Authors note
As my most recent reviewer was not signed in, i would like to take a quick moment to say thank you for reviewing. I really appreciate it! I have anoterh two unsigned in reviewers, one from a different story and one from several chapters back, but i would also like to say thank you to both of them. They left wonderful comments that left me feeling very good about myelf and my decicion to become an author.
Wooo! its three thirty six am right now, and i have just completed this chapter, its been a very tiring week for me, and i have not until this point written in this sttory for a number of very good reasons. i have been in a poor place internally for writing is one, and another would be that i must hep my father and step mother to move. That is all over now, however, and so i spent the night writing, and though i have not yet gone over the chapter i am extremely satisfied with the result. It is quite honestly everything i had hoped it would be, as far as my strange and sleep deprived thinking goes right now. Another thing that maeks me happy is that i have a total of four people who have reviewed my story, and i am grateful to each and every one of them for even the smaller bits of criticicm and comment. I do not care about what the qualitty of what you say, only that you say it. it is truly the thought that counts (though for all those who review long out there, please do not be discouraged to do so in here).
So please, help reward my efforts by reading, and do so on an even deeper level by reviewing. That said, i will without further ado present the sixth chapter of "The Pokonomist" and i hope that you all enjoy it.
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Ra'uf had never faced a greater nor more important mystery than the one now staring him down. How was he, a human, to defeat a fully grown Abomasnow through his own sole efforts? Perhaps with a handicap it was possible, but fate had distributed only one, and it had been placed again him. His depleted body refused angrily to move, while the Abomasnow's carried its lethal purpose smoothly and complacently forward.
The Roar of the Abomasnow died out, but the Misdreavus continued in its voracious laughter. From the force of its amusement at his coming demise, he could only wonder if pursuit was a dire offense to its species, for it was the only crime he had committed. Or perhaps he had been blind in his faith of Pokemon goodness, and now was to be cruelly disillusioned. Fate would reveal the answer to him, if he could only survive the encounter. To do so, however, seemed very unlikely.
Still, he had to try. He would suffer an eternity in the afterlife ashamed with himself, if in the final moments of his life he allowed himself to submit to death. No, it was better to fight until the end, and there was always the chance that in doing so he could avoid it. That in mind, Ra'uf chose to ignore the overwhelming odds placed against him and instead thought back to his training. The first rule of any situation, Mr. Gershom had taught him, was to asses it.
Looking around him and remembering the materials in his bag, Ra'uf managed to mentally draw a bleak outline of the mess he had fallen into. The first and most dispiriting things he noted were the tall, sulfur stained boulders that surrounded him and the Abomasnow. Dark, smooth and sheer, they offered little in the way of footholds, and the parting from one to the next was only inches wide. Escape, then, was unlikely.
Whatever fault in reasoning had inspired him to hike in the dead of night, that particular detail had now turned to his advantage. The human eye was a poor receptor of light when compared to most Pokemon's, but his opponent was among the unique few exceptions. Ra'ufs vision in the coming bought would be limited. The Abomasnow's would be nearly useless.
The Abomasnow was rearing closer, but Ra'uf remained focus on his task. Some of the gloom that had been smothering him lifted away at the observation. He had an advantage, and a very good one! The lighting would be pivotal part of his defense. Still, he would not be able to slay the Abomasnow with darkness alone. What else did he have he have available to him that could work as a weapon?
Thinking quickly, for the Abomasnow had now closed half of the distance that separated them, Ra'uf mentally riffled through the contents of his bag. The answer occurred to him almost immediately; the ice pick! The item was dull at this point, but the metal was strong and thing, and with enough force behind it could perhaps pierce through the eyes of the Abomasnow and into its brain. In his study of the Pokemon anatomy he had learned that the eyes, while far harder than a humans, were still the softest part of their bodies. While the knowledge did not give a clear impression of just how hard that meant, it spoke clearly enough that they were where his odds were best.
The Abomasnow moved slowly, even for a creature its size, slowed perhaps by its poor vision. Looking at it closely, however, another explanation came to mind, and Ra'uf felt his likelyood for success rise exponentionally when he confirmed it. The Abomasnow was stumbling in its movements, the footsteps erratic and clumsy. That the creature was abnormally thin by its species standards was the final and conclusive indicator. The Abomasnow, too, was starving.
