Story 7: Meeting. (5-12-02)
A bell tinkled as Celeste opened the doors of the Viridian Pokemart with her free hand, Eon cradled with her other arm. The store was rather small, only holding two or three aisles of goods, but it had it's own quaintness about it that made Celeste feel at home. There was only one other trainer and the shopkeeper in the store, so Celeste felt free to peruse the merchandise and pick out what she wanted. She walked up to the first row, set Eon down, grabbed a basket, and began shopping.
Celeste knew she had a somewhat limited budget, and while she did enjoy the free medical care for her and her Pokemon, she didn't really want to resort to those extremes again, so she decided to stock up on medical supplies for her Pokemon. She filled her basket with several potions to suppliment the supply she already had, as well as a fix for every forseeable status ailment she could think of her Pokemon getting, including Antidote, Paralyz Heal, Awakening, and Burn Heal. There were a couple items absent that she wished she could buy, including a heal for freeze and some suppliments like Iron and Calcium to build up her Pokemon's poor stats, but she supposed she would have to wait until she reached a larger city to buy them.
During her shopping outing, she noticed that the other trainer in the store, a boy younger than herself with short spiked hair, brown eyes, and wearing a baggy blue t-shirt and black pants, was watching her out of the corner of his eye the entire time he was shopping. This made Celeste feel a little bit uncomfortable, so she tried to stay as far away and hidden from the trainer as possible. It made her shopping extremely difficult and prolonged despite the size of the store since the boy didn't seem to want to leave. But finally, after about half an hour, the boy checked out and left the store. Breathing a sigh of relief, Celeste grabbed the last of her necessary items and checked out herself, taking the time to pack her bag inside the store to give the boy time to move a distance away. After getting all the potions and heals situated in the new backpack, Celeste set out again with Alpestreon's pokeball in her hand, ready to try Viridian Forest again.
She pushed the doors open and made sure she held it so Eon could trot through the doorway. As she walked down the hard dirt path from the store to the main road, a voice from the shadows stopped her dead in her tracks.
"Hey, I noticed you in that store. That's an awful nice Eevee you got there."
Celeste turned around, a pretty good idea of who had spoken already formed in her head. Sure enough, the boy from inside was leaning against the store's brick wall, as nonchalant as could be. Celeste sighed as the boy began walking towards her.
"Yea, I'm trying to train it to fight, I've had it for several years, but I just had been keeping it as a pet. Now I'm starting to train."
"So you ARE a trainer. What's your name?" The boy said, very smoothly and with a practiced flair.
"Celeste. Yours?" Celeste had a pretty good idea where this was going, and she really didn't like it.
"I'm Yotari. How long have you been training?"
"Just a couple of days. Haven't been doing so hot."
"But you've been around Pokemon for years?"
"Yea, more or less. My parents were breeders."
Yotari's eyes lit up, but he kept on the poker face he had been wearing. He stopped five feet in front of her and pulled out his pokedex, punching in a few numbers. Celeste was taken aback by this, not sure what he was doing. She continued the conversation after he had been quiet for several minutes.
"So... um, how long have you been training?"
"Not long. Lemme finish these calculations... Ok, there." Yotari was very absorbed in what he was doing, and after he finished, a smile lit up his face as he folded up his pokedex and put it in his back pocket. "So, now that we know each other, do you want to battle? Two on two?"
Celeste flinched, although this is exactly where she figured the boy's advances were going. She really didn't think her pokemon were up to it, especially after the slaughter in the forest.
"I really don't think that's a good idea now, my pokemon aren't very strong and we all just recovered from a massive defeat," She held up her still bandaged arms, not seeing how the boy had failed to notice the numerous bandages that still covered her visible frame. "So, I'd hate to do it, but I really can't accept the challenge right now."
The boy pressed on, obviously very familiar with rejection.
"Come on, it'll be fun. I'm not very strong either, it's a fair match. You've got nothing to lose."
Celeste faltered for a minute. A trainer battle might go smoother than the forest battles, especially if the trained pokemon were any different than the Pokemon in Viridian forest. Her mind wavered between the images of bringing her pokemon glory and the defeats both Eon and Alpestreon had suffered in the forest not long ago. After taking into account the full supply of potions in her bag, she decided it was just the next logical step in the training process.
