Casey took a deep breath, looking out at the field.

She was... well, she kind of had mixed feelings about this one.

It still amazed her how far she'd got. She was in the quarter finals! And... every time she won, she felt a kind of mixture of triumph and queasiness.

"Master."

She looked down, and smiled. "I was doing it again, huh?"

Riolu nodded to her. "You were. It does not matter if you win, merely that we all do all we can."

"Right." Casey took another breath, happier this time. "Okay, let's do this."

There was a grating on the floor as Riolu moved the chair over, and hopped onto it so she could see out across the battlefield.

"Who first?" she asked, rolling her neck.

Casey took out two Pokéballs, both marked with a little lightning-bolt.

"Uh... let's see..."

After a moment of thought, she put one away. "Sorry, Elekid, not your turn this time."

The referee raised his flag. "Will both competitors please send out their first Pokémon!"

Casey bounced Pichu's Pokéball for a moment, then threw it with a practiced skill.

It burst open in the air, releasing her little Electric-type mouse, and she noticed Ash had sent out a Butterfree before catching the 'ball as it returned to her from the backspin.

"Okay, Pichu!" she called. "Do your best!"

Pichu nodded to her, then turned back to the battle. He touched his tail for luck, a spark jumping from it to his hand, then set his stance.

Butterfree began by swooping down for a moment, producing an Air Cutter out of his wake, and sent it down towards Pichu.

The Electric-type jumped over it, took a moment to aim at the fast-moving Flying-type, and launched out a bolt of crackling lightning.

Butterfree dodged away, and Pichu's attack missed – but barely. His eyes glowed, and he fired down a hammer of psionic energy which Pichu avoided with a sprint and skid-dive to a safe area.

"Good start!" Casey called. "You know what to do now! Play!"

Pichu clapped one fist into the other palm as he got up, a mischievous grin on his face. Lightning crackled around his cheeks, and he sent another burst skywards.

As Butterfree had done the first time, he slipped out of the way and began to prepare a Psychic counterattack.

That was about when he discovered what Casey had meant by 'play'. Pichu had followed the nasty plot they'd prepared before the battle, and used a hidden ball.

Specifically, a hidden Electroball, which came flashing out from behind the Thunderbolt towards right where his opponent was trying to dodge to.

Butterfree managed to divert the Psychic energy to a shield in time to avoid the worst of it, but the Electric attack still clearly hurt. He wobbled before recovering, and fired down a Bug Buzz while sustaining his psionic shield.

Pichu dodged that one, too, though he took a hit to the tail as he cleared the area. Glancing up as he ran, he fired another bolt skywards (a fastball, this time) and Butterfree decided that discretion was the better part of valour.

Wings beating steadily, the Bug-type ascended to the apex of the stadium, and Casey frowned.

"Pichu, how are you feeling?" she asked.

Pichu threw her a thumbs-up. "Pichu pi!"

"He says he is full of energy," Riolu translated.

"That's what I like to hear, Pichu!" Casey enthused. "Okay, Charge for now. I want to see what he's planning next..."

For several seconds, not much happened. Butterfree stayed high, out of trouble, and Pichu stood ready on the battlefield with electricity crackling around him.

Then Butterfree came swooping down again – with a powerful psionic shield visible around him.

"Looks like he's been using Quiver Dance..." Casey mused. "Right! Okay, Pichu – start off with a Charge Beam!"

Pichu nodded. "Chuuu!"

Electrical energy built, crackling around his ears, and he gestured up. The beam hit the edge of Butterfree's shield, and he dodged away and built up an attack.

This time, Pichu was a bit slow in dodging. The Psychic slam hit him hard, knocking him backwards across the arena, and he bounced several times before managing to turn it into a foot-first slide and shed the rest of his momentum.

The electricity skirling around him was as strong as ever, though, and he threw another electrical attack skywards. This one was a Shockwave, curling around at speed to hit Butterfree despite his attempt to dodge, and Casey grinned.

"Yeah!"

Butterfree was not happy – that much was obvious. He fired down a Signal Beam which hit Pichu on the side, then swooped down a little and added to that with another – and more powerful – Psychic.

"Pichu!" Casey called. "Endure!"

The little Electric-type flashed red just before the Psychic arrived, and managed to survive the impact. His cheeks flared through the dust cloud, and as it began to fade he crouched.

"Okay, go for the home run!"


Butterfree would have blinked if he were biologically equipped for it. "Home run? What's that supposed to-"

As it turned out, that meant Volt Tackle.

It hurt.


Casey recalled Pichu before he hit the floor, checked Butterfree's condition for just a moment, and sent out her next Pokémon. "Okay, Beedrill! You know what to do!"

