Ch 20: Ambush
Evan Hunter had rapidly grown into something of a protege to the head of Team Anonymous, Sir, over his impressive initial months inducting into the criminal organization. It felt like just yesterday to Evan when he had been brought in face to face to meet the mysterious Sir, who had such a keen interest in Evan from day one, which had never particularly surprised Evan due to his prowess at battling. Sir had made it a point to coldly excuse Snake from the room before introducing himself to Evan, which showed Evan that Sir had no problems belittling Snake, and likely didn't respect him. Evan promised himself that he would perform such high caliber work to this organization that had given him a new purpose, a fresh start in his boring life, that Sir would have no choice but to speak to Evan as an equal.
One of the first missions Evan had been assigned with was to steal some rare chemicals being shipped to a crummy Poke-Mart in Celmont three months back with his partner, Ms. Stacy of Wintervale, whom Evan had strongly disliked upon meeting. He had hated her, actually. He hated the wealth she had, the ease and accessibility she had to take her pick from the cutest of baby pokemon to fully evolved, trained-upon-purchase monsters capable of swallowing up the joke pokemon of the Gord Wods. Evan did not inform anyone in his team that he had his Dodrio kill Stacy so that he could hog the full glory of completing the mission, also while taking out a competitor for Sir's interest, and they believed Stacy just got killed by dumb luck from the shop owner's pet pokemon, a Delcatty and Stoutland.
After bringing the chemicals back to the delighted Sir, along with the news story showing the mourning town of Celmont over the horrible robbery, Sir had immediately upgraded Evan to full Anonymous clearance to all information and resources and Sir insisted that Evan no longer needed a partner, like Stacy, who would likely, "get in the way again" (Sir's words).
Sir pushed heavily for Evan to train, and train vigorously, against the best of the best of Anonymous' members in their large gymnasium that was designed to resemble the standard Ilragorn League gyms. Now Evan was very proud of his team, as he had all of them from the beginning, with rarely a loss to his name. He had his frenetic Dodrio, which outsped probably 95% of the pokemon on Ilragorn. There was then his charming Mr. Mime, always playing goofy when walking around in public but in battle, became a master of control and concentration. There was his old reliable Steelix, with the ability to Mega evolve when needed, which Evan rarely needed to use these days since he had leveled every mon on his team to league proportions. Steelix was Evan's oldest pokemon and the most powerful one on his team by a landslide, especially considering the rarity of mega pokemon on Ilragorn. Then he had a revolving door involving the other three and they constantly changed. Even though Evan had an incredible amount of pokemon in his PC boxes to use, he only focused on leveling up a few specific ones, but he could never decide on a solid core of six pokemon to settle with if he ever got in a league.
But Evan was beyond any silly little Pokemon League at this point - he had much bigger plans. These past three months had been brutal for him, as Sir had been piling on his Anonymous agents to battle against Evan with their most powerful of mons, strongest of attacks, no hold barred, and at times it could get a bit brutal. There was one intense battle in particular where Evan's Dodrio had thrown off such an angry assault of Drill Pecks to a Lickilicky already unconscious on the floor, that his beak had split the Lickilicky's fat pink throat in half and blood had come splurting out. The small crowd of spectators consisting of Anonymous members and rookies cheered the gore on and Evan was awarded with both applause and respect from the members, who grew to learn that there was a reason Sir saw potential in him and gave him so much personal time.
"Evan," Sir had said in their last meeting, alone in Sir's luxurious office. "I know I've had you acquire very important chemicals for my lab techs in the past, and I've had you train your pokemon to their limits and beyond, and that all might have seemed kind of challenging along the way-"
Evan laughed in a humble, 'oh stop it' voice, saying, "It really wasn't."
"Nevertheless," Sir drummed on, raising his voice to show he didn't like the interruption, but cracked a small smile to show that all was forgiven and to keep the atmosphere light. Evan enjoyed this because he knew that Snake could never interrupt Sir and get away with it. "The real challenge has finally presented itself. And I believe you're ready."
A few days later, Evan found himself flying via Dodrio from Anonymous Headquarters to the furthest point north of the island, to the only place in Ilragorn less secluded than the darkest corners of Exeter Forest: a cave about a mile off the shore of the ugliest beach on the island. The North beach was so littered with garbage, pokemon waste, and broken bottles of glass that it was rightfully closed down and banned from public use. Blocking the beach off meant that it was inaccessible unless you could fly over it, meaning only people with helicopters and pokemon trainers with well trained flying pokemon could get into the beach, or fly to the exotic cave a mile out to sea.
