Update: Feb, 2016.(ver.1.1) Some dialogs and scenes have been revised, though nothing serious.
Just like in ver. 1.0 I also decided to refer to all Paul's and Reggie's pokemon as living individuals, though trainers (and Paul especially) may refer to them as tools. It is done for sole plot purpose.
Finally, as usual, have a nice reading and don't forget to leave reviews. =^_^=
Chapter 4 - Brotherly love (part 1).
Paul coughed several times shielding his face from the thick smoke trying to make out the silhouette of his electric partner. The ray had hit his pokemon straight on, and the younger brother didn't expect to win this round, but the unfolded sight surprised even him.
Both Maylene and Reggie gasped in shock, when the smoke revealed a heavily panting, but still standing thunderbolt pokemon! Several seconds later Paul emerged from the smoke as well, his face already calm, yet pale. The impact of the hyper beam pushed Electivire back to Paul's trainer box, however the pokemon managed to protect his master from the blast.
"Giga impact." Paul ordered flatly. As if simulating master's cold demeanour, the thunderbolt pokemon silently took a step back, made a heavy sight and rushed at the cringed Luxray. A massive pinkish sphere surrounded Electivire, which continued to gain speed with an impact now imminent.
Reggie could not do anything but watch in horror, as a massive electric type quickly closed his distance and rammed into the helpless electric lion. The blow was so powerful that it send lion flying away from the battlefield. A single yelp of pain escaped from the gleam eyes pokemon, before he crashed into the wood pillar just next Reggie's battle box. The pokemon didn't move any more.
Maylene sighed before raising her left arm to symbolize Paul's victory.
"Luxray can no longer battle, Reggie please return your Pokémon and select your next one." she announced weakly, the worry for Reggie evident in her purple eyes as she saw him recall Luxray with a sigh.
"You performed wonderful my friend, now take a rest, your efforts won't be in vain. " Reggie muttered to the ball before minimizing it and clipping it back on his belt.
"Keep comforting yourself like that, Reggie and this battle will so be mine." Paul murmured to himself allowing a small smirk watching with empty eyes his brother planning his next move. His face became passive once again, when Reggie unclipped a new pokeball.
"Now, Drapion, on your guard!" Reggie cried, summoning an ogre scorp pokémon in a flash of white light. The dark/poison type clicked his front pincers menacingly and made a roar in front of his grim foe, who watched this bravado scene in silence.
"Very well, you may continue the battle!" Maylene announced a new round of a battle.
"Drapion, use cross poison on Electivire, while it cannot move!" commanded Reggie. He tried to look indomitable after Paul's pokemon latest performance, but a sudden shrill in his voice told another story.
"Endure the hit." came the cold response from the other part of the battlefield, while the purple scorpion crossed its arms in front of his footbal-like head, as they began to glow a sinister looking purple, color. The thunderbolt pokemon stood motionless, as if he didn't mind to be hit at all, but still screamed, when Drapion's pincers crashed into his torso and sent him hurtling through the room back to Paul.
"Electivire, thunderbolt!" commanded Paul, trying to avoid the direct combat with his oponent. Once back on his feet Electivire made a weak growl, before his head antennas burst into life with electric energy.
Reggie sighted softly, as he finally saw a good opportunity to finish his brother's electric powerhouse. Reggie was far more than just impressed by Electivire's latest performance, but announcing his own thoughts was not a part of his plan, at least during their battle. The breeder glanced at the ground next to his pokemon analyzing something. 'The ground should be hard enough to hold the integrity of the building… though Maylene will be mad at me for that."
"Drapion, use dig!" The giant armored scorpion lowered himself to the ground, bringing his segmented arms to the proper level for digging. Two giant pincers tore the ground quickly extracting two large piles of plain dirt and throwing them to Drapion's sides. The action repeated itself until Drapion's arms turned into purple blur creating a large whole in mere seconds.
"Transfer energy to the light screen." Paul ordered simply. Electivire panted heavily, as he raised his arms to conjure a golden rectangual barrier of light. Just as he did so, the ground under the thunderbolt pokemon began to tremble, and in the next moment a roaring Drapion emerged under Electivire's feet. With an incredible show of power the armored scorpion grabbed his foe's torso and lifted Electivire in the air before throwing it on the ground with a loud thud. The Maylene's reaction was momental…
"Electivire can no longer battle. Paul, please select your next pokemon!" the declaration drawed a small grunt of annoyance from the younger of Evans brothers. Without any word Paul returned the battered Electivire into his capsule, already enlarging another sphere in the hand.