"Ok, I accept." She said, a note of coolness in her voice similar to the boy's. "Two on two, no strong pokemon, only beginners. Meet in the forest in 10 minutes?" Celeste held out her hand to shake, looking directly into the boy's brown eyes.
"Agreed." The boy took her hand in a firm shake. "The clearing just inside the entrance to the forest. 10 minutes." He let go of the handshake, turned around, and walked down the firm dirt path that led to the street without another word.
Celeste watched him go, a puzzled look on her face. She wondered why the boy had smoothtalked a girl much older than himself simply to ask for a battle. She shook her head to rid herself of the thought, then bent down to pick up Eon. She cuddled the pokemon close to her face and spoke to it as it made a soft purring sound.
"You ready for another battle?"
The pokemon squeaked energetically, then jumped out of her arms and ran off in the direction of Viridian forest. Celeste shrugged her shoulders and followed suit, figuring she should probably locate the battle site anyway since she had no idea where it was at. After a few minutes of jogging after the overexcited Eevee, the two reached the edge of Viridian forest, and within another couple minutes located the clearing that was intended for the battle. To kill the rest of her time, Celeste made Eon practice its tackle, sand attack, and scratch. After the 10 minutes had passed, Celeste stopped the practice and waited quietly in the shade of the trees for the boy to show up. Sure enough, before long, Yotari came through the trees into the clearing and stopped about 5 feet in front of Celeste, giving her a measured stare.
"Are you ready to battle?" Yotari said in a cool tone, his hand moving down to one of the Pokeball he had clamped around his waist.
"Indeed I am." Celeste said, narrowing her eyes in an equally icy tone, Eon at her feet with its fur bristling.
Yotari looked across at the girl he was battling. She had long bangs in the front that appeared to be a natural violet color. The bangs fell about halfway down her torso. In the back, the hair had been cut off short and jagged about halfway down her neck, and this hair was black. She was wearing a buttondown lavender shirt with gold buttons that fell over denim pants that were cutoff halfway up her calf. She was wearing brown sandals which had gold buckles on them. She wore several golden bangle bracelets on her arms, which were now posed on her hips, and her ears had been pierced six times each, the top three bearing gold studs and the bottom three bearing gold rings, all six on each side were connected with a delicate gold chain. She wore a gold necklace around her neck that had a glass orb with what appeared to be a chunk of Moon stone in it, but Yotari had never seen it before, so he couldn't be sure. Her stature was very short, only about 4'8", and she had a very round face with violet eyes. She wore bright red lipstick and heavy grey eyeshadow. Her features were currently set into a look of challenge. Yotari hadn't asked her age, but he assumed she was 10 or 11, same as himself. He grabbed a pokemon from his belt, initiating the challenge and thinking this would be one of the easiest wins in his short training career.
"Let's start. Charmander, go!" The boy threw his pokeball and threw it, a red beam forming the fire pokemon when it hit the ground. It let out a cheerful call and stood ready to battle.
"Ok Eon, you can do this, just like we practiced! Tackle it now!" Celeste called, a panic welling up inside her. She wasn't sure if Eevee was ready to take on a fire Pokemon yet.
With amazing speed, Eon dashed across the clearing and knocked the bewildered Charmander down. Celeste cheered happily as Eon backed up to its side of the ring and waited for the Charmander to recover. Yotari's eyes flashed as he thought this might be harder than he had anticipated.
"Charmander, that Eevee's nothing. Scratch attack, then ember!" Yotari shouted, an edge creeping into his voice as he let his annoyance with the first attack show.
The Charmander leaped up and came back down, scratching Eon hard with its claws across its face and chest. Eon cried out and reeled back in pain. Lucky for it, Charmander had set the ember attack right where Eon had been standing.
"Eon, shake it off and try a sand attack!" Celeste yelled, hoping to blind the Charmander before anything else happened to Eon.
Eon obliged, turning around and kicking sand in the face of the Charmander. The Charmander gave an annoyed squeal and began brushing itself off and wiping sand from its eyes.
"Charmander, try another scratch attack!" Yotari yelled, clearly beginning to panic.
The Charmander began swiping the air in the general direction of the Eevee, but Eon easily avoided its advances since the Pokemon was still blinded by the sand.
"Eon, good work, tackle it again!" Celeste yelled, getting excited about her chances of success at finally winning a Pokemon match.