It was in this cave that the person Evan was looking for would be, according to Sir, who said his information was always reliable. Evan descended from his Dodrio upon reaching the small stony piece of land with a small entrance glittering with bright powder. Evan returned Dodrio to his pokeball and entered the cave, which had nothing of renown interest as of yet. It looked like an ordinary cave, with a few simple water/ice pokemon jumping out of the ponds of water on the cave floor, but nothing special.
After walking a short while, no longer than 5 minutes, Evan reached the end of the cave, surprised to find it had a solid wall blocking anyone off from continuing, meaning the only way out was the way he came in. However, Evan found something else at the end of the cave, the man he had been sent to find and kill. And that man was Morgan Wrigley, the youngest of the Elite Four of Ilragorn.
Morgan, always known for being the quietest or the most humble of the Elite 4, was proving this rumor true by kneeling in a vulnerable position, eyes closed, as if he was praying. The sounds of Evan's footsteps along the cave floor caused an echo, so Morgan was alerted to Evan's presence yet he didn't bother opening his eyes, unbothered by this uninvited guest. He still continued facing the dead end cave wall with its glittering bright powder splashed along the walls, looking either lost in concentration, lost in prayer, or just plain asleep.
"How did you find me, whoever you are?" Morgan introduced himself in a calm voice.
"You gave an interview a long time ago about significant places to you," Evan answered honestly, recalling the information Sir had fed to him. "You listed this uncharted cave as one of them, the place you got your first pokemon that saved you from getting swept out to sea when you were a child."
"Ah, yes," Morgan smiled to himself, eyes unopened. "My lovely Mawile."
"I thought I could find you here, since you're all out traveling these days heading to the festival tomorrow. Thought you might want to stop in on your old memories." Evan remained standing on the fat side of the large cavern he was in, just examining his prey in Morgan. So this is an Elite 4, Evan thought, Top of the top of Ilragorn. Only the winners of the Ilragorn League get to face these four trainers of the highest order, second only to the old bitch champion, Ava. And I get to face him.
"Yes, the Festival of the Elite, that's tomorrow?" Morgan's head cocked to the side and his eyes opened at last, catching a sight of Evan for the first time. "Time goes by fast. Hmm. Yeah, I don't know you." Morgan rose to his feet. "You here for an autograph, because that's awfully flattering, you going over North Beach, and flying or swimming all the way out here to this unmarked cave just on the off chance I'm out here." Morgan's voice gave away his doubts that Evan actually was here for a signature.
"Actually, and it's nothing personal, but I'm here to - well, kill you," Evan answered, finding this conversation very bizarre. When he'd killed in the past, like Stacy or that nobody shop owner in Celmont, it was impulsive and felt right in the heat of the moment. But this was planned, and Evan had to think about this over and over for the days he'd spent searching for Marvin upon Sir informing Evan that the Elite 4 always travel abroad the island right before the Festival of the Elite and that Sir knew Evan was ready to take on the youngest member of the Elite 4. Also, Evan had a huge amount of respect toward Morgan on principle. He had become one of the four elite trainers on this entire island, and even if Evan could and would take him down, Morgan was still eons better than everyone else.
"You may try, little boy," Morgan snapped at the teenager just a few years younger, his eyebrows lowering as he realized the severity of the situation, hands jolting to his trainer belt, which was gold plated, and snatching up a pokeball. "You're really trying to fuck with a member of the Elite 4? What are you on?"
"I'm going to be the new leader of Team Anonymous," Evan answered brazenly, grabbing a pokeball of his own. "And that starts by taking out the best of the best. Like I said, it's nothing personal, it's just business."
Morgan only had three pokeballs on him from what Evan could see, whereas Evan brought all six, even though most trainers don't normally lug around 6 pokeballs while journeying, as they had PC boxes for storage. Evan just wanted to be extra prepared for anything Morgan could throw at him.
It didn't take long, and the battle was one-sided the whole time.
Morgan chose Braviary, while Evan started with an unusual lead for him: his Steelix. Morgan initiated with Braviary going for Superpower while Evan used the mega stone attached to his watch to evolve his mon into Mega Steelix, the 10 meter tall iron-clad snake pokemon with iron horns jutting out of his jaw, small rocks orbiting around his long body, and a look of insane anger on his monstrous face.
