I Don't Own Pokemon
I was standing at the moment, looking forwards at the open sign on the gym door, which now that I'm thinking about it, I've never seen one of those before on a gym. Gyms are practically always open, even when the gym leader isn't there, technically speaking the building it self is suppose to be open at all times as it counts as a public space, like a park, unless the gym leader owns and pays for the building themselves and not the regions Pokemon League. That could be the case here but out of all the gym leaders out there Whitney isn't the first to come to mind that would own her gym's building.
Well, I guess it doesn't really matter now that I'm thinking about it, I'm sure some gyms have closing times and I just don't know about them, I mean it is possible for me to not know something as surprising and sad as that fact is doesn't make it any less true, which is the truly unfortunate part. Anyway all of that is basically to summarize that the gym was open at the moment and I could challenge the place now.
Focusing on my surroundings again instead of thinking of stuff like I usually do when I'm not doing the other thing. Besides all that, I noted that Riolu was being impatience and could practically feel her about to either yell at me or yank on my hair, both of which I would rather not happen in the slightest as both are quite painful for both my scalp and my ears. To be fair I've kind of made it a hobby to think about stuff right before entering gyms, though considering that I think about stuff anywhere and everywhere, it doesn't count as much.
So with that I walked into the gym and looked around, it was a bit bare bones, but then again that might be because it was just an average building. Compared to volcanoes, power-plants, psychic training facilities, and whatever other buildings I've been in that were used instead of a proper normal building to have a gym battle in, hell during the battle to get the Zephyr Badge the battle was outside the bloody gym building itself, so surprisingly the most normal building I've been in for the gym is the most out of place.
Really the place looks like a normal office of some middle to lower end advertisement company, it wouldn't be out of place to see some cubicles. And there was someone at a desk which just completes that image way to well. To be fair Celadon also had a front desk but that gym also had a massive bloody tree in the middle of it along with a massive grass field, so that probably doesn't count as normal. Still maybe this place as a thing like that so I shouldn't judge just yet. So with that I walked up to the man behind the desk and asked.
"Yo, I'm here for a gym battle" Haven't said 'yo' in a while, I think might use it more its certainly more casual than hello, which can have someone lower their guard and it's quicker to say. Things to think about at a later time. The man behind the desk looked up at me, widens his eyes then looked down at the desk in front of him and typed something out on his desktop. I swear I'm never going to get over this if he says he sent a memo and I'll have to wait two to three business days.
"Alright, your in luck, no one called in wanting to schedule a battle today so Whitney is all ready for a battle at anytime. Just head down the hallway and two lefts later you'll be in the battle chamber, Whitney and a referee will be their in five minutes top" Called in to schedule? I honestly have no idea why this is the gym I'm having a problem with. I've battle a couple meters over molten bloody magma after scaling a god damn mountain and I had less issues with that than this.
"Thanks" I got a nod and with that he went back to typing on his keyboard while I walked down the hall. Now to take those two lefts and get this battle started. Arriving in the, 'battle chamber' which is an interesting choice of words. The room wasn't anything was to special to be honest, but considering it is an actual battle arena it does in fact make more sense to see in a gym than a office.
"Oh hey, I heard that I had a special challenger but I wasn't expecting it to be a Champion, boy am I glad my assistant told me to pick up my strongest available team" Oh yeah, I'm still a Champion technically, I was still aware of that but since it never comes up in day to day life I kind of just put that bit of information in the back of my mind. I still have that title for another few months until the next Indigo League takes place and a new winner is declared.
"I'm actually a bit annoyed at your assistant now, I have a newer Pokemon on my Team and I haven't had the needed time to train them up to the rest of the team's level. I hope this isn't to one sided" I wasn't kidding, Absol wasn't ready for any gym higher than maybe badge four, which is why I'm having her battle in a badge three level gym, if this gym leader suddenly pulls out Pokemon at say level six or seven, well it highly depends on how many Pokemon she'll use I guess. Either way it'll be good battle experience though we'll have to see if I should trade out Pokemon half way through the battle.
"Oh don't worry, this'll be about a three on three battle, so even if this new Pokemon of yours loses, I'm sure the other two will balance out the lose" Shes much more nice and not as whiny as I thought she would be, game knowledge seems to have prejudiced me a bit. Well, I can say that this isn't the first time this has happened so might as well just ignore whatever I can remember form the games about this person, which isn't much besides a hatred of miltanks and her whiny attitude, so it isn't much to ignore.