She opened the Pokéball again, and gave Pichu a look over. "I think he's okay..."

"Just exhausted," Riolu judged.

There was the woosh of a psychic attack from overhead, followed by a thwack.

"All right!" she said, as Butterfree began to fall. "Great shot, Beedrill!"

She felt quite triumphant about it all. Fell Stinger was not an easy move at the best of times, but actually getting it to work?

Yeah, this was a good start.

A moment later, a red beam lashed out and caught Butterfree.

Ash's next choice surprised her. There were several she was afraid of – Lucario, Pikachu, Charizard, or any of the Legendaries – but what she actually got was that Larvitar they'd both helped save.

"Huh," she said, then cupped her hands around her mouth. "Outfield, Beedrill!"

Beedrill flipped up his pointed stinger, and saluted her. Then he buzzed back around to the front... contemplated Larvitar, and looked just a bit confused.

"Beedriiilllll?" he asked, in a buzzing tone.

Riolu blinked. "He... asks how exactly he's supposed to fight Larvitar."

"Uh... good point..."


Larvitar frowned up at Beedrill, then decided to take matters into his own hands.

He concentrated, forming a circle of Hidden Power orbs, and threw them at Beedrill.

Unfortunately for him, while the Bug-type may have not had many ideas what to do now he was still alert. He zipped aside, and the balls of energy missed.

"Aha!" Larvitar heard Casey shout, and winced. Things might have just got difficult... it sounded like there was a plan afoot.

In preparation, Larvitar hardened his skin a little and set his stance, before beginning to charge more Hidden Power attacks.


"He's a Rock-type!" Casey reminded Beedrill. "So he's weak to Ground-type attacks! Use Drill Run!"

Beedrill heard her, and flitted sideways out of the attack path of a second shower of Hidden Power orbs before putting his spikes together.

There was a pause as he lined up, and then he came down in a high-speed drill-based attack run.

Larvitar met the attack with one of his own, drawing back his fist and punching at the stinger. It clearly did some damage, but Larvitar just as clearly came off worst – he was knocked backwards by the heavy blow, his feet making twin furrows in the dirt, and he wasn't able to do any kind of follow up before Beedrill was skywards and safe again.

"Good work, Beedrill!" Casey called. "Don't get cocky!"

Beedrill began to reply, but was interrupted and nearly hit by an explosion just behind his shoulder. Deciding not to stay within range of Larvitar's accurate Hidden Powers, he gained height before reversing and going in on a second Drill Run.

This time, Larvitar seemed to try a different approach. Rather than face the attack head-on, he did just about the opposite – and dug a hole.

Beedrill aborted his attack run, buzzed for a moment, and then dove down the hole.

There was a second when nothing moved, then both Larvitar and Beedrill burst from the ground. Larvitar was volleying in a series of punches, and Beedrill was blocking and jabbing with his arm-spikes in a complicated Fury Attack.

The combat continued until they landed – which, since it happened to be upside down, imposed a sort of halt as both righted themselves.

"Beedrill, stay outfield!" Casey called, and her Bug-type duly shot skywards away from the Rock-type as he readied what looked like an absolutely devastating headbutt. "He's mainly good close in!"

Beedrill replied with a frantic buzz, and Casey glanced over at Riolu.

"He was reminding you that so is he," she said.

"Right, true... uh..."

Casey frowned, thinking.

She could switch out, here... but that would mean losing the effect of that boost Beedrill was on. That would be a real shame...

Wait.

That boost meant that some of Beedrill's attacks would be much more effective than they normally would be. And that meant-

"Beedrill!" she called, and the Bug-type backflipped away from one of the Hidden Power orbs and glanced over. "Pin Missile!"

Beedrill's reply was to launch a shower of homing needles. They spread out, then converged on Larvitar.

"Now Twinneedle!"

Wings humming, Beedrill followed the shower of missiles down. He put both stingers out in front, one a little ahead of the other, and reached Larvitar almost before the impacts had stopped.

The first stinger hit, empowered by Beedrill's earlier success with Fell Stinger, and he brought up the second one to deliver that as well.

Larvitar's counter to that was somewhat unorthodox.

"Ow!" Casey winced, clapping her hands to her ears, as the little Rock-type Screeched.

It was loud, and shrill, and atonal, and it hurt her ears.

She saw Beedrill wobble a little drunkenly through the air as he tried to gain height, the sound clearly disorienting him. This meant he was in trouble when Larvitar pushed off from the ground, leaping for his opponent (though mercifully ending the Screech) and managed to grab the Bug-type around the thorax.

As Larvitar weighed between two and three times as much as Beedrill did, this was a quick ticket to a crash landing.