"Ursaring, stand-by for battle." said Paul throwing pokeball absentmindedly.
Once released a large bipedal bear immediately snarled at the armored scorpion. The pokemon sniffed the air furiously taking in the new and familiar smells preparing to issue master's orders. Maylene however couldn't remove her gaze for another reason. The longer than average fur around her neck and shoulders indicated, that despite the way the normal type had acted, the poemon was in fact a female of her species. How Paul could catch or even train such beast was complete mystery for a Veilstone gym leader.
"Hey, idiot, has drowsee hit you with a hypnosis?!" a rude remark of a younger of Evans brothers brought her back to the reality.
"Paul, shove your anger back into yourself or at least spill it on me, if you have incontinence!" Reggie retorted. He sent Maylene a sympathetic smile, but was a little late. A nun-chuck flew in a direction of Paul's head. The younger brother however stepped aside effortlessly avoiding the projectile. Paul's Ursaring glared at Maylene and answered at the blatant action with a low warning growl showing her a range of sharp teeth. That didn't stop the girl's rage though.
"You dare call me an idiot again, Paul, and the only way you're getting out of here is in a wheelchair." hissed the gym leader in a deadly whisper. In reply she received a quiet laugher from the younger brother.
"I highly doubt that. Say, have you really forgotten why you had become the gym leader in the first place?" Paul gave a freezing glance at the gym leader in response for her recent action. "And I had some real-life practice during my travels."
"How does your fighting skills correspond with our current battle?!" Reggie interviened trying to mitigate the conflict.
"It doesn't." Paul confessed in a calm tone. "I've just been cheering up our judge. She seems to be fazed by something though."
Maylene threw a dirty look at Paul, but didn't't say anything on that remark.
"Then it is my job to make her happy again.", Reggie chortled, trying to lift the mood of the gym leader. His look was yet again full of determination and vigor. "By beating you, Paul."
"Has Drowzee put you in a sleep too, brother? Seems like you are already having dreams. If that the case, I'm about to bring you back from slumber."
"Some brave words, Paul, but I'm expecting to test them in practice. Go on, show me your moves."
"This is your funeral, Reggie. Ursaring, focus blast!"
With a snarl the bipedal bear brought her paws together before separating them once more. However there was now a swirling blue energy orb between her paws which was quickly expanding in diameter.
"Drapion, counter with cross-poison!" replied Reggie firmly. His pokemon followed the master and with a mighty roar brought her arms in X-shape glowing with a sinister purple light.
"Unleash it at once!" thundered Paul.
Ursaring roared before quickly pushing her arms forward launching energy sphere directly at her opponent. However, at the last second Drapion finally made a sweeping motion tearing the energy sphere to shreds. As a result a small explosion pushed the scorpion pokemon back staggering him in a process.
"Don't just wait for it to come, use hammer arm!" Paul spat with his anger seeping from him once more.
"Drapion, let her come close and dodge the move with faint attack." countered Reggie keeping a passive stance allowing his enemy to run out of steam.
The bipedal bear charged at the struggling armored scorpion swinging her right arm to the side, while supporting it with her left arm. As the distance between them dropped in half, Ursaring's right arm began to shimmer with a pure white color. Jumping in the air in front of her foe, she attempted to perform a wrestling move she had been taught in order to crush her enemy with her weight. Instead, the bipedal bear crashed into the ground, as Drapion suddenly faded into nothingness bringing out another enraged roar from Ursaring.
Her foe didn't make her wait for long though. Drapion surprised the brown fured pokemon re-materializing just in front of her face and with a battle cry of its own drove one of its pincers in bear's chest.
"Drapion, dark pulse. Aim for Ursaring's feet." Reggie commanded seeing an opening but realizing in the last moment the mistake of issuing a special attack.
Paul still snorted in disgust his right eyebrow twitching, as he watched his pokemon being sent stumbling back with a series of successful moves trying to regain her balance from the purple ray. The previous light screen conjured by Electivire, however, saved the day.
