A/N: The previous chapters have been updated to reflect a minor change in Volume 4. You may want to reread Blake's POV again—the changes there propagate throughout.

Volume 9: Preemption

Ruby vs. Braviary

While Weiss was fetching my partner for the day, an Audino brought me breakfast. I was feeling much more rested and ready to move around more, but I didn't want to push my leg. Weiss returned, bringing with her one of Cynthia's Luxury Balls.

"This is Braviary," she said. "Cynthia said he was a little temperamental, but thinks you'll get along well."

She sent him out. He had red feathers on his back, and blue on his underside. A white crown with three more red feathers gave him an impressive stature. He was close to my height, and he strutted over to the side of my bed.

"Hello, Braviary," I said. I activated my aura. "My name is Ruby. I try to learn Air techniques. You help?"

He stuck out his chest, and I reached out my hand to stroke him. He accepted my petting for a minute. Then I channeled a portion of my aura into my hand. He eyed it warily. Concentrating, I threw the gathered aura. I was imitating something I had seen Barry's Staraptor do while dueling with the Nevermores. He had thrown some kind of cutting air disk, but I had little practice trying something like this.

Braviary watched my attempt, I gestured for him to show me how to do it. He formed a small cutting edge, and let it fly across the room.

I realized that throwing around cutting techniques inside a hospital was a bad idea just as the air blast collided with the wall, cracking the drywall and knocking the picture that hung there to the ground. It wasn't ten seconds before a Chansey threw the door open and started lecturing us. I was embarrassed, but Braviary refused to accept he had been in the wrong, shifting all the blame onto me.

"Is there practice room we use?" I asked the Chansey. She held up one finger, and disappeared.

"I'm sorry," I apologized to Braviary. "I not think."

He preened. I stroked him some more before a nurse came along. When she saw the damage to the wall, she glanced at me. I smiled. "I'm sorry. I want to practice technique, but not think about damages. Is there place practice?"

The nurse smiled back. "Let me get a wheelchair. As long as you don't exert yourself, you can go to the training center with your Pokémon."

I was about to correct her, to say that Braviary wasn't my Pokémon, but she had already left. Weiss just sighed. "Ruby, I could have told you that was a bad idea."

"Yeah, I'm sorry."

The nurse came back with a wheelchair, and helped me into it. I returned Braviary, placing the Poké Ball on my lap. "I can take her," said Weiss. "I know where place is."

The nurse smiled, and said to me, "Take is easy, and be back in two hours for a checkup."

We took an elevator down to the tunnel floor. I had heard mention of the tunnel several times, but it was kind of cool. They had lights embedded into the walls, and the tiled floor had a zig-zag pattern of white and mint green. Fifteen minutes later, we arrived at the training center.

The place was mostly a large open room with an especially large ceiling. There were maybe half a dozen trainers in the room, each training with their Pokémon. I tried to identify as many as I could: a Buizel training his water techniques; a Staravia running drills on her dives; a Vulpix practicing emitting embers from his coat; a Bibarel sparring with a Luxio. There were two more I didn't recognize—a purple balloon practicing what looked like a Shadow Ball, and a bug covered in leaves—which I resolved to look up in the Pokédex later.

Barry had let me borrow his, so I had taken to looking through and memorizing each Pokémon I could while I was on break between patrols. I could name about 200 of them off the top of my head, but there were still so many more than that. I had prioritized learning about the ones I saw, but there were a few I couldn't help but look at.

A few of the Pokémon that stood out included Charizard, Machamp, Kabutops, Houndoom, Crobat, Sceptile, Breloom, Milotic, Krookodile, Pyroar, and Dragalge. I liked each of them for different reasons, except for Houndoom. They were eerily similar to Grimm, though I knew that they wouldn't be like that in real life.

Blake was off in one corner practicing with Beck's Banette, while Yang was sparring with Hosaki center stage. I decided not to bother them, instead directing Weiss to an unoccupied corner. A few of the trainers had become distracted by Yang and Hosaki's spar, pointing and whispering to each other.

I sent Braviary out. It was time to get to work. I started by requesting him to show me what he had done earlier.

