Chapter 20

LETS GET READY TO RUMBLLLE!

(-¤-)

The tiny bronze bell that sat above the door rang as I stepped out of the grocery store. The bustling sounds of a small town turned tourist trap weaved an urban static that put me at ease. Kids ran up and down the tree lined cobble roads with young pokemon in tow. Buildings older than most family names stood side by side with modern architecture causing a strangely contrasting aesthetic that constantly had one glancing about to absorb it all. The occasional car rumbled down the ancient street, over worn stones that had experienced a dozen ages of technology and progress.

Celestic town was the oldest town in Sinnoh, something that had already brought it much fame and prosperity. It was a quiet place just a few decades ago, enjoying its fair amount of tourism and comfortable atmosphere. Until Cynthia had taken Sinnoh by storm and became one of the few trainers to ever claim the mantle of champion. After that the place had become a boom town of trainers looking to get a glimpse into what had made her who she was. Of people who admired her strength and came to pay respects. Or just strong trainers looking for a challenge. It was a peacful place in the off season, letting gentle gusts of wind play at my hair with curiosity.

The effect was a bit ruined by Jacks choice of snack.

'Crunch'

"They had mangos, oran berries, carrots,"

'Munch munch munch, ulp'

"And you picked,"

'Crunch'

"A fucking,"

'Munch munch munch, ulp'

"Onion."

'Crunch'

we got to Celestic just a few hours after healing up the team, what would have been a days walk was shortened by my shitty trash board and I went right to finding Jacks apology snack. I came across a nice little mom and pop shop, a cute place with lots of wood paneling, homemade shelves, and an elderly man named Mort running the register. He was very sweet and gave me a mint, I hate mint but I took it so I wouldn't hurt his feelings.

So now I was strolling down the street with a buneary shoved in the front of my buttoned up jacket with just his arms and head hanging out as he ate a raw onion like an apple. I was gonna stink for the rest of the day dammit. Oh well at least I know his favorite food now, I should let the others pick something out in the future as well.

I made a futile attempt to huff the sulphurous stench out of my nose as I strolled down the street, ignoring any or the odd looks I got for Jacks antics.

Glancing around at the mix of ancient Japanese style architecture and modern multi floored buildings was still a bit jarring as I wandered deeper into town. The place was fairly clean as well though I'm not sure if thats because humans here are more environmentally conscious or if their janitors were very dedicted.

If I remember right theres not actually much in Celestic town. In the games it was just some tiny village but the anime had a historical research center, though I'm not sure if thats open to the public. I know the Lustrous orb is probably still buried in the ruins nearby, but I wasn't gonna touch that shit with a ten foot pole, not yet at least. Kicking the events of Diamomd and Pearl off to soon could have apocalyptic consequences.

My eyes drifted to a telephone pole to my right, a flyer was stapled to it with big colorful letters blaring out to anyone who would listen.

GET YOUR BATTLE ON!
Come join or watch a local tournament
To see who the best trainer in town is!
1v1 on all rounds
No substitutions
First place winner gets the grand prize of

300¥

20¥ to enter.

Oh thats perfect! A small tournament would be a great way to test our skills. And it probably won't have anyone too tough in it, I doubt a high level trainer would bother with a grandprize as small as that.

I ripped off one of the precut stubs from the bottom and gave it a read. It said it was tonight at 6:30 with an address that I assume was a designated battle field. It was only about four in the afternoon right now, plenty of time for some warm up spars and a good pep talk.

I took out my pokedex and after navigating some of the functions, punched in the address. A highly detailed map popped up with a digital compass in the upper left corner. It didn't have an actual gps on it, so I would have to figure out how to get there myself. However it did have some extremely accurate maps of all the routes and cities of Sinnoh.

Ok, I think I need to go left up here.

(-¤-)

This place got really lively really fast.

I was right about the address, a league standard battle field park just like in Eterna city. I got here nice and early, had a good few hours of light warm up exercises and gave the journal a skim so any strategies from it would be fresh in my mind. I'm as ready as I was gonna get.

A van full of people showed up not too long ago and got right to work. All but one of them were in there late teens, the last was a woman in her mid thirties maybe. A few of them released some gravelers, a couple of gastrodons and even a rhydon, and started directing them to sink several of the larger fields into the ground resulting in large rectangular pits. After that they began to raise more dirt at the sides as mock bleachers.

