Shedding Skins
Chapter Twenty Eight
Another Party
The next six weeks consisted of training at the beach and keeping a look out for updates about the training situation. It was a pleasant time, working on tactics and strategies while our Pokemon beat the living daylights out of the native water Pokemon, all the while working under the scorching sunlight.
Cerletti grew a lot during that time, and looked like she was days from evolving. By now, she was just as much a Kirlia as she was a Gardevoir. She learned calm mind, which was amazing. If she used it a few times during battle, it basically made her a living weapon. She also learned healing wish, although I didn't intend on ever using it. She could now use her ranged attacks, like shadow ball and magical leaf, with unnerving accuracy, hitting her target virtually all the time.
Ares grew even more than Cerletti - he evolved into a ferocious Yanmega. He learned bug bite and night slash, which were both hard hitting moves. He also became stronger, faster and much scarier looking. He had taken to using bug bite while zooming past his foes, which more than once resulted in the death of his poor opponent.
Unfortunately, Naja improved the least. He was no longer my strongest Pokemon, and was showing little interest in battling. He was still on par with the Ares and Cerletti, but if they kept improving at the same rate, I knew he would fall behind. He still had his strengths, like understanding near enough every word I said, and being able to follow my commands in battle to the letter, but he hadn't improved much.
I decided to call the Bagon Skyler. He was helpless for the first few days and feeble for the first week, but he started rapidly improving after that. Although he didn't know dragon dance or dragon rush as egg moves, he knew something better: hydro pump. He also learned rage, bite, leer and headbutt through training. Considering how young and inexperienced he was, he was doing remarkably well.
I also found out why Ares and Cerletti had considered him evil. As soon as he could walk, he would try to headbutt me with his steel like skull whenever he got the chance. I nearly sustained broken teeth and a broken nose several times. He was relentless when fighting, often going overboard and beating an unconscious opponent. He didn't like anyone except Naja, who was also the only one who wouldn't put up with his shit. He tried to attack the cobra only once, and ended up covered from head to toe in a particularly concentrated acid attack.
"Linus," someone called over to me. We had been training for just over a month when this happened. I didn't recognize the voice. I looked to see who had called my name and saw Seviper girl walking over. What had she said her name was? Was it Hazel?
"Hey," I said, not using her name in case I got it wrong.
"Want a battle?" Forrest and Marnie were looking at us with interest. They hadn't met her before.
"Alright then. Two on two?"
"Fine by me," she agreed. She dropped a Pokeball and released a bipedal, reptilian Pokemon. It was primarily red and orange in color, with a long, muscular tail that had a flame on the tip of it. Spikes ran down its back and it had fire like horns on its duck billed face. Apparently her Magby had evolved. I had expected a fire Pokemon - the heat would give it an edge in battle.
"Skyler," I called out to the miniature dragon who was abusing a washed up Tentacool. He ignored me. I let out a sigh, returned him to his pokeball and released him again, this time right in front of me.
"Sure about this?" Hazel asked me, eyeing the Bagon curiously. I wanted him to get experience, I wasn't so bothered about winning.
"Yeah," I replied. "Attack," I instructed Skyler. I didn't bother being more specific because he would have ignored me and attacked as he saw fit. He strongly reminded me of Wreck, although Skyler was more brutal and hated me more.
"Fire punch!" Hazel ordered her Magmar. Skyler ran at the fiery reptile, steel like head lowered, with surprising speed. The Magmar's fists started burning, it jumped into the air and then sent one flaming fist at Skyler - who was still running - as he came down. The Magmar's attack missed by inches and its fiery fist struck the sand, forming a large portion of glass.
"Brick break!" Came the next command. The Magmar obeyed, clenched its hand into a fist and sent a quick jab at Skyler. It hit him in the jaw and knocked him out cold straight away. I was happy with that. Skyler had gained experience from that fight and had, hopefully, been taken down a peg or two by his defeat. I quickly returned him.
"Ares!" I called to my gigantic dragonfly, which had been wrestling with a Kingler. One high pitched buzz of his wings later, he was hovering in front of me. He looked truly terrifying. His blood red eyes had black, Y shaped lines, separating each eye into three segments. The spikes jutting out of his back looked cruel and wicked, as did his new fangs. I knew he had a type disadvantage but that wouldn't matter if he could use his speed to evade fire from the Magmar.
"Flamethrower!" Hazel shouted immediately. I guessed that her plan was to finish Ares quickly, before he could do any damage to her Magmar. I didn't even need to tell the dragonfly to dodge.