With more space to let loose, he amped up the power of his technique. As he flew, a visible disk of air began to spin, and he threw them at the ground, kicking up a large cloud of dust. When the dust settled, there was a large gash through the floor. I motioned for him to return to me, and told him to build the technique up slowly, while standing next to me.

As best I could, I imitated his form, trying for a much smaller disk than his. From what I had seen of Yang, Weiss, and Blake, it was best if you started small. So I did.

My first attempt did little more than stir the dust on the floor, but I was happy getting at least some result. Twisting my aura into a disk was difficult, but I did my best. I alternated between mimicking Braviary and watching him perform for the better part of an hour and a half, until my aura was depleted enough it was beginning to become harder to use it.

Weiss had left soon into my training session, citing a desire to talk to Candice, leaving me to try and maneuver myself around. I rolled myself over to Blake, who was still practicing with Banette. When she noticed me, she walked over.

"You're out of your room," she commented.

"Yup." I grinned. "The nurse let me out on the condition I didn't overexert myself. Weiss took me here when I didn't think about collateral damage inside a hospital room."

"What were you practicing?"

"It wasn't me," I protested.

"Ruby," intoned Blake, "do you take me for a fool?"

"It really wasn't. Cynthia let me borrow her Braviary for the day, and I told him to use the technique that Barry's Staraptor was using against the Nevermores."

"Braviary?"

I pointed to where he was currently floating. "That's him."

"How did your practice go?"

"Well, it's a little resource intensive, but I think I'm starting to get what I'm supposed to do." I demonstrated, showing her the progress I had made.

The disk was still very transparent, but it gouged out a sliver of the floor. Blake looked suitably impressed.

"How about you?" I asked. "What have you been working on?"

"I'm still trying to master Shadow Claw," said Blake. "It's more functional that it was before, but I still have a ways to go. These aura techniques are hard."

I nodded. "I'm months from the skill Braviary has over Air Slash."

She demonstrated her Shadow Claw for me. She had moved on from just using it on one finger, but it still only extended about an inch from her fingernails. I looked at Banette, and he took his cue, showing me the mastered version.

A hand of shadow superimposed itself over Banette's arm, five large fingers protruding and extending several feet before dissipating. I whistled. Blake was still a long way off.

"How much aura are you putting into it?" I asked.

"Not a lot," she admitted.

"Why don't you triple the amount you put in, and see what happens?"

She shrugged, and focused. A blob of shadow clung over her fingers, and she furrowed her brow as she tried to direct the shadowy mass. For half a second, three stubs emerged, trying to form fingers, but didn't hold. Blake let out her breath.

"I think I know what I was doing wrong," she said. "I was feeding aura to the technique little by little, instead of starting with a large amount and going from there."

"That can't be the rule though," I said, "because Yang's fire is a continuous stream."

"I think that's because she has to constantly generate new fire," speculated Blake. "My technique doesn't change at all once it's done, but hers goes for as long as she puts new aura in. Two categories of techniques, then."

"That's a useful distinction," I said. "Mine would be like yours, and what Weiss was trying to do with her cold air would be like Yang's."

"Reminds me of the three categories of techniques they use. They have physical, for attacks that make contact, special, for ranged attacks, and status moves as a catch all for stuff that doesn't do immediate damage."

"I don't recall seeing any status moves," I said.

"Actually, do you remember the Gyarados?" When I nodded, she continued. "The dark green aura it emitted? That was a boosting move. It's called Dragon Dance, and it boosts your physical power and speed."

"That sounds incredibly useful."

"Apparently, they're really difficult to use properly, and they wear off after a while—faster the more you boost."

"Still, having a boosting move would really help," I said.

"That's something to think about for the future. We need to focus on mastering what we're learning now before we can think about other techniques."

"Yeah."

"Were you getting hungry at all? I'm about ready for some lunch, myself. I could take you to the cafeteria," offered Blake.

"Not really, but I'm low on aura, so I was planning a long break anyway. If you want to take me, I'll go."

Blake returned Banette, and I did the same for Braviary. As we exited the training center, I asked, "Was there much from the strategy meeting you got last night?"

