got a lot of training. And the monsters we already have caught have been very
hesitant about showing us their power and potential. Before you started directing them at us, we had no clue
about what they could do. You've made the extraction process much easier"
"Extraction?", I thought, but didn't say anything. Something right behind Alpha caught my eye. It was the
leftmost of the five semi trailers parked on the other end of the square. It was all black, apart from a spot
on the short end of the back compartment, right behind the driver's cabin, which glowed a faint orange. As
Alpha spoke, the colour of the spot got brighter, and the air around it began to shimmer.
"What are you looking at?", Alpha suddenly said when he realised he didn't have my attention any more. The
wall with the glowing spot - which had now grown to a size of about a square metre - started to bulge. A
second later, the trailer exploded in a roaring inferno. A pillar of fire engulfed the entire vehicle and
scorched a few unlucky grunts who were standing too near. Everybody in the area raised their guns, but
seemed unsure on who to shoot.
"The monsters...", Alpha said. "Fools! You did not sedate them all properly"
"Sedatives?", I thought. I quickly reached for a Poké Ball from my belt, raised it, and shouted at the top
of my lungs:
"Roserade! Aromatherapy!"
Roserade emerged in a flash of light, arms raised. A soothing scent filled the air. The TLA grunts finally
pulled together and aimed for Roserade.
"What are you waiting for? Attack!", Alpha and I screamed in unison. Alpha while pointing in my general
direction, me while releasing all the Pokémon I had carried with me. The sound of several dozen guns firing
wildly is extremely loud, but it was easily drowned in the roar of Pokémon attacking. The dragons all
plunged into the barricade to our left, while the emerging Pokémon headed right. The tension from a few
seconds ago was all gone, now everything was chaos. Alpha looked around, confused.
"Secure the trailers!", he shouted to a bunch of soldiers who had taken cover behind an armoured car.
Himself, he headed for his helicopter.
"Down, Rob!", a familiar voice sounded in my head. I hunched down as a wall was broken to pieces behind me,
and a blue ball of energy thundered into the helicopter. Rotor blades flew in every direction, and Alpha was
thrown backwards. As I turned around, I could see Lucario through a hole he had just made in the wall behind
me.
"I'll see you later!", he said as he darted away, further into the building. Half a dozen TLA grunts came
running after him.
"Look! Over there!", Roserade hissed. She had not left my side, but kept a Protect bubble around us. I
looked where she had pointed. One of the trailers was rocking back and forth. Suddenly, a large bulge
appeared in the side of the back compartment. Then it was ripped open like paper. A steel cage with a large
grey creature inside fell out of the trailer. For some reason, it appeared like the fire retracted from that
area, preventing the creature from being burnt. It had fell over when the cage tipped, but now got to its
legs. The creature looked like a statue of a man at first. It was all grey and extremely muscular, and
appeared to wear black underpants. However, it had two sets of arms, and only two toes on each foot. It had
no hair, but sharp ridges on its head, and instead of teeth, its lips were hardened to form a beak. Tiny red
eyes appeared to shine as it saw the chaos. It looked like it couldn't wait to join the battle. Then it
suddenly frowned, and grasped its neck. A thick, black cord was attached to the back of its head. The
creature yanked it loose and squeezed the end piece in one hand. Purple ooze spilled all over the cage.
"The monsters are loose!", Alpha shouted. The trailer on fire had now melted to a glowing lump. Through the
intense heat shimmer, I could see the bulky silhouette of a Pokémon, both its hands were spewing fire.
"Alpha! Over here!" A suit-clad man standing amongst the vans to our left produced a syringe from his pocket
and ran towards the cage, while Alpha darted in the opposite direction, towards the safety of an armoured
van. The creature meanwhile ripped the metal cage open as if it was made from sugar canes, and loosened a
bar from the wreckage.
"Come get me", it said in a low voice as it raised the bar above its head. The TLA agent hesitated for a
moment, then produced a gun from a holster inside his jacket.
"Give that to me", he said and pointed his gun at the metal bar. The creature nodded, then in a blindingly
fast motion threw the bar at him. It happened so fast that I didn't notice the throw before the bar hit an
armoured van fifteen metres away with a loud "clang". The bar made a significant dent in the armour.
"Dang, he missed", I mumbled.
"Machamp never misses", Roserade said smugly. True enough, the agent collapsed on the spot. Machamp's
throw was so powerful that the bar had gone straight through the man. A large pool of blood formed around
the body, before it suddenly ran back into the wounds, which closed neatly. Behind Machamp, more ooze was
dripping out of the hole in the trailer. Sounds indicated that more Pokémon were on the move inside.
"Send over November!", somebody shouted over by the vans. "They can keep the monsters at bay"
"I think you should get ready to away now", a deep, calm voice said behind me. I jumped. Right behind me
stood a creature that had appeared out of thin air. It looked like a bent, old man at first sight, wearing a
mask and carrying a silver spoon in each hand. However, upon closer inspection, one noticed the yellow skin
and the lizard-like feet. The head, while looking unnaturally big on such a frail body, was real.
"Alakazam! Wh- why that?", I asked.
"A battle will break out here any moment, and it will make a perfect deterrent", Alakazam replied, this time
using telepathy. "Wait for it..."
"Where should I run, then?", I asked. "There are battles going on to the right and left, and the only other
way is blocked by..." - I glanced - "...the remains of a tank, or something. Hard to tell because it's
burning"
"I'll fix that. Just wait for my signal", Alakazam said. "Get ready, here they come!"
I looked where he was pointing. About thirty men came stumbling towards the square up the road to our right.
Their clothes were torn and dirty, their faces seemed filled with fear and despair. Neither of them appeared