"Drill Run!" Casey called, trying to mitigate the situation, and Beedrill managed a few revolutions before they hit the ground with a crash.

Larvitar finished the battle off by a close-range spread of Hidden Power, which seemed to do enough damage to Beedrill to knock him out.

Casey winced. "Okay, that wasn't good..." She raised a Pokéball and returned Beedrill, then frowned. Meganium or-

"Master?" Riolu asked. "May I?"

"Sure," Casey nodded readily. "Go get 'im, girl!"

"Thank you." Riolu hopped up onto the viewing slit, then out onto the field.


"Watch out, Larvitar!" Ash called. "She knows Aura Sphere!"

Larvitar nodded, and vanished underground for a Dig – the best way he had of avoiding being hit, at least short-term.

Riolu stood poised, one foot slightly ahead of the other and her paws together at about waist height. She turned back and forth a little in the wind, and Ash frowned.

What was she-

Larvitar burst from the ground behind her, readying a Hidden Power attack, and Riolu exploded into motion.

Her left leg pushed off a little from the ground and came up, sending her spinning towards Larvitar, and her clasped paws came up towards her right shoulder before separating out.

A blue light flashed between them as her arm movement revealed the Aura Sphere she'd had charging in her right palm, and as she came to the point she was facing Larvitar she put her leg back down again – then her right arm came whip-cracking around, and the Aura Sphere flashed across the stadium towards Larvitar.

The Rock-type was still charging his attack, and Riolu's devastatingly accurate fastball came by surprise. It hit his readying Hidden Power, bursting it, and carried on to hit him on the nose with a crash.

A moment later, and Larvitar was out for the count.

Pikachu blinked. "Okay, she's been playing a lot of baseball..."


"Nice work, Riolu!" Casey cheered. "Great pitch!"

Riolu smiled back at her, then turned as Ash sent out his third Pokémon.

"Primeape, huh..." she said, frowning. "Let's see what this means! Riolu, play it safe for now..."

The yellow-and-black Fighting-type's stance changed, subtly, as she followed Casey's general directions.

Between her paws, a little blue spark could be seen.

Then Primeape exploded forwards, Riolu countered with a thrown Aura Sphere, and things got very fast very quickly.


Riolu took a quick step back as soon as she'd pitched her sphere, feeling a distinct satisfaction as it hit Primeape on the cheek, and her paws glowed as she pushed Aura into them.

Primeape launched a punch, and Riolu reacted with the kind of speed she'd learned through playing considerable amounts of baseball. She jinked a little to the side – not much, not in the time she had, but enough to get herself away from the path of Primeape's punch – and brought her right paw around for a Force Palm strike at the side of his elbow.

Primeape turned the punch into a kick, accepting the elbow blow and even using it for extra momentum on the volleyed-in impact, and air whooshed out of Riolu's lungs as he caught her on the side of her chest.

She rolled with the blow as much as she could, flipping backwards and onto her feet again, and forced down a deep breath before throwing another whiplash-fast Aura Sphere.

Again, it was so fast that Primeape couldn't really get out of the way in time. He tried, but the globe of Aura still burst on his glove as he headed sideways.

This seemed to annoy him.


Casey watched with a mix of pride and apprehension as Riolu and Primeape blurred back and forth.

There was a definite pattern emerging, though only a general one – things were happening too fast for her to be specific. But it looked like, generally, Riolu was managing to get off her high-speed Aura Spheres whenever the range opened – though the range was usually opened by Primeape hitting her very hard – and then the resultant close-quarters exchange overall favoured the bigger monkey, though Riolu was still getting some licks in.

The main question now, for Casey, was how she could help. This wasn't like the earlier battles – this was all happening a bit fast for her to keep track of, and that felt like she was letting Riolu down.

There was a thud, and Riolu rolled backwards before coming to her feet – favouring her right arm a little.

"Are you okay?" Casey called, worried.

Riolu glanced back. "It's nothing."

"I don't think it is," Casey replied. "Okay... right. New plan. We practised for this, right? Left hand pitch!"

The Fighting-type shiny nodded, and shifted her stance a little. Another Aura Sphere sparked to life in her palms, and she threw it just as Primeape came in again.


"I have to admit, this worked out really well," Ash said, as the high-speed battle continued. "I didn't even realize the baseball thing until just now, but – yeah, that worked out nicely."

"You seem oddly pleased that Casey's currently about even with us," Pikachu pointed out.

"I like Casey," Ash replied with a shrug. "She kind of... well, it's a bit like I imagine I'd be if my life wasn't an endless parade of chaos. Or, rather, what I'd like to be like."