Satisfied with what he had learned, Ra'uf swung around his backpack, determination once again coursing through his veins. From within it he drew the pokeball, the remote, and the strange stick of of assorted body parts. They would be the tools for his capture of the Misdreavus. For the Abomasnow, he withdrew from its strap the ice pick. Coming to a standing position, Ra'uf tossed the now useless bag off to the side and turned to face the Abomasnow, the ice pick aloft in his grip. Staring down the creature, Ra'uf waited in witness of the final few steps of its approach.
At five feets distance from him, The Abomasnow came to a halt, and once again a booming roar issued from the strange crack in its head that formed the mouth. This time, Ra'uf heard more than the threatening sound; he heard the shakiness and desperation in its voice, and with them the sound became unimpressive. Standing to his full height, Ra'uf countered with a scream of his own, that unlike the Abomasnow's did not waver. The sound did as he had hoped, and the great big eyes of the Abomasnow directed themselves at where he had revealed himself to be. A second later the Abomasnow growled in return, and a huge wooden arm came down upon the spot where Ra'uf had moments ago stood to the challenge.
Now, however, he was darting around it, planning and anticipating the battle to come. The Misdreavus would be his first problem, for it possessed better night vision than either he or the Abomasnow. Dashing up to it, Ra'uf paused long enough near its face to watch it recoil slightly in surprise. When it had regained its composure, it immediately lost it again by retorting with the same angry garbling sounds that had amused him before. The creature had quite an attitude really, Ra'uf mused, but he would learn to live with it when the time came. For now, he simply needed it not to interfere. It could be dealt with next.
Ra'uf responded to the crude sounds by screwing up his own face and mimicking the shouts, the actions behind which reminded him so much of a child in the midst of a temper tantrum. Surprised, the Misdreavus once again recoiled, and Ra'uf chose that moment to utilize the first item which he had drawn from the bag. Waving the stick in addition to his shouting, Ra'uf with able to enjoy the brief and rare sight of a terrified Pokemon.
Gasping loudly in fear, The Misdreavus sprang further backwards at the sight of the teddy bear head, feathers, and snake skins. For a moment, it stayed paralyzed by its fear. Then it screamed, and took off in the opposite direction far faster than it had when Ra'uf had been chasing it. Within seconds it had disappeared into the Darkness, but he did not worry over the fact. Before the night was over, its proud and vengeful nature would have prompted its return, and at that time he would be waiting.
The first of his problems had been dealt with, then. Turning, Ra'uf swapped the stick into his useless right hand and took into his left the ice pick. Now, it was time to do the impossible, and slay the Abomasnow. His soon to be victim had turned directions some time ago, and made good ground using the sounds he and the Misdreavus had made as a guide. Each step of its monstrous legs brought it what Ra'uf estimated to be a distance of eight feet, but the speed at which it executed them balanced the movements considerably in his favor.
Staring at its approach, Ra'uf's mind raced for a strategy that could overcome the few factors still playing against him. Leading among them was the Abomasnows height. At nine feet tall, the Pokemon was like a tower before him, at the distant tip of which rested its single weak spot. Without an object to provide him with additional height, the eyes would be safe from him, and no matter how blind nor slow the creature was it would find him if given the time. Even if he avoided it for hours, the sun would sooner or later rise, and Ra'uf would lose his single greatest advantage. It was vital that before that point came to pass, the Abomasnow lay dead before him.
Which meant it was vital that he acted soon. He had no idea what time it was, nor was there any way to discover. Finishing things quickly was the only way to assure he would not run out of time, and to do that Ra'uf would need higher ground. As far as he was aware, only one feature in the area could provide it, and that was the slick, unscalable boulders that ringed the makeshift arena.
As far as Ra'uf could tell, none of the boulders contained foot holds. Climbing them, he deduced, would be a challenge.
