Next chapter time. Due to the time I've been out, I've gotten a few chapters done, so none of that one-chapter-at-time thing. Wastes to much time, so now I'll put in two and see when I can put in the next!
For now, Spike finds himself in a very tight-dangerous-hazardous....(you get the idea) situation. read on! (Aerosmith Dream on reference.)
Chapter 52: Crimson Disruption, Part 3: Conflict
Spike leapt backwards in a panicked hurry as the large purple claw that belonging to Nidoking swung past him. Spike's back slammed against the bars as he dodged, teeth clenched, and he ducked to his left in a roll as Nidoking slugged said bars in where Spike had only been a split-second ago.
Spike rolled until he gained some distance from the bulky titan of a Pokemon. Springing to his paws, he witnessed Nidoking glaring at him intently and growling.
Something like 'Crap, crap, crap, damnit, shit, crap!!' were Spike's thoughts as he tried feebly to glare back.
Knowing unless he thought of something quick his days were numbered down to this moment, Spike hastily brainstormed for a plan. Nidoking could probably take him down in a single blow. The unlucky bars it had dented bars were proof enough. He took a quick glance around. The chair Nidoking sat in was set next to a table, something Spike hadn't noticed before, and the room was easily wide enough for Spike to navigate around Nidoking. Or at least play one good game of keep away.
Then Nidoking charged, roaring. The floor shook with every step.
Spike clenched his teeth. "Ack!! Damnit!" No time to think, Spike did the first thing that popped into his mind and quickly produced five illusionary copies of himself using Double Team. Obviously Nidoking didn't care much and continued its charge, smashing his fist into the ground where a Spike copy had been. It had vanished in an instant with a very frightened, very blank-eyed expression.
The rest watched terrified. One's mouth was gaping. And so the remaining Spikes panicked and scattered, screaming. The real Spike noticed something with a jolt. '...They aren't copying me...? Are... they copying my thoughts....?' He glanced at the running, screaming Spikes once more. He was standing still, yet the copies acted like a thousand Steelix hoards had them marked down for death. "Yep. That's about right."
He decided he could think about it later. Spike quickly took advantage of Nidoking's distractedness with choosing which copies to kill, and quickly climbed the bars of the cell until he reached the top. With his copies running amuck, Nidoking hadn't noticed Spike escape. The gator sat down to watch. Nidoking was obviously having a tough time; being so big and lumbering wasn't helping, and the Spike's being as panicked as they were didn't make anything much easier. A Spike clone hastily ran away from Nidoking as one leapt from the table and across Nidoking's face before the purple Pokemon bulldozed off in pursuit of said Spike copy and knocked over his sleeping chair and the table in a clumsy wreck.
Spike would've laughed, but that wouldn't have been a very wise thing to do. So he studied them intently instead. "They're doing exactly what I want them to... run around in sheer terror to confuse that monster-purple-Nido-thing..." Then something else occurred to him. The gator titled his head and brushed his chin thoughtfully. "But... they are me... so does that mean they know what to do already because I know what I want to do...? Or because they know what to do because..."
While Spike confused himself, the total Spike copy number had decreased to two. Nidoking was infuriated he hadn't found the real one yet. He barreled after one that had run to a dead-end that was the wall, and the Nidoking charged right into it; it meaning the wall.
Spike was lucky enough to have been paying attention again. That gave him an idea. He recalled the results of using Double Team when he battled Katrina's Pokemon. He could attack, they couldn't. Furthermore, he was beginning to understand just how much he could control the his copies, remembering when he had used them in his fight against Blaze, and then Verrex.
The gator smiled wickedly. Maybe this plan would save everyone. "Here we go..."
Nidoking stumbled away from the now dented metallic wall, dazed, but quickly swatted a paw at the last Spike copy that was standing on the table, which had been placed back up by Nidoking; lest the TC grunts complain about their broken poker table. The copy disappeared at the blow. Nidoking looked around. There were no Spike's left. Nidoking's lip curled in sheer anger and he bellowed disbelievingly, "How?!" Then a water gun hit the side of his face. Nidoking's head spun around in all directions.