Pikachu nodded, considering. "Right. Because she's got a good team..."

"...and she's doing well with it, and because she's good at getting them all involved," Ash agreed.

A pause. "Plus it's nice to see a Riolu fighting again. Lucario's great, but there's still a difference."

"I do know what you mean."


Riolu threw another Aura Sphere, panted, and swivelled on her right foot to kick out at Primeape's oncoming fist.

That deflected the blow away from her centre-of-mass, though she still took a glancing blow to the shoulder.

She rolled with the blow, her right hand coming out to slap at Primeape's back, and he shifted enough that the attack failed to connect.

Taking advantage of the lull, she pushed back and opened the distance again as soon as her foot reached the floor.

This was going to be a tricky one.

So far, she'd been pitching. Time to field.

Primeape kicked off and plunged towards her, by now moving fast enough that most Pokémon wouldn't have been able to properly track it.

To a Riolu used to catching attempts at home runs, it was merely very fast.

She reached for the boxing glove as it approached, stepped just a little to one side, and her hands closed over it – then, before the force of the blow could transmit itself to her, twisted sharply to one side.

She rotated through a quarter turn, and then the effort of holding on was too much. Her grip broke.

The whip-crack effect was brutal – on her end, let alone what happened to Primeape.

Riolu went over on her back with a thud, wincing, and skidded along for several paces before stopping.

Primeape, on the other hand, went hurtling towards the arena wall. He managed to turn himself, so he was moving feet-first, but the impact still produced a small crack and quite a loud noise.

By the time he'd dropped down to the floor and crouched down, Riolu had come back to her feet – and, cheekily, she even threw a new Aura Sphere at him with a left-handed curve pitch.

She realized that antagonizing him might not have been a great idea when his Anger Point activated.


Ash, prudently, put his hands over his ears.


"You're doing-" Casey began, and then there was an earsplitting CRACK-BOOM. Dust blasted up from the arena floor with the instant wash of wind, and she threw up an arm to protect herself from it.

When it faded, she looked out in apprehension.

Riolu was out cold, but it looked like the effort had exhausted Primeape as well – as she watched, the fuzzy Fighting-type dropped to his knees and supported himself with one arm.

"Excuse me?" she heard Ash call. "Referee?"

The ref duly looked over to him.

"My Primeape can't fight any more... and probably needs medical attention... so I'm withdrawing him. It's going to take a few minutes to arrange, if my opponent's fine with it."

"Sure!" Casey called, relieved for the chance to let Riolu recover.

Sure, the Emanation Pokémon wasn't going to be able to participate in the match – but it'd be nice to have her watching.


Fortunately, Riolu had managed to get her paws up in time to block. The attack – apparently a Master Blow, whatever that was – hadn't done much more than knock her out, and a quick spray of Potion had her up and ready to watch the next part of the match.

That done, Casey considered her options.

She was worried about... Lucario, Pikachu, Charizard, or any of the Legendaries.

The one who gave her most options was-

"Pidgeot, go!"

"Snorlax!" Ash shouted, at the same time.


"...oh, great," Ash winced, as Casey's Pidgeot climbed smoothly into the stadium's large open air zone. "Might not have been the best choice..."

"What were you thinking?" Pikachu asked, curiously.

"Meganium," Ash replied. "Do you want to give this a go, Snorlax? I can call you back-"

Snorlax replied in quite a direct way, by firing a blast of orange energy from his eyes up at the circling Pidgeot.


"Whoa!" Casey said, as Pidgeot weaved away from the Hyper Beam. Snorlax corrected it once or twice, and it swerved briefly across his body near the tail before running out. "Okay, Pidgeot, stay high and stay fast! Don't let him get you!"

Her Pidgeot beat his wings hard, letting out a defiant cry and ascending skywards. A Gust blasted down as he did, hitting Snorlax and making him scratch an itch, and he then replied with a second shot of Hyper Beam.

Reaching a more comfortable altitude and speed, Pidgeot started to prepare a larger attack.

He started off with a Twister, a tornado laced with mystical energy which lashed down around Snorlax. The Normal-type didn't seem to mind much, yawning, and after a few seconds the Twister faded leaving a circle of affected grass behind it.

"Snorlax!" Casey heard Ash call. "Fire when I tell you!"

"Look out, Pidgeot!" she said in response. "He'll be trying to get you when you slow down – so keep the speed up!"

Another cry from Pidgeot, and she glanced over at Riolu.

"He is quite ready for this," she assured her trainer. "Most of that was aimed at Snorlax."

"Now!" Ash called suddenly, and orange energy lashed skywards.