"Bug bite!" I ordered. He'd had enough practice at this kind of attack with the wild Pokemon recently. As an after though, I added "Don't kill it," before he zoomed forwards. He bit into the reptile's side with his sharp mouth parts and then zoomed away, taking a large mouthful of flesh with him. Blood started spurting from the wound and it was clear that the Magmar could no longer battle. She returned it and released her Seviper.
"Poison tail!" Hazel shouted, pointing at the glass that the Magmar's fire punch had made earlier. The snake was even larger than Naja, and had a thick, muscular body. It used all of that strength to swing its blade like tail at such an angle that when it hit the glass, it shattered it and sent the shards flying towards Ares. An idea popped into my head, although I wasn't sure if it would work.
"Sonicboom!" I shouted, clamping my hands over my ears. I still heard the high pitched ringing noise, although it was muffled. As the razor sharp shards of glass were flying at the dragonfly, the noise from his sonicboom caused the glass to shatter even further. The glass fragments were now so tiny that they formed a harmless powder, which drifted over Ares.
"Poison tail again!" I had the perfect counter to this.
"Silver wind!" Ares started beating his wings rapidly and a dozen white crescents flew at the snake, although only a few hit, it was still enough to halt the Seviper. The attack also created a strong wind, which lifted the glassy powder and caused it to swirl about, creating a silvery vortex which shielded Ares from view. The Seviper had no idea where he was.
"Night slash!" I simply saw a dart of purple striking the Seviper's face, knocking it out and creating a large cut in the process. When the purple color faded, I realized that the dart was actually Ares. I was surprised that we had won.
Hazel disappeared without a word after that, as she had the last time I saw her. I didn't see her again for the next two weeks, which was as long as we stayed in Cianwood.
"Everybody!" L.J roared from the entrance to the Center. "Get in here right now!" No one had any idea what was going on, however, L.J was out of the Gym for it, so we figured that it must be major.
"This has got to be important," Forrest said as we were walking to the Center.
"It must be," Marnie agreed. I noticed that Forrest and Marnie had been getting along really well in the last few weeks.
"Shut up and watch," tall blonde trainer shouted when everybody was inside the center, gesturing to the flat screen T.V mounted on the back wall. Tyson, Raynor, Pauli, Shenzi, tall blonde trainer, L.J and five other Gym Leaders were all standing at the front, staring at the T.V. Zach, Kate and Lee were among the five other Gym Leaders. I recognized the other two as Reece and Jan - who still had to use crutches because of her injuries during the riots. I noticed another experienced looking trainer and guessed that she was the other Elite.
"...Due to reasons that cannot be disclosed, we have decided to lift the ban on Pokemon training," the newsreader said. It was clear from the expression on her face that she did not approve of this. The whole Center burst into life. There was laughter, cheering and applause at the news. There were also some less than pleasant words about the government thrown in there.
It wasn't long before the music came on, then alcohol was being passed freely around, regardless of the age of the trainers in the Center. I sat at one of the tables with Forrest and Marnie and we just talked for a little while.
"When did you catch a Butterfree?" I asked Marnie.
"I didn't. I caught a Caterpie after that Absol killed my Weedle," she replied casually, apparently not distressed by the death of her Pokemon.
"Aren't you bothered about your Weedle dying?" It was Forrest that asked the question, not me.
"Honestly? Not really. It's intelligence was non existent. It did nothing, apart from eating and it wouldn't learn any commands. As much as I feel bad saying it, I just didn't care about the Weedle," she answered. I thought about my Chikorita and I knew Forrest was thinking about Nail. I didn't really want to continue this conversation, so I left to go and play cards at one of the other tables.
Blackjack, poker, go fish and every other card game I had ever heard of - as well as several that I hadn't - were being played all around the Center. My luck wasn't quite as good as it had been in Violet City but I was still earning myself a considerable amount of money. I finally got a grasp of the rules of poker and made a bit playing that. I was really starting to love card games.
"What's up?" I said to the other three when I was back at the table, having a short break from playing.
"How much money have you lost so far?" Marnie asked snidely.
"I'm richer than I was when I left the table. A lot richer," I replied, grinning triumphantly. "I would be broke if it wasn't for card games," I said, smiling to myself.
"Must be nice to have such good luck," Forrest said.
"I have shitty luck. Cards are the only exception," I laughed. Forrest knew that was true. I went back to playing cards after that, won a shitload of money and then lost most of it again. I played for a while longer and earned a little more, mostly by winning at blackjack. That seemed to be my lucky game. When I had enough money, I decided not to risk losing any more and went back to the table to talk to Marnie and Forrest.
As I approached the table, I noticed that they were sitting very close together, not much space between them. I then noticed that they were sitting ith their arms wrapped around each other, lips pressed together in a kiss.