Eon reared back and tackled the Charmander yet again, knocking it down on the ground. The Charmander had become visibly angry, and began scratching Eon, the sand finally cleared from its eyes.
"Eon, try one more tackle before he defeats you!" Celeste yelled, becoming fearful as her chances of winning slipped away every time Eon was scratched.
Unfortunately, Eon didn't get the pleasure. A bright glow consumed the Charmander and Celeste could only watch helplessly as it evolved into Charmeleon. Yotari cheered and took control of his Pokemon again.
"Charmeleon, you've almost got this Eevee beat! Give it a flamethrower attack to finish it off!"
Celeste was horrified. She was so close to winning... Eon only had a little health left, and she was pretty sure the Charmeleon only had a bit left too, but it was so angry that it was hard to tell if it had gained any energy in the evolution or not. She gave the battle one last valiant try.
"Eon, bite it as hard as you can, you've almost got it finished!"
Charmeleon towered about three feet over the head of Eon now. It began warming itself for a flamethrower attack, but Eon didn't give it the chance. So strong was its will to win, it jumped up and clamped its jaws on the shoulder of the Pokemon, not letting go. Charmeleon cried out and pain and began to thrash wildly around, trying to unlatch the Eevee from its body. Since its power had already been taxed earlier in the battle, it passed out before it had a chance to remove Eon.
Yotari bowed his head and gracefully recalled his Charmeleon. That had been the purpose of the battle anyway, to evolve that Pokemon. He hadn't expected any of Celeste's pokemon to be able to defeat a Charmeleon, but now that it had happened, it was no holds barred.
Celeste cheered wildly as the badly battered Eevee jumped into her arms, both wildly excited. Yotari watched the two celebrate.
"I must ask, how did you come by an Eevee in the first place? They're extremely rare, it's said that only a few are alive in the world today. Usually only advanced collectors and trainers keep them, and even then only as pets or showpieces." Yotari asked, curious as to where he could get ahold of an Eevee himself.
"Oh, my parents bred them. It's true there aren't very many alive today. Even as breeders, my parents only had a few. Luckily, when the lab burned down, their prototypes were saved. There are 17 Eevees and evolutions in the World today excluding mine. The technology to breed them was lost when the lab burned down along with many, many Eevees, so this is the highest number of Eevees there ever will be, and this number will only fall as they die out." Celeste answered evenly, wondering why the boy was stalling before going into the next battle. She wanted him to make the first move.
"So you're saying Eevees will go extinct soon, like Kabuto? That I can believe, since this is the first time I've ever seen one. However, I don't believe that your parents bred them seeing as how there are so few. I also refuse to believe that a significant slice of the Eevee population burned up in a lab. How many perished, would you say?" Yotari asked in a mocking tone.
"Well, actually they had around 40 Eevees running around the lab. They were just making progress on how to go from the Eevee DNA to iron DNA for an Iron type Eevee, close on the heels of their release of the Dark and Psychic type evolution last year. That took them FOREVER to figure out, they didn't think Eevees had a natural evolution. Of course, since they take care of theirs and train the lab species hard, they stumbled across it. No other Eevees had really been trained since they were so rare. However, before they could entirely descramble Ferreon's evolution codes, the building caught fire. All 40 lab Eevees perished, along with my parents."
Yotari didn't know what to say. He knew that the new Dark and Psychic evolutions had just been announced last year, but it hadn't occurred to him that the process was descrambled by breeders, and most likely Eevee breeders. He also felt kind of bad for Celeste's parents. He decided instead of humbling himself however, he would just move on in battle.
"Whatever you say, little girl. Let's just continue. Let's see... think I'll try a native species. Beedrill, go and show that Eevee who's boss with a twinneedle attack!"
A red beam formed the shape of a formidable looking Beedrill. Before Celeste had time to even call out an attack, the Beedrill had KO'd Eon. Celeste walked into the arena and gathered her Pokemon in her arms, dousing it with her potions and other formulas to bring it back. After she was satisfied that it was in much better health, she pondered the Bug-type. She really didn't want to start training Obsideon just yet, so she decided to continue on with Alpestreon since a battle between bug and grass could go either way. She drew its Pokeball from her backpack and threw it, yelling the traditional trainer battle call.
"Alpestreon, I choose you! Vine whip, I know you can do it this time!" Celeste encouraged the large plant Pokemon.