"I guess we'll just have to see then" She gave me a smile which I'm sure was fake, because I don't know anyone who can smile that brightly besides myself when I'm faking my expressions to a super extreme level to unnerve someone to hell and back. I can say from personal experience that going from super smiley and happy to completely expressionless throws off most people and puts them off edge enough that manipulation is easier. For some reason my normal levels of lack of trust just got even lower.
"Cool, then lets get this started. Referee? You can call us in at any time" The man that showed up a while ago stepped into the middle area between me and Whitney while we made our way to our own areas to stand in. After a moment, the ref raised two flags that I honestly have no idea where he got them from and held them up before telling us to get ready, so with that I reached down and pulled off the correct pokeball from my belt while Whitney did the same.
Then the flags dropped and with that my opponent threw her pokeball of choice forwards while I tossed my out as well, watching as Absol appeared in front of me while snatching the rebound of her pokeball out of the air and placed it back into it's correct belt slot. As that was happening I looked on and noted that a delcatty was sent out as my own cat's opponent, her first gym battle is a quite literal cat fight, I'm certain there's some kind of irony in there somewhere.
"Wake-Up Slap Delcatty!" Oh joy, right off the bat with the super effective moves, though this delcatty is quite fast, normally from meta knowledge this Pokemon's stats aren't all that crazy but they have a decent speed stat, but that doesn't mean much when it comes to this speed which means heavily trained and a more than likely specialized training into that aspect. I knew something was off with that smile and those disarming comments, false sense of security when when she herself told me that she was using an advance team, clever. Alright then, no reason to pull anything back, I'll just have to hope I'm not over stressing Absol from chaining to many commands.
"Detect, Leer, then Psycho Cut" She seemed to freeze for a moment, probably trying to figure out what I mean for her to do from just a few moves but after a moment she figured it out and jumped into action. Using Detect, something she learned from Vaporeon, jumped over the tail swing of delcatty's and twisted overhead and glared down at the Pokemon while her horn glowed. After just a second of build up she swung her neck and smashed her horn down on top of the cat Pokemon.
"Damn! Growl" Oh great, I don't need Absol's attack stat lowered any, she's already at a minor disadvantage anyway, and she doesn't have any moves at the moment that can counteract the effect, I should make sure to get her to start working on Swords Dance sooner much rather than later. Well, at least I can stop it before it happens, as the Pokemon was just now beginning to let out an angry hiss, so there might be time for a quick-
"Taunt" I taught her that one myself, so with a bit of unrequired pride I watched as Absol raised an eyebrow and put on a face that acted like the hiss was just sad and beneath her. The reaction was just like I was expecting as the Growl was stopped and instead the cat Pokemon just glared at Absol with a look of rage, not bad.
"Now Night Slash" Another move she picked up from the others, Luxray to be more specific, there's a lot of those actually, but the ones that she's spent the most time on are the Psychic moves mostly because they're the ones that took the most effort to learn. Still, she still knows how to use the move as she dashed forwards and jumped behind the delcatty even as they tried to move out of the way only to be hit from behind sending them backwards, skidding away.
"Delcatty, Play Rough!" The cat dashed forwards after a very short recovery time from the last attack as a pinkish hue of energy surrounded their body as they charged forwards at my Cat. Another super effective move, brilliant, Detect is used to closely avoid a hit, which doesn't work near as well when the attack was an aura to it which can hit the target without needing direct contact.
"Protect, then Swift" Because I'm in the habit of giving credit to the one's on the team that taught her some of these moves, that one came from Vaporeon. The actions that played out in front of me are practically apart of some of my signature strategies. As the delcatty smashed against the Protect and stopped dead in their tracks, and from the sides of the Protect barrier a wave of stars shot out and quickly slammed into the delcatty knocking them backwards.
"Pursuit" Absol shot forwards and quickly charged forwards, this time it was her that was covered in a dark aura instead of a pinkish one and slammed into the Normal type. After a moment once the delcatty had landed on the ground the referee called out that they weren't able to battle. Neat, one down two to go, looking over towards Absol I noted that she was a bit tired, I should make sure to train her stamina up some more later, she hasn't gotten hit yet but if she was too tired to fight then that lack of damage taken won't last for much longer for her.
"Damn, well that's on me, I should have figured that even if it wasn't as strong as the others, any Pokemon trained by you would be pretty strong nonetheless, well then let's see how you manage to hold up against this one" I honestly don't remember any incarnation of her being so manipulative of people. I mean she just did a simple arrogance play, trying to make me over confident in my own Pokemon to let my guard down, she's trying to make me fall into the 'trap' she says she fell into herself.