Pidgeot slammed his wings up, shedding speed, and then rolled and dove as Snorlax retargeted. The beam hit him for a moment, but he powered away from it, and then pulled up and increased speed again to make himself a harder target.

"Okay, Pidgeot!" Casey called. "Home run!"

Pidgeot obliged, levelling out, and then began to turn inwards. Faster and faster, tighter and tighter, reaching for a goal of a barely-subsonic circuit no wider than a baseball diamond – until a windstorm developed.

He was forced to leave it for a moment as Snorlax fired again, but then the miniature tornado whipped downwards and crashed into the ground – well away from Snorlax.

That was exactly what Pidgeot was aiming for, though. The impact kicked up a plume of grass and dirt, which was promptly swept into the vortex and began to fill the stadium with dust.


Ash squinted through the dust. "Snorlax – down a bit, down a bit – fire!"

Orange light flashed, and he hissed – Snorlax had missed.

Not surprising given the sand everywhere, but annoying.

As he watched, the blue aura signature of Pidgeot threw himself into a turn. He dove into the cloud, and aimed for Snorlax.

"Look out!" Ash called. "Ready an Ice Punch!"

There was a crash, and Pidgeot's Sky Attack hit. The Ice Punch connected, hitting his leg, but the Flying-type's attack was far more of a problem.

Snorlax bounced backwards, staggered once, and shook his head as Pidgeot climbed back into the swirling dust storm.

"This isn't your kind of fight, Snorlax!" Ash called, raising a pair of Pokéballs. "Return!"


Casey heard the return-beam and the sound of a Pokéball opening, and squinted. "What's he-"

"Charizard," Riolu said tersely, and then there was a roar and the sound of wingbeats.

The dust storm collapsed as its momentum slowly ran out, and Charizard climbed into the sky after his opponent.

Camera flashes started in the stands.

"He is well anticipated, it seems," Riolu noted.

"Not surprised, he's been on TV a lot," Casey replied. "Okay, Pidgeot! Don't let him get too close!"


Charizard took a deep breath, and let it out with a rush of air.

This was going to be interesting... by his count, Casey had all three of the Pokémon who'd fought him last time still available to her.

Pidgeot first.

"You're bigger than last time," he observed neutrally, and Pidgeot chuckled – then flipped a wing, and bored away at high speed.

Charizard saw the sonic boom cloud form a moment before he heard the SLAM that proved it, and winced to himself – fighting a Pidgeot was always a tricky mental exercise. They were so dang fast...

He gained a little height, then settled down to hover.

Pidgeot wasn't long in coming back. Brown-cream wings showed for a moment as he turned, and then he was on the way back in.

Wind swirled around his wings.

Right.

Charizard inhaled, then began to Flamethrower – a long, rolling gout of fire that just kept coming and coming and coming. Twisting his neck, he sprayed it out in all directions, forming a continually-replenishing sphere of flame which covered all possible directions.

A moment later, a hammer of air hit him – blowing the counter shield away, but disrupted sufficiently that it didn't hit as hard as it might otherwise have done.

Charizard frowned, wings crackling as they spread to full extension again to arrest a momentary drop, and surged to the side after Pidgeot. His Flamethrower clipped the feathers of his opponent, and then the faster Flying-type was away and safe.

This could be a tricky one.


"I'm so glad we spent so long training to handle Charizard," Casey admitted. She cupped her hands around her mouth. "You're doing fine! Just make sure you take a wider line!"

"This is the Charizard who fought legendaries?" Riolu checked.

"Yeah – though I'm not sure if he's got the Mega Stone to transform here, Ash said it was kind of strange..." Casey shook her head. "Kind of wish I had one..."

Pidgeot rocketed past Charizard again, waves of Air Cutters slicing across in a diagonal wave which flicked at the Fire-type's orange scales.

"Okay!" Casey shouted. "Now, try to get him out!"


Pidgeot heard, and interpreted what his trainer meant.

Leaning back in a climb, he soared upwards – thousands of feet in seconds, then came curving around upside-down in preparation for his dive back towards Charizard again.

As he flew, wind began to gather under his wings for a Hurricane – the strongest wind-blast he had, intended to knock Charizard out of the sky entirely.

Even if he wasn't knocked out by it, being driven into the ground had to hurt.

Reaching the turnover point, he dove – ready to attack.

Then he spotted a bluish shimmer in the air.


Charizard felt quite proud of this one.

That Noivern he'd fought back in Blackthorn had given him the idea. His Blast Burn didn't detonate all at once – which led to the conclusion that, if he planned specifically, the explosive lensing that resulted from a cloud of gas exploding just right could be put to very useful purposes.

Pidgeot stooped towards him, then his tail suddenly changed shape – aborting his attack run early.