'So you've just wanted to throw my pokemon off balance before charging into attack? Was that your little master-plan from the beginning, Reggie? Not gonna happen.' An evil smile krept over younger Evans brother face, as he came with a simple solution.
"Ursaring, thrash." Paul barked out loud enough to meet shocking looks of both the referee and his older brother.
"Paul, don't-! This attack will rather damage the gym than hit opponent!" Reggie's words were drowned in the roars of a bipedal bear. It was too late to object now. Ursaring lunged forward and brought a set of razor sharp claws crashing into Drapion's head. The onslaught of a normal type continued with an additional set of kicks into Drapion's torso.
"Huh, as if some broken wood is going to bother me! This is all or nothing battle, brother!" Paul responded in agitated tone. A certain individual in the gym room reacted on Paul's comment with angry remark including some death sentences, but it barely received any attention from Paul. "Besides, someone has just tried to blaster me with a hyper beam!"
Reggie missed his brother's insult, but instead used this time to analyze the situation and go on the offensive once more.
"Drapion, Ursaring is about to come with another portion of thrash! Dodge enemy moves with faint attack than come back out with brick break!" Reggie fired out drawing Paul's confused look.
'Huh? Was it possible for him to come up with such combo in the first place?' Paul's flow of thoughts was abruptly cut off by Ursaring's new series of roars. The bipedal bear rushed at the segmented scorpion with her razor sharp claws ready to shred the foe in tiny pieces.
However, the normal type slashed through thin air before she realized that her opponent had simply vanished. She stopped her useless onslaught and began to sniff her surroundings. Paul's mouth once again curled into the cruel smile. Finally his training has begun to pay off. The thought that pokemon could show simple signs of intelligence even in a thrash state sent pleasant goose (or better say ducklett) bumps through Paul's back.
"How did you-?!" exclaimed Reggie also being stunned by Ursaring's unusual behavior.
"You said for yourself, brother. Don't let your strategy be limited by the old experiences." Paul lectured his older brother, returning the favour. "Thinking that a pokemon can't respond to counterattacks in a thrash mode is a thing of of the past."
Meanwhile Drapion quietly reappeared behind Ursaring. The mighty poison/dark type moved his arms over the bear's head and was about to deliver a powerful blow, when Ursaring suddenly spun around bringing her arms up and filling the air with yet another roar.
The fiendish behavior of the normal type was put to an abrupt end, as Drapion brought down his glowing pincers upon bear's head. Paul growled in anger seeing his plan fail miserably. Even more, it was now his pokemon to stagger back and it seemed that thrash mode had worn off already.
"Ursaring, bulk up and then proceed with slash!" Paul commanded, as he tried to put his messed tactics into proper shape. However, much to his displeasure, the pokemon suddenly ran into another amok, ramming herself into the nearest wood pillar and beginning to scratch the wooden pillar with her long claws.
"Now, now, Paul, don't you remember the aftermath effect of thrash move? I tried to warn you about it, but you didn't listen." said Reggie switching sides with Paul and now playing his role of a lecturer for a kindergarten kid.
"Go to Giratina's hell, Reggie." replied Paul in a scathing tone.
"Well, if you don't have any clever remark in your pocket, I think I may use this opening, then." said Reggie oblivious to his brother's latest flow of insults. "Drapion, cross poison, while Ursaring is confused."
Reggie however realized his mistake too late, when Drapion crashed his poisonous pincers upon bear's back. The older brother glanced at his relative; an evil smile plastered on Paul's face was all he needed to know.
'Darkrai curse it! He did this on intention to slack me off, so that his pokemon would certainly receive a status condition!' Reggie bit his lip as he watched Drapion crash his pincers onto the bear's back. Ursaring snarled violently, vainly trying to reach her bruised back. Meanwhile, Maylene sighed with relief, since Paul's pokemon stopped damaging her gym's property.
To the horror of Paul the brown bear seemed to be healthy apart from all physical damage she had just received. Still on the bright side Drapion's attack had managed to snap Ursaring out of her confusion. Back to her sanity the bear fell on her back and stared in surprise in different directions drawing concealed chuckles of laugh from both Reggie and Maylene.
"Ursaring, bulk up and follow with slash, if you finished slacking!" repeated Paul breaking the comical scene at once.
"Drapion, don't let Ursaring prepare for the next attack. Use brick break to finish her!" ordered Reggie feeling the outcome of this round.
