Pokémon Battle
Grate Oracle Lewot
Ethan strode up the golden stairway, eyes shifting between the Dratini statues flanking the arena. His left hand clutched the strap of his bag; his right hung next to the small red-and-white balls clipped onto his belt. Following along behind him, a bipedal blue alligator sucked on a pink-and-white spray bottle. As it drank, the scratches and bruises covering its scaly body faded away, and when it was finished it crushed the bottle in its claw and tossed it aside.
Running out of statues, Ethan examined his shoes as he and the alligator reached the top of the stairs. Then, his hat still shading his eyes, he looked up to face his opponent.
Lance the Dragon Master stood several yards away, at the opposite end of the arena, in front of an elaborate, closed doorway. He held his arms crossed, and his red hair and black cape rustled a little in the wind provided by a fan that existed expressly for this purpose. His expression was neither threatening nor welcoming; it was, plainly, pure gravitas.
There was an obligatory dramatic pause, helped in no small part by the aforementioned fan. Finally, Lance spoke.
"Ethan. We both knew this day would come. There's no need for words now." Reaching down to his own belt, he withdrew a Poké Ball and pressed the button dividing its red and white halves. The Ball expanded from golf to tennis size. "I'll choose first, shall I?" He pitched the Ball high into the air, and, opening on a hinge opposite the button, it released a stream of white light onto the ground, which coalesced into a blue, quadrupedal dragon with red wings. The Ball closed back up and bounced off of the ground, automatically moving back toward Lance; he caught it and replaced it on his belt just in time for the dragon in front of him to exclaim, "Salamence!"
Ethan eyed the Salamence, looking more determined. The alligator behind him, the red spikes on its back making it a perfect visual foil for Salamence, started to move forward, but Ethan held out his arm in front of it. Immediately it stopped, nodding at the boy as though it had read his mind. Ethan instead tossed a Poké Ball to reveal a tan-and-blue creature with a sharp spike on its head.
"Hitmontop!"
The humanoid Pokémon's cry echoed a little before silence returned. Lance smirked, but maintained his composure.
"Interesting choice," he said to Ethan. He glanced over at the enormous plasma screen hanging on one side of the room. It displayed pictures of himself, Ethan, their selected Pokémon, and the number of Pokémon that they each had remaining.
Ethan looked at the screen too. At the bottom, a conspicuous light changed from red to yellow. He leaned forward in a tense stance, though Lance did not change position. Then the light changed from yellow to green.
Lance shouted out: "Flamethrower!"
"Fake Out!" cried Ethan.
As Salamence reared its head and generated a well of fire in its mouth, Hitmontop leapt forward and landed upside-down on its spike, spinning quickly. Zipping to and fro in this position, it dodged Salamence's stream of flames, flipped into the air, and slapped both of the dragon's cheeks at once. Salamence's fire breath was snuffed out and it appeared slightly dazed.
"Close Combat!" Ethan shouted.
Taking advantage of its proximity to Salamence, Hitmontop unleashed a flurry of punches and kicks onto the dragon's underbelly. Salamence roared in pain.
"Escape with Fly!" commanded Lance. Salamence beat its wings, blowing Hitmontop slowly away as it rose from the ground and soared toward the ceiling of the arena. It reached the peak of its parabola and then went into a dive, streaking down toward Hitmontop.
Hitmontop stood, rightside-up again, and looked back at Ethan. The boy nodded slightly and said, "Wait for it . . ." In response Hitmontop looked back up at Salamence and braced itself.
The dragon rushed down at an incredible speed; moments before impact, Hitmontop jumped up to meet the living projectile, but seemed to intentionally take the hit, clearly getting the wind knocked out of it. Before it collided with the ground, however, Ethan yelled out "Revenge!" and it suddenly executed a powerful spin and used the momentum to deliver a kick to Salamence's chin that flipped it over backward and sent it crashing down at Lance's feet. Hitmontop managed to land on its own feet, dropping to a kneel and closing one eye in pain, but standing back up a moment later.
Salamence's wings stirred a little, but then collapsed. On the monitor, its icon on Lance's side of the screen dimmed and was overlaid with a red X.
Lance stared at Salamence, then looked from Hitmontop to Ethan. "Impressive," he said. "I see I don't need to hold back on you." He took Salamence's Poké Ball from his belt and pointed it at the dragon; a beam of red light shot out, transforming Salamence into red light itself and absorbing it all. Lance swapped Poké Balls and said, "That being the case . . ."