Alpestreon materialized and executed a vine whip. Its vines were thrashing madly at the Beedrill, but it was easily avoiding the leafy appendages. Yotari gawked in amazement at this new Pokemon.
"What's that?!"
"Alpestreon, the grass evolution of Eevee. One of my parent's prototypes they kept in storage just in case of emergency. It wasn't burned up."
"How's come they never released it to the public if a grass evolution exists?"
"They have an evolution to every Pokemon in prototype form, even the ones they didn't discover. For the ones that they were working on, they'd take a prototype Eevee and splice its DNA with that of plant, rock, or any other kind of Pokemon to see the results. That was the easy part, even though they were the only ones that knew how. The real challenge for them lied in trying to figure out a natural transition from Eevee to the spliced pokemon. They were successful twice, and nearly a third time. This was one of the ones they never got to." Celeste said, impatiently watching her Pokemon swipe hopelessly at the Beedrill.
"S...so what you're saying is you have an Eevee in every single type? May I see them?" He asked, his voice shaking a little in excitement.
"Yes, I have an Eevee of every type, that's the only kind of Pokemon I train. No, you can't see them unless you force me into a situation where I need to use them, which you won't do seeing as how this is our last battle and I don't plan on seeing you again. The last thing I need is every single trainer I come across drooling over my Pokemon." Celeste snapped, growing increasingly more angry as her Pokemon continued to struggle in battle, the Beedrill on defense and waiting for its owner to shout out an attack.
"But I swear..."
"Alpestreon, use stun spore!" Celeste called harshly, trying to get Yotari's mind back on track.
The Alpestreon fired spores at the Beedrill, but it simply used its wings to fan them back onto Alpestreon, immobilizing it in Paraylsis for the second time in its short battle career. Yotari just watched with a smug look on his face.
"I wouldn't be so eager to continue this match if I were you. See what happens when you rush things? Beedrill, finish it off with a Poision Sting!" Yotari called, anticipaing his inevitable victory.
Celeste watched helplessly as the Beedrill stung Alpestreon mercilessly. The poison circulated through its struggling, immobilized body, and in no time at all the Pokemon was KO'd and the match fell in favor of Yotari. She ran to the aid of Alpestreon and sprayed it with the same generous amounts of cures that she had lavished on Eon, now possessing enough medicine to run her own Pokecenter. She looked angrily up at Yotari, who was watching her nurse her Pokemon with glee.
"Didn't you have a Pokemon I KO'd? You know they'll like you a lot less if you don't attend to their wounds immediately." Celeste advised, growing to dislike the persistent, creepy youth.
"Oh, Charmeleon will keep inside his pokeball, and I've got other Pokemon to train before I go back to the Pokecenter. Now, since I won the match, can I see all the Eevees you have?" He asked, bending down to stroke the soft petals in Alpestreon's mane.
Alpestreon turned its head and lunged for his hand. Its jaws clamped on empty air as Yotari drew his hand back in annoyance. Celeste smiled cruelly at him and spoke.
"I don't think they like you. I'm pretty sure they want you to leave. They might make you leave if you don't do it voluntairly."
"Ooh, a threat. We already learned your Pokemon are as weak as the day they were genetically created in a test tube. How are they going to MAKE me leave? It's awfully big, but judging by how easily I won against it, I'd say your pokemon are all bark and no bite. Besides, you owe me money for losing to me." He began to dance around and openly mock Celeste. She became very angry and pulled another Pokeball from her backpack.
"I won't give any money to someone as horrible as you are! Also, not all of my Pokemon are 4 feet tall and weak. Some of them are even bigger and stronger. I'll let you see one more before you leave." She said cooly and with a hint of sarcasm as she threw her Pokeball.
Zephyreon formed on the ground in all of its seven feet of glory. It looked down at Yotari and began growling at him, sensing its master's displeasure. Yotari took the Pokemon in for a moment, then bowed respectfully to Celeste and without another word made his way from the clearing at a walk.
"Odd." Celeste said as she made a face in his general direction and drew Zephyreon back into its ball. Her first trainer battle hadn't gone so well, and the trainer himself had been quite an odd duck. She pondered him for a minute, then shrugged it off and attended to her battle-worn pokemon.
Celeste fully healed both of her Pokemon and praised them for their prowress and bravery in battle. They rested in the clearing for a little bit, Celeste chattering away about the big plans she had for them concerning entering the Pokemon Indigo league championships.