to have shaved or cut their hair in the past few months. Or showered, for that matter.
"Umm... those guys don't appear to be very dangerous", I said. A statement I took back once the first of
them was exposed to the light of the full moon. Suddenly, he was all covered in hair, his face had changed
completely, and huge fangs had appeared in his mouth.
"Werewolves?"
"The correct term appears to be 'lychantrope'", Alakazam remarked dryly behind me. The werewolf sprinted in
the direction of Machamp, who had taken a fighter stance. Even outnumbered thirty to one, he seemed to enjoy
the situation.
"Now, where were we... oh, yes, escape", Alakazam hummed behind me as Machamp met the first werewolf. It all
happened too fast for me to catch the details, but suddenly Machamp's right lower arm was stretched out in
front of him, and the werewolf was nowhere to be seen. A couple of the werewolves also climbed into the
trailer, where the Pokémon were still presumably locked in cages. Horrifying screams were heard from it
seconds later, but I couldn't tell who it was. Suddenly, a sound behind me made me throw myself to the
ground. There was a thundering boom, as if the entire building collapsed.
"Get up and come with me!", Alakazam's voice sounded in my head. The hole Lucario had made earlier was now
widened and went all the way through the building. "Shame to do that to such a fine example of late 19th
century architecture", he sighed. Through the hole, I could see one of the large loading cranes collapse
into the sea.
I had a last look at the square. The werewolves were already scattered all over the area, lying beneath
walls in twisted positions or slammed so hard into the ground that the cobblestones were broken. A couple of
large bulges had appeared in the trailers; something must have hit the walls from inside with significant
force. A mess of green vines entangled one trailer.
"What about the others?", I said as I climbed through the ruins. The air was so thick with dust that I
couldn't tell what sort of room this was.
"They will manage on their own for now", Alakazam replied behind me. "You've given them all orders, haven't
you?"
"Ehh... I..."
"You told them to attack, at least. That will suffice" This time, the voice was in front of me. Alakazam was
suddenly standing by the remains of the loading crane. "Follow me" He vanished, appearing again some hundred
metres down the street.
"Aren't there boats in the water?", I asked as I jogged towards him. I felt very exposed here, with the open
sea to my left and dark alleys between warehouses to my right.
"Of course. Have a look", the answer came. I glanced out to sea as I ran. Numerous small boats were floating
around, all with large machine guns mounted at the bow. However, there were nobody in any of the boats. A
few of them missed parts of the railing. A larger boat, all black of course, was put on fire. I spotted what
must have been the crew of the boats, piled up on the pier next to each crane. Something large and blue
jumped off the pier next to a pile in the distance, without making a splash. Unconscious bodies were
floating in the water as well.
"Reinforcements are on the way, but we have time to get away in the meantime", Alakazam said in my head. He
had moved a few dozen metres further down the road, where a black van lay upside down. The dust was still
settling after the impact, but there were no traces of whatever had put the van there.
"Keep to the shadows", he grunted when I reached him, before he vanished again. "A helicopter is coming"
I stuck to the walls as I ran now. Behind me, I could hear the steady chop-chop of a helicopter, flying low
above the pier. A glance over my shoulder left no doubt that it was heading straight for me.
"Alakazam..."
"Just run!"
"I can't outrun it, and you should know! Isn't your IQ like five thousand or something?"
"Six. And if you stop running, the pilot might think you've got a plan, and pay attention to what is behind
him"
"What?"
A loud crunch sounded before Alakazam could explain further. Over my shoulder, I could see the helicopter
slamming into the pier before tilting over and into the sea. A large grey pterosaur fled away from it,
roaring in triumph.
"Now, in here!"
I followed Alakazam into a narrow side street. A black van was pushed halfway through the wall ahead of me.
Grunts lay scattered all over the street, some of them halfway through holes in the walls. I could hear
their steady breathing over the sound of waves hitting the pier behind me, and the gunshots a couple of
blocks away. A battle cry that could only have been Garchomp pierced through the other sounds.
"Come on! We're almost there, now!"
"Right behind you", I panted. I had ran for quite long in clothes that weren't made for running. "Also, is
anybody following us? I keep seeing things in the corner of my eye, but it always vanishes in the shadow
when I look further"
"He's just covering your back", came the answer. I had to tiptoe over a squad of soldiers lying unconscious
on the ground. Their guns were all snapped in half.
"Wait here", a low voice whispered in my ear. I jumped, and turned. Nothing there. A small shadow flicked
away in the corner of my eye. Seconds later, I heard gunshots, a very menacing laugh, and screaming around
the corner in front of me. A hole the size of a basket ball suddenly appeared in the door of a car parked
nearby. The ringing in my ear told me that must have been a bullet. The retributive attack from the shadow
Pokémon thundered back, and the noise indicated that something big collapsed a block or so away.
"I need some assistance here!", the low voice said in my head. Alakazam, standing in a doorway across the
road, fired a green beam towards something I couldn't see. The gunshots stopped, but the screams continued,
now lower. I peeped around the corner. I could see some twisted metal some tens of metres down the street,
but past that, smoke billowed too thick to see through.
"Run now. They will be coming again any minute, and apparently, the battles are coming closer too", Alakazam
said. "Right through this street, now. Spurt!"
He vanished again, and I ran. The narrow street ended in a moderately large open square. Alakazam was
nowhere to be seen. Not any other Pokémon either. Instead, I found about forty soldiers and TLA grunts
pointing guns at me.