"Mostly they were talking about synergy. Not all of them have fought together before, so they were mostly going over their Pokémon's capabilities. A lot of it was really interesting, but it was hard to follow because I didn't know which techniques they were referencing. I was going to watch their training session this afternoon, to see exactly what they were talking about."

I a little quieter, I asked. "Do you think they stand a chance?"

"They sounded pretty optimistic," said Blake.

"But what do you think?"

"I think they're going to pull out on top."

"It's just, last time we were so lucky. I...just thinking about all the ways it could have gone wrong..."

Blake put a hand on my shoulder. "Hey, where's the girl who said, 'Let's kill it'?"

"Back in the forest, with her leg bleeding out."

She squeezed my shoulder. "Good thing she had her teammates to rescue her, then."

"Yeah."

We arrived at the cafeteria in silence. I spotted Yang, and directed Blake over to her.

"How was your morning?" I asked.

"Ruby!" Yang exclaimed. "You're in a wheelchair."

"I was getting restless and breaking things."

"What were you breaking?" demanded Yang.

"I just assisted in the fragmentation of a wall," I said.

Yang laughed.

I pouted. "What's so funny?"

"Sorry, you just cracked me up."

I sighed. "I saw some of your training with Hosaki. Was there anything specific you were working on?"

"I mainly wanted to get him accustomed to his new body," said Yang.

"Cool. I was..." I trailed off when I noticed Weiss running in. She saw me waving, and hurried over.

"Weiss. What's—"

"The Goliaths..." she panted. "They're moving on Shelter Town."

Weiss vs. Sneasel

"How long until they reach there?" asked Blake.

"I don't know," I answered. Candice had received a call while we were talking, and when she relayed the information to me, I had run off to find my teammates. I was annoyed that my conversation had been interrupted, but I knew my irritation wouldn't change anything. Candice was fun to talk to, and after the fight was over, I was going to find her again.

One of the first things I had asked her was why she wasn't participating in the Goliath fight. She replied that her job as a Gym Leader was to protect the people, first and foremost, in an event like this. As much as she wanted to fight, she was going to only fight defensively and would put her efforts on evacuating people over directly confronting the Goliaths. She also added that she felt that the Goliaths were out of her league. Then she had to return her little bipedal weasel Pokémon because he was being troublesome.

I could respect that. She knew her limits, and wasn't afraid to take the defensive option. And that's what needed to happen now.

"What're we waiting for?" asked Yang. "Let's get suited up."

"Actually, Cynthia requested that we sit this battle out."

Yang frowned. I knew she was going to be the one that took the request the worst. She had been swatted aside by the first Goliath, and she wanted to prove she was more than that. But Blake understood. I could see it in her calm expression. We were hopelessly outmatched against them. To make matters worse, Blake and I were out of Dust. Yang was still dangerous without her weapon. Blake and I...less so.

"And do what?" Yang asked. "Nothing?"

"Yang, you're really the only combat capable against the Goliaths out of all of us," I said. "I'm out of Dust, which limits my offensive potential greatly. Blake doesn't have enough aura to go for very long when she has to supercharge her attacks just to break their skin. Ruby…."

She sighed. "I get that. But it doesn't feel right to stand by when others are risking their lives to do our job."

"It's no more our job than theirs," argued Blake. "They are the primary defenders for their citizens. They have more claim to this fight than we do."

"Still…."

"They want us with Rowan at the communication hub," I added. "We'll still be able to hear what's going on with the battle."

"We should get going, then," said Ruby. I grabbed her wheelchair, and together, the four of us headed to the communication hub.

The communication hub was just the meeting room we had been using repurposed with a new computer to track the radio transmissions. To my surprise, Cynthia was there.

"What you doing here?" I asked. "Not with others?"

She shook her head. "Portal alone. I check out. My Pokémon okay alone."

My eyes widened. Was she going to…?

"Want to go home?"

"But what about you all?" cried Ruby.

"We okay alone," said Cynthia.

I wasn't sure what to say. My mouth had dried up.

"Even though we don't know the root of the portals?" asked Blake.

"What if last portal?"

