New chapter. Longest yet! (3.5k)

After a long day of training, we headed back to the Pokemon Center. I immediately sprawled on the lawn chair in the back with everyone else.

"I'm hungry..." Rae complained.

"We'd have enough money if Sam didn't decide to throw away the cash," Kurt said pointedly.

"Whatever," Sam grouched.

"Hey, are you Pokemon Trainer?" A voice said from close to them. Sam snapped open his eyes.

"Yeah," He said unsure what to say.

"Alright then, I challenge you to a Pokemon battle!" A boy with wavy, blonde hair and a purple beret with a white suit said, holding a very high tech Pokedex emitting pac-man noises.

"A-a Pokemon battle?"

"Yeah, haven't you ever been in one?"

"Not yet."

"Huh, well usually I like to have special types of battles to spice it up, but if this is your first, lets make it normal. Three on three."

"Sure." Sam jumped up and the other guy walked away to make enough room for a battle field.

"I'm Gauge." He said, holding up a Pokeball as he turned around.

"Sam."

"I'll go first." Gauge released a Ratatta.

"Alright," Sam said, pulling out a Pokeball, knowing I didn't like Ratatta, so I just stayed a couple feet behind him, lying on the lawn chair.

"I choose Missile!" Sam yelled arcing his arm in a throw. He released the Pokeball just as it passed the highest point causing it to fly high and fast. Missile materialized.

"Kuna kuna!" Missile chanted.

(Trainer Sam vs. Gamer Gauge)

"Missile, use harden!" Missile glinted silver before turned much more sturdy looking.

"Ratatta, growl!"

"Ha! Missile's attack is nearly nothing yet anyway, that didn't do anything!" Sam taunted immaturely and Rae and Kurt tried to laugh at the exuberant trainer.

"Missile harden again!"

"Tackle!"

It connected but barely affected Missile at all, Ratatta felt more dazed than anything. I cheered.

"Ratatta get up close and use Scratch!"

"Missile, give him a stream of Poison Stings!"

Ratatta being so close was only able to dodge half of the dozen Missile was able to shoot.

"Fall back, Rattata!" He jumped back but cringed. He was poisoned. "Ratatta! Bite!" The poisoned Pokemon charged at Missile as fast as he could, eyes fevered, by fainted a couple inches in front Kakuna.

"Ratatta, return. Good work." He said, recalling his weakened Pokemon. "Go, Paras!"

"Paras, use sleep powder!" Blue spores floated out of the crab Pokemon's back and Missile's black eyes started to droop.

"Missile! You can do this!" I cheered, but his eyes closed at he started to snore.

"Now Paras, leech life!" Small seeded entered Kakuna and seemed to replenish Paras's color. Missile fainted and was recalled.

"Let's go, Gold."

'Shrew shrew!' Gold said, balling his paws into fists.

"Be careful of sleep powder," Sam warned, " Use Swift!"

Gold shot a flurry of stars out of his mouth. Paras dodged to the side but last second the barrage of stars switched directions and nailed it in the face. As soon as the Paras's vision cleared, Gold punched him on his back and the Paras fainted.

"Return! Go, Squirtle!" The tiny turtle Pokemon appeared, which I recognized as the one that was picked a couple of days before she had met Sam by an out-of-towner. Rare, but not overly weird.

"He's so cute!" Rae gushed.

"Thank y- oh you mean my Squirtle." Gauge blushed.

"Squirtle, Water Gun!" It hit Gold right in the chest, leaving him worse for wear.

"You better give up! My Squirtle's attacks are super effective!"

"We're not done yet, Gold, sand attack then defense curl!"

"Water gun!" This time, the water wasn't able to get through Gold's brick armor.

"Rollout, let's go!" Sam said, pumping his fist in the air. Unable to see, Squirtle's next water gun missed. I could barely tell

Gold's rapid spin seemed to be approaching Squirtle with frightening velocity, but then something weird happened. Squirtle didn't even bother to pinpoint direction Gold was coming from, he quickly aimed a water gun in a seemly random direction but when the sand cleared, Gold lay wet and unconscious on the ground.

After the shock passed, I realized what happened and pointed it out to the still shocked Sam. Squirtle had used water gun on the ground from roughly the spot Gold had curled up to the spot to himself, creating a mini-mud slide that would have ensured that Gold would come from there, being pulled into the mud's direction, unknowingly.

Sam gritted his teeth and recalled Gold.