Another dragon appeared, this one orange and standing upright. It was less angular than Salamence, with smaller wings and a bit of chub to it, giving an overall milder impression, but Ethan knew better. He had battled alongside this Dragonite when he and Lance had taken down Team Rocket's hideout in Mahogany Town, and he knew what it was capable of.
The light had changed back to red, but now it flashed yellow again. Hitmontop panted where it stood.
When the light turned green, Lance said, "Dragon Rush!"
Dragonite flew toward Hitmontop; Ethan shouted "Close Combat!" but Dragonite's shoulder rammed into Hitmontop, and it skidded to a halt at Ethan's feet, its defeat a mirror image of Salamence's. Its icon on the battle screen dimmed.
Ethan rubbed Hitmontop on the head and returned it to its Poké Ball. Dragonite glided back closer to Lance as he drew another one. Holding it close to his mouth, he whispered, "I know you can do it . . ." He threw it into the air, where it released a large green dragonfly - a Yanmega.
The two Pokémon took their positions, and the light turned green again.
"Double Team!" said Ethan.
Yanmega appeared to spawn an identical copy of itself on either of its sides, each of which went on to spawn more, creating a row of Yanmega across the arena.
"Fire Blast," said Lance.
Dragonite loosed a stream of flame from its mouth, and when the stream collided with the middle Yanmega, it paused in midair and extended in five directions, forming a star shape that engulfed the entire group of Yanmega. Most of them vanished into nothingness, but one down the left side was revealed to be the real Pokémon, and it fell from the air in a smoking arc.
"Yammy!" cried Ethan, running onto the battlefield toward the plummeting Yanmega.
Yammy, thought Lance, watching the boy catch and cradle his Pokémon. Sometimes I forget the kid is only ten years old. In less than a single year, Ethan had gone from the beginning of his Pokémon journey to this, his final battle with the Champion of the Pokémon League. And he hadn't been stingy about his accomplishments along the way: from foiling multiple schemes of a criminal organization to unearthing and capturing an immensely powerful Pokémon previously seen only in storybooks, he was undoubtedly a prodigy the likes of which the Pokémon Trainer community had only seen once or twice in recent history. This fact didn't seem to have gone to his head, either, but in order to become the Champion, he must be able to handle the opposite side of the trade as well - unexpected losses. Indeed, from a cynical perspective, these were essentially the Champion's reason for existence. For his part, Lance almost wanted to see the kid win. And he could honestly say that he had no idea who would be the ultimate victor in this battle.
Ethan held up the Poké Ball over the Yanmega.
"It's okay, Yammy . . . You were a huge help against Karen. Have a good rest, okay?"
"Ya . . ." the Pokémon mumbled weakly. Ethan recalled it into the Ball, and despondently clipped it back onto his belt.
There was a pause, and Lance allowed it to pass without comment. Then the Feraligatr behind Ethan reached out a claw and lightly lifted Ethan's chin up. The two looked at each other, and Ethan gave Feraligatr a nod.
The Pokémon strode onto the battlefield, giving Lance's Dragonite a competitive look. The light on the board changed from red to yellow again.
Ethan collected himself. "Zigg," he said, "arm your Ice Punches!"
"Arm?" mused Lance. The light changed to green, and he said, "Outrage!"
Dragonite began glowing and its brow furrowed. In one gesture, Ethan and the Feraligatr, Zigg, both threw their arms out to their sides, and Zigg's claws both became surrounded by glowing cyan lights. Dragonite lunged toward Zigg, but the crocodilian ducked under its arms and then delivered a punch to its jaw. Snowflakes flew from the impact point.
"Left! Right! Left!" said Ethan, making little jabbing movements with his hands himself, and Zigg clobbered Dragonite with three more frozen punches.
"Draco Meteor!" exclaimed Lance.
"Uppercut!" yelled Ethan. "HYDRO PUMP!"
Dragonite pointed a hand upward and a strange light gathered around the arena's ceiling, but the dragon was then flung upward by Zigg's punch, and then blasted even higher by a powerful jet of water released from Zigg's mouth. A glowing blue meteor fell out of the swirling mass of energy under the ceiling - and landed right on the rising Dragonite.