One trainer brought out a mr mime whos appearance gave me the heebie jeebies, it was giving off uncanny valley vibes with its weird peach skintone and almost human like face. They started setting up invisible glass like barriers around the arenas to further protect the audience from stray attacks.

The others were working on setting up a few tables a small distance away from the entrance to the park. The first had a small metal box, a roll of red yarn and a notebook with a few other office supplies. The second was what looked to be a food stand of some sort, I could already smell the frying oil starting to heat up.

Something that should have taken a day with construction equipment was set up within a mere twenty minutes. Pokemon made projects like this ridiculously easy, and proved just how malleable the terrain was with them at our finger tips. If this was just what a handfull of the magic monster could do imagine an army.

Other people started to show up as I contemplated how many pokemon it would take to literally build a mountain. Most were fairly young, ten to twelve but there was a small handfull of teenagers as well as some adults. It was a bigger crowd than I was expecting but I suppose these people needed something to entertain them in the off season.

No one looked particularly serious about the event though, mostly they were just milling about and chatting, using it as an excuse to socialize. A few were giving pep talks to their pokemon, I couldn't see anything incredibly exotic, probably caught around the city somewhere.

I was carefully untangling some small twigs and leaves from Karens fluff, making sure to not tear any of the cloud like fur. She always did a bit better to listen to me right after a grooming session, and I'm sure today would be no different.

But just in case.

"Hey Karen."

She chirped a bit at her name, having been lost in the euphoria of being cleaned by gentle fingers.

"Its very important that you listen to my orders today, ok?"

She huffed at that, probably a bit miffed that I was implying she was anything but perfect. Which was a common theme with her.

"And if you do, I'll give you some more maple syrup with your dinner tonight." I let that juicy bit of bait hang over her head.

Her reaction was both optimistic and reserved. It wasn't a question as to whether or not I was lying as I hadn't lied to her about anything in the weeks we had known each other. It was simply a matter of submitting to me for a treat.

She was the proudest member of the team by far, sticking her nose up at anything she regarded as even slightly beneath her. However she was still a pokemon and was ruled by instincts and survival. While she may not need to scavenge for food any more her opportunistic foraging instincts were still hard wired in and were probably screaming at her to go for the high calorie and sugary food, something that was a bit hard to find in the wild.

Pride vs nature.

In the end though, nature won and she gave a nod.

I smiled, she might disobey me a bit if she feels her judgement on the matter is better, but it was a considerable step forward. In her first battle in the warehouse she had ignored everything until she was attacked. And now she had actually agreed to go along with me.

"CAN I HAVE EVERY ONES ATTENTION!" I snapped to attention as the woman with the megaphone started to address the crowd. "WE WILL BEGIN THE TOURNAMENT SHORTLY, IF YOU ARE HERE TO WATCH PLEASE GO AND FIND A SEAT IN THE STANDS. IF YOU ARE HERE TO BATTLE START THE LINE HERE!" She gestured to the first table, with the metal box and yarn. "PLEASE HAVE YOUR TRAINERS LICENSE AND CASH READY WHEN YOU REACH THE FRONT!"

People were already shuffling into their respective groups. I returned Karen and quickly got in line, which was fairly long. Apparently these people really needed something to do. Or these kind of small time events were just that popular. In all I think there was maybe sixty trainers waiting to sign up, most looked fairly young. The group finding their seats in the stands looked older, probably parents eager to watch their kids kick some butt.

I should get some video of my battles to send to Nurse Joy, the pokedex did have a video recorder function, and Rowan might like the results as well.

We were quickly processed and each given a numbered tag tied to our wrists with red yarn, mine was 17. We were told to wait until our number was called and then go to the arena and battle our opponent, easy and simple. I was called pretty quickly to report to field five where I would battle 'Trainer 38'.

Show time.

The bleachers were far from packed but the viewers were spread out over multiple battlefields. Even still it was a decent crowd and despite myself I felt some butterflies rumble in my gut. I rarely had an audience for my shenanigans and when I did they were small and unexpected. I shook off the nerves as I stepped up to the trainer box painted into the ground, busying myself by figuring out the pokedexs recording feature.

Oh wait, filming this and battling at the same time is gonna be difficult, uh... Oh I got!

Jack was released from his ball with a flash of light, his scowl seemed to deepen at the crowd who was now curiously looking and fawning at my little mascot. He huffed and started to stalk to the pit below before being stopped by my boot.