The Abomasnow crawled uncertainly towards the spot that Ra'uf had settled to think, for sudden stillness masked his position. Without the clatter of footsteps, Ra'uf realized, the Abomasnow truly was incapable of finding him. Perhaps if he moved slowly and carefully enough that he did not make a sound, he could tip toe unnoticed to one of the boulders. From there, it would be a simple matter of noiselessly feeling out crevices in the rock. By the time he was ready to climb, the Abomasnow would be too far away to prevent him.
Confidant in the idea, Ra'uf shuffled a careful step to the side, intent on the boulders farthest from himself and the Abomasnow's current path. If he could move quickly enough, the Pokemon would walk straight into the wall behind him, leaving it as far as possible from his destination. The moment Ra'uf's foot touched the ground, however, the Abomasnow jolted to a stop, and both its unseeing eyes and massive body homed in on his exact location. Freezing nervously in place, Ra'uf realized that he had underestimated the Pokemon's hearing.
The arms of the Abomasnow rose into an extended position, palms pointed toward him, and Ra'uf recognized immediately what was happening. Abandoning stealth, he darted blindly to the side, intent only on getting as far from where he'd been as possible. Moments later, a flurry of thin white shards crashed into the ground that he had previously occupied, justifying the decision. The ice shard attack, as he recognized it to be, collided into the ground with what sounded to be the force of a rocket, but Ra'uf wasted no time in watching. The racket it had produced drowned out his footfalls, and it was important he gained as much ground as possible in those brief few moments of invisibility.
The attack lasted an extensively long time, allowing Ra'uf to cover a greater distance than he had hoped for. By the time the Abomasnow had ceased fire, he had closed three quarters of the length remaining to the boulders. Responsibly freezing into place, Ra'uf quickly tried to abandon any action that might produce noise, and in the course another terrible and revealing moment realized that he had overlooked something of incredible simplicity; that to move as he did required energy, which he dew from the air around him. Doubling over in order to pant into his knees, the exhaustion that had all this time worked against him in the following moments saved his life.
Finding his legs too tired to carry him, Ra'uf collapsed onto the ground, so that when the Abomasnow turned with another roar and released a new wave of its ice shards they passed harmlessly above him. Aware that even a slight increase in the proximity between himself and the attack would kill him, Ra'uf lay rigidly still and attempted to calm his breathing before it once again had the chance to expose him. Inhaling deeply, Ra'uf forced himself to ignore the chaos above him and focus instead on his fleeting passion. Every five minutes, it seemed, his confidence had fluctuated from brimming to faded, and in the last couple of minutes had dimmed. Once again he revived it, and this time another feeling accompanied it back into life; a strong recklessness, very much like the one that had whispered in his ear to choose Misdreavus. Flush with the prospect of death that awaited him should he only lift his head, the feeling urged him to risk his life even further, to dance along the edge of death through some ridiculous last stunt, such as engaging the Abomasnow in hand-to-hand combat.
No matter how whimsical he felt, however, Ra'uf was adamant to maintain enough sense of mind to survive against the odds. Planning was important, as was thinking before acting, and cunning as useful as either of the other two. Fishing through his mind for something cunning or intelligent, Ra'uf unearthed one of each.
In thinking about the failed ice-shard attack, Ra'uf realized that rather than tearing into himself the shards had torn into the boulder behind him, rendering deep holes in the rock. The result was a surface pockmarked with the footholds that it had previously lacked. If he could only find away to reroute the Abomasnow's attention long enough to reach them, he could overcome his current and most pressing obstacle of height. Thinking of what he could do to cause a distraction awoke the second quality Ra'uf had been reaching for; his cunning.
To find a solution took only moments, and Ra'uf celebrated his newly created plan by enacting it. Reaching carefully down to his foot while taking great pains to keep his legs flat against the ground, so that neither limb might rise into the path of the ice shards, proved difficult. The recklessness that had only in the past few minutes came into being disapproved of the cautionary movements, and urged him to sacrifice safety for speed, so that at each moment he waged mental warfare on his own self-control.
Unlike when it had influenced his choice of starter, however, Ra'uf's inner instinct stood against it, this time aligning itself with reason. Stubbornly refusing to submit, the temptation to throw caution to the wind threatened him throughout the entire process of removing his right shoe and re-extending his leg.