"Hey ugly, up here!" Spike called, still sitting on the top of the cell. He just noticed it wasn't attached to the roof for some reason. "And no, by up here and I mean everywhere you aren't looking."
The Nidoking roared and charged for the cell. "You...!! I'm going to smash your head in, use your teeth for a necklace, then make toothpicks out of your bones right after eating you, runt!!"
Spike reconsidered. Now he wondered wether this plan would help him win or get him killed that much faster. Either way, the Totodile hopped to his paws and created a line of Double Team. They all braced themselves.
Nidoking didn't care where he charged, so long as he got to Spike, and smashed into the bars furiously. The Pokemon closest to the bars fled to the back of the cell. A moment before the impact, Spike, along with his clones leapt from the cell top. Spike landed smoothly and noticed the other clones doing just as he planned. Some moved closer towards the cell full of frightened Pokemon, and some were scattered among the room. Spike smirked and used Double Team to create even more copies for a good measure in chaos.
The Nidoking pulled its horn from being stuck between the bars and stumbled backwards in daze for a moment or two. Once he was aware of his surroundings again, he froze. The room was littered with little azure Totodile.
"Which one's which!" They all shouted.
Though what happened next erased Spike's smugness and self-confidence completely. Nidoking looked calm. Somehow, he suppressed the impulse to snap and instead, he chuckled. A glint of pure evil was in his eyes, Spike noticed. "Oh-ho... kid, I'm so going to enjoy killing you very, very slowly once I catch you..."
The Spikes simply stared back. All morale in this mission was gone. Death didn't sound very pleasant, and neither did the malice in Nidoking's voice. The real Spike was mentally cursing. 'Tauros-crap, damnit, shit!! He wasn't supposed to stay mentally sound! Snap, you fool! SNAP!"
But Spike didn't get the chance to actually say anything back; Nidoking had already started the mayhem again by trying to punch out a few Spikes near the cages. Luckily they dodged and immediately began dashing about in panic, although they stayed near the cages.
Spike took that as a cue to snap himself back into sensible thinking. 'Okay, not all hope is lost... the copies are still behaving as planned...' He moved over to a group of his clones, who almost stood directly behind Nidoking. Spike launched a water gun into his back, and as the poison Pokemon spun around, Spike shuffled places along with his copies. He smirked at a look of confusion on Nidoking's face, knowing he couldn't tell which was which. 'Haha! What, to confusing?' Spike imagined one of his clones saying, and luckily the farthest one away from him had the guts to do it.
Sounding a battle cry like never before, Nidoking leapt for them, aiming his feet at the Totodiles.
"Scatter!!" The gators all scrambled off in different directions again. Nidoking landed with a tremendous thud and the entire room shook violently. After that he proceeded to trying to take a few more Spikes down with Mega Punch and smashed holes in the ground and walls.
Spike secretly made his way over to the cell and the groups of Spike that were still bunched around them. Pushing into the crowd, which wasn't difficult at all seeing as how he walked right through them, Spike's paws flashed as he used Metal Claw and immediately started sawing through the bars.
Sableye watched the entire battle in a surprised, stunned, and somewhat suspenseful state, and when he saw Spike cutting the bars he grinned. "Hey, clever bit of strategy, amigo! Your clones over there make for pretty darn good distractions."
"Yeah, yeah," Spike answered, cutting away until a bar snapped before going to work on the next. "Now be quiet!"
"RAAAGGHHHH!!"
Spike nearly leapt into the sky and spun around. Nidoking was raging towards him and all his clones except the few around him were gone. Acting on sheer instinct, he swerved left as the Sableye in the cage shouted a warning, dodging a punch tossed by Nidoking that dented the bars again, and luckily, broke a few. Once the purple beast spun around, its tail smacked the remaining clones away. Nidoking swung his other arm, but Spike quickly bent over backwards a little, stumbling a bit, and Nidoking's arm swished by him. Then the Nidoking gave one last roar, raised both arms, and brought them down.