"It's all up to you Nova!" I lept up from the chair and jumped in front of him. Gauge's eyes widened at my strange color and Sam and I instantly knew that it would throw him off for a second at least, putting us at an advantage.

"Nova! Tackle!" I charged at Squirtle when something weird happened. My limbs seemed to become more flexible and lean and snap back into place neatly and before I knew it, I realized I was hurtling towards the Squirtle with frightening speed. I instantly knew I was moving at about 15 mph, amazing for some Pokemon whose legs were about six inches long.

Rae must have recognized...whatever the heck was going on right now because Sam said "Nova, Quick Attack!"

Something clicked and I sped up even more. I connected with Squirtle with my entire body versus only my head to lessen the impact across my body and quickly jumped away, about five feet away. Squirtle began to release a water gun in my direction, but using the speed I had left from Quick Attack, I spun on my front legs and narrowly avoided the attack. I growled at him, waiting for Sam's next command.

"Way to go Nova! Nail 'em with a Tackle!"

I charged, this time, not as fast but the attack carried more force and the Squirtle fell back, defeated. I stood over him overcome with accomplishment and turned back and ran at Sam. Just as I reached him, he scooped me up and held me in the air before bringing me to his face. I licked his face.

"Aww! Nova, come on!" Sam protested, trying to move his head away and failed.

"Good job. Next time we meet we'll have a more interesting battle," Gauge said fixing his hat and handing over 200 Poke.

"So long, I'm heading out."

"Aren't you gonna battle the Gym?" Sam asked.

"Nah. I don't want to play by their rules, I do things a little differently. He winked and headed for the forest.

"Wait, you don't have any Pokemon left, how are you gonna go through the forest?"

Gauge didn't respond and just kept walking after shrugging indifferently.

"Strange guy..." Rae spoke up.

We went to the Pokemon Center, revived Missile and Gold and all of us passed out in a spare room in the back.

I yawned and rolled around on my back to stretch as I woke up. The light was dim and it was foggy outside. I almost went back to sleep when Kurt barged into the room waving a flyer so violently the paper protested with loud crinkles.

"I know what we're doing today!" He announced loudly, jarring Sam and Rae awake. Rae quickly sat up in bed, slamming her face into the top bunk with an unpleasant smack.

"OW! Whabbya wanb Kurt. Is earbly!" Rae said, holding her nose and blinking away tears.

Kurt ignored her. "I found this old pamphlet underneath my bed about an old training ground near a cliff! The terrain is awesome for training! Abra and I just checked it out!"

My ears perked up at the idea of training but Sam just groaned so I climbed onto his face and stomped on it a couple times.

"Fine! Fine! If Nova's in, I am too. Lets go," Sam conceded, getting out of bed and throwing on his jacket. Rae, in too much pain to go back to sleep, put on her red short sleeve shirt with a breast pocket on over her blue tank top.

In minutes, we were beginning the rocky ascent up the mountain, eating bagels. Mine had baked Peacha berry and quite honestly was completely amazing. There were a growing amount of ledges with naturally formed steps about two feet tall. I was able to navigate through them finding small crevices or stepping on Gold, much to his displeasure. Sam carried Missile because he wanted him to be able to join them. Missile looked very happy to be out of his Pokeball. I would be too.

"How much longer?" Rae groaned after 10 minutes of scaling.

"I don't know! Abra teleported us!" Kurt called back.

"Why can't he teleport us now?" She whined.

"There's too many of us and he's already exhausted from teleporting me all the way over there."

Sam groaned.

20 minutes later

"...At least we all got a good workout..." Sam said, trying to placate Rae as Igglybuff wheezed like she had athsma.

I had to admit though, the place was pretty great. You really had to be careful where you stepped, but it was awesome.

Kurt grew a little sheepish and Abra shifted his weight nervously for a second.

"We were wondering..."

We looked over.

"If you could train Abra for me."

'Ve!' I exclaimed, wagging my tail and looking at Sam.

"Sure we'll help you," Sam told him an Kurt looked relived.

"Thanks guys, I owe ya one" He sighed, "Let's try hard 'kay?" He said to Abra.

'Abra!'

Gold whipped out his old red boxing gloves from God knows where. Or should I say Gold knows where haha...

Abra hesitantly walked over to join us.

"Hope you're ready fer this." Gold muttered. "You're good enough at running away so I guess we don't need to practice dogding... just try to block my punches." Gold aimed a punch at Abra's stomach and Abra's arms briefly fluttered everywhere but where Gold was aiming and he ended up getting socked in the gut.