A bell tinkled as Celeste opened the doors of the Viridian Pokemart with her free hand, Eon cradled with her other arm. The store was rather small, only holding two or three aisles of goods, but it had it's own quaintness about it that made Celeste feel at home. There was only one other trainer and the shopkeeper in the store, so Celeste felt free to peruse the merchandise and pick out what she wanted. She walked up to the first row, set Eon down, grabbed a basket, and began shopping.
Celeste knew she had a somewhat limited budget, and while she did enjoy the free medical care for her and her Pokemon, she didn't really want to resort to those extremes again, so she decided to stock up on medical supplies for her Pokemon. She filled her basket with several potions to suppliment the supply she already had, as well as a fix for every forseeable status ailment she could think of her Pokemon getting, including Antidote, Paralyz Heal, Awakening, and Burn Heal. There were a couple items absent that she wished she could buy, including a heal for freeze and some suppliments like Iron and Calcium to build up her Pokemon's poor stats, but she supposed she would have to wait until she reached a larger city to buy them.
During her shopping outing, she noticed that the other trainer in the store, a boy younger than herself with short spiked hair, brown eyes, and wearing a baggy blue t-shirt and black pants, was watching her out of the corner of his eye the entire time he was shopping. This made Celeste feel a little bit uncomfortable, so she tried to stay as far away and hidden from the trainer as possible. It made her shopping extremely difficult and prolonged despite the size of the store since the boy didn't seem to want to leave. But finally, after about half an hour, the boy checked out and left the store. Breathing a sigh of relief, Celeste grabbed the last of her necessary items and checked out herself, taking the time to pack her bag inside the store to give the boy time to move a distance away. After getting all the potions and heals situated in the new backpack, Celeste set out again with Alpestreon's pokeball in her hand, ready to try Viridian Forest again.
She pushed the doors open and made sure she held it so Eon could trot through the doorway. As she walked down the hard dirt path from the store to the main road, a voice from the shadows stopped her dead in her tracks.
"Hey, I noticed you in that store. That's an awful nice Eevee you got there."
Celeste turned around, a pretty good idea of who had spoken already formed in her head. Sure enough, the boy from inside was leaning against the store's brick wall, as nonchalant as could be. Celeste sighed as the boy began walking towards her.
"Yea, I'm trying to train it to fight, I've had it for several years, but I just had been keeping it as a pet. Now I'm starting to train."
"So you ARE a trainer. What's your name?" The boy said, very smoothly and with a practiced flair.
"Celeste. Yours?" Celeste had a pretty good idea where this was going, and she really didn't like it.
"I'm Yotari. How long have you been training?"
"Just a couple of days. Haven't been doing so hot."
"But you've been around Pokemon for years?"
"Yea, more or less. My parents were breeders."
Yotari's eyes lit up, but he kept on the poker face he had been wearing. He stopped five feet in front of her and pulled out his pokedex, punching in a few numbers. Celeste was taken aback by this, not sure what he was doing. She continued the conversation after he had been quiet for several minutes.
"So... um, how long have you been training?"
"Not long. Lemme finish these calculations... Ok, there." Yotari was very absorbed in what he was doing, and after he finished, a smile lit up his face as he folded up his pokedex and put it in his back pocket. "So, now that we know each other, do you want to battle? Two on two?"
Celeste flinched, although this is exactly where she figured the boy's advances were going. She really didn't think her pokemon were up to it, especially after the slaughter in the forest.
"I really don't think that's a good idea now, my pokemon aren't very strong and we all just recovered from a massive defeat," She held up her still bandaged arms, not seeing how the boy had failed to notice the numerous bandages that still covered her visible frame. "So, I'd hate to do it, but I really can't accept the challenge right now."
The boy pressed on, obviously very familiar with rejection.
"Come on, it'll be fun. I'm not very strong either, it's a fair match. You've got nothing to lose."
Celeste faltered for a minute. A trainer battle might go smoother than the forest battles, especially if the trained pokemon were any different than the Pokemon in Viridian forest. Her mind wavered between the images of bringing her pokemon glory and the defeats both Eon and Alpestreon had suffered in the forest not long ago. After taking into account the full supply of potions in her bag, she decided it was just the next logical step in the training process.