"Ahhh!!" Spike's arms shot up defensively.
A tremendous burst of water nailed Nidoking in the face. The sheer shock of the attack alone stopped the brute in his tracks, and he stumbled backwards. He'd been caught off guard, and somehow, he looked very much confused.
"Yellow umbrellas...tutu ballerina....I'm a pretty lady..." he stammered.
Spike opened his tightly shut eyes reluctantly, wondering if the blow had killed him instantly. It certainly didn't hurt. He took a look around and was very disappointed. "...Heaven... sure looks depressing..." A thought occurred to him. "Or is this that other... oh no! I haven't been that bad!!"
A whistle came from behind. Spinning around, Spike saw the Sableye staring at him with amazement, or maybe having jewels for eyes always made him look like that. "Holy friggin' crap!!" Spike realized he wasn't in Heaven. But with Nidoking still around, maybe Hell, but definitely not Heaven.
"Metal Claw, Double Team, Water Pulse... What other fancy techniques do ya know?" From Sableye's genuine tone of admiration, Spike ended up as confused as Nidoking was.
"Water Pulse...?"
"Yeah, your arms just started glowing when I thought you were berry mulch, then a blast of water came outta no where! Now that guy over there's in lala cooky bird land."
Spike spun around again. Just as Sableye said, Nidoking was stumbling about, muttering something tacos and Sudowoodo now while swinging confusedly at the air. Spike was glad he himself was only confused and also not delirious. He looked at his arms. "How did I...?"
"Doesn't matter!" Sableye interrupted. "But, uh—how about gettin' us outta here now? You know, before he snaps out of it," he pointed at Nidoking.
Spike still didn't know how he had done it, but he dismissed it to think. He had to stop Nidoking before freeing the other Pokemon, and this might be the only chance he'd get. Slowly he walked away from the bars, ignoring the surprised protest from Sableye, and stood only a couple of feet from Nidoking whom was busy shaking his head. "Hey, horn-for-brains!" Spike mentally noted his insults needed sharpening. "Down here!"
The moment Nidoking turned to face him, glaring, Spike lifted his arms; focusing with everything he had on the purple Pokemon while murmuring, "Concentrate..." He forced himself to imagine shooting water from his arms, while the back of his mind noted to haunt that Sableye as Verrex did him for the rest of its life if this didn't work.
Nidoking snarled at Spike. Obviously his moment was over and now he was more pissed than before. He charged with a loud roar.
Spike forced himself to keep focusing and not run to the hills. "Concentrate..!!" His arms flashed blue.
Nidoking was less than five away when suddenly Spike felt a surge of power. Nidoking aimed a punch.
"GO!" A light blue ring pulsed around Spike's arms and immediately after, water blasted forth and into Nidoking's face yet again in another powerful torrent. Nidoking stumbled forward still, and Spike dodge rolled out of his path.
"INCOMING!!" Sableye and the Pokemon nearby in the cell scattered as Nidoking fell, head first, into the bars of the cell with one loud crash. The noise of screaming Pokemon, scraping metal, and bars clanging noisily on the floor could be heard as Spike got back to his feet and turned around. The bars where Nidoking had crashed were completely wrecked and the massive purple Pokemon slumped into a position where his face leaned against the bars and his head was stuck in-between of what was left of bars dented bars. He fell onto his stomach with a low moan of pain.
A moment where nobody spoke passed and silence filled the room. Eventually someone noticed the bars had been broken.
"...We're... WE'RE FREE!!"
Cheering erupted in place of silence. The Pokemon captured within the cell suddenly charged the broken bars and poured out of their prison, applauding Spike and some shaking his paw.