"I can't believe you cant block that with such fast reflexes. Here, this is how you block a punch to the stomach." Gold shifted his stance to his right leg was bent in front and his left was behind him as extra support. His arm was straight and angled downward above his leg. "It's front stance." Gold described as if that would be obvious. Realizing I really couldn't help with what they were learning as I didn't have arms, I loped over to see how Team Rae was faring.

Amarill was shooting up little sprays of water to hit leaves off of a small tree. Rae had her hands extended, one out to both of the other Pokemon. Each of them was using them for punching the palm of her hand.

I walked up to Rae.

"I can take over for you if you want." I told her.

'Eevee vee eva eevee.' Was what she heard up she seemed to understand so it all worked out.

"You wanna help? Thanks Nova!" She said absentmindedly rubbing her palms that had tiny red spots in the middle of each. She gave me a quick stroke and ran over to the guys whose Kakuna training session had quickly diminshed to something else entirely. Sam had had the idea to toss rocks into the air to see if Missile could hit them but when Kurt had joined him he decided to put a rock on his head and Kurt had barely escaped without a new hairdo. They were now throwing rocks at each other to trying to get Missile to aim at the other in a game of russian roulette. It was all poos and giggles until there was a smoking hole in Kurt bandana a quarter inch from his head. That and Rae had scooped up a pile of rocks and tossed to pile at the boys who jumped behind a large rock to avoid both Missile's attacks and the raining rocks.

I shifted my attention back to the Police Pokemon who were all patiently sitting in front of me.

"Okay, let's see what you got. Give it everything you have." I told them, taking my battle stance. The three chibi Pokemon looked at each other and nodded in determination. Amarill bounced off her tail and shot up into the air but I didn't have time to wonder as the other two both ran the other two directions. Until then, I hadn't realized how in sync they were. I was like they each shared half a personality that came out during battle and the other half were totally unique, seen when they were playing. It was like their minds were radio stations and they were all tuned into the same wavelength.

Suddenly Igglybuff and Cleffa appeared in front of me but before I could bat at them, they started to jump from one foot to another, rubbing there cheeks.

So cute!

I managed to stop my paw from bowling them over just in time. The cute little puffs were okay. Hurting them would be like stomping on a marshmellow. The longer I looked at them, I noticed a rosy pink haze emitted from them until a foggy look surrounded everywhere I looked. It was getting harder to see them. I walked up to them so I wouldn't lose them but right before I licked their foreheads. But I got an unpleasant surprise.

A punch to the face.

Ow.

At least an adorable little Pokemon punched me. That's good.

...Wait why is that good?

I couldn't think.

Oh! A pink bubble! It's sooooo cute!

It hit me in the face.

Ugh. Don't feel good. Kinda gross. A little nauseous.

The bitter taste in my mouth disrupted the ethereal feeling I had been feeling and my head started to clear.

I could see the outlines of Igglybuff and Cleffa through the pink fog that I was beginning to think wasn't actually there.

But heck if it didn't make a good a good camouflage.

Camoflague? They're pink...but not Amarill. I turned my head around, looking for the blue Pokemon. I remembered Amarill had jumped up so I looked up. A stream of water hit my face and I had to spit out all the water.

Enough messing around. These guys clearly had gotten stronger since the Meowth attack a week ago. They must have been training hard when I was out of commission. I wasn't sure if this would have an effect or even where to aim, but I started to charge up my Shadow Ball.

I, in a lapse of judgement, I decided to not aim it, but let it explode. Or... it kinda did it itself because I had no idea where to aim it.

The explosion knocked my brain clean of the smog and I slowly pulled myself up. Cleffa and Amarill were lying on the ground winded but Igglybuff looked fine. I realized that maybe normal types weren't effected by it for some reason. It didn't work on the Meowth either...

Everyone who was apparently was watching us got back to work when they saw we were okay (sans Gold and Abra because Gold didn't stop for the explosion).

After resting with the Police Pokemon and discussing strategy that was over Amarill and Igglybuff's heads with Cleffa, I realized that Cleffa had at least ten other plans in case anything unexpected happened. We even thought up a strategy together and dubbed it NovaFairy Project.

"Rusty, git over here," Gold beckoned me over with his stubby hand. The humans joined us as well as Gold and I faced off against Abra. So it was going to be a semi-official Pokemon battle...