Can't have that, Charizard thought cheerfully – and spat a shower of Embers.

A cloud of bluish hydrogen shaped a little bit like an inverted cone exploded. Rather than from the tip to the base, though, this one flashed into flame along the entire curved surface at once – the blast racing inwards and contracting, until it reached the centre of the base and produced a huge overpressure wash aimed straight up.

The hammer of hot air smashed into Pidgeot as he tried to pull out of his dive, wrenching his wings back with a painful suddenness and sending him tumbling.

Charizard most certainly did not have it all his own way, though. Pidgeot's Hurricane was mostly unhindered by the highly-focused blast, and hit the Flame Pokémon in the chest – missing his wings, but driving him towards the ground as well.


Casey watched, heart in her mouth, as both Flying-types fell from the sky.

Pidgeot's tail was flaring from side to side as he fought to control his tumble – she could see his spin slowing, but he was running out of sky-room.

There was a ripple of indrawn breath all around the stadium as the battling Pokémon fell into it. Distantly, she was aware Charizard was falling faster than Pidgeot was, and then Pidgeot's beak began to come up as he broke the stall-

Bottoming out so low the grass caught fire, Charizard swooped up underneath the recovering Pidgeot and strafed him with green dragonfire.

That seemed to do the trick. Already tired, Pidgeot wobbled – then flopped down onto the grass in a relatively soft landing.

His trainer held out her Pokéball and returned him. "Good work," she said, then frowned. "Hmmm... who now..."

One of her Pokéballs wobbled, and she glanced down at it. "Really?"

Another wobble.

"Okay, sure." She threw the 'ball. "Meganium, your turn!"


Charizard blinked. "...okay, wasn't expecting that."

His opponent shrugged. "Perhaps you should have."

"No, I mean – seriously. Grass-type. Can you see the problem here?"

Meganium smiled thinly. "Not at all."

"Whatever." Charizard shook his head, wings beating as he came down to land. "Okay, this is mainly going to be difficult in terms of how to do it without hurting you too badly-"

Meganium's vines lashed out.

Charizard rather abruptly found himself under attack from four directions at once, as Meganium's well-conditioned vines whipped towards him. He inhaled in surprise, and then one of the vines lashed around his muzzle and held it shut.

The snort of flame that issued from his nostrils was bright and potent, but went nowhere near where it would need to go to damage the Constrict.

Meganium's other three vines were just as well aimed. One whipped up around his leg, another his arm, and the fourth one scored the most important success. Passing twice around his torso, it trapped his wings and tail beneath it – preventing him from simply flying away.

"Mrrf!" Charizard roared, enraged, and pulled violently on the vine on his wrist with main strength. It creaked, but held, and then the trailing end of the one holding his leg came up and snagged his other wrist as he tried to use his claws to cut one of the vines.

Snarling, he bent his neck to try and flame one of the vines – and then saw Meganium's flower glowing.

A large rock floated up in front of her face.

"...mff."

Then Meganium used Ancientpower.


"What."

Liza stared at the screen, as a barrage of small rocks repeatedly knocked Charizard's head back before the vines pulled it forwards into position to be hit again. "Is this actually happening?"

Behind her, Charla collapsed on the floor in fits of giggles.


"This is working," Casey said, mostly to herself. "This is actually working."

She could see the strain on Meganium's face, the sheen of sweat as she struggled to hold Charizard down – even off balance and being continually beaned in the head with rocks, the Fire-type was powerfully muscled and Meganium was having trouble holding him despite the two Ancientpower boosts she'd gained already.

Another curl of flame escaped Charizard's mouth, and she winced. That was a bad sign...

"Keep it up!" she shouted to Meganium, getting a determined nod in response. "Don't let him refocus!"


"...this is strange even by my standards," Ash observed.

Pikachu nodded.

Ash raised his voice. "Charizard! Try to go over backwards!"

Charizard seemed to hear him, though it was probably a little hard for him to interpret anything with the rhythmic thwacks of rocks against his forehead. He flung his neck back hard when the rock hit, wobbled, and crashed to the ground.

The abrupt change in position threw Meganium off a little, and fouled her aim. She staggered forwards a step and a half as Charizard pulled on the taut vines, and that made the others – including the one holding his right forearm – go slack.

"Dragon Claw!" Ash added.

The reminder seemed to help. Charizard slashed out with his forearms – one was caught, but the other was held loosely enough that it had some play. The sudden tug pulled the remainder of the vine off his arm.

Then Charizard's mind got enough traction to take up the fight again.


Casey winced as Charizard's claws flashed – and cut the vine holding his other arm, just before Meganium recaptured his first one.