"Put your hands up!", a soldier shouted. His gun made a very convincing argument. I looked around,
desperate. Was this another of Alakazam's tricks? He had a plan, right? The square was filled with soldiers,
and contained a couple of tanks and a dozen or so black vans. There were also other armoured vehicles as
well as a few trucks. It was relatively silent, apart from distant explosions and gunshots. Two soldiers ran
over to me, and checked my pockets for weapons. They took my backpack, as well as all the empty Poké Balls I
had on me. Then, they put on handcuffs. Above us, I could hear a low howling sound. I looked up, hoping for
it to be a Pokémon coming to my rescue, but it appeared to be a werewolf in free flight. It flew in a wide
arc and fell down into the sea somewhere. No signs of Pokémon anywhere.
"Lieutenant Omega, we got him!", a grunt shouted. "We got him!"
"Good work", a voice said. It sounded vaguely familiar, but I couldn't remember where I had heard it before.
"Put him in the car"
The soldiers handed the backpack and the balls to a grunt, who pushed me into the back compartment of an
armoured black van nearby. The door slammed shut, leaving me alone in silence and darkness. I realized that
Alakazam had lead me straight into this. Why? Had he figured out that it would pay off to obey the TLA?
"Stay calm", Alakazam's voice suddenly rung in my head. "Any last orders, by the way?"
"Tell me why you did this!", I thought back, trying to sound as angry as possible.
"Apart from that, I mean. No time"
"I just want everybody to get back home safely!"
"See you, then", he chuckled. I was left to my own thoughts. Either, Alakazam was a traitor of the
"humorous" kind, or he had a plan. I heard a door slam shut in the driver's cabin. The car was set in
motion. This is it, I thought. We had made a great last stand, but it was all for nothing. I would probably
spend the rest of my life under constant TLA supervision, and if I was lucky, I wouldn't die helping them
making their dreams come true. On the other hand, that would mean Julia would be the one to finish me off.
Now well, if I made it that far, I would probably be vegetated and not feel a thing...
Suddenly, the car jerked to a stop. A few seconds later, the back door opened. Were we at some local TLA
camp? We couldn't have driven for more than two minutes.
"Hello, Rob", said a familiar voice.