"Intercept!" roared Paul in a sudden burst of rage.
As the scorpion pokemon rushed at the normal type with his gleaming pincer, Ursaring extended her arms to each side. At the last moment, the bear pokemon caught Drapion's right arm in the air panting heavily trying to withstand her foe's strenght.
"Paul, this is just like the match you had with Ash at the Conference. I still have a free left arm AND the tail. Drapion, repeat the attack!" the only reference of his rival by Reggie made the younger brother give him a murderous stare.
Reggie's pokemon got the message and raised his left arm over Ursaring's head only to be grabbed by the normal type in the same manner locking both opponents in a stalemate.
"You are the one who keeps making the same mistakes, brother. Ursaring, use hyper beam point blank." Paul muttered darkly.
Reggie did his best to remain calm with a cold head, but his awakened trainer part gave its toll on the older brother. He gritted his teeth watching desperately, as Ursaring opened her jaws to reveal a mass of orange energy in the shape of a ball. It was slowly growing in diameter illuminating the round snout of poison type. The look of fear was clearly pictured on its face, as the pokemon vainly tried to escape from Ursaring's grip.
And then the idea hit Reggie…
"Drapion use your tail and grab Ursaring's throat to preven-!"
"Not gonna happen!" Paul cut in. "Unleash the beam at once!"
A huge explosion covered both pokemon, before it violently sent each one of them in the opposite directions. Ursaring landed heavily on the plain ground bringing large clouds of dust cringing in pain; her body was now decorated with numerous patches of burnt fur. Her foe, however, was not so fortunate…
The force of the blast had sent Drapion right out of the battlefield into one of the gym's woodden support pillars. The segmented scorpion smashed through the construction as if it was a tooth stick and then continued his flight crashing into the wall leaving a giant dent into the next training room. Maylene just stood with mouth agape trying to comprehend the amount of damage two brothers had already caused to her gym.
"Drapion!" Reggie cried in horror as he made about to leave his trainer box to check on his old friend, when a reprimanding noise from across the filed caught his attention.
"Now, now, Reggie, leave the box and forfeit the rules." Paul waved his index finger at his brother and was about to bring a new portion of degrading words upon his brother, when an angry roar reached their ears.
"How?" grunted Paul through teeth, as he watched battered and chared Drapion surfacing from the pile of ruble, but still able to move and act offensively. 'Ugh, but of course I'm battling my brother. He has invested so much into its natural defense. Still it's just pathetic to see such pokemon wasted without any knowledge of special attacks.'.
Paul now shifted his sight trying to find his pokemon. Breathing heavily Ursaring was quickly recovering from the use of hyper beam. Definitelly Paul's special recovery training didn't go in vain.
"Drapion can't have much strength left. Focus blast, once more!" commanded Paul in his normal tone. Ursaring panted heavily, as she folded her palms fighting the strain from the previous attack.
'She still needs more training though…' realized Paul, watching in disgust the struggles of his pokemon.
"Drapion, I know you are in much pain, but you must act quick to avoid the forthcoming attack! Dig and follow it with brick break!" responded Reggie seeing an opening. If only Drapion could get to Ursaring before she finishes her next attack…
Thankfully the ogre scorp pokemon submerged underground, before the bipedal bear was able to form an energy sphere(for focus blast attack). Paul gritted his teeth in anger seeing his chance of ending this round vanish miserably.
"Fire it at the ground before you. Now!" shouted Paul once his pokemon readied the attack. At least he would catch Drapion off guard or so he had thought. The normal type did as her master had commanded and pushed the ball of pure energy at the ground in front of her. The sphere exploded upon the impact drawing a small cloud of dust, but that was all it had done.
As if on cue, Drapion had expected such move beforehand and erupted to the Ursaring's right side, aiming at the bear's torso baring its white pincers ready to strike. The normal type stumbled back from the blow limping on her right side suffering the excruciating pain. The bear was not even snarling any more; instead her whine now more begged for mercy in the darkened eyes of her master. She chose the wrong trainer for that…
The last swing of pincer over Ursaring's head brought cries of hibernator pokemon to a dead silence. Finding no more strength, she finally brought herself on the right knee before collapsing on the ground.
