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Episode 21: The Family Reunion and the Final Gym Battle!

I heard screaming children and a loud television as we stood outside Kyle's house. Kyle stood there at the doorstep for a long time before finally lifting his fist to knock on the door. A woman with frizzy blond hair and thick glasses answered the door.

"Bout time you gave up and came home." She held a baby girl on her hip. "Get on in here and help watch the kids." She turned to walk into the house.

"No Mom. I'm not staying, so you'll just have to find time to talk to me." Kyle looked tense.

The woman turned and stared at him. "Well, go ahead and say what you've got to say."

"I'm not giving up. I'm going to get my last gym badge, and compete in the Indigo League. I've already come a lot farther in this then you ever expected." Kyle said flatly.

I spoke up. "And he's a very good trainer ma'am. One of the best I've seen."

Kyle smiled at the compliment, but the woman simply gave me a look. She didn't acknowledge me and instead turned back to Kyle.

"And then what will you do when you lose the Indigo League huh? I'll tell you what you'll do. You'll come running back home, and return back to your old job, old life. Can't you see this is all just a big waste of yours, and my time?"

Kyle frowned. "Since when is my happiness a waste of time Mom?"

There was a long silence. The baby in Kyle's mother's arms began flailing and wailing.

"Do what you want. You already have anyway." She snarled. "What do you want from me? Money?"

Kyle bit his lip angrily. "No, I don't need any money. I just want you to drop this ridiculous manhunt for me. I'm not running away, I'm on a pokemon journey."

Mrs. Gray finally looked tired of arguing. "Fine. Just go finish it and get back here Kyle." She glared at us before shutting the door.

I looked up at Kyle, I couldn't tell if he was sad or happy. I was proud of him for standing up to her, but didn't say so. "When you are done, are you coming back home?"

Kyle glanced over at me slowly. "I guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it."

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"I wonder if that gym inspector has come by yet?" I asked as I twisted the doorknob to the gym. The door opened. "I guess so." I smiled as we walked into the gym. It was dark. Too dark. I felt around the walls to try to find my way around. "Hey can you see anything Kyle?" As I asked this, Pichu lit up the room, revealing tall crates stacked high to the ceiling. There were few gaps in the crates, but we followed the makeshift path, trying to find our way to the leader.

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"Boss! Mr. Giovanni!" The Rocket member approached the man, who was dressed like a mafia member.

"Yes, what is it?" Giovanni adjusted the bandanna wrapped around his prisoner. The man squirmed in the tight grip of the ropes.

"Sir! We're ready to take the crated pokemon and get out of here whenever you are, but…"

"It's a real pity. This gym made a great secret base, and an easy way of capturing new pokemon. Too bad someone had to go and report us to a gym inspector." Giovanni lit up a cigar and stuck it in his mouth.

"Sir!" The Rocket trembled. "That's not all sir."

Giovanni turned to face the man. "Well, spit it out already!"

"Eep!" The Rocket stepped back. "Well Boss, I'm afraid I forgot to lock the door back after the inspector… and two kids snuck in. We picked them up on the monitors. They're headed back here now.

"Insolent Fool! You're going to ruin our plan!" Giovanni shouted. "I'll deal with those kids. You go lock that door!"

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Kyle and I wandered through the maze of crates, hitting dead ends and turning around several times. Along the way, we thought we heard strange noises, like whimpering. We ended up back at the door we started at and thought it may be best to report this, but when we tried to leave, the door wouldn't budge.

"That's weird." Kyle said as he tugged on the doorknob. He looked back at me. "It's no good. We're trapped in here."

"You're kidding." I said, holding Riolu tight to me. "Guess we'll have to find the gym leader then."

We wandered around the maze again, eventually finding a path we hadn't come across before. We followed the path into a large open room. We stopped when we saw a man with thick-rimmed glasses and a league uniform. He was sitting in the floor with rope binding him, and a bandana stuck in his mouth.

I ran over to him, going to help, when a man stepped out of the shadows. He walked calmly between us, and glared up at me.

"Are you the gym leader?" I glared back at him. Riolu let out a low growl from my shoulder.

"My, I don't do well at making a good first impression, do I?" The man looked scary in the dark, and the only light I could see him by, was the bright tip of his cigar. He lifted his hands and clapped. The lights came on from the back in a neat order. But it made me wish I had known that was all it took to get the lights on.

"No, you don't seem to do well with introductions either." Kyle stepped forward.

"Forgive me for that. My name is Giovanni. I am the Viridian City gym leader."

"You're the gym leader?" I looked around at the tied up gym inspector, and the crates around the room labeled "Fragile: Pokemon" I frowned, knowing the whimpers earlier were from pent up pokemon. "What kind of operation are you running here anyway Giovanni?"

"You children are much too young to understand the meaning behind Team Rocket." Giovanni snickered.

"You're the leader of Team Rocket too?" Kyle clenched his fists together. "How did you get to be a gym leader?"

"It's simple really. So simple a child much like yourself could be one. You merely need to show good skill with a certain type of pokemon, and fill out a lot of paperwork."

"Well no matter what, I'm going to challenge and defeat you." I walked up to him, pulling a pokeball out of my bag. "Go Duchess!"

The cat pokemon popped out of the ball and stared down Giovanni. I was sure then, that the pokemon knew how evil he was too.

Giovanni stared at Duchess, looking intrigued. "Persian are a wonderful species, aren't they? I just adore mine." Soon, a persian appeared behind Giovanni.

"Rrrrooooww!" The persian meowed.

"Hssssss!" Duchess hissed at the other persian.

Kyle stepped back to observe the battle, and I got ready to fight it.