His desire to speed things along, gained much more credibility in his mind when moments later the Ice shard attack came to a halt. Had he taken only moments longer, he realized, the sound of fleece scraping against rock would have drawn a large bulls-eye on his current position. Luck, it seemed, had once again intervened, though this time through a much less ironic means. Feeling a jolt of excitement run through his chest and up his arm as it curved over his head, Ra'uf could barely contain a grin as he tossed the shoe into some far of direction and waited for it to hit the ground.
The still present sounds of the deformed landscape made it hard for him to tell when exactly it did, but the Abomasnow's acute hearing revealed to it the exact moment, and Ra'uf found it far less difficult to hear its resounding roar and the shifting of its massive body into the wrong direction. A jubilant grin spread across his face when moments later he heard the crashing of a third ice shard attack begin, officially opening his pathway to higher ground.
Springing to his feet reminded Ra'uf of the weariness in his limbs, but he felt far to enlivened to take serious notice, and instead focused intensely on closing in the remaining distance to the boulder. A further bounce, unnoticed by the Abomasnow in the din of its attack, fell into his step as the now thoroughly scarred form of the boulder came into sight. To his relief, the scars covered a thorough five feet into the boulders height, at the height of which his own five feet and eleven inches would be sufficient to bring the top of the boulder within arms reach. Very soon, he would stand victoriously upon it, having won a fighting chance at survival.
And exactly as soon as he had imagined it would be, it was, and Ra'uf hoisted himself over the edge of the boulder with a euphoric grunt. Panting heavily through his grin, Ra'uf stayed resting upon his side as the Ice shard attack continued, in wait for its end. He needed a moment to think, now that he had accomplished as much as he had thought to, and the wonderful thing was that he had as much time as he needed now. The Abomasnow would cease its attack, and when it strained its acute ears and useless eyes for any hint of his location, nothing would be revealed to it. And when it decided to start aimlessly searching for him, it would not find him.
He had found sanctuary. He was concealed from and beyond the reach of the Abomasnow; he was safe.
Relaxing back into the ground, Ra'uf took the opportunity to roll several feet away from the cliffs edge while the ice-shard attack could still hide the movement. Exactly how much time passed before the Abomasnow stopped attacking and began its steady approach to inspect where it thought to be the meal that was his course, Ra'uf had no care to measure. Content where he was, he focused his brain power instead to developing a new plan that would accommodate his advantage. The great crash of the Abomasnow's footsteps, the first of which shook even the boulder on which he lay, inspired one.
It was still a pivotal point that he move without attracting the attention of the Abomasnow, and if he could blend each of his footsteps in with that of the Abomasnow's the noise he caused would once again be drowned out. The ratio of distance covered, however, would be greatly in the Abomasnow's favor, as each of its strides reeled in a full seven feet more than his own. Glancing over the edge of the cliff, Ra'uf squinted to see where his boot and landed and where the the Abomasnow would therefore be headed. It was hard to tell in the dark, but it appeared that he had thrown it into the middle of the natural arena.
As that was where the Abomasnow was headed, it seemed that very soon it would be beyond his reach. If he wanted to finish it, he would need to once again attract its attention, and this time to a spot directly below the cliff face of one of the boulders. From there, as long as the Abomasnow remained unaware of his true location, he would be free to strike a killing blow.
As much as the idea of killing the Abomasnow unnerved him, there was simply no other choice. The Misdreavus could return at any moment, and if it chose to direct its fellow Pokemon at him using its superior eyesight he would not survive long. To try and escape, on the other hand, by going one step at a time in sync with the Abomasnow's own, would land him barely a hundred feet from the arena before sunrise, at which time it would be even more consequential when the Misdreavus returned. The Killing was something he would have to do now, while the chance was raw and present, and the advantage still on his side.
Grim determination running through his veins, Ra'uf waited for another crashing footstep before lifting himself to his feet. The lopsided height caused by having one boot on and the other off was not something that he had to bear long, as with the next step he removed his second shoe, causing it too to be exposed to the freezing airs of the elevation and strange warmth of the smooth, volcanic ground. Opting to not wait for a third, Ra'uf estimated took into brief account the difference between how much ground both he and the Abomasnow could cover in a given period of time, and then launched his second shoe what he then deemed an appropriate distance away.