"You?", I replied. The man standing in front of me was wearing an all-black TLA battle uniform. He had a
gilded emblem on his chest, featuring the Greek letter Ω, Omega. He was leaning towards the open door,
smiling at me.
"You were incredibly lucky this time, Rob", Joe said as he took off my handcuffs. "We had upwards of forty
roadblocks around there, and you found the one I was in charge of. I'll drive you home, come here and jump
in in front"
I hesitated. Going home now would mean leaving a lot of Pokémon in a heated battle versus a small well-
equipped army. Joe apparently noticed this, and said:
"I know that you don't want to leave, but... what can you do? I mean, look at that" He pointed at the sky.
We couldn't see the harbour from here, but a thick column of smoke was rising to the sky in the distance.
Sporadic flashes lit up parts of it, and every now and then, the ground shook slightly. Apparently, a huge
area was devastated and put on fire. "I've listened to the intercom all evening. Smoke everywhere, you can't
see your own nose in there, never mind controlling a group of Pokémon spread across such a large area. It
would be dangerous as well; we've had a few incidents with soldiers shooting at each other through the
smoke. This will take weeks to cover up completely"
"Fine, I'll go, then", I sighed and closed the door behind me, then got into the front compartment of the
car. The interior was all black in here as well, apart from a pair of garish plush dice hanging from the
rear-view mirror. The mirror apparently served no purpose, as the wall behind the seats was solid.
"I know, I don't think they're pretty either, but this little violation of company regulations is my way to
protest against the current system", Joe said, pointing at the dice. Apparently, the TLA hadn't been too
successful in brainwashing him, like the other agents.
"As well as helping the fourteenth most wanted person in the world escape from a major operation", I
mumbled. I wasn't in the mood for small talking right now.
"You're fifth now, actually", he said. "Probably taking the fourth spot after tonight. Alpha sounded really
angry on the radio"
"What if he finds out about you?", I said. "I mean, aren't there trackers in your cars?"
"Conveniently, they can be turned off", he replied. "Being high-ranked gives you certain privileges"
"Did they tell you what TLA stand for?", I asked, hopeful. Joe frowned.
"I asked, but they wouldn't tell me"
A long silence followed as we drove through the suburbs. We spent ten minutes queueing before a road block,
and passed more ambulances than I could count. Joe was listening to the TLA radio through a pair of earplugs
connected to the dashboard. Every now and then, he uttered long lines of letters and digits that made little
sense to me. As we drove into the street outside my house, he said:
"They're apparently calling for an air strike. All our folks have left the area, but they haven't seen any
Pokémon for several minutes. Perhaps they got away..."
He didn't tell me the alternative; I got that by myself. If they didn't get away, they would be toast. My
mood hit rock bottom as the car stopped right outside the house. I got out, grabbed my bag, and slammed the
door shut without saying goodbye. I jumped a little when Sceptile appeared out of thin air just in front of
me, then I realized that I had walked through the invisibility bubble provided by Xatu, perched on the roof
as usual.
"Things went badly", I said to Sceptile and handed him the bag. "And, yes, let him go. It's Joe", I said
when I realized he was ready to take the car out.
"How badly?", Sceptile croaked. His large, yellow eyes looked curiously at me. I didn't answer, just went in
and straight up to my room, where I collapsed on the bed. It might have been tricks of my mind, but I could
hear the sound of fighter jets in the distance.