"Duchess! Slash attack!" The pair of persian locked claws and scratched at each other wildly.

"This should make an interesting match." Giovanni pulled out the cigar and let a puff of smoke into the air.

"It should, but there's something that's going to be a severe disadvantage to your persian." I grinned.

"What's that?" Giovanni asked angrily.

"It's a boy." I chuckled. "Now Duchess! Attract!"

Duchess let down her claws to the persian, and rubbed against him playfully. She rubbed her tail under his chin, and gently licked his fur. He was love struck in seconds.

"What?" Giovanni smashed the cigar in his hand.

I simply laughed. "Finish him Duchess."

Duchess let loose a string of attacks on the persian. It toppled over and fainted in minutes.

"A more powerful persian. I'll have to make it mine." Giovanni sneered.

A wooden crate dropped onto Duchess and was quickly lifted by some mechanism. It was placed onto one of the boxes nearby.

"What did you do?" I shouted. "Give Duchess back!"

"I stole your pokemon. And I'll feel free to do so as much as I like." Giovanni threw his crushed cigar to the ground and grinned.

"You can't do that!" Kyle ran up to me.

"Right!" I yelled. "That's against the rules!"

"You foolish children. You should have learned by now that I don't play by the rules!" He screamed as he threw out his other pokemon; a nidoking and a nidoqueen.

"Well if he uses two…" Kyle grinned as he looked over at me.

"Then we will too." I smiled back as I chose my next pokemon.

"Go Arcanine!" Kyle called.

"And Go Ponyta!" I cried.

The two fire types stood tall and glared at the Nidoroyalty. They didn't seem intimidated, and only glared back.

"Nidoking, Nidoqueen! Poison Sting!"

Me and Kyle were both a little flabbergasted by the seemingly weak attack, but once we saw the hundreds of powerful poisonous barbs shooting toward us, we reacted quickly.

"Arcanine Dig!

"Ponyta Bounce!"

Arcanine ripped into the floorboards and under the soft Earth below. Ponyta leaped high into the air to avoid the attack.

Giovanni snickered. "Nidoking! Earthquake!

The ground shook and me and Kyle fell to the ground. Arcanine whimpered from underground, taking hefty damage. Ponyta, crashed into Nidoking with the Bounce attack, luckily cutting it short.

Arcanine leaped out of the hole, shaking off the dirt.

"Show your Frustration Nidoqueen!" Giovanni called, and Nidoqueen angrily pumped up and rammed into Ponyta, knocking it down.

"Sheesh." I stood. "Your pokemon must really hate you Giovanni." I watched Ponyta get up and run back toward us. Nidoqueen and Nidoking began thrashing toward us. I motioned to Kyle, and he nodded back.

"Flamethrower!" We called, and Ponyta and Arcanine stood side by side and let out a mass of flames. The blue and red flames swirled together and made a beautiful flamethrower combination that hit the Nidopair head on. They were burnt and weak, and fell to the floor defeated.

We heard a crashing in of the entry door nearby, and sirens outside the building. A voice in the back of the building called out. "Police!"

"Shoot." Giovanni said under his breath. As we turned to see if the police could figure out the maze, Giovanni hopped out of the only open window. We chased after him, but it didn't matter. We looked out the window and saw the police had surrounded the building. Jenny was outside blabbing about the rocket they caught sneaking around the gym.

Kyle chuckled. "Wow, we helped capture the Team Rocket Leader. All in a day's work, right Shonna?" He turned to face me, but I was looking at my glowing Ponyta.

Ponyta rose to be slightly taller than me, and the blue flames on his back intensified. A sharp horn grew from his head.

"A rapidash." I whispered, as I pet his fiery mane. Rapidash turned, and faced the crate with Duchess in it. He rammed into the crate, tearing into it with his sharp horn. The crate burst open, and Duchess ran to me. "Duchess!" You're okay!" I giggled and pet the cat happily. She purred in response.

Arcanine walked over to the tied up man and bit through the ropes. The man coughed as he pulled out the cloth in his mouth. Me and Kyle smiled at each other as Jenny and the other officer's entered the room.

"Kyle?" Jenny stopped in front of us. "I can't believe it."

We grinned, awaiting our praise.

"I can't believe you're in cahoots with these pokemon thieves! I knew you were bad, but not that bad!"

We fell over in shock.

"On the contrary madam!" The gym inspector spoke up. "These young folks saved me and this gym full of stolen pokemon!" He cleared his throat. "If they hadn't arrived here, I don't know what would have happened."

"Oh…" Jenny looked disappointed.

I stood and confronted Jenny. "If you'll check Officer Jenny, Kyle should be cleared of all charges, and he's no longer on your missing persons report."

"What?" Jenny looked stunned.

"That's right." Kyle said. "I'm a free man. You can't chase after me anymore. Although let's face it, you were only doing it because you thought I was hot." Kyle grinned.

"Absolutely not!" Jenny turned, looking embarrassed. "Let's get out of here, we got our man." Jenny and the other officers left, taking Giovanni and the Rocket into custody.

"So, what now?" Kyle looked at the inspector.

"Well," The inspector answered. "We'll find the homes for the pokemon captured here, and work on finding a replacement gym leader right away. We are sorry that no one checked up on this sooner, but thank you both for the help."

"But…" I looked around sadly. "What about our badges?"

"Lu!" Riolu leaped off my shoulder and pawed at a smaller crate in the corner. Something was shining inside. I walked over and saw the crate full of Earth badges. I picked one up, and added it to my collection. Kyle did likewise.

"Guess we're ready then." Kyle said, returning his Arcanine.

I returned Duchess and Rapidash. "Yes, ready for the Indigo League!"