"Ok, I accept." She said, a note of coolness in her voice similar to the boy's. "Two on two, no strong pokemon, only beginners. Meet in the forest in 10 minutes?" Celeste held out her hand to shake, looking directly into the boy's brown eyes.
"Agreed." The boy took her hand in a firm shake. "The clearing just inside the entrance to the forest. 10 minutes." He let go of the handshake, turned around, and walked down the firm dirt path that led to the street without another word.
Celeste watched him go, a puzzled look on her face. She wondered why the boy had smoothtalked a girl much older than himself simply to ask for a battle. She shook her head to rid herself of the thought, then bent down to pick up Eon. She cuddled the pokemon close to her face and spoke to it as it made a soft purring sound.
"You ready for another battle?"
The pokemon squeaked energetically, then jumped out of her arms and ran off in the direction of Viridian forest. Celeste shrugged her shoulders and followed suit, figuring she should probably locate the battle site anyway since she had no idea where it was at. After a few minutes of jogging after the overexcited Eevee, the two reached the edge of Viridian forest, and within another couple minutes located the clearing that was intended for the battle. To kill the rest of her time, Celeste made Eon practice its tackle, sand attack, and scratch. After the 10 minutes had passed, Celeste stopped the practice and waited quietly in the shade of the trees for the boy to show up. Sure enough, before long, Yotari came through the trees into the clearing and stopped about 5 feet in front of Celeste, giving her a measured stare.
"Are you ready to battle?" Yotari said in a cool tone, his hand moving down to one of the Pokeball he had clamped around his waist.
"Indeed I am." Celeste said, narrowing her eyes in an equally icy tone, Eon at her feet with its fur bristling.
Yotari looked across at the girl he was battling. She had long bangs in the front that appeared to be a natural violet color. The bangs fell about halfway down her torso. In the back, the hair had been cut off short and jagged about halfway down her neck, and this hair was black. She was wearing a buttondown lavender shirt with gold buttons that fell over denim pants that were cutoff halfway up her calf. She was wearing brown sandals which had gold buckles on them. She wore several golden bangle bracelets on her arms, which were now posed on her hips, and her ears had been pierced six times each, the top three bearing gold studs and the bottom three bearing gold rings, all six on each side were connected with a delicate gold chain. She wore a gold necklace around her neck that had a glass orb with what appeared to be a chunk of Moon stone in it, but Yotari had never seen it before, so he couldn't be sure. Her stature was very short, only about 4'8", and she had a very round face with violet eyes. She wore bright red lipstick and heavy grey eyeshadow. Her features were currently set into a look of challenge. Yotari hadn't asked her age, but he assumed she was 10 or 11, same as himself. He grabbed a pokemon from his belt, initiating the challenge and thinking this would be one of the easiest wins in his short training career.
"Let's start. Charmander, go!" The boy threw his pokeball and threw it, a red beam forming the fire pokemon when it hit the ground. It let out a cheerful call and stood ready to battle.
"Ok Eon, you can do this, just like we practiced! Tackle it now!" Celeste called, a panic welling up inside her. She wasn't sure if Eevee was ready to take on a fire Pokemon yet.
With amazing speed, Eon dashed across the clearing and knocked the bewildered Charmander down. Celeste cheered happily as Eon backed up to its side of the ring and waited for the Charmander to recover. Yotari's eyes flashed as he thought this might be harder than he had anticipated.
"Charmander, that Eevee's nothing. Scratch attack, then ember!" Yotari shouted, an edge creeping into his voice as he let his annoyance with the first attack show.
The Charmander leaped up and came back down, scratching Eon hard with its claws across its face and chest. Eon cried out and reeled back in pain. Lucky for it, Charmander had set the ember attack right where Eon had been standing.
"Eon, shake it off and try a sand attack!" Celeste yelled, hoping to blind the Charmander before anything else happened to Eon.
Eon obliged, turning around and kicking sand in the face of the Charmander. The Charmander gave an annoyed squeal and began brushing itself off and wiping sand from its eyes.
"Charmander, try another scratch attack!" Yotari yelled, clearly beginning to panic.
The Charmander began swiping the air in the general direction of the Eevee, but Eon easily avoided its advances since the Pokemon was still blinded by the sand.
"Eon, good work, tackle it again!" Celeste yelled, getting excited about her chances of success at finally winning a Pokemon match.
Eon reared back and tackled the Charmander yet again, knocking it down on the ground. The Charmander had become visibly angry, and began scratching Eon, the sand finally cleared from its eyes.
