"Again, with more speed this time."
It wasn't unusual for Shinji to train alone with his pokemon. Like any other journey, he needed to be prepared for anything that may happen.
Training new captures was always a source of slight paranoia for him. It was when Shinji felt most vulnerable. Sure he always had Torterra to have his back, but in certain situations... there was only so much one well trained pokemon could do.
Thats why upon beginning his journey, Shinji wasted no time in capturing a pokemon with great potential. It was a dark type that would grow to be a dragon in its final form.
It's sleek lilac body and dark blue frill on its head gave off the impression of innocence, but in reality, the small pokemon was a terrifying force of darkness when prompted. "Arwyu, you need to work on your timing. A strong attack means nothing if you cant hit a moving target. Understand?"
"Euuu." The small Pokemon nodded with a determined glare and looked forward toward a large tree. From the tallest branch hung a makeshift swinging target that Arwyu was supposed to attack.
Focusing all of his concentration, the small reptilian Pokemon opened his mouth and shot out three medium sized dark balls of energy. The first two merely grazed the target, but the last attack hit dead center.
Seemingly pleased with its progress, Shinji decided to begin practice on another move that, if mastered, could become their go to move. "Good. Now lets work on your-"
"Hey, you there!" Before he even had a chance to instruct his Pokemon, he was rudely interrupted by some random trainer. Glaring at the younger teen, Shinji growled in pure annoyance. "You're a trainer right? Battle me!"
Looking him over proved unimpressive to the violet haired man. All he could think was how did some preppy boy have the balls to but into his obvious training session. But the guy looked like a first class prick.
He was the epitome of a 1980s frat boy. He wore a pair of too tight jeans with a pair of yellow high top basketball shoes. He had a loose pale yellow tee shirt underneath a letterman jacket with brown leather sleeves.
His blond blowout hair had to be held in place with an obnoxious amount of hair product and he finished his look off with an unnecessary pair of bright pink sunglasses. Just looking at him made Shinji nauseated. "Go away. I'm busy."
"No way! According to the trainers official rulebook, if a trainer challenges you on the trail to a gym, they have to accept!" What a fucking simp. That's the nicest thing Shinji could think of in that particular moment. Only a new trainers acted that way and this jerkoff looked entirely too old to be a newbie.
Besides, if he wanted to quote the rules and get technical, then so be it. "This is a meadow. Not the trail you moron." With a satisfied smirk, Shinji turned his back on the unknown trainer, fully prepared to continue his training until he heard an annoyingly arrogant taunt.
"Aww whats the matter? You scared to lose with that puny Arwyu of yours?" The smirk vanished from Shinjis face and was replaced by one of his infamous intimidating stony looks.
"Call out your pokemon."
Shaken by the sudden change in aria around the man he challenged, the young man walked to the far side of the clearing and grabbed a pokeball from his brown belt. "Alright, come on out Gengar!"
In a flash of white light, a fat purple ghost with large red eyes and a long pink tongue appeared. Evening with pride the trainer had a look of sudden realization and looked over at Shinji. "My name's Steve by the way."
"I don't care, and your choice in Pokemon is pathetic. Pining a ghost pokemon against a dark type is a rookie mistake."
"Yeah... right." Steve said with an unamused scowl of his own. Nodding to his Pokemon he pointed forward and the battle began. "Gengar, use confuse ray!"
"Block it with screech and follow up with dark pulse." A sudden darkness covered the area where the Pokemon faced off. The purple pokemons red eyes began to glow and emit an eery multicolored light.
But, before the light reached Arwyu, he opened his mouth and let loose an unbearable screeching sound that sent visible shockwaves through the air. The ripples created by the sound broke apart the hovering colorful attack and forced the Gengar to shut it's eyes and cover it's invisible ears with its tiny hands.
Once his opponent was fully distracted by what was sure to be a pounding headache, Arwyu sucked in a huge breath of air before releasing three spheres of glowing violet and black energy.
"Crap it knows dark pulse? Dodge buddy!" Steve was showing how panicked he was by calling out meaningless moves. His pokemon didn't have time to dodge. Even a beginner would've seen it.
When all three spheres hit their target, the ghost type began to look around in complete confusion. Frustrated with the quick downturn, Steve called out a move that wouldn't help him in the slightest. "Gengar, try using hypnosis!"
"Useless." Smirking down at his pokemon, Shinji nodded signaling it was time to wrap things up. "Aryu use dark pulse again and finish this poor excuse of a battle."
Steve looked like he wanted to argue with Shinji over weather or not the battle was "pathetic" but as soon as he saw how fast the attack was coming, he changed his mind. "Gengar look out!"
But it was already too late. Watching all three spheres hit his starter pokemon was like watching a car crash in slow motion. He wanted to stop it but there was nothing he could do but wait for it to be over and hope the aftermath wasn't too bad.
As the dust settled and the smoke cleared, a very unconscious Gengar laid on the ground twitching while an exhausted Arwyu stood over him with a look of accomplishment on his face.
Knowing there was no more fighting, Steve sighed in disappointment and pulled out his purple and white pokeball. "Aww man. Gengar return."
Turning to Shinji, Steve glared and did not hide the fact that he was upset with his loss. "You're a really jerk you know that?"
When Shinji didn't respond he continued. "You didn't even give me a chance to beat you! You just sent in your psycho pokemon and obliterated him for no reason!"
"If I remember correctly, you were the one who called my Arwyu puny. It's not my fault you decided to challenge someone who very obviously outclassed your training skills." Ignoring the look of pure catered Steve was shooting his way, Shinji simply returned his Pokemon and walked right up to the infuriated trainer.
"Just give me my pokeyen and leave me alone." Rolling his eyes, Steve reached into his jacket pocket and shoved a bag of precounted money into Shinjis hands.
"Geez what is your problem bro?" Before he had a chance to scold the blonde for referring to him in such a disrespectful manner, Shinji heard something that sent a chill down his spine.
Steve seemed to have heard it too because his face morphed into one of concern almost immediately. "Did you hear that screaming?"
Of course he heard it. Not only did he hear it, he recognized it. Dismissing the annoying trainers question, Shinji looked in the direction the screaming came from. His heart nearly stopped when a sudden explosion came from the same direction.
Going completely against his usual nature, Shinji took off in a sprint, not once looking back at the trainer he'd left behind. If he would have looked, he would have seen that Steve had vanished the moment the explosion went off. But he was too concerned with other things to even worry about that now.
He had to get to Hikari.