I was torn. I was surprised that I was torn. There was something freeing about this place. I couldn't place it. But here I wasn't being constantly evaluated, analyzed for any mistakes. Beacon had been a taste of that freedom. I now had more self expression than I ever did before.

"Do you think this will be the last portal?" asked Yang.

Cynthia smiled. "I think there will be two, maybe three more. But I be wrong."

"If there's a strong chance there will be more portals, my vote is to stay."

A beat.

Blake frowned, considering my words. Ruby smiled at me.

"I think we should stay, too," she declared. "But if you both say we should go back, then we will."

"I think we should take this chance while we can," said Blake. "If there aren't any more portals, then we're stuck here forever."

"Why do you think there will be more portals?" I asked Cynthia.

"Because of where portals are. Mt. Coronet, close to Lake Acuity. I think two or three more portals. One at Lake Valor, one at Lake Verity, and maybe one more at Mt. Coronet."

That...made a lot of sense, actually. It would explain why the portals were where they were. The three lakes were connected to Uxie, Azelf, and Mesprit. Since they had intervened in the fight between Dialga and Palkia, it was safe to assume at least some connection remained.

"Yang," said Ruby, "you have the deciding vote."

"I...vote we stay. I think there's a lot we can still do to help. Not to mention all the new aura techniques."

Cynthia looked surprised. "Thank you."

"I still would like to check out the portal," said Blake.

"You come with me."

The radio crackled, and Rowan picked up. "We're getting into position. We can see the Goliaths on the horizon. ETA fifteen minutes."

"Understood."

Once Cynthia and Blake left, it was a tense wait while the Goliaths approached. Flint called in every couple of minutes to confirm the situation. I didn't know much of what they had planned, but I hoped it was enough.

"Preparing to engage. On my count. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Now!"

Blake vs. Meowstic

We traveled to the portal on the back of Cynthia's Braviary. I was initially surprised to find that he could hold both of us in flight, but Pokémon were deceptively strong, and any Pokémon owned by the Champion more so.

The area around the portal was still a mess. Burnt and shattered trees, scorched earth, and an area of basaltic rock where Camerupt's lava had cooled. Snow had drifted in, but there had been no significant precipitation since the battle. As we drew close to land, I spotted an Ursa, and pointed it out to Cynthia.

She gave an order to Braviary, who formed an Air Slash and let the giant spinning disk slice through the Ursa's upper body. The disk was at least twice as large than what he had used in the training room, and it cleaved the Ursa in two.

Landing, Cynthia walked up to the portal and pulled out three Poké Balls. She returned Braviary, sending out Lucario and a cat-like Pokémon I didn't recognize. She had white fur, with navy blue accents and amber eyes.

Together, we examined the portal. The color of the portal was different than I remembered—more of a dark blue, rather than the pure black it had been previously. I poured aura into my eyes, but it revealed nothing to me. Lucario, on the other hand, had a more definite reaction.

"This portal is most unusual," he said. "It feels as though a perfectly round hole has been cut from reality and then matched up with another perfectly round hole. I cannot sense beyond this hole, but I feel it."

"Meowstic, any observations?" asked Cynthia.

The bipedal cat shook her head. Cynthia sighed. "I'm tempted to go through the portal, but I am unsure of what potential consequences there might be."

"There could be any number of Grimm on the other side," I pointed out.

"That's a risk I'm willing to take."

I looked her over once again. I knew by now that she was adventurous and calculating. That was a dangerous combination, as it meant that she pushed herself to the edge of her capabilities as often as she could.

"I'll go first," I said. "When I get to the other side, I'll throw two rocks back to let you know I'm okay. If it's only one rock, come through to help. If I don't throw any…." I trailed off.

"Wait for about three minutes before giving up on me," I continued. She nodded, and taking a deep breath, I stepped through the portal.

The portal was just as disorienting as the first time, though in reverse. Colors stretched out and swirled at various speeds, until I stepped out the other end.

I immediately evaluated my surroundings, and finding no Grimm to be in the vicinity, I picked up two rocks and tossed them through the portal. I was in a forest, but there were no landmarks I could recognize from the ground. I climbed a tree, but there was nothing that I saw that I had seen before. It was at times like this that I wished I had my scroll, as it could have given me a better idea of where I was. But I had forgotten my solar charger, a mistake I wouldn't be making again.