"Ready Nova, Gold?" Sam called.

We prepared to spring.

"Let's...not lose, Abra!" Kurt encouraged.

"Nova, Gold divide!" We ran two different directions onto the sides of Abra.

There was a second of hesitation before Sam decided on the next command.

"Nova, use Helping Hand, Gold, Pound!" I channeled energy towards Gold and could almost see a transparent grey funnel of energy join us as Gold ran at Abra with a punch. Abra teleported behind him and used a downward block.

"Don't block, stupid, you're supposed to attack!" Gold growled as he spun around and aimed another punch which only clipped the edge of his side.

"Nova, assist Gold!"

I jumped in closer and helped block off Abra's movements, effectively trapping him. He seemed to have used up his PP for Teleport so he wasn't nearly as evasive now. After blocking him from escaping a couple, times I could tell Abra was getting frustrated. So was Kurt who knew Abra only had one move. Even Kakuna, who was at Sam's feet looked vigilant in watching the training. The training surface was difficult, jumping from rock to rock, though they were spaced relatively close together, and staying at least ten feet from the edge at all times. I blocked off Abra's movements again, having an advantage by watching his feet. Something seemed a little off so I looked up. Abra's eyes glowed purple and for a couple seconds, I was entranced. Abra's voice came into my head though he didn't speak.

"Forewards, Gold, backwards, I up, ground, down, sky." Everything hazed and the ground moved 45 degrees onto its side. I shifted into the new balance but it still felt wrong somehow. Weird sounds of caterpie filled my ears, blanketing other sounds.

Was one of my paws turning into a weedle?

Was it Sidney the weedle?

No, it's just a paw. My paw. I looked around for Abra I saw him sinking into the ground then floating above the ground. His legs and arms switched places and when I looked at him, he looked like a kalideoscope. I turned towards Gold. He was closer than I thought. Maybe five feet away? Or is it just another sandshrew calling my name confusedly?

But what if he wasn't confused, he was just hungry? Did he want baked beans or-

"Dunumubaua, usde tabernacle nose!" Was that Sam. Did he forget my name? My name's...well no time for that now, he wants me to attack. The sandshrew resembling Gold, now stroking a small Magikarp protested as I charged at Kalideoscope-face. I was charging, right? Not moving sideways. Before I hit him he either cartwheeled, triple flipped, or dodged to the side. Under my paws, I felt squishy rocks under my feet fall and I lost my grip. I started free falling spinning head over paw. Everything more nauseous now, like a tilt-a-whirl. Were there giant rock islands in the sky, how strange. Maybe I would grow wings? I glimpsed the ground and most the fuzziness in my brain dissipated.

Oh great Mew, I was falling to my death. The revelation gave my heart a shock and sent terror through my spine. I screwed my eyes shut.

FFWUMMPP!

I collided. As soon as I did I lost another five feet of altitude. So l hadn't landed of the ground. This was more squishy. And now it was trying to gain altitude.

I opened my eyes in surprise as my ears finally registered the super-fast wing beats.

I was on a Beedrill.

I was rescued and now laying sprawled on the back of the bug Pokemon how was flying in an unsteady circle, slowly gaining altitude before dropping back down a little from an missed wing-stroke.

Weedle, Kakuna then...

"Missile?" I asked raising my head and pulling myself into a less precarious position by hooking my claws in the Beedrill's torso fur.

The Beedrill gave a shy laugh. "How did you guess?" He though for a second and added, "are you okay now?"

"It's all good." I reassured him, mentally trying to make myself lighter, "thanks for saving me. Did you evolve just for that?"

"It would be hard to fly as a Kakuna." Missile replied, quite possibly making his first joke even if the deleivery could use a little work.

I smiled. "Thanks." We finally reached the altitude of the edge and Missile half-crash landed only six inches from the ledge. "Good thing there was an upwind..." He muttered.

"Nova! Missile!" Everyone surrounded them. Sam gave both of us a big hug and gushed his excitement of having a fully evolved Beedrill.

Pretty soon we were all relaxing under the cool shade of trees.

"So what happened Nova? You charged at Abra when he was three feet away from the cliff but then you started to curve of and slipped off." Sam asked worriedly. I buried my nose into his leg reassuredly.

"Abra learned the move Confusion. You might have noticed Nova was swaying back and forth before you gave the command. I heard trainers with strong binds can learn to notice immediately when something like that happens but it takes time..." Rae told them.