Bouncing accurately into place, Ra'uf let the wind brustle against his still form, and watched for the Abomasnow's reaction.
The Pokemon did much as he had expected to do, though escalated slightly by a rising level of irritation. It made sense that it would be angry when he thought about, for the delicious snack which it had just thought to have claimed had turned out to be nothing more than rubbery boot. In addition, no Pokemon alive enjoyed seeing a skill it possessed outdone, and intelligence was of particular pride, no matter how intelligent the Pokemon in question might actually be. As a result, the Abomasnow turned with a growl rather than a roar, and proceeded personally towards the new disturbance without launching a fourth volley.
With a slight chill, Ra'uf realized that it no longer desired merely his death, but that he suffer beforehand. If events still somehow managed to go bad, he had earned himself an agonizing end that could be defined by any one of the very many capabilities a Pokemon possessed. It could freeze him, crush him, rip him into parts, or simply ingrain its roots into his body and feed off his insides, as well as any creative combination of the above. Despite being more secure where he currently stood than he had been for the entire encounter, Ra'uf found himself growing steadily more nervous with each step that brought him and the Abomasnow closer together. The feeling was not entirely attributable to fear, though; for each step that brought Ra'uf closer to the Abomasnow brought him closer to his impending murder of another intelligent being.
Gripping the ice pick firmly in his hands to outlet his anxiety and steel himself for the task ahead, Ra'uf forced himself to continue. By the tenth step, Ra'uf realized how truly accurate his throw had been. By the eleventh, Ra'uf was standing directly above his boot, and the Abomasnow was merely another eight foot step away. On the twelfth, the Abomasnow landed directly before him, and all that was left to do was strike.
Breathing in only a shallow breath for support, for a larger one would give away his position, Ra'uf lifted his ice pick and swung. Moments later it collided with the eye, and penetrated the surface surface. It was far harder, Ra'uf realized in that moment, then he had ever imagined an eye could be. A final second later, the ice pick stopped moving, and both the Abomasnow and Ra'uf stood still. Then, simultaneously, they reacted.
Horror and disbelief sprang to life within Ra'uf as he watched the Abomasnow jerk away from him, thrashing its enormous wooden arms along with the entirety of its body, causing the icepick, which had embedded itself barely half of an inch into its eye, to flail about with it. Ra'uf could only feel the gravity of his failure pressing in on him; he had swung the ice pick, with as much strength and precision as he possessed, and it had collided with what felt like iron Jello. He had only pierced a fourth of the way through it before it had absorbed his momentum, and a repeat attempt would yield little more than what he had already seen. He was out of options, and his single weapon lay sheathed beyond his grasp.
It was impossible for him to kill the Abomasnow. The only thing left to do was flee.
Watching the Abomasnow flail around for another moment, Ra'uf found himself rooted to the spot with dread. Slowly, he made to turn, when the Abomasnow turned sharply toward him. Growling with more bristling intensity than Ra'uf had ever thought a living creature could display, the Abomasnow ceased its thrashing and turned both of its eyes to glare at him.
Reaching one of its tremendous arms up to its face, Ra'uf paled as he watched it grasp the icepick between its root like fingers, and with a single sharp movement withdraw it from its eye. No additional hints of pain appeared upon its features, and seconds later it closed its fist around the ice-pick. When it opened it again a cloud of splinters burst free, followed by a tiny lump of twisted and dented metal. Overturning its palm, Ra'uf watched as what had once been his ice-pick dropped with agonizing slowness to the ground.
The thump of it landing seemed strangely emphasized to Ra'uf, and moments later he realized the reason why. It was his cue to leave. Blinking out of his stillness, Ra'uf turned and did as he felt the sound had suggested and ran. Moments later, the rumbling growl that had been emanating from the Abomasnow fell another octave lower and rose dramatically in volume. Before he had made it so much as ten feet in the opposite direction, a loud and terrible sound, that was otherwise indescribable, rose from behind him. Upon turning to glance over his shoulder, Ra'uf found that an equally horrific sight was the cause of it.