"Ursaring is unable to battle! Paul, please choose your next pokemon!" dictated Maylene. The purple haired trainer quickly glanced at the gym leader. At least she kept her joy well concealed now. Or maybe that was that dead cold atmosphere in the air of how he had just gave up on his last pokemon, making any taunts towards him too dirty.
Paul silently returned Ursaring in her pokeball, and for a moment searched his belt.
'I must quickly bring back the initiative, before it hits me hard. In that case…'
"Magmortar, stand by for battle!"
A large humanoid fire type was much more quiet than his predecessor. Instead, the mischeveous look on his ugly face told his opponent that he is the force, which should be reckoned with. His giant rose lips only added to his grotesque appearance, making him look like some generic evil character from the fairytale.
Maylene winced at the sight of the familiar fire type. Thanks to Dawn's help she was able to recover and continue her job as a Vailstone gym boss after that terrible loss to Paul. She remembered Magmar being a relentless and sturdy powerhouse specializing in special and status attacks. The final evolution however gave her nasty duckletbumps already from the sight of the pokemon.
"Drapion, use dig once more and then continue with cross poison." Reggie ordered smoothly as he massaged his temples. The ogre scorp pokemon was on the verge of collapse, so his current task was to deal as much damage as possible before the switch.
Drapion began working with his pincers once again throwing chuncks of the field to the side and quickly dissapearing from the sight. The opponent's side, however, was waiting for something…
«Magmortar, surround yourself with rock tomb, then aim flamethrower beneath your feet!» announced Paul.
«That order…» Reggie spent several seconds trying to digest the command, when his eyes went wide in disbelief. If he ever had an urge to smack his younger brother in the face before, that was that exact moment. He clenched his hands into fists barelly keeping the onflow of the memories he didn't want to remember.
«Drapion, cancel attack!» Reggie shouted desperately once he snapped out, but it was too late. The ogre scorp had already dug under his opponent and was about to unleash its attack only to fall into a deadly trap. The fire type had casted several large boulders all around himself creating a small circular arena before aiming his tubular arms at the ground. In the next second the area was bathed in flames leaving a vivid silthoete of Magmortar in the middle suffering insignificant damage in the process. At this very moment the earth errupted under Magmortar feet and a terrible roar filled the room, as Drapion was caught in the center of a living hell.
Just when Drapion emerged from the ground, Magmortar used ogre scorp attack, as well as the sheer force of his own flamethrower, to launch himself in the air. A quick memory of battle between Paul and Ash at the lake Acuity flashed in older brother's head. Back then Magmortar easily caught Ash's Pikachu off guard by jumping in the air using smog attack. It was still a mystery for Reggie of how Paul had managed to train such heavy pokemon do such jumps. The current battle, however, brought some light to this trick of his brother's.
Magmortar safely landed behind the rock circle in front of his trainer leaving Drapion in a fiery trap. The grunts of volcanic pokemon were mere huffs compared to howls of poison/dark type as he was being slowly cooked inside. Eventually the thrashing ogre scorp smashed into one of rocks freeing himself from the stone prison. Although the escape attempt was a last straw for Drapion, as he fell limply to the floor, writhing and twitching.
«D-Drapion is unable to battle! Reggie, please return Drapion and select your next pokemon!» came the announcement from the judge.
"Your performance was great my friend. You gave all you could and I'm thankful for that. Now take a rest." Reggie commented as he quickly returned his agonised pokemon to the sphere.
"I have to admit I'm far more than just impressed with your latest move. Not only you remembered that move from when I had battled Brandon, but you've also managed to modify it for your needs." Reggie confessed, only to meet a cold glare from his brother. As if returning a favour in kind, Reggie suddenly changed his demeanor to a more serious. "Yeah, I forgot I'm speaking with a brick wall who is actually my brother."
"Spare your base flattery, Reggie. That Drapion of yours was just a pathetic copy of our mother's. Its resilience is just a poor mockery of what a real Drapion should be!" Paul spat out depleting another portion of rage stored within.
"It still was able to give me a tactical advantage over your team." Reggie stated narrowing his eyes. "Besides, now I have an idea of where you got that Drapion for the Lily conference…"
"Took you long enough. I still had to hold it back several time from going a complete berserk on Ketchum's team." replied Paul with a smirk.