It didn't feel like more than a few minutes had passed when I was woken up by tapping on the window. I got
up, still completely dressed, and looked out. Aggron, Sceptile and Nidoking stood in the garden, staring
down the street. I could see Houndoom and Manectric lurking in the bushes as well. It took a few moments
before I realized that Yanmega was floating outside the window too. What were they all looking at? Something
big and black turned the corner of the streets. TLA trailers, there was no mistaking them. Big and armoured,
with a machine gun mounted on the roof of the driver's cabin. There were two of them, moving slowly towards
the house. As fast as silent as I could, I ran out to the garden. The trailers stopped just outside the
house, and I raised an arm as a signal to the Pokémon. Aggron flexed his muscles, making a spine-chilling
sound as the metal plates scraped against each other. The sound felt like awfully loud in the total silence.
I frowned. There was no sound coming from the trailers. No buzz of a running engine, no puff from the
brakes. Something was very wrong here. Houndoom was the first to realize. He got up from a crouched position
under a bush, and ran underneath one of the trailers. Enthusiastic barking told me that he was happy. He ran
around an object apparently stuck between a pair of wheels.
"It's...", Sceptile said. He too straightened up and walked towards the trailers. Now I noticed that parts
of them were badly dented, and the driver's cabin on one was covered in soot, barely visible against the
black paint. A pair of green legs were visible between the first wheel pair underneath the lorry. On the
other trailer, a similar pair of dark purple legs protruded from underneath the tractor frame itself.
"Tyranitar?", I asked. The reply was an exhausted puff. There was a sound of crunching metal as he bent down
and climbed out from underneath the trailer.
"Get Blissey", he panted. "Many hurt. Some seriously"
"Did you... all...?"
"Get Blissey!", he roared. Behind me, Sceptile turned and darted into the house.
"Xatu, make sure my parents are still asleep", I said. Then I turned back to Tyranitar. Garchomp, exhausted
and bloody, crept out underneath the other trailer. He didn't manage to get up on his own. I could feel the
scent of Aromatherapy spread again.
"How...?"
"We managed to gather, and attacked a road block", a calm voice said. A large, green sauropod Pokémon had
climbed out of the back compartment. "Then we hijacked these, and Tyranitar and Garchomp pulled us here. I
think somebody used mirages to get past the other road blocks"
"Did you all get away?"
"Most of us, at least. I know Machamp and a few sea Pokémon created a deterrent so we could get away, but I
don't know if Machamp can swim, so he couldn't go with the others..."
"He sacrificed himself, then."
"He's still out there", a deep bass voice said behind me. A Dusknoir, a large dark mummy Pokémon was
hovering just a few centimetres off the ground. Black smoke billowed out of what was unmistakably bullet
holes in his body. One of his manhole cover-sized hands was mangled, and his single eye glowed weakly inside
the slit where his mouth should have been, but he appeared to be all right.
"I would have felt it if he had left this world"
I shivered. Dusknoir was the Gripper Pokémon, said to be responsible to take Pokémon and humans to the
spirit world.
"And... any others? Are they all safe?"
"When they die, I can feel them. I can not feel them before they are standing on the doorstep to the spirit
world, at the point where their life force is ebbing out. They can be in tremendous pain, captured or
tortured, or eating PokéBlocks and watching cartoons in a happy place somewhere. I don't know before they
die"
"But nobody else have died, right?"
"Seventeen TLA grunts ceased to be tonight, shot by their own comrades. A soldier was on the verge of
passing away, but I can't feel him any more"
"Seventeen dead...", I stuttered.
"Not dead. Non-existent. They aren't in this world any more"
Before I had time to ask more questions, Gardevoir pushed Dusknoir aside and started patching the holes in
his body with pieces of a large piece of torn purple cloth. It was as if his body was made of the same
substance as the cloth.
"Can I help you somehow?", I asked Gardevoir.
"Do you know how to apply bandages?"
"No, but-", I replied, but was cut short.
"Clean wounds?"
"No, but-"
"Ground berries for medicine? Apply said medicine? Do you know how to treat a Pokémon - or anyone, for that
matter - with a broken leg?"
"I..."
"Guessed so. No offence, but I think we fare better off without you right now. Just tell us where you want
the trucks" She threw a glance at the dark trailers parked in the street.
"Umm... can you just park them here in the garden, and we'll take care of them tomorrow?", I said, puzzled.
As far as I knew, Pokémon were supposed to assist humans healing wounds, but Blissey and Gardevoir had found
it more effective to break the taboo, and ordered everybody around with various medicines. I suddenly felt
very redundant.
"Okay, now call Emily, and go to sleep. It will be a long day tomorrow, and..."
"That's no problem, I've decided to quit school", I said. "I've realised that I can't fit both hunting and
Pokémon into my life, and while quitting school will impact my life, it won't threaten it, like the TLA
does. If you don't mind, I want to sleep in tomorrow"
Gardevoir sighed. "Just go and make that phone call, now. If you want to convince Emily that this is a good
idea, you're going to need all the time you can get"

[Greg]

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS.