Literally drilling into the stone with its root like appendages, the Abomasnow had rooted itself firmly into the rock, and as he watched used the enormous strength at its disposal to lift itself off of the ground and onto the boulder. The entire process took no more than ten seconds, and the moment it was back on its feet it released its hold on the rock and then comensed to chase to Ra'uf.
Whatever advantage he had thought his superior speed would give him was quickly overshadowed by the one that his enemy presented; lifting its palms as it ran, the Abomasnow released another attack, though this time of a different variety. An incredibly cold gust of wind and snow blew over Ra'uf, causing a thick layer of frost to form over his clothing and his feet to wither under the blunt of the assault. Unguarded as they were, it felt to Ra'uf like they had been suddenly plunged into the icy water found beneath a frozen lakes surface. The feeling helped to soothe the aches and pains that had formed in them over the past couple of days of travel, but the overall lack of feeling concerned him. The icy-snow attack, which it seemed to be , was perfectly capable of causing frostbite to his flesh, but the overall side-effect of the attack was far more pressing. Icy-snow was designed to cut the speed of its recipient.
And to that effect, it was succeeding fantastically. Each second that wore on in which the attack continue Ra'uf's number feet were forced to slow, and each second he felt himself falling more and more in danger of the Abomasnow. Very soon now, he knew, it would be able to reach him, simply pluck his pathetically sluggish form from the ground. What followed would be an excruciating death, and a bitter start to either an eternity in the afterlife or his dissipating into nothingness. It was best to avoid all three possible forms of torture, if possible, but the Abomasnow's gain promised his suffering of at least two.
Perhaps the only thing that could again save him chose that moment to strike, and Ra'uf blessed whatever had earned him his good fortune that day with luck. The boulder that the chase had been staged on up to that point ended, and Ra'uf leapt from it onto the ground and transitioned smoothly back into a run. The Abomasnow, however, required itself to cease its attack and come to a full stop before engaging in the short jump from the boulder to the ground, and then struggle to regain its momentum. In the time the lapse afforded him, Ra'uf pulled significantly ahead.
Before long, however, the Abomasnow was back on his tail. This time, though, no attacks spewed forth from it, causing Ra'uf to glance curiously over his shoulder. What he saw was the reappearance of a detail that had long since fallen from his attention; that the Abomasnow had as well been starving. Now little more than limping through gigantic steps in pursuit of him, it seemed that the tables should finally have turned fully in Ra'uf's favor. When Ra'uf urged his own body to pick up speed, however, he found it to be no better off than the Abomasnow's. Each step required the careful management of his will in order to come about, and in all areas his body suffered pains of various intensities. The hunger in his stomach, the aching in his legs, and the burning of his right arm were the most significant.
The mutual exhaustion and weariness of Ra'uf and the Abomasnow turned the chase into a battle of stamina and endurance, and his thoughts from earlier echoed through his mind, filling him with cold dread. If it came to a test of stamina there was no Pokemon in existence that would lose to a human. It was simple fact, and the fact that it was simple fact was what destroyed him. In the following moments of the chase, Ra'uf realized with clarity that he was going to die. It was unavoidable, at this point, and no amount of determination or innovation on his own part would save him. It was simple fact.
Unless...
The landscape had shifted into something very different than the original staging of Ra'uf's and the Abomasnow's confrontation during the chase. Rather than a barren stone arena, only several elongated points of rock, some twenty feet long and flat along the top, jutted from the ground. The most noticeable shift that Ra'uf noticed in his environment, however, as he turned around to face the Abomasnow with the Pokeball in his left hand, was that statues had returned to the edge of his vision. Almost as if to commemorate the event, an impressively large group of about twenty, the thickest he had seen yet, lay in front of one the jutting rocks. It was disturbing in a way, he mused, to be back under the receiving end of there lifeless stares, but oddest of all was that the mere familiarity of it brought comfort to him. The thought caused him to smile.
The Abomasnow stumbled into the clearing, and rather than taking immediate advantage or Ra'uf's stillness bounded ahead of him, placing its massive form directly in his path. It had not given up on its goal to torture him to death then, Ra'uf thought sadly. The large crack that was its mouth grinned at him, the first thing it had done with it other than roar or growl. Then, the creature took a tipsy step forward, and Ra'uf threw the Pokeball at it.