"Arceus dammit!" Reggie bursted aghast. "Paul, that thing has killed innocent people! What if Cynthia recognized it or, even worse, the international police division?! You could have been sent to jail for-" The older brother stopped short noticing puzzling look in Maylene's eyes, which filled with horror upon the realization hit her.
"I should stop the battle right now and report on you, Paul, into League Commitie for cheating and this is just for using pokemon of another person!" The sudden and no less harsh intervention of a gym leader cooled down Paul a bit. "Using a pokemon who has been accused of all the violence your mother had done with its help is a much more serious matter!"
"Well, for starters, neither she nor any one else on the stadium has noticed the difference. Besides, as I've already said I had the situation under control!" Paul retorted, in a more civilized manner. The option of loosing trainer licence nor being accused by the police for the use of a pokemon with a criminal record was not favourable for Paul's pokemon trainer career.
"Sure, your sense of control cost you the match." Replied Reggie sourly. "Just don't tell me that you were not caring about the championship back then. If it was not your overconfident strategy of sending half of your team to recon the situation-"
"Then I would have lost to Tobias anyway. I had to keep my best pokemon for that battle. I thought it was pretty damn obvious."
"Still the 3rd place in the conference would have proved your expertise as a trainer and even maybe justified your training methods… especially after 3 unsuccessful leagues."
"Just bring out your next pokemon, Reggie." Paul hissed through his teeth. "I'm going to justify my way by obliterating your team."
"This is yet to be determined, brother." the breeder checked Maylene with a knowing look. She was still in tense mood from Paul's revelation, but the replying nod from her reassured Reggie. "Now, Swalot, on your guard!"
A great mass of slick purple ooze has been released from the sphere. The creature moved her whiskers tasting the air as it lazily searched for an opponent. Upon succeeding in the task she focused her small round eyes on Magmortar with a derp look on its face.
"Swal!" the blob of purple ooze yawned.
"Urgh, just scorch that thing with flamethrower." ordered Paul in annouance.
Reggie only smiled at his brother's command. He already had a plan for a counterattack.
"Stockpile!" the older Evans ordered. He caught a scawl from his brother. If Paul was already upset with the choice of his attack, then he was about to experience the shock of his life with this next attack.
Magmortar pointed his two giant tubular arms at the poison bag pokemon. Two dark holes suddenly began glowing bright red before unleashing a roaring stream of devouring flames.
Maylene covered her face with an arm, as a fire beam travelled unobstructed through the battlefield hitting the purple ooze dead straight. The sheer power of attack was so palpable that the fighting-type gym leader nearly lost her ballance as a collateral heat wave reached her. She never understood how fire-type gym bosses withstood such sudden temperature onslaughts.
The force with which the flamethrower hit Swallot sent the poison type a few centimeters back as the flames literally engulfed pokemon's gelly body. However, instead of shrieking in pain or giving any adequate reaction to the attack, the poison bag pokemon simply swelled up to a larger size, bolstering her defences.
"Magmortar, they're getting to launch a spit up so rock tomb!" Paul knew for a fact that his brother's Swallot didn't know swallow, which meant that Magmortar would have to cover for an oncoming the attack.
A nod of approval came from Reggie at Paul's words. "Looks like your memory is as good as ever, Paul," he said confidently. "So I wont keep you waiting. Swalot, spit up now, aim for the roof!"
"Reggie, what are you doing?!" Maylene shrieked in horror, only her question to be ignored, as Swalot's jaw dropped open, a large ball of purple energy forming in her mouth. The poison bag pokemon turned up as she prepared to fire, releasing the sphere. The purple orb tore into the wooden roof, destroying it into smithereens. Chips of wood and metal rained down, the rays of morning sun fully invading the gym.
Maylene grabbed her head in shock, tears welling up in her eyes as the legacy of previous gym leaders fell apart in front of her. However, she jumped in surpise when she realized that her Lucario was "standing" just next to judge's box clearly attracted by the whole commotion of the battle.
"Lucario, stop!" she barely had time to prevent the aura pokemon from firing an aura sphere aimed at Paul for some reason. She considered ending the battle right there and beating both trainers senseless herself before making brothers fix up her gym. The pink haired girl knew, however, that Reggie would be more than willing to help fix the place as best as he could, though it would take much more than a bit of wax, paint and elbow grease to complete the task.