Braviary's Superpower certainly connected into the Steelix, the eagle pokemon using his powerful legs to get off a nice super-effective fighting hit right in the Steelix's chest, but the close quarters with the mon allowed Steelix to just drop all of his weight with a powerful Heavy Slam right on Braviary, crushing the bird under his massive 900 pound weight and literally squeezing the life out of it seeing as Steelix wouldn't shift his weight afterwards, and his heavy steel body blocked off Morgan from recalling the Braviary with his pokeball naturally.
With all of this happening in under 10 seconds, Morgan panicked, understanding that his Braviary was dying and he needed to act fast. Morgan released an equally tall and massive pokemon to the Mega Steelix in Tyrantrum, the rock dinosaur behemoth with a jaw that could go toe to toe with Steelix, if Tyrantrum wasn't made of rock.
"Head Smash!" Morgan ordered, using the strongest move he had. Tyrantrum also got a solid hit off on the Mega Steelix, using his strong rock cranium to crack right into the opponent's face. While Tyrantrum astoundingly did not recoil in pain from slamming into hard steel, but Mega Steelix raised the lower end of his body, as Evan called out 'Autotomize!', and Mega Steelix began spinning in place. Once Mega Steelix spun himself into lightening the density of his iron body, the pokemon was now delighted to find that he was twice the speed he was before, which was still not exactly enough to win any races, but it was enough to outspeed his opponent.
"Outrage!" Morgan tried, going for the most powerful physical dragon move there was, normally a desperation play.
"Heavy Slam!" Evan repeated, excited over how easy all of this was.
Mega Steelix finally shifted his weight off of the pancaked Braviary, who looked like a bloody mess of roadkill rather than a pokemon, and then Steelix rose straight up, standing incredibly tall, applying all of its weight on the tip of its tail, as Tyrantrum started just bashing mindlessly into Steelix's body with all the aggression and power Tyrantrum could muster, using his small arms, his legs, his jagged teeth. Steelix brought all of his weight down, falling straight forward on his belly, slamming all of his weight on the Tyrantrum. Due to the Autotomize, it wasn't as strong as before, and Tyrantrum actually managed to wiggle out free from under the Mega Steelix and continued to beat at it with Outrage.
"Brutal Swing!" Evan shouted, and Mega Steelix used its tail like a bat to clunk Tyrantrum on the top of the head, creating a severe crack in his cranium and bringing Tyrantrum to his knees. With a few additional Brutal Swings to the head, Mega Steelix managed to bash Tyrantrum's head into the cave floor enough to splatter his head into a liquid substance as Morgan stood on, paralyzed with nerves over how quickly his world was falling apart around him when it was just fine 2 minutes ago.
Evan, on the other hand, was having the time of his life. While he did admit matchup and typings definitely were aiding him in this fight, the point remained that he had taken down two of an Elite 4's pokemon with just one of his. And it was so fucking easy.
Flustered, Morgan revealed his last pokemon wordlessly, but his face was beet red: it was a Mawile, and Evan had a funny feeling this was the same Mawile that had saved Morgan as a child, which had a kind of silly irony to it and made Evan even giddier over the fact that his pokemon completely walled Mawile.
Morgan revealed a mega stone as well, and his Mawile transformed into a Mega Mawile, with its extra pair of jaws sprouting from its head and its remarkable pink-and-yellow coloring. It looked battle-ready, prideful, and like it rarely lost a match. The Mega Mawile of an Elite 4.
"Earthquake," Evan said with finality, ending the battle.
Mega Steelix brought the wrath of Arceus upon the cave floor of that offshore land. Mega Mawile was caught in the fallout of the attack, the super effective ground move immediately bringing the proud Mega Mawile to its knees before it could even fire off an attack. And the Mega Steelix did not stop until Mega Mawile was knocked out, and he didn't stop then. Not until the tremendous Earthquake had occurred for so unnaturally long that the ceiling began to cave in and rocks began to fall in a hailstorm of boulders. Morgan and Mega Mawile were blocked off from escaping the enclosing cavern caving it by Mega Steelix and Evan, and eventually the ceiling swallowed them up as the ceiling became the floor.
Assured in completing his mission as he recalled Steelix and released Dodrio so he could send himself airbound and fly directly out of the cave and back to the main island, Evan remained beaming with pride the whole ride back to Anonymous Headquarters where he would deliver the good news to Sir.