"Okay, Meganium!" she called. "Grand Slam!"

Meganium pulled with her three remaining vines with all her strength, flipping Charizard over onto his front, then withdrew the vines just ahead of a vengeful blast of Flamethrower.

She skipped back a step, then shouted. "Me-ga-UM!"

The ground trembled.


Charizard pushed himself back to his feet, shaking his head to remove the residual dizziness.

He wasn't sure how many times he'd been hit in the forehead by rocks, but it was going to give him one heck of a headache in the morning...

Resolving to take Meganium as seriously as possible, he spread his wings and launched himself skywards.

Flame came to his mouth – this time not being penned in by the stupid vines – and he fired a Fire Blast down at her.

It didn't knock her out, not with the reddish enhancement energy crackling over her, but she was clearly badly affected by it nevertheless.

Swinging around for another attack run, Charizard prepared to finish the job.

Then the arena floor erupted in four different places, and huge root-like constructs grew out of it with shocking speed. They reached towards him in a kind of diamond-shape, and he switched targets to them with an almighty WHOOMPH of Inferno.

That reduced one of the towers of roots to a smouldering mess, but then another one smacked him in the side and knocked him towards the floor.

He rolled and landed in a long skid, braking his momentum with his hind legs, and had just enough time to be proud of avoiding a crash before all three other pillars of the Frenzy Plant landed on him.


"Did that do it?" Casey asked, anxiously.

Riolu closed her eyes, reaching out with Aura sight.

"...he's not moving," she said after a moment, then gasped. "Wait-"

The towers of plant matter exploded.

As flaming debris crashed to the ground all over the stadium floor, Charizard loomed out of the smoke. His mouth flashed with orange heat, and Meganium was knocked out by a direct hit from a Fire Blast.


Once Meganium was recalled, Charizard let out the breath he'd been holding.

"What's she been feeding that Pokémon?" he asked rhetorically. Then he frowned. "Wait..."

Turning, he pointed a claw at Casey. "Have you been training your Pokémon specifically to fight me?"

Casey glanced over at her Riolu, who muttered something.

"Oh! Uh... yes?" Casey said, with a shrug.

"That explains a lot..."

Casey scooped up her final Pokéball for the match. "Okay, Raticate! You know what to do!"


Charizard had, by now, learned his lesson. As Raticate formed, he blew a stream of fire at her.

A plume of smoke fountained up, and then Raticate blurred out of it with a whoosh of wind – yellow-black scarf fluttering behind her.

"Oh-" Charizard began, then took off in a clap of wings to try to get clear – too late.

As he rose, Raticate jumped and grabbed onto his tail. Her fangs flashed briefly, then she chomped down on the tip.

It hurt. A lot.


"Hold on, Raticate!" Casey called, as the Fire-type thrashed his tail around to try to throw the Normal-type off. "And keep working that Super Fang!"

Riolu winced. "That looks painful."

"I know, but-"

There was a whoomph of flame, as Charizard sent a blast back down his own body to try and force Raticate off. The Mouse Pokémon scampered to the lee side of his tail, avoiding the worst of the flames, and bit down again on the orange scales of her opponent.

Charizard roared something, and bashed his tail into the floor.

Casey glanced over at Riolu.

"He asked why it was always the tail," she supplied helpfully.


Charizard felt yet another stab of pain from Super Fang, and snarled – this was not fun!

He inhaled, then whip-cracked his tail upwards. The force seemed to be just enough to dislodge Raticate, and he gave an evil grin before bathing her in the purplish fire of an Inferno.

The wash of flame hid her for at least a full second, and then a tattered Choice Scarf fell out of the fire.

Charizard blinked. "Wasn't that-"

Raticate dropped out of the smoke cloud.

Her tail and some of her fur were on fire, but that only seemed to have made her angrier – a violent red aurora of energy swirled around her, and she fell past his head before grabbing onto the top of his neck.

"Get off!" Charizard snarled, as the large rat clung to his neck and started to swipe with her free paw – knocking his head back and forth while dodging out of the way of his attempts to grab her and physically pull her off.


"That looks about right!" Casey called. "Now!"


Raticate used Thunder.

By itself, her attack wouldn't have done much to Charizard – he was, after all, used to Pikachu. But he had not been having a good day, and the blast of electricity came at a bad time.

Raticate jumped off just before her opponent plowed a furrow in the dirt.


"Right," Charla said.

Liza glanced back. "What is it?"

"He's never – never – living this one down," she chuckled.


"Nice work!" Ash called, recalling Charizard. "I guess he needs to learn to take his enemies seriously!"

"Thanks!" Casey replied, feeling really quite pleased.