"Eon, try one more tackle before he defeats you!" Celeste yelled, becoming fearful as her chances of winning slipped away every time Eon was scratched.
Unfortunately, Eon didn't get the pleasure. A bright glow consumed the Charmander and Celeste could only watch helplessly as it evolved into Charmeleon. Yotari cheered and took control of his Pokemon again.
"Charmeleon, you've almost got this Eevee beat! Give it a flamethrower attack to finish it off!"
Celeste was horrified. She was so close to winning... Eon only had a little health left, and she was pretty sure the Charmeleon only had a bit left too, but it was so angry that it was hard to tell if it had gained any energy in the evolution or not. She gave the battle one last valiant try.
"Eon, bite it as hard as you can, you've almost got it finished!"
Charmeleon towered about three feet over the head of Eon now. It began warming itself for a flamethrower attack, but Eon didn't give it the chance. So strong was its will to win, it jumped up and clamped its jaws on the shoulder of the Pokemon, not letting go. Charmeleon cried out and pain and began to thrash wildly around, trying to unlatch the Eevee from its body. Since its power had already been taxed earlier in the battle, it passed out before it had a chance to remove Eon.
Yotari bowed his head and gracefully recalled his Charmeleon. That had been the purpose of the battle anyway, to evolve that Pokemon. He hadn't expected any of Celeste's pokemon to be able to defeat a Charmeleon, but now that it had happened, it was no holds barred.
Celeste cheered wildly as the badly battered Eevee jumped into her arms, both wildly excited. Yotari watched the two celebrate.
"I must ask, how did you come by an Eevee in the first place? They're extremely rare, it's said that only a few are alive in the world today. Usually only advanced collectors and trainers keep them, and even then only as pets or showpieces." Yotari asked, curious as to where he could get ahold of an Eevee himself.
"Oh, my parents bred them. It's true there aren't very many alive today. Even as breeders, my parents only had a few. Luckily, when the lab burned down, their prototypes were saved. There are 17 Eevees and evolutions in the World today excluding mine. The technology to breed them was lost when the lab burned down along with many, many Eevees, so this is the highest number of Eevees there ever will be, and this number will only fall as they die out." Celeste answered evenly, wondering why the boy was stalling before going into the next battle. She wanted him to make the first move.
"So you're saying Eevees will go extinct soon, like Kabuto? That I can believe, since this is the first time I've ever seen one. However, I don't believe that your parents bred them seeing as how there are so few. I also refuse to believe that a significant slice of the Eevee population burned up in a lab. How many perished, would you say?" Yotari asked in a mocking tone.
"Well, actually they had around 40 Eevees running around the lab. They were just making progress on how to go from the Eevee DNA to iron DNA for an Iron type Eevee, close on the heels of their release of the Dark and Psychic type evolution last year. That took them FOREVER to figure out, they didn't think Eevees had a natural evolution. Of course, since they take care of theirs and train the lab species hard, they stumbled across it. No other Eevees had really been trained since they were so rare. However, before they could entirely descramble Ferreon's evolution codes, the building caught fire. All 40 lab Eevees perished, along with my parents."
Yotari didn't know what to say. He knew that the new Dark and Psychic evolutions had just been announced last year, but it hadn't occurred to him that the process was descrambled by breeders, and most likely Eevee breeders. He also felt kind of bad for Celeste's parents. He decided instead of humbling himself however, he would just move on in battle.
"Whatever you say, little girl. Let's just continue. Let's see... think I'll try a native species. Beedrill, go and show that Eevee who's boss with a twinneedle attack!"
A red beam formed the shape of a formidable looking Beedrill. Before Celeste had time to even call out an attack, the Beedrill had KO'd Eon. Celeste walked into the arena and gathered her Pokemon in her arms, dousing it with her potions and other formulas to bring it back. After she was satisfied that it was in much better health, she pondered the Bug-type. She really didn't want to start training Obsideon just yet, so she decided to continue on with Alpestreon since a battle between bug and grass could go either way. She drew its Pokeball from her backpack and threw it, yelling the traditional trainer battle call.
"Alpestreon, I choose you! Vine whip, I know you can do it this time!" Celeste encouraged the large plant Pokemon.
