Alright, two people wanted B, one wanted A and no one wanted C (I guessed you wouldn't). But I'm going to have him battle people on Victory Road now, and decide how the Johto League is organized later, because it's more interesting and less work.
Sorry about the delay. I'm dealing with schoolwork, pokemon crystal, TV and a neopet, so I've been busy and then I kept getting banned from the computer. Plus I'm working on three (ultra long) fics. I have about a hundred pages combined and I'm nowhere near done.. Still, I'll try to do this on a regular basis.
Ash walked down the dirt path. All that lay between him and being a pokemon master was walking to the end of this road. That and defeating the Pokemon League, but after all, he did have Midnight, so the walk currently seemed harder then the battles at the end of it.
"Hey you!" called a trainer. "Wanna battle before the Pokemon League?"
"Always!" replied Ash. Now was the perfect time to see how strong the trainers were.
"Ok then, how about three on three?"
"Fine with me."
"Go, bulbasaur!" she yelled.
"Go, Sneasel!"
"Bulba!" called the bulbasaur happily.
"Sne!" chirped Sneasel.
Ash looked at the bulbasaur. While you didn't have to evolve your pokemon as soon as possible, it did make them stronger. A super-powerful bulbasaur would make sense, like the one Ash Ketchem had used, but this bulbasaur didn't look that strong.
Confused, Ash pulled out is pokedex to check it's level.
"Level 32."
Politely, Ash bit down his yelp of surprise. Alright, so she had one weak pokemon. Maybe that just meant that she was using her weakest first. After all, Sneasel wasn't quite at level thirty yet. Still, if her bulbasaur was so weak, why hadn't she evolved it yet?
"Sneasel, use ice punch!"
"Esel!" she agreed, running at the grass pokemon. Her confidence had greatly improved since she had beaten Falkner's Noctowl.
"Bulba…" it groaned.
"Bulbasaur, use leech seed!"
"Sneasel, dodge it and use quick attack!"
Bulbasaur shot a seed at Sneasel, but she was already moving so fast from quick attack it missed. Sneasel rammed into the bulbasaur, fainting it.
Ash was surprised. To win you'd think this trainer would have been smarter then to use a slow-acting attack like leech seed against a pokemon with an element advantage, but oh well. Maybe it was just a rare mistake. No trainer was perfect all the time.
"Go, ivysaur!"
Ash blinked. Why was she using an ivysaur? Serious trainers almost never had the same pokemon on their team. He opened up his pokedex again to check it's level.
"Level 32."
Her second pokemon was the same level? Ash was starting to get a bad feeling about this.
"Sneasel, try your ice punch again!"
This time, the ivysaur dodged the attack.
"Ivysaur, use razor leaf!"
"Ivy!"
Sharp leaves flew at Sneasel, who managed to dodge most but got hit by a few.
"Good job ivysaur, keep it up!"
Ash was slightly surprised by this. The ivysaur was only doing marginal damage, as any halfway educated rookie trainer should have seen. What was going on?
"Sneasel, use faint attack so the leaves won't hit you and attack that ivysaur!"
"Sne!" Sneasel agreed.
The ivysaur and it's trainer, rather then try to figure out what they should do, simply kept up with the razor leaf attacks. Sneasel vanished, and the trainer gasped. The ivysaur looked around, trying to see it's opponent, before Sneasel smashed into it.
"Iveeee" it groaned and fainted.
"You cheated!" screamed the other trainer at the top of her lungs. "Your pokemon disappeared and got a cheap shot in because ivysaur didn't know where it was!"
"I did not! That's a legal move! Faint attack causes the pokemon to disappear and reappear by their opponent!" yelled Ash back, no quieter then her.
"Yeah right! You're probably just lying, you cheater!"
"I AM NOT A CHEATER!" Ash roared, pulling out his list of pokemon moves and throwing it to her. "Faint attack is right in there, and that list doesn't even have all pokemon moves!"
Grudgingly, she looked down the list, finding it. Without apology (unless you count not tearing the list to shreds apology), she threw it back to him and sent out her last pokemon.
"Venusaur!"
Ash was slightly startled by this new development. She had three pokemon that were of the same exact kind? Pulling out his pokedex, he heard exactly what he expected.
"Level 32."
"Ha! I bet your little pokemon can't beat this guy!" she said. "Just 'cuz you taught it one ice move doesn't matter."
"You do know Sneasel has a type advantage, right?" said Ash, already knowing what the answer would be.
"It is? No, I didn't know. It's too hard to remember what each pokemon's name is, let alone type too. I just know common ones. Like pidgey and rattata and mankey are all normal types."
Ash refrained from correcting her. This looked bad. Still, who knew what the other trainers were like? Maybe she had just gotten in on a day when the gym leader's normal strong team was at a pokecenter or something. Out of the many who did that, perhaps on occasion one got all the badges.
"Sneasel, try your ice punch again!"
"Venusaur, use solar beam!
Ash started. She was using a two-turn attack now, rather then try to do damage? Sneasel could easily dodge the attack and then she wouldn't have done any damage for two turns!
Light began to gather on venusaur's flower. Sneasel ran up, smashing her icy fist into the venusaur's side.
"Again, then jump away and dodge the attack!"
Sneasel punched venusaur again, then ran off.
"Now, use solar beam!"
The venusaur aimed the beam at Sneasel, but she was too far away. The distance meant she had time to see it coming and jump out of the way.
"Oh well venusaur, if at first you don't succeed, try again! Use solar beam again!"
Ash sighed. This was incredibly stupid of her. If her venusaur managed to survive long enough to fire that attack, Sneasel would just dodge it again.
"Sneasel, use quick attack!"
Sneasel ran forward, hitting into venusaur but not doing much damage against the pokemon.
"Again, then use ice punch again!"
Sneasel rammed into venusaur, then punched it.
"Run! It's about to use solar beam!"
Sneasel zipped off.
"Venusaur, now!"
Venusaur roared and blasted at Sneasel once again, missing.
"Oh well, third time's the charm. Use solar beam again!"
Ash shrugged. If she wanted to make a fool of herself and give him an easy win, he guessed he shouldn't be annoyed by it.
"Sneasel, use ice punch one more time!"
Sneasel punched the venusaur, finally fainting it. While a powerful pokemon, it could only take just so much damage.
"Drat!" said the girl, walking over. "My name's Megan. What's yours?"
"I'm named Ash, after Ash Ketchem," Ash said proudly.
"Cool."
"So, um, you have a rather unusual team. Any reason why?"
"Oh, that's easy. I'm checking out pre- and post- evolution pokemon. While the earlier stages learn moves faster, they are weaker, just like the textbooks said."
"How…" Ash refrained from saying something like unprofessional or silly. "Informative. I'll remember that."
"Good luck!" she called after him as he walked off toward the Pokemon League.
Well, I'll try to have the next chapter out soon.