Dragonite's icon on the screen dimmed well before it hit the ground. As Lance recalled it into its Ball, Ethan and Zigg both slumped forward and held their knees, panting. Zigg's claws no longer glowed.
Lance looked at the two of them for a while before commenting, "You have an incredible bond with your Pokémon."
Ethan looked a bit embarrassed and said, "Yeah, well . . . Yammy's . . . kind of special . . ."
"I'm sure that's true," Lance said, "but I meant your Feraligatr. You two clearly know each other in and out."
"Well, you know . . ." said Ethan. "The first one you get . . ."
"Indeed," said Lance, looking at Dragonite's Poké Ball. He clipped it back onto his belt and asked, "Are you ready for another round, Zigg?"
Zigg looked at Lance and said "Fera" with a nod.
Lance smiled. He tossed another Ball.
A giant blue sea monster roared as it emerged - a Gyarados.
The light flashed yellow. Gyarados's gaping mouth roared again at Zigg, who growled back. The light turned green.
"Hyper Beam!"
"Ice Punch!"
Zigg's right claw glowed again as it pulled it back for a punch. Gyarados reared its head and a bright white light blossomed in its maw. The light transformed into a swirling rainbow of colors as it was blasted toward Zigg in the form of an awe-inspiring energy beam; Zigg threw its punch directly into the beam, breaking it into many small streaks and pushing in toward Gyarados. As the alligator neared the sea monster's mouth, it had to grab its punching arm with its other claw for support; the fist struggled against the origin point of the beam until finally a multicolored explosion sent both Pokémon flying apart.
Zigg landed on all fours; Gyarados, though still conscious, lay panting in a heap, apparently having overexerted itself.
"Crunch!" yelled Ethan.
Moving with its belly to the floor like a true crocodile, Zigg rushed toward Gyarados with its fangs bared.
"Hydro Pump!" said Lance. Gyarados weakly aimed its mouth toward the oncoming threat, but merely remained panting. "You can do it!" Lance urged.
Just as Zigg jumped toward Gyarados, a huge burst of water sent the alligator flying into the air, much as it had done to Dragonite.
"Hydro Pump back!" said Ethan.
Zigg fired a water jet to meet Gyarados's, and was pushed up against the ceiling as a result. The two streams of water sent spurts flying everywhere, covering the arena in a layer of moisture.
"Keep it up!" said Ethan.
Neither Pokémon relented for a while, but slowly the collision point of the jets moved downward, closer to Gyarados. Then, once again exhausted, Gyarados ceased spraying and dropped its head, taking the pounding from Zigg's attack.
"Stop and dive!" Ethan said.
Zigg discontinued its stream and let gravity take hold, reaching down its claws and baring its teeth as it fell toward Gyarados.
"Move away!" Lance instructed. Gyarados struggled to an upright position, then darted forward, out of Zigg's falling path.
"Water Gun!" said Ethan.
Zigg fired a smaller jet of water out of its mouth, but instead of aiming at Gyarados, shot the wall above Lance, altering its momentum just enough to land on top of Gyarados after all. The impact made a loud thud and sent water splashing onto both Ethan and Lance, who shielded their faces. When they looked up, both of their Pokémon were unconscious. Zigg's and Gyarados's icons dimmed on the plasma screen.
Neither Trainer said anything for a while. Eventually they broke the silence by simultaneously returning their monsters to their Poké Balls.
"Incredible," said Lance, sliding his fingers over his remaining Poké Balls indecisively. "You haven't lost your ingenuity. But it's not over yet." Making a selection, he released a blue bird with cottony wings - Altaria.
Ethan made an equally fluffy choice: Jumpluff, a darker-blue Pokémon with three dandelion-like protrusions. It hovered as though lighter than air across from Altaria, which beat its wings to keep itself aloft.
The light turned green.
"Poisonpowder!" Ethan shouted.
Jumpluff soared above Altaria's head.
"Safeguard!" said Lance.
Jumpluff spun and released a purple powder from its pom-pom-like hands, but rather than moving out of the way Altaria squinted and secreted a shiny, translucent film from its skin, making its feathers and fluff glisten in the artificial lighting. The powder slid off the film and fell to the ground.
"Leech Seed!" said Ethan.
Jumpluff spun the other direction and seeds rained down.
"Dragonbreath!"