Alakazam is such an intellectual 

[Raymondbl]

*dies at seeing too much awesomeness*

[SuperFireKirby]

Another brilliant chapter. Had a crappy day today but this cheered me right up.

[Cobraroll]

Hi again!

I kinda pulled myself together this time, it only took a month and a day to get this written and approved (many thanks to GreekGeek). This chapter isn't as long as the previous one, but it will tie in to the next one instead.

Enjoy!
P.S.: Spot the sentence that was added as an afterthought.


Chapter forty-one: The day after yesterday

"Ice Beam!"
Mamoswine let out a low growl, scraped the ground with his right front hoof, and sent a super cold beam of
frigid air towards Tyranitar, who braced himself. The beam hit its mark, a ragged scar in Tyranitar's
armour, about the size of a manhole cover. Tyranitar groaned in pain, and took a couple of steps backwards
as the beam hit. A frostbite as large as a basket ball had appeared in the centre of the scar, and parts of
the armour fell off in large flakes. Within seconds, the armour had grown back, and the centre of the scar
was nice and smooth again.
"I think we got it this time", I shouted. Pokémon battles in an enclosed space was a noisy affair, and I had
to wear ear protection to avoid headaches. "Are you okay, Tyranitar?"
"Fine", he grunted, massaging the spot where the beam had hit him. "Looks better now"
"Let's wait a while before we take on the rest", I said and patted him on the back. It was like touching
metal, all hard and cold, yet Tyranitar was able to easily flex and bend the solid armour that had saved his
life tens of times yesterday. His back was scarred with marks from low-calibre bullets, and we still hadn't
picked out all the splinters and armour-piercing bullets that had stuck in it. The scar we had just removed
apparently stemmed from a direct hit from a 107mm tank projectile.
"Who wants to be the next?", I asked a group of Pokémon that had taken shelter behind one of the rocks in
the battle room, in the cave underneath my house.
"Better get over with it", Lucario grunted and took Tyranitar's spot. His right hand was a nasty mess to
look at; he had been hit with an anti-tank round. "The hand has kept me awake all night. Knock me out hard,
please"
"Charizard, then", I said. This method of healing was brutal, but effective. Pokémon were after all
susceptible to wounds of all kinds, and while they didn't grow very well on their own, wounds caused by
another Pokémon would heal in seconds. Thus, all we had to do was inflict worse damage than the original
wound, using a Pokémon move, and it would regrow. The downside was that the Pokémon were often knocked out
badly by the treatment, and it was exhausting for all parts involved. We couldn't use it on the most injured
Pokémon, though, as the exhaustion would kill them, but those with relatively minor injuries could handle
it. Lucario had closed his eyes, and stood in the middle of the room with his right arm stretched out to his
side. Charizard had taken a position a couple of metres ahead of me.
"OK, Fire Fang on my signal. Ready, Lucario?"
"Just do it!", he growled.
"Go!"
Charizard's mouth was suddenly full of flames, and he darted towards Lucario. I could hear a crunch and a
sizzling sound as his powerful jaws closed around the mangled arm. Lucario howled in pain, and collapsed on
the spot. Charizard walked off, and left Lucario lying on the back, stretched out like the classic da Vinci
sketch. Puffs of smoke rose from his hand, which looked all fine again, if a little singed.
"Ouch", Charizard remarked, and wiped soot off his snout. "That must have hurt"
"I'll take him to the nursery", I said, and helped him to his feet. Lucario was almost as tall as me, but
his skeleton was apparently some sort of metal, so he weighed a little more than an average human, quite
contrary to what the Pokédex stated. By now, I had completely discarded the Pokédex weight data. Eventually,
Gallade assisted me, dragging and carrying Lucario into the nursery room. The room was filled with wounded
Pokémon, some of them critically. For once, Weavile hadn't been hit, but Salamence and Scizor were in a
terrible condition, and Infernape could barely breathe. Heracross, another Pokémon that had arrived tonight,
had his horn broken. Dusknoir looked more pale in the bright artificial sunlight, and Electivire's torso was
bandaged. He lay on his back on a bed of leaves, eyes closed.
"Any news?", I asked Blissey, who scurried across the room from Pokémon to Pokémon. My wristwatch told me
the clock had passed 5PM, it had been sixteen hours since the trailers arrived. They were now buried in the
garden, as Steelix and Venusaur had dug up the entire lawn before my parents woke up. I had slept well past
ten this morning, and when I turned on my phone after I got up, I had 39 missed calls from Emily. She had
not taken my decision lightly.
"Rob! You're wasting your entire life if you skip your education", she had hissed to me when I called her
last night.
"I prefer to have a life to waste in the first place", I had replied. Then she had hung up on me. At times,
I didn't understand how she was thinking. Would the TLA somehow just leave me in peace if I stopped caring
about the missing Pokémon? Would they forget and forgive what had happened if I stopped provoking them? Or
was she just angry because I couldn't spend as much time with her? On the other hand, what if she was right?
How could I possibly get the TLA to stop following me, if not by giving them what they wanted? The thought
made me shiver: It was me they wanted. Nope, this seemed to be the only way to keep them at bay.
"How are you, Metagross?", I asked. Metagross' metal body was scarred from countless impacts. Although he
was able to reflect some bullets with a combination of psychic and magnetic powers, most of them had found
their marks. The large white X across his face was bent, one of his legs looked limp, and one of his eyes
was darker than the other. Still, being made of steel meant that he had taken most of the bullets quite
well.
"I can manage", he grunted. There was a scraping sound in his voice that hadn't been there before. "We took
a lot of damage yesterday, but it doesn't seem like the TLA have caught any more of us. I've been listening
to their radio, and they seem to believe that most of us were killed yesterday"
My pocket radio was balanced on a rock next to Metagross. Connected to a pair of speakers, it continuously
spewed out most of the radio transmission between most TLA field units in the city.
"Do they have anybody stationed near the house?", I asked him. Gardevoir, being nearby, answered:
"According to Xatu, an ice cream van has been stationed for some time at the bus stop down the street"
Metagross continued: "And this house is under satellite surveillance. They seem pretty intent on not letting
you go again"
"Have you done anything about it?"
"The ice cream van does not receive any signals, thanks to Magnezone. As a bonus, the car battery is dead
too. And we froze the satellite image. With any luck, they won't notice before night falls"
"By the way, we're getting visitors", Gardevoir said.
"More TLA?"
"No. Looks like Emily is here to pay you a visit"
"She has tried to call you all day", Metagross grunted. "While you get no phone coverage down here, I can
still track the signals"
"I'm going up, then", I said. I didn't want to show Emily the results of the battle yesterday. Also, I
wanted to breathe some fresh air again. The plants that covered the walls of the cave produced sufficient
oxygen, but it was hot and dense down here, and the air was damp. I had spent most of the day in the cave,
and longed to see real sunlight as well. As I climbed the shaft, it went colder and the air was drier. It
was darker here too, as the shaft was lit only by torches that for some reason didn't burn up. Finally, I
got to the ladder that led out of the hatch in the house basement. I stopped to listen in case mom was doing
the laundry. She didn't know I was home, and it wouldn't be too good for her mental state if I bustled
through the door with dirty clothes. It was all silent, so I quickly emptied my pockets on the floor, pulled
off the clothes, and changed to a clean pair from the dryer. Then I grabbed my school bag from behind the
old boiler, went up, and silently sneaked out to the entrée. I could hear mom and dad in the kitchen, and
didn't want them to see me now. When I saw Emily walk up to the house, I opened the door and met her
outside.
"So there you are", she said bluntly as I came out. I didn't quite know what to say.
"What... on... Earth happened yesterday?!" she continued in an increasingly higher-pitched voice. She pulled
a newspaper out of her handbag. "Most of the old harbour in ruins? Fire-fighters are still on site,
trying to prevent it from blazing up again? Neighbours heard mysterious roars?" She quoted headlines as she
flipped through the pages. "And not a single picture or proper explanation. Do not tell me you weren't
there"
It was as if her eyes looked straight through me.
"We were there", I admitted.
"Dad too?"
"He got me out of there. Uninjured, I might add"
"Did he? He went to work early today. 'Important meeting', he said. Probably about what happened last night.
If they find out that he helped you..."
"I said that too, but he seemed very confident that they wouldn't", I said. To be honest, the thought
worried me as well.
"And you... don't you DARE to try anything like this again. Putting yourself, other people, and the Pokémon
in danger by battling the TLA. They will escalate the conflict as much as they can - and that would be a
lot -  until they get you. And who knows how many will be dead or injured for life by then?"
"Emily..."
"Listen, I can live with it if you drop out of school. But that's on the premise that you don't do anything
stupid, and care for yourself until they lose interest in you. After that, it's right back to school"
"Do you really think it is that easy?", I asked. "I decided to quit school so I could get more time to get
the rest of the Pokémon back. After that, we will see"
"You aren't planning your future at all, are you?"
"That's because I have to focus on the current first!", I shouted. Emily looked furiously at me.
"You're going to get yourself killed!", she whispered. She was crying now.
"What alternatives do I have? Emily, the TLA is very intent on catching me. If I hide, they will wait. The
choice is between taking the chance and fight, or live in solitude like a fox trapped in its hole. And to be
honest, I prefer dying to protect my friends than sitting passive until the day they get me"
"You're mad", Emily whispered. Then she turned away and ran, leaving me standing in the doorway.