The Pokeball arched with a slowness that reflected the general exhaustion of the scene, but the same exhaustion prevented the Abomasnow from dodging. A strange snap resounded dully around the area after bouncing off the Pokemon's skin, announcing that it had opened, and from within its interior sneaked a red beam that struck the Abomasnow. Ra'uf managed to find it in him to be amazed when the Pokemon turned the same dark red color of the beam and then compress itself into ball just smaller than that of the Pokeball. The red beam, still attached the the ball that had become the Abomasnow, then dragged it in.
The Pokeball landed with a soft clang amongst the particularly thick group of statues that Ra'uf had observed, and then proceeded into the first of the three "wiggles" of capture.
Once the first was over, the ball still had not opened, and Ra'uf resigned himself to his fate. He was capturing a powerful and therefore un-trainable Pokemon straight from the wild. Its sale would give him enough to perhaps settle down within some city, where he could then search for a bottom of the line job to fulfill. That was only considering, of course, the off chance that any trainer powerful enough to be able to train an Abomasnow would not already own six Pokemon. Ra'uf had never heard of such a case.
Ra'uf dully observed the second wiggle, and though he did not have the energy to physically express it he felt an exponential rise of terror and dread at its completion. God, he wanted nothing more then for that Pokeball to open, so that he might be spared the tortuous life that he would be sealed into if it did not. Let it open, and then let him be crushed by the Abomasnow and go to death proud of how to the very last moments he had fought as hard as he could! Anything, but for it to close on the third wiggle, and everything that made life seem promising to him die.
The second wiggle completed and the ball then turned to the right, the initiation of the third wiggle.
And no sooner than it had begun, the Abomasnow burst free from the constraints of the Pokeball and rematerialized in mid-air above the statues. Ra'uf felt a sort of crazed and suicidal joy that managed to break free across his face in the form of a smile as the Pokeball shot off to the side, technically still usable, though it was unlikely the Abomasnow would leave it that way. Then, the Abomasnow plummeted, and the heads and bodies of twenty rock children broke the fall. The moment it hit the ground, the count down to his life would begin. The Aboasnow would rise to its feet and then kill him, slowly and painfully.
What followed instead Ra'uf watched in amazement.
Popping free from the statues remains, one at a time, were ghost Pokemon. Shuppets, Duskulls, Ghastly, Sableyes, and even a couple more Misdreavus gradually took form, but despite the variety of the species present a single disturbing detail unifed their mass. As angry as the Abomasnow appeared to be at having very nearly been captured, the eyes and faces of the Ghost Pokemon were alive with a wrath and rage levels deeper than that of the Ice Pokemons. The promise of death on their face outdid its as well, and Ra'uf realized that the Abomasnow was about to die.
Seeming to have realized that as well, the Abomasnow had time to get in a single defensive strike before it was over. The blow was from his fist, and passed over his head and into the nearest ghastly with all the incredible strength that was its power, then harmlessly through it. The blow hit the ground instead, cracking earth for feet in every direction, and the moment it was over the swarm descended. The sheer number of them caused a thick purple and black cloud to form around the Abomasnow, preventing Ra'uf from seeing what happened beneath it, but the sounds that passed through sugggested terrible things.
When they pulled away, a nine foot tall skeleton of an Abomasnow collapsed unsupported to the ground and shattered in all directions, and the thought returned unbidden to his mind ,"Do not disturb the Children." Then, the ghosts turned to him.
In that moment, Ra'uf realized another very clear thing. Despite what he had just seen, he still wanted nothing more than to capture his Misdreavus, and to do so now would be easy beyond words. All he need do was wait for his Misdreavus to return, for he wanted none of the murderous ones before him, and had admittedly already grown attached to his first choice. So if the option to live and still become the trainer he had always wanted to be was still open to him, than that was what he wanted to do.
The swarm of ghost Pokemon launched itself at him with the same rage that it had displayed before, but Ra'uf did not have the energy to be daunted. All of his energy went into reaching behind his back and drawing forth the snake skin, bird feather, and teddy bear head stick. The moment it rested in his hands, the swarm came to an immediate and complete halt.