Altaria spewed a stream of bluish fire from its beak; it aimed upward and swirled its head, trying to disintegrate the falling seeds. Jumpluff dodged the blast and flew back toward Ethan; some of its seeds made it through the assault, and when they started to slide off the shiny liquid, they dug their roots into Altaria and anchored themselves.
"Mist!" said Lance.
Altaria flapped its wings at the ground, which was still wet from the previous duel, and the water quickly rose into the air and formed a fog that obscured the arena.
Ethan could make out Jumpluff in front of him, but had lost sight of Altaria. Lance had not yet given another command, but the bird was surely sneaking into position for an ambush.
"Bounce!" Ethan commanded.
Jumpluff rushed at the ground, ricocheted off, and climbed toward the ceiling. The mist only reached to about halfway up the walls, and Jumpluff popped out of the top of the cloud with a wink at the camera that hung in one corner of the room. Then Ethan heard Lance's voice say, "Sky Attack!"
The whole mist cloud seemed to glow with an ethereal light.
"Uh-oh . . ." said Ethan. Shouting upward, he said, "Try to find the center of the light and dodge!"
The light shone more intensely, and the mist began to swirl, perhaps because Altaria was flying in circles to hide its position.
"Scratch that -" said Ethan, "Bullet Seed everywhere!"
Jumpluff took a breath and then began spitting watermelon-like seeds from its mouth at machinegun pace; it shook its head back and forth, spreading the seeds' trajectory around everywhere. Shortly, the light began to emerge from the mist and Jumpluff took aim at it more carefully, but such was the speed with which Altaria dashed into Jumpluff that there was little clear transition between a glowing section of mist and the bird flapping in place above the cottonweed, whose icon on the screen dimmed. The forceful winds from Altaria's attack dispersed the mist enough to allow Ethan to aim the streak of red light from Jumpluff's Poké Ball at it before it drifted to the ground.
Altaria returned to its spot in front of Lance. As Ethan exchanged Balls, he mumbled, "Well, I guess it's your turn . . ." As the Pokémon appeared, he finished his sentence aloud, "Hans!"
Now that nickname's not half bad, thought Lance as he eyed the Haunter's floating hands. He had watched on the plasma screen as this Haunter, in the previous room, had defeated Karen's Gengar, its evolved form. But that was not what worried him - he was concerned about Ethan's as-yet-unrevealed sixth Pokémon.
The light turned green.
"Dragonbreath!"
"Shadow Ball!"
Hans formed a glob of purplish shadow and hurled it directly into Altaria's stream of blue fire; the ball cut through the flames and smacked Altaria in the face, stunning it. Hans followed up with a second Shadow Ball to the torso, and Altaria plummeted from the air. Its icon dimmed.
Lance returned Altaria and replaced it with a Charizard. The orange dragon glared at the purple ghost, and the flame burning on the end of its tail crackled challengingly. The light turned green.
"Air Slash!"
"Hypnosis!"
Charizard beat its wing and created a slicing air current directed toward Hans; Hans flew forward into the current, taking the hit with clear difficulty, and approached Charizard's face, making swirling hand movements. Charizard's eyes were drawn to the motions and it began to lose its focus.
"Flamethrower!"
"Shadow Ball!"
Charizard shook its head clear and blasted a jet of fire from its mouth; Hans countered as it had Altaria's Dragonbreath, and despite the close range managed to hide behind the Shadow Ball and avoid damage. But Charizard's flames were stronger than Altaria's, and instead of cutting through them, the Shadow Ball became stuck at the end of the stream, splitting it off and sending fire in every direction (except backwards, where Hans hid). Hans resumed its mesmerizing hand gestures.
"Don't fall for it!" shouted Lance. "Full force!"
Charizard increased the strength of its Flamethrower, but it couldn't help watching Hans' hands. The Shadow Ball backed slowly toward Hans and began to lose its shape.
"Renew the Shadow Ball!" yelled Ethan.
Hans made another Shadow Ball and tossed it into the first, sharpening its form again and increasing its size. It stopped moving backward, and Hans resumed its Hypnosis. Charizard finally succumbed, its eyes closing; the fire stopped spraying from its mouth and its head dropped to the floor, just in time to avoid the double Shadow Ball, which sped over its body and collided with the wall next to Lance. The Champion shielded himself from the explosion.
Ethan smirked and said, quietly, "Dream Eater."