I was restless the rest of the evening. My mind played the conversation with Emily over and over again,
especially that last part with her running away in tears, but still, I wouldn't have changed a word if I was
allowed to travel back in time and talk to her again. I truly wanted to go out again, to bring more Pokémon
to safety or at least prevent the TLA from getting them. However, I wanted to avoid causing havoc in a full
-scale battle again. This time, I wanted to get a better overview of the situation before I plunged into it.
I was confident I would make it. Late in the evening, I sneaked down to the cave to hear if Metagross had
heard anything.
"You're in luck", he brummed after I asked him. "I was just about to send someone to get you. There has been
a lot of chatter on the TLA radio that they are 'going out' tonight. Apparently, they want to pick up
something in the forest, not too far from here. Doesn't look like they will bring many troops either.
Apparently, the military isn't to eager to support them again"
"Sounds nice", I said. "I'll go. However, I have learned from yesterday. I'll only bring a couple of
Pokémon, it's easier to keep track that way. Also, the TLA are probably there for Flygon, Machamp,
Typhlosion and the like, and they can help me make an escape. Good think it's within biking distance, as the
flying Pokémon big enough to carry me have been knocked out"
"Sounds risky, but that's your decision. If you are careful, it might work. Who are you thinking about
bringing?
"Weavile. I need a good scout. Also, somebody to ride on in case we need to get away quick. What about
Rapidash?"
"I don't think so. All those flames make it impossible to go unnoticed"
"Dodrio, then?"
"Impossible to keep silent. The three heads don't talk to each other via telepathy, like Exeggutor, for
instance, so they chatter all the time to get their individual points across"
I looked around the big room. Who else could I ride on? Most Pokémon were either too spiky, too slow, or
couldn't carry me. After some thinking, I got an idea and decided:
"I'll bring Tauros"
I went to the storage and picked up the Poké Balls for Typhlosion, Machamp and Flygon, changed clothes, and
we were ready to go. Mom and dad had gone to bed already, and would usually go to work before I got up in
the morning, so they wouldn't miss me before they came home tomorrow. Even then, I could call them and say I
was with Emily. Perfect. Ten minutes later, we were on the move. I biked up the road leading to the forest,
with six Poké Balls in my belt, four of them empty.