"Woah bud, I need you fresh for the finals. For now I want you to record this battle."

He looked genuinely confused at my request, which makes sense considering he had no experience with technology other than the TV. Pokemon, despite their intelligence, have a large amount of difficulty understanding complicated tools and tech. They could use simple tools like hammers and knives but become confused with anything more complicated than a pair of scissors. With enough training they can use certain tools and equipment but they just don't have the natural talent for it that humans do.

I squatted down to his level and showed him my pokedex, "Don't worry it's super easy. See this?" I pointed to the screen on the front, "It will remember anything it sees so we can see it later." I intercept his thought process as his brow deepened in confusion, "Don't worry about how it works, its human magic."

"Bun..." he still seemed perplexed but motioned for me to continue.

"Watch" I hit the record button and then snapped my finger in front of the camera. With a bit of poking around I brought up the new video and showed him.

His brow flew up in astonishment at the sight of me snapping my fingers again from the past.

"All you have to do is point it at the battle, everything that the screen shows you, it will remember. You got it?"

He hesitantly nodded as he took it from me, I made sure to hit record as he did.

"ON THE GREEN SIDE" I jerked to attention as the ref introduced us "ALICE THORN OF DELLITOWN." His voice boomed above the murmur of the crowd with a practiced ease that spoke of trained vocal cords.

There wasn't any excited cheers or whistling as he announced me, and that was fine. I was a newbie and hadn't done anything noteworthy quite yet, except for the stooges but that was a few towns away. No one here had any idea who I was.

"ON THE RED SIDE" He motioned to a ten year old kid with a blue cap, shorts and a yellow shirt on the opposite side of the field. "JET JONES OF CELESTIC CITY."

The kid gave me a cocky grin, though it quickly disappeared as I heard a woman cheering a little too enthusiastically for him. Probably his mom judging by the embarrassed blush that spread over his face.

"TRAINERS PLEASE SELECT YOUR POKEMON." I grabbed Marks ball and braced giving Jack a quick glance to make sure he was using the pokedex correctly. Jet grabbed a regular red pokeball from his belt and enlarged it adopting a determined look about him. "READY?" The referee was met with two quick nods.

"BATTLE!"

I tossed my monster out and Mark crashed out of his ball with a giggling snarl, stretched and ready to beat something into a pulp. His opponent was a meditite that calmly appeared on the opposite side of the field, the blue psychic fighting monkey thing sat peacefully across from him eyes sharp and focus unwavering. Its typing meant it both had a disadvantage and an edge against the scraggy but I was certain he could handle it.

Though the opposing trainer was either quick on the draw or already had a strategy planned because he got his order out first

"Calm mind!"

I didn't know a whole lot about psychics quite yet, most of my research had gone into my own team, but I recognized the move from the games as a stat buff, though not exactly what it affected. Its body glowed a faint blue as it closed its eyes and took a deep breath, muscles visibly relaxing.

"Feint attack!"

Mark dashed forward with viscous enthusiasm and a fist that seemed to absorb whatever light touched it, shading it a sickening black. There was too much distance between them to stop its Calm mind but it still wasn't allowed to continue it for more than a few seconds. With just a few feet between them the Meditite gracefully snapped up into a standing position ready to block Marks strike with arms raised above its head.

Its eyes went wide as Marks foot swung and kicked the meditators legs out from under them. The shocked look on their face did not last long as Mark drove his fist straight into their nose slamming its head into the dirt below without remorse.

Feint attack was very simple and worked off the instincts most dark types have, misdirection and breaking defenses. The pokemon feints an attack for one direction before subverting their foes expectations and tripping them up. This creates a large opening that could be taken advantage of and deal some decent damage.

However it kept its wits about it and immediately retaliated from the ground. despite being in pain from the super effective cheap shot the meditites limbs were a flurry of blurs as it tossed Mark off and both raised itself and palmed him firmly in the gut with a glowing hand. A sound reminiscent of a leather belt smacking skin echoed through the arena, slightly drowned out by the cheers of the crowd at the sudden reversal.

Mark doubled over as a wave of dark roiled over him and shot back towards the psychic with vengful intent. A rifle like crack rattled against the saftey barriers as the more humanoid of the toy was thrown into the wall behind them.

Payback was one of those moves that was kind of an unknown, nobody knew for certain how it worked, just that it did. Some researchers believe the dark type energy uses the foreign energy of the initial strike to amplify itself and ripple back to the contact point. The timing of it however was very tricky as its window for use was a split second. To soon or to late and it would fizzle out without so much as a whimper. Even with his training Mark still missed that window at least half the time.