Hans reached out a hand toward Charizard, and a pink light appeared around the dragon's head, undulating in an otherworldly manner. With its hand, Hans directed the light to rise up and then float into its mouth. It chewed on the dream with gusto, and finally swallowed.
Lance brushed some shadowy ectoplasm off of his arm and said, "I can't believe you've made me resort to this . . ." From his pocket he pulled a squarish spray bottle. Ethan and Hans both frowned but, as per League rules, waited patiently as Lance walked up to Charizard and spritzed it with the Full Restore. It awoke from its slumber and growled at Hans.
Lance backed up and the light turned green again.
"Dark Pulse!" cried Ethan.
"Dragon Claw!"
Hans' purple coloration faded to gray and it released a black wave of energy in all directions. Charizard took to the air with a mighty flap and, using its front two claws, tore a hole through the pulse and then batted Hans to one side.
"Again!" said Ethan.
"Air Slash!" countered Lance.
The Dark Pulse met the Air Slash and not a molecule of the room's air stayed still. Charizard streaked through the torrent and delivered one final Dragon Claw to Hans. The ghost's eyes rolled backwards and it fluttered to the ground.
Its icon on the screen dimmed, leaving Ethan with only one Pokémon remaining, while Lance, counting Charizard, had two. Charizard took its position and Ethan grabbed his final Poké Ball.
The Pokémon that came out was large and birdlike. Its body was mostly white, with a light blue underbelly and darker-blue plates sticking out of its back. Two spiky plates framed its eyes, which glared down at Charizard much the way that Charizard might glare down at a Caterpie. Its wings were tipped with giant feathers in such a pattern as to make them look like the fingers of a hand. The Pokémon raised its head toward the ceiling and let out a birdlike cry.
Lance's arms hung at his sides, and he looked up at the creature in awe.
"Beautiful," he said.
Ethan waited for him to recover. Sometimes he still had trouble believing it himself. When Lugia had first appeared to him deep in the caves beneath the Whirl Islands . . .
The light turned yellow. Ethan and Lance gathered themselves. It turned green.
"Air Slash!"
"Hydro Pump!"
The piston of water punched right through the air current and smashed Charizard into the wall above Lance's head. When the water stopped spraying, Charizard fell to the ground and its icon dimmed. Lance returned it to its Ball.
"Such power . . ." he muttered.
Lance's final Pokémon had a sharklike face and a fin on its back, but its feet were firmly planted on the ground.
"Garchomp!" it said.
The light turned green.
"Dragon Rush!" said Lance.
"Aeroblast!"
As Garchomp charged at Lugia, white energy manifested at multiple points in front of Lugia's beak-like mouth and was sucked in as it inhaled. Just before Garchomp collided with it, it fired a forceful white beam that stopped Garchomp in its tracks and required it to dig its claws into the floor to avoid being thrown backwards like Charizard. Lance's mouth fell open at the might of the attack. When the beam stopped, Garchomp rose and glanced back at Lance expectantly. It took a moment, but Lance came to his senses and said, "Stone Edge!"
"Fly!" said Ethan quickly.
Garchomp's arm became coated in sharp brown rocks, and it lunged at Lugia, who took to the sky and avoided the attack.
"Quickly," Lance said, "Swords Dance!"
Garchomp began performing a peculiar dance routine while Lugia rose toward the ceiling. The legendary bird swooped gracefully upside-down as it turned into its dive. Garchomp completed its dance by throwing its arms out in a dominant pose.
"This is it! Stone Edge!" Lance cried.
Lugia fell like a meteor toward Garchomp, whose arm was still covered with rocks. Garchomp leaned down, then jumped up and slashed its arm at Lugia.
The impact sent the rocks scattering throughout the arena; Garchomp fell to the floor but landed on its feet, and Lugia was flung back into the air. Both Pokémon appeared to have survived the strike.
"Extrasensory!" shouted Ethan.
Lugia blinked, and when its eyes opened they glowed with a strange pink light. The air around Garchomp wobbled, and space itself seemed to distort around it. The land shark looked back and forth, but could find no escape route. Finally, its oddly stretched image snapped back into place, and it collapsed onto the ground, its eyes out of focus. Garchomp's icon dimmed on the screen as Lugia alighted in front of Ethan, folding in its wings.
The battle was over.