As the scent of the forest enveloped me, I realized just how much I had missed the smells of Remnant. Sinnoh had a different quality of air, and coming back to the familiar, I could smell the difference.

Down below, Cynthia emerged from the portal, Lucario and Meowstic close on her heels. I could see both Pokémon flinch as the new environment assaulted them. Lucario's reaction seemed to be more tempered than Meowstic's, but that didn't surprise me.

I returned to the ground. "Welcome to Remnant," I said.

"It feels different here," she commented. "The air is oppressive here."

"We are deep in Grimm territory. I don't know exactly where we are, which presents a potential problem later on."

"What is your analysis, Lucario?" asked Cynthia.

"Everything around me is full of aura," he whispered in awe. Wonder. "Even the plants express it more vibrantly."

"I never really noticed," I said. "I guess I just got used to sensing that."

"But I can feel the taint of Grimm. Their repulsive wake is easily identifiable in the beauty of this place."

I blinked. "You can tell whether or not a Grimm has been here recently?"

"I can tell you what kind of Grimm passed through here three days ago," said Lucario. Disgust. "Their wakes are counter to aura, standing out more than a lighthouse on a new moon."

"Could you teach me?" I blurted. I realized a moment later that I had no idea how to ask for a favor, but the words had already escaped my mouth.

"It would be my pleasure," replied Lucario. Amusement. Danger! He stiffened, and I sensed the Grimm seconds later. It was coming from the left of the portal, and I drew Gambol Shroud, ready to take it on. Lucario was meditating, and I could feel his aura output doubling.

The Grimm burst through the trees, snapping its large jaws at Cynthia. Meowstic interposed herself between them and raised a bright blue barrier. Lucario formed a blue ball of aura in either hand and launched them at the Grimm. It flexed its neck, dodging, but the spheres recurved around, striking it behind the head.

The Grimm brought its tail around, slamming Lucario into a tree. I rushed in, using two clones to dodge tail swipes and slashed at its neck.

I had no time to react as the Grimm's neck split into three, and the second head lunged forward. A psionic blast from Meowstic saved me, and I rolled and flipped backwards, trying to gain some distance to think.

We were facing a Balaurus, a three headed draconic Grimm that liked to confuse its foes by pretending it only had one head. Meowstic had saved me from an excruciating death, because as Balaurus saliva left the mouth, it solidified, making easy prey of any covered with it.

"Don't let the saliva hit you!" I warned as Lucario went in for round two. He formed dozens of miniature aura spheres and launched them to distract the Balaurus. Then he blurred and struck the Balaurus's neck with a glowing fist, knocking it back.

I sneaked around the side, and sent an aura enhanced swing at the Balaurus's side. I swung again, aiming for the hind leg. One of the Balaurus's heads rushed at me, and I used a clone to leap up, slashing down on the Balaurus's mask, shattering it into fragments and slicing the head in two. I drove Gambol Shroud as deep as I could into the Balaurus's back.

The Balaurus bucked, trying to throw me off its back, and this gave Lucario the opening to blast the Balaurus with a multicolored beam. The beam ate away at the Balaurus's flesh, and I heaved Gambol Shroud out of the Balaurus and jumped off.

The Balaurus tried to spit at Lucario, but Meowstic formed a psychic barrier and block the saliva. Lucario doubled the output on the beam, and vaporized the the upper half of the Balaurus's body.

I tried not to stare excessively at Lucario, who didn't even seemed winded from the fight. I would have died fighting the Balaurus solo, though I had no doubts my team could win. At least, we could at full strength. With Ruby down a leg...and down on her attitude.

She was struggling to stay positive. The Breach had affected her more than Weiss or Yang realized, but I noticed the way had gripped Crescent Rose. While she might not have directly killed anyone, many of the White Fang members hadn't made it out of the tunnel. When she had asked about the plan, I had said that I thought they would pull out on top.

That wasn't quite true. There was no other option. And against the Grimm, the only way to beat them is to win before you start the battle. Poor morale only costs more lives. It was a twisted kind of logic. The happier you were, the less likely you were to be overrun by Grimm.