It must have been suffering by now from taking two super effective moves from a dark type, though to its credit it rose back up, albeit shaking on its thin whipcord limbs while it did so. Mark stalked forward, committed on making his prey squirm.

"Rush it." He sprang into action at my order, gleeful savagery and cruelty bouncing around in his head no doubt.

"CONFUSION!" Cried Jet in desperation, clearly unaware of my lizards typing.

The doomed fighter obeyed without hesitation, summoning a wave of blue psychic energy that kicked up an impressive cloud of dust and debris, I'm guessing that had something to do with the Calm mind earlier. Though as powerful as it was it still rolled across my dark type like water off of wax. The wave destabilizing and splashing away from him in motes of struggling light as he ran through it without a drop of hesitation.

He dashed forward to his now exhausted toy and drove another feint attack into their gut, obviously taking immense joy in watching it double over and gasp for air. A blur of fists and kicks crashed into it, each seeking out vulnerable spots and knocking away its meager attempts at defense.

He was starting to play with his opponent again, the nasty habit bringing him joy but drawing out an already decided battle.

"Finish it!" I called out, just because they lost doesn't mean it deserves to be tortured like this. I was already beating up some kids pet, no need to be a dick about it.

His forehead shined with faint light as he smashed the Headbutt against his foes. Meditite slumped to the floor without anymore struggle, eyes swirling in that bizarrely cartoony way.

"MEDITITE IS UNABLE TO BATTLE, ALICE THORN PROCEEDS TO THE NEXT ROUND!"

There was a few polite claps and even a whistle at our victory, not the most voracious reaction but a welcome one nevertheless.

I gave a glance down to Jack to see how he was fairing with the pokedex as Mark scrambled up the slightly slanted walls of the pit. He was still pointing it at the battle field with a bit more confidence. I bent down and took from him without complaint. A quick once over revealed it to be covered in dirt on the back side, doofus must have dropped it at some point. Hopefully he got most of the battle at least.

I returned both of them, making sure to thank them for the work they put in, and made my way over to the side of the arena where a dejected Jet was trudging to as well. Getting knocked out in the first round had to feel awful, especially so quickly.

I met him in the middle and offered a hand shake, sportsmanship is important after all. Apparently he thought so to because he took my hand and gave it a half hearted judder.

"It was a good battle dude." I wasn't super sure what to say after that, I hadn't had too many battles with other trainers and I usually didn't need to be tactful after I beat the shit out of someone before I had died.

He simply nodded and left me there, walking over to a woman who held a striking resemblance to him. She gave him a pat on the back and spoke words of encouragement, despite his lose, taking care to acknowledge his failure in a way that wouldn't sting.

Careful, loving, respectful.

I felt a slight pang in my chest as the sight brought back a certain feelings of my own parents, an odd jealously that washed into something more melancholy. But that was ok, I had come to terms with alot of that.

I didn't need to find the words to cheer him up, she would do a fine job.

I let out a sigh as I shook off the old memories.

Now, lets see if Jack was a decent camera man.

(-¤-)

Alice Thorn

May 4


Team

Jack

Buneary

Moves: Pound, Foresight, Frustration, Sweetkiss, Defense Curl, Baby Doll Eyes, Quick Attack, Jumpkick, Shadow Ball, Low Kick, Swagger, Protect, Fire Punch

Ability Limber

Luke

Golbat

Moves: Absorb, Super sonic, Astonish, Bite, Whirlwind, Wing attack, Confuse ray, Air Cutter, Swift, Protect

Ability Inner focus

Karen

Cottonee

Moves: Abosrb, Fairy Wind, Growth, Leech Seed, Stun Spore, Mega Drain, Poison Powder, Protect, Swift, Razor Leaf, Cotton Spore

Ability Infiltrator

Mark

Scraggy

Moves: Leer, Headbutt, Sand Attack, Feint Attack, Swagger, Low Kick, Dragon Dance, Protect, Endure, Facade, Pay Back

Ability Moxie


3290¥


In Box

N/A


Its about time for a tourney arc me thinks. Also don't give your rabbits onions or garlic, it very bad for them. Jack can eat it cause hes a pokemon not an actual rabbit.

Please leave a review, it makes me very happy to read them.

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