Both Ethan and Lance let out sighs of relief. Lance smiled as he returned Garchomp to its Poké Ball, and Ethan did the same for Lugia. Stowing the Ball, Lance strode out toward the middle of the battlefield - dotted with puddles of water and ectoplasm, patches of powder and seeds, burn marks, and Garchomp's rocks - and motioned for Ethan to do the same. The boy bounded up excitedly.
"Ethan," Lance said. "I haven't watched your progress for very long, but it was clear to me from the moment we met that you were no ordinary Trainer. Now the whole world will know just how extraordinary you and your Pokémon are. But I must thank you personally as well."
Ethan gave Lance a questioning look.
"I don't feel angry that I lost," Lance explained. "In fact, I feel happy. Happy that I witnessed the rise of a great new Champion." He seemed about to say more, but suddenly voices became audible from behind the door to Karen's room. "Oh, Zubat," Lance swore. "The media. Come, let's see if we can't slip away for a few moments. They know there is business to take care of with this, but they always . . ." He shook his head. "Never mind. This way."
Lance led Ethan through the elaborate door in front of which the Dragon Tamer had been standing during the battle. The door led to a hallway with strange neon lights running along the floor; following the trail of lights, the two approached a pedestal displaying a machine not unlike the one used at Pokémon Centers worldwide to heal injured Pokémon. Lance invited Ethan to place his six Poké Balls into the machine, which the boy did.
"This is the Hall of Fame," said Lance, pressing a few buttons on the machine as he spoke. "It is here where we will record the achievements of you and your partners for future generations to see. Watch."
The hole in which Ethan's first Poké Ball sat lit up, and a holographic screen appeared above the machine. The screen displayed an image of a Feraligatr, and various fields listed the statistics of the Pokémon - its type ("WATER"), its Pokédex number ("160"), its species name - even its nickname, "ZIGG." The machine went through all six of Ethan's Pokémon, and then finally displayed an image of the boy himself, surrounded by the six of them.
Eventually, the screen flicked off, and Ethan collected his Poké Balls, whispering into them, "We did it, guys!"
Lance pushed a button to power down the machine, and looked back toward the door through which they had entered. "I suppose we must face the media circus sooner or later," he said. "Lead the way, Mr. Champion."
Ethan chuckled at being addressed as such, and he and Lance stepped off of the pedestal and toward the door.
A soft beep came from behind them. They turned back around.
The buttons on the machine were glowing again. It appeared to have turned itself back on.
"Hmm . . ." said Lance. He stepped back up and pressed the power button again. Once more, the machine shut down, but a moment later it came back on again. "That's odd. Did I - ?"
The machine powered off again even though Lance had not pressed the button. Then all of the buttons began flickering their lights on and off at a rapid, erratic pace.
"What the Giratina - ?" Lance muttered.
The flickering stopped, and the holographic screen popped up again, but all of the fields were blank, except for one. In the "Number" field was the word "MISSING."
Lance tilted his head. "Missing number?"
"That's weird," said Ethan. "Have you seen that before?"
"Missing number?"
"Yeah. Is that what it says when you put a -"
"Missing number?"
"What?" Ethan looked away from the screen and toward Lance. Once again, Lance tilted his head and said inquisitively, "Missing number?"
"Uh . . . Lance?" Ethan waved his hand in front of Lance's face.
The Dragon Master tilted his head. "Missing number?"
Ethan's heart began beating like a prisoner. Every time that Lance repeated his phrase, his head snapped back into an upright position as though he were an image on a short loop; there was no clear transition from the tilted position to the upright one.
"Missing number?"
Ethan began backing away slowly. As he continued to stare, the repeating image of Lance began to skip like a defective film image, but his voice did not react accordingly, its reiterating phrase remaining a regular background rhythm. Lance's body began skipping between various other poses, and occasionally one of these short-lived images looked as though it were the real Lance trying to get out - first looking around in confusion, then pounding an invisible wall, and finally clawing his own face in a terrifying silent scream.
"W-w-w-w-what . . ." Ethan could find no words, but he knew that something had to be done. He grabbed Zigg's Poké Ball and tossed it in the air. Even before the beam finished solidifying, however, he knew that something was wrong here too.
Instead of a Feraligatr, the Ball released a Magnezone. Spinning slowly like a rotisserie chicken, the Pokémon fixated on him with a blank stare.