So I had misdirected her. But she needed all the positive support she could get. She was falling apart, and I wouldn't see that happen.

I let out the breath I had been holding. I didn't need to project my feelings out when Lucario was capable of reading them like a book. On so many levels they shadowed over us.

To see firsthand how outclassed we were by Pokémon…. Gyarados had been the first hint, Heracross had proved the pattern, Camerupt had shot my expectations out of the water, and now Lucario was upping the bar even further.

I tried to imagine how much aura Lucario had spent on such a technique, and it exceeded my own considerable reserves at least twofold.

Lucario finally put an end to my thoughts. "Unless we wish to dally, I see no reason to stay any longer. We lose time."

I stepped through the portal. It was still as disorienting as before, but I had a better handle on the sensation. Or I thought I did.

The distorted colors shifted, contorting around me as I felt myself be stretched and compressed at the same time. It became harder to breathe, and for a brief moment, I thought I saw a distinct green color, but it faded as it registered in my mind.

And then I was falling, falling without stopping, falling—I stopped, frozen in the middle of wherever, unable to breathe, unable to think, unable to scream, when the green color reappeared. I tried to reach for the green shape, but I blacked out.

Yang vs. Yanmega

I paced back and forth, still angry that I was being kept off the front lines. Intellectually, I knew that I wouldn't have much impact on the fight, but I still felt like I should be out there. It didn't help matters that I could hear Flint's every order as he controlled the battlefield.

With the assistance of Beck's Exploud, he was able to communicate all of his orders to each Pokémon. It was hard to hear Flint's voice over the booming sound of Exploud, but I could still follow the battle.

While they had numerous plans set in place to battle the Goliaths, with the sudden movement of the giant Grimm, they had to improvise many of those tactics on the field.

It had only been twenty seconds since they engaged, and already so much had happened. The assault led off when the two Roserade, owned by Barry and Cynthia, spread their vines around the Goliath at the back of the pack. While they held it down, a few of the more powerful Fire-types bathed its back legs in flames.

Banette and Spiritomb, the two Ghost-types in the group, engaged next. Using their more esoteric techniques, they weakened the Goliath as much as they could in five seconds. Aaron had started narrating the battle at this point, trying to give us as complete a picture as he could.

At this point, the other Goliaths had started to respond. Aaron was talking so fast I couldn't understand him any longer, other than picking out a few words here and there. Eventually, he stopped describing and used as few words as possible, still relaying the info as quickly as he could.

The Water-type Pokémon had been hit hard by acid, while the Steel-types were being bombarded with a shell-like explosive that primed on contact. Aaron grew excited when one of his Pokémon, a Yanmega, finished an attacking run from above. I wasn't sure what kind of attack run Yanmega had done, but it had drastically improved the combat abilities of a few choice Pokémon.

Cynthia's Garchomp was one of those Pokémon, and it took to its dedicated role as the most powerful Pokémon at the battle seriously. Together with Aaron's Heracross, they took out the back leg of another Goliath.

That was when things started to go wrong.

I hadn't really given much thought to the amount of planning they were doing, but the fact that most of these Pokémon had never battled with each other soon became apparent. The emphasis on practice sessions in the afternoons made much more sense now, as the teamwork began to fall apart.

I could hear the urgency of Flint's voice as he tried to direct the Pokémon to attack where they wouldn't interfere with others, but he made a few mistakes, as well. He didn't know all of the Pokémon well, and he couldn't keep track of all forty-some at the same time.

The Goliaths focused their efforts on one area with their acid, trying to take down Garchomp, Heracross, and Infernape, the three biggest threats. Several of the flying Pokémon, like Togekiss, Volcarona, and Dragonite, tried to intervene, raining down attacks, but their unfocused fire did little to stop them—the Goliaths were too durable.

More Pokémon were being taken out with the acid attacks. Aaron didn't have a good view with the acid misting up the battlefield, but he did his best to keep on describing the events. Volcarona switched tactics at Flint's insistence, blowing away the cloud of acid that hung over a group of about five Pokémon.

This caused one of the Goliaths to start targeting the skies, and the flying Pokémon soon had their time occupied by narrow dodging of the acid grenades.