Paul, oblivious to the danger of being hit with aura sphere narrowed his eyes at the clear blue sky trying to determine Reggie's actions.
'The additional sunlight should give me additional advantage… unless-' Something clicked in Paul's mind once he realized his older brother's plan.
"Don't just stand there! Don't let Swallot finish her next move! Double fire blast!" roared Paul in despair already knowing Reggie's next move.
Magmortar, once more, aimed his arms at the poison type, but now two small balls of fire formed at their extentions. The spheres quickly gained at its size growing nearly up to the pokemon's size before being released at almightly speed. Two fiery balls cut through the air leaving a fiery trail behind them before connecting with their target. A massive blast barely missing Reggie sent a massive heatwave across the battlefield, enough to create cracks in those few remaining wooden pillars by Reggie's side.
Silence filled the room as everyone's sights including Reggie's were focused on the epicenter of the fire blast explosion. A silhoete of Swallot became visible just after the last flames of explosion ceased down, but it took at least another 10 seconds before poison type finally responded.
"Swal-lot" replied pokemon in her indomitable manner.
"What?! It barely took any damage?!" Paul roared in anger once the smoke revealed his oponent's pokemon still in full colors.
"Remember, Paul, stockpile bolsters special and physical defence." said Reggie in a teaching tone. "Now, to complete my plan… Swalot, rain dance, now!"
Paul gritted his teeth in pure rage as he saw his brother's pokemon switching odds to his favor. Swalot began to glow a dazzling white, steam slowly creeping off of the Poison-type and rising into the air above the Gym, a dark grey storm cloud forming overhead.
A heavy rain fell from the heavens momentally drenching three humans and their respective pokemon. Magmortar released an annoyed sound, already suffering the effect of rain. Lucario was another pokemon who was not fond of soaking. The aura pokemon shook himself vigorously trying to get rid of the water on his fur earning an angry glare from his master standing just next to him.
Despite the rain greatly lowering the power of fire type moves, Paul's only reaction was the same angry scowl at his brother, far less of what Reggie had expected. Something was not right…
Meanwhile, the younger brother glanced at the remains of the previous rock tomb attack. It was time to unleash his next trump card.
'Perfect…' Paul muttered to himself drawing an imaginary straight line from the rock up to Swalot. 'Time to use this technique in real action'
"Magmortar, just as we practiced. Rock shatterer!" Paul ordered firmly.
The fire type nodded in approval and then made an odd move. Using his right tubular arm Magmortar leaned to the nearest rock facing the poison type. At the same time the volcanic pokemon grabbed the rock with his left arm as if trying to keep the stone mass in one place despite the absurdity of the situation. The rock suddenly started to turn red quickly evaporating all the rainwater in the vicinity.
"What the-" Reggie questioned Paul's command only to snap his eyes wide open a second later. "Crap, Swalot, counterattack with sludge bomb, before –" Reggie wasn't able to finish his command, as the rock heated by Magmortar suddenly exploded sending hundreds of small shards at a dangerous speed in straight cone right at his opponent. Before the poison bag pokemon could react, several sharp pebbles penetrated her gelly body. The pokemon shrieked in pain from the unexpected attack; her trainer couldn't do anything but to quickly duck behind her silhoete to avoid being torn to shreds.
"That was a nice use of your surroundings, brother, but it can work in both directions. Retaliate with sludge bomb, aim at the nearest to Magmortar rock!" ordered Regie.
Similar to stockpile move Swallot inhaled air growing twice in size, but instead of keeping the accumulated inergy inside her, the poison type regurgitated a lurge purple blob aimed at her foe.
"Dodge it and then proceed with rock tomb for rock shatterer!" countered Paul. The rain, however, caused the fire type slow down a bit. The purple sludge crashed at the rock fortifications, which had been giving Magmortar additional defense up for that moment. Specks of rocks and purple ooze hit the fire type sending him crashing to his trainer's feet.
"Stop daydreaming, get up and fight!" commanded Paul in his usual manner. To both Reggie's and Maylene's surprise Magmortar had actually managed to get up, though not without an effort.
"Good, now let's show what you're really capable of! Rock shatterer on the go!" announced Paul.
"Taar!" bruised and covered in mud Magmortar yet roared in high spirits as he rushed at his opponent with no regards for his own defense...