"SMOOCHUM!" the Magnezone bellowed in a voice that Ethan recognized as belonging to Koffing.
"Missing number?" responded Lance's voice.
Ethan wrenched his trembling hands up to his head. "WHAT'S HAPPENING?!" he shouted, his voice breaking.
The Magnezone suddenly glowed as though it were about to evolve.
Magnezone was a fully evolved Pokémon.
The white storm of energy that it had become sank to the ground and then grew to reveal a taller form. The Magnezone had evolved into a Kangaskhan.
Before Ethan had time to process the change, a baby Kangaskhan poked its head up out of the adult's pouch. But something was wrong. Indeed, Ethan watched in shock as an even smaller Kangaskhan appeared in the pouch of the baby, and yet another, smaller one in that one's tiny pouch, and another, and another, and . . .
"Cubone!" cried the first baby Kangaskhan. It leapt into the air, out of its parent's pouch, and as it did so it began to grow rapidly; simultaneously, the adult Kangaskhan began to shrink, and by the time the baby landed on the ground (now the size of an adult), the adult had vanished completely. Then the now-adult baby's baby jumped out and the process was repeated, over and over and over and over.
"Missing number?"
"Cubone!"
"Missing number?"
"Cubone!"
"Missing number?"
"Cubone!"
"STOP IT!" shrieked Ethan, tears welling up in his eyes.
Ethan felt a tap on his shoulder. He whirled around, but there was nothing behind him. Eyes bloodshot and his whole body shaking, he turned again, but both Lance and the Kangaskhan had vanished. The last cry of "Cubone!" echoed throughout the room, and then there was silence. A ghastly kind of silence. The kind of silence that roars louder than any thunder.
There was a thunderous rumble behind Ethan.
On pins and needles, he dared spin around once more.
The floor had cracked to reveal bare dirt. Slowly, a gray, skeletally thin hand and arm pushed their way out of the ground. They were followed by a head, a torso, and another arm; all had the texture of worn leather stretched tightly over their bones. The sunken eyes of the specter bored into Ethan's, and in a horrible raspy voice, it spoke:
"Lonely . . . I'm so very lonely . . . Won't you join me?"
Ethan wanted nothing more in the world than to look away, but he found himself unable to move. After doing nothing but swaying sickeningly a few times, the ghoul suddenly opened its mouth to the size of a Wailord's and a swarm of Zubat rushed out. Ethan's arms flew up to cover his face, and when he could no longer hear them whooshing by, there was again silence.
Ethan kept his eyes shut tight and waited. He was not sure of anything now, but he just wanted to stay there, hiding, until the nightmare passed. What made him relent was a tugging sensation around his belt.
He looked down to see his remaining five Poké Balls pulling themselves away from him of their own volition. Before he could make efforts to retain them, he noticed what had happened to the room around him.
It was in geometrical chaos.
It was as if the room had been divided into neat little cubes, and the cubes were now randomly switching places with each other, teleporting between each others' locations, until Ethan was surrounded by an unrecognizable mess of scrambled matter and space. It became impossible to look at without inducing a headache.
Then, as Ethan's Poké Balls pulled themselves from his belt, the madness was instantly gone, and he and the orbs were completely alone in an utterly black void.
He could no longer feel any ground beneath his feet. He watched in a stupor as the Poké Balls swirled around him, bobbing up and down, increasing in speed with each revolution. Then they slowed to a halt in front of him, one at a time. Each Ball rotated to show him its white underside. Then black specks blossomed within the white spheres, and black bars traced their edges, until each Ball had become the eye of an Unown. Three of the Unown had the same shape, while the other two differed:
E - r - r - O - r
Then, one by one, each of the Unown popped like a balloon, disintegrating into a cloud of square particles. The particles were not cubical: they seemed only to have two dimensions; but as with the rearrangement of the Hall of Fame, each square appeared to be a severed portion of some image or another. Each subsequent cloud swirled into the first until there was just one tornado of particles. And then the cloud in front of Ethan began to form rows out of the squares, stacking each upon the last to first form a larger square, then a vertical rectangle. When it had reached half of Ethan's height, the next set of rows left off a portion of its left side, and this new size continued until no more particles remained, so that the final shape was of a sort of backward L. For some reason, this simple, unassuming shape struck fear into Ethan's heart more than anything that had preceded it. He stared at the shape.
There was a blinding flash of light.