Spike however was still dazed. He stared at the unconscious Nidoking. 'I... beat that?' It sounded enough like a lie. But seeing Nidoking, lying on the floor with his tongue lolling, was proof enough.
The Pokemon rushing off towards the exit finally caught his attention. Spike smirked. He dashed to the side of the door. "Run, do not walk to the nearest exit, ladies and gentelmon. We hope you enjoy leaving much more than you have your stay at Team Crap-mongers base. Good-bye and have a nice life!"
From the group, Sableye ran to Spike."You rock, mate." He quickly hopped, grabbed Spike's paw, shook it vigorously, then ran off with the rest. "WE'VE BEEN FREED!!"
As the last of the Pokemon left—another Nidoran for some odd reason— Spike watched, chuckling lightly. Unknown to him, the normally blood red spikes on his back flashed white briefly. They were red again in the next few moments.
Spike smirked. "Eh, what the heck? Hey, wait for me!" With that, the gator tore after them. Then returned a moment later and collected the TM's he had stashed away, and ran off again.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"Vulpix, Flamethrower!"
Another burst of flames roared through the darkened blue halls and towards a Furret. The cream and brown-striped Pokemon quickly rushed to its left as the burst of flames blasted by. It snickered tauntingly.
"Fuck," Cathaya muttered, teeth clenched and panting hard. That was the fourteenth Flamethrower she had used and her throat actually burned. "I've had it..."
Pearl noticed it almost immediately. The blonde trainer knew Cathaya had reached her limit. They had taken down at least six Pokemon so far, one being a water type. The vulpine Pokemon looked like one more attack would cross the line and cause it to collapse. Their team in total had taken down far too many Pokemon to count.
Things weren't going very well. All around them, grunts were issuing commands, or simply blocking off any passage of escape. Alvin, Samantha, and Melena were all still battling, forced close together, working side by side in an attempt to cover each other. And they were outnumbered nine grunts to four.
Pearl narrowed her eyes and threw her mind into overdrive. They needed a new plan. 'Okay, maybe if we—'
Suddenly an immense thud cleared the area and the ground shook. A low, rumbling moan came from behind that made Pearl flinch.
"Steelix! Oh no..." Melena exclaimed, worry made her voice sharp. She rushed over to the fallen steel snake's side. He was burned, bashed up, and just flat out exhausted. He lay panting on the floor, and Melena rubbed a giant steel boulder on his side soothingly. His tail had accidently put a large hole in the wall. It was lucky the area was large enough for Steelix to collapse in without crushing anyone. Melena smiled warm-heartedly as Steelix tried to push himself back up, "You're awesome, Steelix, but that's it; you've fought enough."
Steelix gave an exhausted nod and fell back to the ground. Melena recalled him to her Pokeball.
"We... we did it! We took it down!!" Melena was once again aware of the grunts. After fourteen Pokemon they finally had, and the brunette growled and backed away, regrouping near Pearl, Samantha and Alvin. "How's everyone?"
"Not very good." Came Samantha's reply, throughly frustrated. She was intently focused on her Eevee, Faith, nipping and dashing around a Sneasel, which did a far better job at playing a speed game than It did.
"It's not much better here, either," Pearl threw in. Melena saw Cathaya. The Vulpix looked downright exhausted, trembling on her feet. "...How much longer can we keep this up?"
Just then, stars zoomed by over their heads. In the next instant, Scope was spiraling down from the air with an injured wing. "I'm hit! Mayday! Mayday!" He crashed into the ground hard.
"Ack! Scope, are you all right?! "Alvin ran then slid on his knees next the fallen Yanma.
Melena sighed. 'This can't go on...' She closed her eyes to think. They hadn't completed their part of the mission to take down the signal jamming satellite. Calling in the Jennys wasn't possible now. 'We must have bought enough time by now... the rest is up them.' The brunette reopened her eyes to fix a murderous glare on the nearest grunt, who was smirking like a madman at that moment. "All right, all right. We give up."