Things finally started looking up when another one of Aaron's Pokémon, Shuckle, finished prepping her most powerful technique, and knocked the feet of another Goliath out from under it. Garchomp took this opportunity to finish off the newly downed Goliath, slicing through its head.

The two Milotic, now recovered enough, launched another assault. Barry's Empoleon used a drilling technique to further damage the leg of the first Goliath, distracting it enough for Heracross to bounce off of Palmer's Grumpig and impale it in the throat. As it died, the Goliath poured out as much acid as it could muster, and the other three did so as well.

When the smoke cleared, the three remaining Goliaths had left, running back towards the portal. Flint ordered the flying Pokémon not to give chase, and the trainers rushed out, returning all of their Pokémon. Alakazam was waiting, ready to teleport everyone back to the Pokémon Center for treatment.

They all appeared in the room. There was a shuffle of Poké Balls as the more critically injured Pokémon were given to Barry to rush to the nurses. "—should set up an ambush for them at the portal," argued Aaron. "We have enough Pokémon still combat ready. If we hit them while they're still reeling…."

"Patch me through to Cynthia," Flint requested. "I want her opinion before we make a move."

Rowan nodded and dialed her number. The signal came up blank. He frowned. "I can't reach her."

Why wouldn't we be able to connect? Wait…if they were near the portal, Cynthia may have convinced Blake to go through the portal….

"They might be on the other side of the portal," I said.

Flint's eyes widened. "We attack," he said immediately. "If she doesn't know that there are three especially hostile Goliaths coming her way…."

I shuddered. Blake was out there too.

Aaron turned to Weiss. "May we borrow your Chimecho? We don't have a good medic on hand, and it would be helpful to have a Pokémon on site to deal with those injuries."

Weiss hesitated. "She would be kept from the battle at all times," he assured her.

Reluctantly, she placed Chimecho's Poké Ball in his hand. "Take good care of her," she said.

"I will," he promised.

"We need to go now if we're going to have any time to set up an ambush," Flint cut in. "Alakazam, if you would?"

Flint and Aaron vanished, leaving Palmer, Beck, and Jamie in the room with us.

"What happened out there?" asked Ruby.

"It was chaos," said Jamie. "I could hardly see what was happening. Aaron didn't really have time to explain all that was happening, but he got the gist of it across."

"He talked too fast for us to really understand," I said.

Between the three of them, they helped us gain a little more understanding of the events. I didn't really care about the details of Banette and Spiritomb's ghosting, but I was curious about Yanmega.

Yanmega had an ability called Speed Boost, which allowed him to naturally gain speed the longer he stayed in combat. He had combined that with two technique, Ominous Wind and Silver Wind, which had secondary effects that could boost his other stats. These stat boosts could be copied with Psych Up, and even transferred to another Pokémon with Baton Pass. Volbeat had used both of those techniques to massively increase Garchomp's attacking abilities.

But afterwards, things started to get messy when one of Flint's Houndoom's attacks went awry and struck Palmer's Rhyperior in the back. Several other missteps occurred, and their unity started to crumble under the Goliath's acid assault, until the bigger flying Pokémon stepped in to clear the acid cloud that had built up.

Then Aaron's Shuckle did her work. With the combination of Defense Curl, Power Trick, and Rollout, she had knocked one of the Goliath's off its feet. This had allowed Garchomp to get in the killing blow, and according to Beck, changed the tide of the battle. "We weren't doing enough damage, and the two that were injured weren't quite out of the fight yet. Shuckle turned a loss into a victory, with Garchomp's help."

These explanations answered most of my questions. Weiss was still curious about some of the techniques they had employed, as she had wanted to see them practice, but hadn't for obvious reasons. Palmer was busy explaining how Milotic's Aqua Ring worked when Flint and Aaron teleported back in with Alakazam.

Aaron, holding the collection of Poké Balls, hurried out to get care. Flint just sat down and put his head in his hands.

"How did it go?" asked Palmer.

"We got them," grumbled Flint. "We got them, but…."

"But what?" I asked, already fearing the answer.

"Before the last Goliath went down, it destroyed the portal."