The wrath that Ra'uf had witnessed before vanished before his eyes, and for whatever reason what Ra'uf recognized to be mortal fear replaced it. Genuinely concerned for their lives, the Ghost Pokemon turned and fled, wailing inhumane shrieks into the night. As a group, they returned to what Ra'uf now figured to be their host statues, and their final actions left him privy to another amazing sight that started with each ghosts eyes turning a shade of blue or purple, and the same shade appearing around their coressponding statues.
Then, the broken fragments, even those the size of slithers, floated back into their correct and original position. When the process was complete, the group of statues shone a bright blue which seemed to lock the fragments into place, and then it was over. Each of the Ghosts floated back into their own respective children, the only evidence of what had just transpired the shattered skeleton of the Abomasnow and a single pair of glowing purple eyes that glared at him from one of the statues, apparently still suspicious. After a minute of inactivity on Ra'uf's part however, the eyes narrowed threateningly, and then vanished altogether, leaving all the world quite and still.
Ra'uf collected the Pokeball, and then stood standing for thirty minutes, unsure of what to do. After that, he collapsed into a sitting position and stayed that way for another hour. At some point during that time, he realized that what he was doing was waiting for the Misdreavus to return, and so tossed the Ghost warding stick into a direction of which he did not take note. He was tired, he realized then, in the sense that he desired sleep, but he forced himself to stay awake, waiting. After another thirty minutes had passed, the waiting payed off.
Floating cautiously into view came his Misdreavus. It seemed unsure of itself now, and Ra'uf watched in complete stillness from his cross-legged position on the ground as it suspiciously scanned the surroundings for his stick. Finding it quite some distance away from himself, it turned to him with triumph and glee in its eye, and swiftly closed in the distance between Ra'uf and itself. Stopping several feet above and in front of him, it exploded with joy and triumph, posing before him and shouting something akin to "HAH!" in its squeaky, feminine voice.
When Ra'uf did not react, confusion tore it from its triumphant pose. Curiosity replacing the glee, and its moth formed into a quizzical "O" as it leaned a couple more uncertain feet towards Ra'uf. When still he did not react, it leaned even closer, its eyes transfixed on his own, which though were open remained unblinkingly fixed onto something other than itself, seemingly thin air. Closer and closer it leaned, until it was nothing but a few inches from its face, before Ra'uf acted.
Now much to close to his face to see his his arms, it missed altogether what he did next. Watching it from the corner of his eyes, though he did not seem to, Ra'uf took careful aim and then tossed the Pokeball the couple feet from his hands to the Misdreavus. The ball collided with it, and Ra'uf watched a final surprised facial expression sprout into being before it became nothing but translucent red light. The same line of red that connected the Pokeball to the Misdreavus once again reached out to drag it in, and the Pokeball dropped the ground, wiggling.
Ra'uf did not need to watch it wiggle in order to confirm the capture this time. The ball he had brought along with him was a Dark Ball, and the Misdreavus was of a low level; he could tell simply from the quality of its movements, the quality of its decisions and from the array of attacks it had used against him. Nothing but psywave, the attack of a baby Misdreavus, and the mannerisms merely confirmed its age. As he expected, the three wiggles went by quickly and without fail, and when the ball had come to a rest he reached down and took it from the ground.
Holding it tightly in his left hand, Ra'uf realized that he would have to be forcefully removed from the ball for him to release it, for his desire to hold it was greater and stranger than any other he had ever experienced. Keeping the Pokeball firmly in his left hand as he did so, then, he reached into his pocket and withdrew the remote. Lifting the plastic casing with one hand proved more difficult than removing it, but the sun had finally peaked over the horizon, and with the improved lighting to help him he managed. Once it was off, Ra'uf pushed the button, and then collapsed back onto the ground.
The ball still clutched tightly in his hands and the remote left forgotten on the ground, Ra'uf fell instantly to sleep. In just four hours time, that was how a helicopter crew would find him, remarking to themselves in fascination about the multitude of strange statues as they pulled him on board and treated his wounds.