Oh course there was a chance that I was simply over thinking this all, but I highly doubt it. A fun bonus of knowing how to and being very good at tricking and manipulating people into the stuff I want them to do or say is that I'm decent at seeing when other people are doing it to others and very good at seeing through such a thing when someone's trying to do so to me, after all I'm much more focused on myself then others.
Anyway, thoughts of all that weren't really needed at the moment as I watched as the next Pokemon was sent out in front of me, this time it was something a bit bigger than a medium sized cat Pokemon, and by that I mean it's a massive bull. A Tauros to be even more specific, looking over towards the referee, I waited another moment before the flags dropped and this time I didn't feel like letting her have the first move again.
"Leer, then Iron Tail" I was trying to make use of all the moves she's recently learned to make sure that everything she had learned was getting a proper chance of being used, which is what the Steel type move was for, the Leer on the other hand, well I totally used that again to even out the difference in power. So with that, I watched on as Absol shot forwards and flipped in the middle of the air and swung her glowing metallic tail down at her opponents head, though before she could connect, Whitney called out.
"Protect Tauros! Now Double-Edge!" Ok, I'll admit I blinked in mild shock as I watched as Absol was launched backwards and landed roughly onto the ground. I mean what someone else do when they watch as one of their most used tricks was used against them in such away. To be honest it was a bit surprising that this has never happened before. Still, I ignored the cheeky look on Whitney's face as I called out a second after Absol landed and got back to her feet.
"Swift, Night Slash" I had one more thing I wanted to say but waited and watched as a wave of stars rushed forwards and was about to slam into the bull Pokemon but was stopped as another Protect was used, which was what I wanted as from the wave of stars came Absol as she slammed her side against the barrier, and right before Whitney could try my trick again, I called out.
"Feint!" A move she had before I met her, but one that was as useful as the others as I couldn't help but have small grin as she seemingly slipped through the Protect and smashed into the bull, snapping their concentration on the Protect and leaving them open for an attack. Something I was more than happy to take full advantage of.
"Now Iron Tail!" Absol twisted and as her tail glowed with Steel type power, I watched as she slammed her tail right up into the under side of the taruos' head, smashing into their chin, almost lifting the Pokemon off the ground, and while it didn't work that well, the attack still lifted the bull off their front feet, which means a lack of balance, something I could take even more advantage of. So with that I ignored Whitney's yells to her Pokemon to get their footing back and called out to Absol.
"Zen Headbutt into Psycho Cut!" Her forehead glowed a light pinkish purple color as she jumped up and slammed into the tauros before dropping down and charged forwards and swiped at their legs with the Psychic type energy moving to her horn. Watching as the Pokemon fell, I noted that one more hit would probably be enough, so with that I called out to Absol, cutting through whatever Whitney was trying to say.
"Night Slash" And just like that the close hit to the side of the tauros was all it took to knock the Pokemon unconscious. Afterward, while the Pokemon was being recalled, I noted that maybe, just maybe, I was a little bitter about my own moves being used against me, and the whole trying to manipulate me thing might be annoying me as well, I don't like it even if I can see through it from a mile away. I'm pointing this out to myself because that level of smack down without any chance of retaliation was a bit much.
This wasn't something like an Elite Four battle, I didn't have to plan out complete and decisive victories to reserve Pokemon to have for the next battles. No, this was just a gym match, but that move at the start annoyed me a bit more than it should have and I over killed it. Normally I wouldn't care about all that, but this kind of battling was very energy consuming.
Looking over towards Absol, I frowned and noted that she was panting hard, chaining so many moves and combos together was a bit much for her current stamina levels. Which just shows that Whitney was very good at what she does, she already knew that Absol wasn't yet ready for some of my battling styles, but she's been slowly egging me on since this started, the copying of my style should have been the deal breaker. Thinking about it, I couldn't help but smile a small bit, damn I've let my guard down bad.
"I got to give it to you, while I'm a little bit rusty when it comes to mind games the fact that you managed to do so much with me being half aware of it the entire time, I got to say, it's very impressive" I wasn't bothering to try and play the field myself, this late in the game it wouldn't work near as well as if I was planing to do this from the start. And because I also didn't really care all that much, sure I was pretty annoyed that she managed to trick me in any way, but those emotions were what let her mess with me in those slight ways from the start, so the best course of action was to simply to care in any form of matter.
"Oh? Damn, you noticed from the start? I guess I'm a bit rusty as well, I was wondering why you weren't falling for my tricks as much as you should have been, still you must be pretty observant to see through me at all. Still, you can't really act innocent in all this either, don't think I haven't noticed your own tries at tricking me" Well, I don't think I tried anything at all really, and if I have then I'm just going to say that those manipulation are from pure muscle memory. Which probably isn't a good thing.