Alpestreon materialized and executed a vine whip. Its vines were thrashing madly at the Beedrill, but it was easily avoiding the leafy appendages. Yotari gawked in amazement at this new Pokemon.
"What's that?!"
"Alpestreon, the grass evolution of Eevee. One of my parent's prototypes they kept in storage just in case of emergency. It wasn't burned up."
"How's come they never released it to the public if a grass evolution exists?"
"They have an evolution to every Pokemon in prototype form, even the ones they didn't discover. For the ones that they were working on, they'd take a prototype Eevee and splice its DNA with that of plant, rock, or any other kind of Pokemon to see the results. That was the easy part, even though they were the only ones that knew how. The real challenge for them lied in trying to figure out a natural transition from Eevee to the spliced pokemon. They were successful twice, and nearly a third time. This was one of the ones they never got to." Celeste said, impatiently watching her Pokemon swipe hopelessly at the Beedrill.
"S...so what you're saying is you have an Eevee in every single type? May I see them?" He asked, his voice shaking a little in excitement.
"Yes, I have an Eevee of every type, that's the only kind of Pokemon I train. No, you can't see them unless you force me into a situation where I need to use them, which you won't do seeing as how this is our last battle and I don't plan on seeing you again. The last thing I need is every single trainer I come across drooling over my Pokemon." Celeste snapped, growing increasingly more angry as her Pokemon continued to struggle in battle, the Beedrill on defense and waiting for its owner to shout out an attack.
"But I swear..."
"Alpestreon, use stun spore!" Celeste called harshly, trying to get Yotari's mind back on track.
The Alpestreon fired spores at the Beedrill, but it simply used its wings to fan them back onto Alpestreon, immobilizing it in Paraylsis for the second time in its short battle career. Yotari just watched with a smug look on his face.
"I wouldn't be so eager to continue this match if I were you. See what happens when you rush things? Beedrill, finish it off with a Poision Sting!" Yotari called, anticipaing his inevitable victory.
Celeste watched helplessly as the Beedrill stung Alpestreon mercilessly. The poison circulated through its struggling, immobilized body, and in no time at all the Pokemon was KO'd and the match fell in favor of Yotari. She ran to the aid of Alpestreon and sprayed it with the same generous amounts of cures that she had lavished on Eon, now possessing enough medicine to run her own Pokecenter. She looked angrily up at Yotari, who was watching her nurse her Pokemon with glee.
"Didn't you have a Pokemon I KO'd? You know they'll like you a lot less if you don't attend to their wounds immediately." Celeste advised, growing to dislike the persistent, creepy youth.
"Oh, Charmeleon will keep inside his pokeball, and I've got other Pokemon to train before I go back to the Pokecenter. Now, since I won the match, can I see all the Eevees you have?" He asked, bending down to stroke the soft petals in Alpestreon's mane.
Alpestreon turned its head and lunged for his hand. Its jaws clamped on empty air as Yotari drew his hand back in annoyance. Celeste smiled cruelly at him and spoke.
"I don't think they like you. I'm pretty sure they want you to leave. They might make you leave if you don't do it voluntairly."
"Ooh, a threat. We already learned your Pokemon are as weak as the day they were genetically created in a test tube. How are they going to MAKE me leave? It's awfully big, but judging by how easily I won against it, I'd say your pokemon are all bark and no bite. Besides, you owe me money for losing to me." He began to dance around and openly mock Celeste. She became very angry and pulled another Pokeball from her backpack.
"I won't give any money to someone as horrible as you are! Also, not all of my Pokemon are 4 feet tall and weak. Some of them are even bigger and stronger. I'll let you see one more before you leave." She said cooly and with a hint of sarcasm as she threw her Pokeball.
Zephyreon formed on the ground in all of its seven feet of glory. It looked down at Yotari and began growling at him, sensing its master's displeasure. Yotari took the Pokemon in for a moment, then bowed respectfully to Celeste and without another word made his way from the clearing at a walk.
"Odd." Celeste said as she made a face in his general direction and drew Zephyreon back into its ball. Her first trainer battle hadn't gone so well, and the trainer himself had been quite an odd duck. She pondered him for a minute, then shrugged it off and attended to her battle-worn pokemon.
Celeste fully healed both of her Pokemon and praised them for their prowress and bravery in battle. They rested in the clearing for a little bit, Celeste chattering away about the big plans she had for them concerning entering the Pokemon Indigo league championships.