The forest was unusually quiet, like that August day I had been knocked out by Tyranitar here. I had
encountered the TLA roadblock some twenty minutes earlier. The grunts stationed there hadn't seen me, so I
left the road and let my bike lie behind a big rock. Weavile was jumping from tree to tree above me, but he
appeared to be the only creature around at the moment. I walked parallel to the road towards the big
parking area. If the TLA were in this part of the forest, that would be the only logical place to have some
sort of command centre When we were about half a kilometre away, I asked Weavile to go ahead and scout the
area. He returned about five minutes later.
"It's weird. There are several vehicles there, some with large floodlights and speakers on them", he said.
"As well as many dumper trucks and excavators. They are yellow"
Weird, I thought. As far as I knew, all TLA equipment was pitch black. And what were the floodlights for?
"What about guards?", I asked as we walked closer.
"Not many. There are lots of people around the lights, but nobody around the perimeter of the area. We can
safely walk all the way up to it, if you want"
"Any armoured cars, vans, such things like we saw yesterday?"
"There are a couple of vans there, but they only seem to carry people"
This was beyond weird. Poor guarding, few weapons... I knew that the TLA had a tendency to underestimate the
Pokémon, but this was downright stupid. Weavile found a mossy rock with a good view of the area. Indeed,
there were several dumper trucks and some excavators parked on the large open area. Around them in a
semicircle were several vans, some armoured, with large floodlights on the roof. A couple had enormous
speaker sets instead of lights. Several generators mounted on trucks were buzzing, giving power to the
lights and the speakers. I could see a vaguely familiar person standing in the midst of the semicircle,
giving orders to agents and some grunts. Where had I seen that guy before...
Then I shook the feeling off. I blinked, and looked again. The man was not only familiar, it was Joe. When
he was wearing the TLA uniform, I seemed to be unable to recognize him at first glance, like all the other
agents. We were too far away to hear what he was saying, but he was gesticulating and pointing in one
direction all the time, in the direction away from the city.
"It looks like they have localized the Pokémon", I whispered. "I think they are somewhere in that direction.
Let's go and have a look"
We walked along the perimeter of the area, all the while looking for guards. The forest was as silent as
ever, and I was a little nervous. I knew that nothing could hurt me with Weavile here, but the darkness had
a threatening feel to it.
"Hey!", Weavile suddenly hissed.
"What?, I said and turned as I walked. Suddenly, I stumbled into a stump ahead of me, and took a few loose
steps to regain balance. Several twigs snapped under my feet.
"Who's over there?", a voice not far from me shouted. I could see the silhouette of a man with a large set
of binoculars standing up between two bushes. The bushes were covered in camouflage netting, and a foul
stench oozed from them.
"Him!", Weavile hissed. "We should get away!"
"Working on it!", I hissed back, found Tauros' Poké Ball and called him out. The three-tailed bull appeared
out of a bright white light in front of the man. Tauros snarled deeply, and the man ran away into the
forest, screaming. I got on Tauros' back so we could get away, as noises from the command centre indicated
that they had heard what had happened. A deep, gurgling noise boomed from the area, probably broadcast from
the large speakers.
"That was quite an alarm", I remarked dryly.
"It calls for us", Weavile added. He had jumped onto Tauros as well, and was sitting behind me. Indeed, my
ability to decipher the true meaning behind sounds told me that the noises were a language of sorts.
"'Come... we are here for you'? What does that mean?", I mumbled. "They probably know that we are here. We
should go deeper into the forest. If we don't find the others within the hour, we'll go back home"
Tauros made good speed as he ran. It wasn't a comfortable ride, with a jolt every time he had to dodge
trees, jump over rocks, or leap across streams.
"What is that smell?", Tauros grunted after ten minutes or so. "Ouch. It's..."
"Eugh!", Weavile added. I couldn't smell a thing myself.
"There is something ahead", Tauros said and stopped abruptly on a small bog in the middle of the woods. "I
can smell it, hear it, and feel it, but not see it. I'm scared"
"And that sound... 'we have food for you'?". I'm not feeling too good about this either", I mumbled. We
could still hear the messages the TLA were broadcasting. Suddenly, two trees in front of us were bent aside
and fell towards us. They slammed into the peat only a few metres ahead of us. Tauros roared in surprise,
and tossed himself away.
"Hey!", I shouted, but too late. I was thrown off, but got a soft landing in a smelly puddle. Tauros had
panicked, and darted into the forest. "Come back!", I shouted as I got up, but it was to no avail. He was
already far away.
"At least go home when you've calmed down!", I bellowed at the top of my lungs.
"Rob...", Weavile whispered behind me.
"What?", I said and turned. The ground shook a little. The fallen trees appeared to be dragged from side to
side. "Do you see... any... Oh! what the..."
There was a large looming figure standing where the trees had fallen. The sky behind it was dark, but I
could still make out the outline of a titanic humanoid creature, more than fifteen metres tall. It appeared
to have two disproportionately large heads, both of which sat very low on its shoulders, as if it had no
necks. Its arms, thick as tree trunks and longer than telephone poles, ended in massive hands somewhere just
below its knees. It was barrel-chested, with long arms and legs. Its fur was clustered in dots, giving the
impression that the creature was covered in moss. It also had a tail, ten metres long and ending in a
tassel. The smell it gave off would have made me throw up under other circumstances.
"This is no Pokémon", I whispered. Weavile took a few steps backwards.
"What do you call those?", he whispered.
"If I'm not mistaken, this is a troll. Bad news. Very bad news". I suddenly realized that the TLA hadn't
been here for any Pokémon at all. It was this guy they were calling for back at the parking area. It was a harsh reminder that the TLA dealt with things out of the ordinary in general, and not just Pokémon.
The rightmost head of the troll looked straight at us. Its huge nose was twitching, as if it was trying to
identify a faint smell. All the time, it appeared to be mumbling to itself. It took a hesitant step in our
direction, and was suddenly only ten metres away. I looked up at the rough-hewn face, with the humongous
nose and tiny eyes.
Then Weavile darted past me, his right arm raised for a punch. It hit the troll with an Ice Punch right in
the chest, just below where the ribcage would have been on a human. The attack didn't seem to affect the
troll much, but it swayed a little and flailed in the air with it arms, and I heard a squeak as Weavile was
caught between two fingers. He struggled to come free, but the troll had him in a firm grip between his
massive fingers, of which it had only four of on each hand. It lifted Weavile high up in the air, and looked
at him in contrast to the moon. It must have had a really bad eyesight. All the time, Weavile was shouting
and spitting furiously. He tried to bite and claw the hand that held him. The troll decided that eating
Weavile wasn't worth the hassle, and simply tossed him over its shoulder. I heard a high-pitched scream as
Weavile flew through the air, in a wide arc over the forest. I was alone with the troll now. I would ideally
have hid under a nearby bush, or behind a tree or something, but I couldn't move. It was as if my feet were
stuck in this small puddle of smelly mud. I was petrified. The troll came even closer, and I felt something
warm run down my leg on the inside of my pants. A foot as large as a family car slammed to the ground only
metres away. The right hand of the troll was swinging in the air right above me. The sniffing noise from its
two noses made me shiver violently. I knew that I was just a small step away from being crushed under it
gigantic feet, or eaten. Then the TLA would find my mashed remains, and the newspapers would probably blame
a bear. It felt like hours before the troll finally walked away. The gurgling noises from the TLA's speakers
could be heard here as well, and the troll probably wanted to respond to the promise of food if it showed up
at the parking area. I could hear its thundering steps for over a minute. Then there was some terrible
noises in the distance, roaring and loud crashes, a flash of light, and then silence. I slowly got out of
the puddle, silently praising its smell. It was probably the mud that had saved me from being troll food;
the smell of human was easily drowned by the stench of this goo.
Now what? I would have to go in a wide arc to avoid the TLA. I couldn't use the same road out of the forest.
The ravine would have been an option, but Dragonite had collapsed it yesterday. I knew about another way,
but getting there would take a lot of time. It was way past midnight already, I wouldn't be home before
sunrise, at earliest.
"Now well, better get going", I mumbled to myself. I had an approximate idea of where I was, and the stars
pointed out North for me. After some hesitation, I decided on a direction, and started walking. Tauros had
been a fast runner, and we had gone a couple of kilometres into the forest. In this tough terrain, and no
light, it would take me three hours just to get as far as the parking area, and even then I would hardly be
halfway to the edge of the forest... "If only I had brought more Pokémon!", I thought angrily. Now Tauros
was somewhere out in the woods, and he would hopefully turn straight home once he got to his senses. Weavile
was even further away, possibly hurt as well. But on the other hand, he had been able to scream as he was
flung, and he could easily outmatch any cat in a soft-landing-competition, so hopefully he was all right
too. With a little luck, we would all be home before breakfast to hear Metagross' lecture on what we could
have done better...
A distant thunderclap, like an explosion, broke the silence. I jumped, the sound had been so sudden.
"What was tha- aaaahh!", I said to myself. That last bit because I stumbled. My foot was caught between two
tree roots, and was badly twisted as I fell.
"Ouchouchouchouch! Gaaaah!", I shouted. It hurt, but it didn't feel like I had broken anything. I slowly got
up again, cursing a little. A careful step showed that the foot could still bear my weight, but it hurt, as
if a piece of glass was stuck between the bones. A sprained ankle was the last thing I needed now. I was a
long way from home, alone in the dark forest, with the exception of the TLA.

[Raymondbl]

Very nice chapter!  I liked the troll part 

just.... doesn't Rob have any medicine?  Like, potions, berries, etc.  It does seem very brutal to knock out a pokemon to heal them. 

I wonder what's going to happen next O.O

[Greg]

The troll was a bit of a surprise. 

Anyway, good chapter. Please continue