She'd beaten Charizard. Sure, it had taken three Pokémon to do it, but... well, this was Ash's Charizard she was talking about.

"Okay, Raticate!" she added. "Let's see what he's got!"

After a moment, there was a flash of white light – revealing Squirtle.


Squirtle rolled his neck. "All right, you rat bast-"

"I'm a girl," Raticate interrupted.

"Right," Squirtle said. He blinked. "Uh – anyway! As I was saying – all right, you dirty rat-"

"I washed this morning!"

"Just let me get started!" Squirtle rejoined. "Okay, you... female... rodent... you may have beaten my comrade, Charizard, but that means nothing! I'm Squirtle, and-"

"You realize I electrocuted-"

"That's it!" Squirtle announced, removing his glasses from his eyes. "You're going down! Eat this, Hydro Cannon Fodder!"

A tiny sphere of water shot towards Raticate. No fool, she jumped- and was above and a little to the right of it when it detonated.

The sudden eruption of water knocked her skywards, and she tumbled for a moment before steadying herself. Electricity crackled around her fang and whiskers, then lanced down towards Squirtle.

He raised his glasses and blocked, sending the bolts of lightning skirling off to blow holes in the ground in three places.

As she ended the barrage, Squirtle switched the grip he had on his weapon and charged.

There was a clash of fang against glass, and the two bounced off where they'd collided – skidding to a halt, neither particularly beaten up from the experience.

Eyes narrowed, and they jumped towards one another again.

The two engaged in combat, Super Fang against enhanced glasses, for several seconds. Then Squirtle locked blade with her, and pushed her back with a shout.

Raticate spun away, landed on her feet, and fired another bolt of Thunder. Like the previous one, it made little impression, as Squirtle simply blocked with his glasses.

"Take this!" he announced, drawing them back, and threw them. Halfway there, they flashed with Aura and duplicated themselves.

Raticate glanced between them, then darted for one and chomped down on it with a Hyper Fang.

It broke.

The other pair of glasses vanished.


Ash blinked.

"...that's torn it."

"Shut up and get down!" Pikachu advised.


"...what?" Squirtle asked, astonished.

Raticate fired another Thunder at him. This time, he had nothing to block with, and the Electric attack knocked him bouncing across the stadium.

"You're not so tough without your-" Raticate began.

"Shut up!" Squirtle replied, pushing himself back to his feet.

"Those glasses were a sign of friendship," he said firmly. "A symbol of the unbreakable bond between fighting Pokémon! They're what show me to be the badass Squirtle, leader of the Squirtle Squad!"

"They're just glasses, steady on," Raticate said.

"Just glasses? Just glasses?" Squirtle repeated, sounding scandalized. "Is a letter from a loved one just paper and ink? Is that scarf of yours just wool and dye? No!"

Water began to swirl around him.

"It's what it means that matters! The symbology of friendship! And that's why I do this!"

Getting a little worried, Raticate fired a blast of electricity at him. It bounced off – Squirtle was too worked up to care about little things like lightning any more.

"Horn!"

The Aura-saturated water began to coalesce around Squirtle's out-thrust hand.

"Drill!"

This was not a drill. This was seven of them, layered on top of one another and whirling frantically in alternating directions.

"BREEAAA-KKERR!"

The moving sliver of bluish light shot across the stadium, shedding water in a mist of tiny droplets. It rode up a yellowish flicker of Thunder, then turned up – towards the sky, and making it instantly rain inside the Silver Conference main stadium.

The movement continued until both Pokémon were a tiny dot in the sky.

Then it exploded.


"...what?" Casey asked, baffled. She glanced down at Riolu, who shrugged helplessly.

After about a minute, Raticate landed in the foot-deep water with a splash and floated to the surface.

Squirtle came down a few seconds later, hitting the ground feet first and absorbing most of the force. He turned triumphantly to Raticate, said "Squir-" and fell over.

"I believe he just said, 'and that's'," Riolu reported.

"Um..." the referee said, hesitantly. "Do either of you have any Pokémon left?"

"...sorry, no," Casey told him.

"I've got Snorlax," Ash volunteered.

"Right." The referee raised his flag. "Ash Ketchum is the winner!"


AN:


Casey made it to the quarter final!

If you couldn't guess the theme, it's basically – baseball, baseball, baseball. (Well, apart from Raticate, whose own baseball talents weren't very relevant. She's a demon running the bases, though.)

I think the one who was most interesting to write, though, was Riolu. That whole thing of whiplash-fast Aura Spheres was a neat concept to write.

Okay... there might be a bit of a delay before the next battle, the semi-final. It's going to be a big one.