"It was the smile, I use it to creep people out, so you using it at all tipped me that you weren't all that happy go lucky as you seem. I'll admit I wasn't paying as much attention as I should have which lead to by before said compliment, but it was still enough to see through everything you've said so far, though I was a bit slow on the whole goal you where going for which is my own fault" I think Riolu was currently freaking out about how casually the two of us were talking about this.
"Really? You use it to unnerve people? Yeah, I could see how that would work, I think I'll try that at some point, I feel like it would be a bit fun to see the result" I honestly have no idea how this started but I have a feeling that this will continue on and the reason why I was here in the first place would just not happen. So with that I decided to steer this surprisingly fun conversation back to the reason why I was here in the first place.
"It depends on how fast you can manage to go expressionless, but yeah, it's fun as hell. Anyway, you still have one more Pokemon left, can we get that done before we continue. I'd rather not let you drag this on much longer and this talk has already given enough of a break for Absol that I no longer see a point in continuing it" She blinked before giving me a sharp look to which I just gave a smile.
So yeah, I might have been lying when I said I wouldn't bother with tricking her, but to be fair she left herself wide open for it. It's not like I was planning on it originally, but she started talking and I figured why not, and it was nice to get back in a small way against her. Because even if it was partially my own fault for not being paranoid enough to notice it, I still don't have any fondness of having someone get one over on me.
"Fine, let's see how you do about this then" And with that she tossed out her last pokeball and from it came the expected Pokemon from my childhood nightmares, a miltank. I just mentally shook my thoughts back into place and looked over towards the ref who was looking confused about what just happened, and after a moment he just raised his flags up again and then swung them downward. But before the flags were even at the half way point on the decline Whitney shouted out.
"Defense Curl and Rollout Miltank!" I held back from showing my look of annoyance and instead watched as the cow rolled up in a ball before glowing slightly then it started. They rolled forwards and was quickly gaining speed and was rushing right at my Cat.
"Hold Leer on them then Detect" Absol glared at the miltank and continued to hold the glare until the last possible moment before jumping to the side as the ball of cow shot pass her in an almost blur of speed. I wasn't expecting the Pokemon being so bloody fast, Absol couldn't contend with that level of speed and power from that Pokemon, the Rollout also gives the cow a good defense against attacks. So time to change things up a bit.
"Swift then Double Team" Absol shot out a ring of stars that smashed into the rolling form of the opponent Pokemon and caused a cloud of smoke to fill the area. I waited a moment for the smoke to begin to clear and when it did, I held back a small smile as I noted that the entire field was covered in copies of my Cat. Looking across the battle field for a moment, I quickly caught onto which was the real Absol before looking away to not give away her location.
"Hit them all Miltank!" And with that a slaughter of copies happened as the miltank ran through many a absol in a couple moments. Tracking the path the cow was taking I waited until the miltank was heading towards the real Absol and was beginning to slow down from the lack of results they were getting, which was what I was planning on taking advantage of.
"Protect, Iron Tail, then Psycho Cut" I called the moves out right before the milank connected with Absol, and so the cow had no time to speed up now that they knew this one was the real one. And so with that a barrier went up and flashed dangerously before the spinning Pokemon stopped. Right before the miltank could start up again the Protect stopped and Abosl smashed her tail into the Pokemon who had their defenses weakened by a lot.
The Miltank was sent backwards and from their Absol rushed forwards and slashed across the front of the miltank's body with the second of the two attacks I called out. And with that the cow dropped down to the ground unconscious. Okay, I'll admit I thought it was going to take more than that, Absol must have dropped the cow's defenses more than I thought with all those Leers.
Still, doesn't change anything, I still won so with that I walked forwards onto the field and looked down towards Absol and bent down to be on her level. Giving her a smile, I noted she was looking quite proud of herself, so with that I gave her a pat on the head before looking up to Whitney as she approached me with a badge in her hand. Well this certainly wasn't the gym I thought it would be but I have to say this was surprisingly fun.
To be completely honest, I had no reason to make this gym or it's gym leader as weird as I did. But I was bored and didn't really care much about the battle itself so I just said screw it and messed around with the characters personalty for absolutely zero reason. Though I do have to say this was fun to write about nonetheless, but I can also honestly say that out of all the chapters on this story, this one has no right to be as long as it is. I mean this one is the longest chapter on Damn It Me so far, which for what the chapter was about doesn't make much sense. Still with all that meaningless stuff out of the way, See ya.
