A/N: Hello guys! Sorry it took so long, we had exams and homework and revising, and everything is a little complicated here.
My apologies to altaria fan, I couldn't put your OC in this chapter, but I'll put her in the next.
"June..." said Mandy wearily, prodding her sleeping friend awake. "June, wake up... June? JUNE!"
"Waah! Oh.. Oww...my head" muttered June, still half asleep.
"June, why on earth are you asleep in the Pokémon centre's backyard?"
"Whu... the what?" said June stupidly.
"BACKYARD! Look, you've even dribbled all over the picnic table... eww" groaned Mandy.
"Oh yeah, I have... I mean I am in the backyard..."
"So, why?"
"Why what?"
"Why are you in the backyard? God, you're so thick..." grumbled Mandy.
"Oh yeah... um I was... practising for the diamo-"
"WHAT?" exploded Mandy. "You've been practising for the diamond cutters... ALL NIGHT?"
"Well... it is today..." said June.
"Ugh... June, Pokémon get tired, ok? And your Pokémon were already tired from the trip here! How are your Pokémon supposed to enter the diamond cutters if they're very tired?" said Mandy as if she was teaching an unruly toddler her lessons.
"I-I didn't think about that..." stammered June.
"Of course you didn't, now... where are they..."
"Oh my god!" shrieked June. "Ukko! Dancer! Oh god... what have I done?" June jumped up and sped off toward a small group of bushes where Ukko and Dancer lay, motionless. Moon was beside them, licking her paw and stretching indifferently.
"Ukko... wake up..." whispered June, stroking the back of his head tenderly. Moon stopped stretching and watched, an amused grin on her face.
"Ukko, what's wrong?" she said when Ukko remained motionless. Moon's grin spread wider.
June began to panic. "Ukko, wake up! T-this isn't funny anymore!" then she turned to dancer. "D-Dancer? You too? Wake up, both of you... please" said June, her tone shrinking to a whimper.
"Hey, what's wrong?" said Mandy, walking in. "why are you crying, and what are your Pokém... oh no..."
"Guys..." whimpered June, tears flowing steadily out of her eyes. "I'm... I'm... I'M SORRY! I d-didn't mean it... this is all my fa-a-ult!" she wailed between sobs.
"Come on... stop crying" said Mandy sympathetically, sitting down beside her "they aren't dead... are they?"
June just wailed harder, her shoulders shaking with each sob.
"Whatever's the matter?" said Nurse Joy, rushing towards the girls. Moon meanwhile, deciding that June's crying was becoming obnoxious, stalked off with her tail in the air.
"Well..." said Mandy. "Her Pokémon kinda died or something..."
Nurse joy sat down next to June and held Ukko's wrist, she looked at the pink watch on her wrist and with a relieved smile, patted June's back gingerly. "Don't worry, they're not dead"
June stopped crying and wiped the tears from her eyes hastily. "They're not?"
"No, but I think they have a strong case of exhaustion, I'll bring them in to the lab to give them a proper diagnosis"
Soon June, Mandy and nurse joy were in the lab, with June and Mandy sitting in some plastic chairs in the far corner, Dancer and Ukko both lying down on a pair of hospital beds with metal skullcaps perched on their heads and Nurse Joy staring at a computer screen with unreadable diagrams and odd wire mesh illustrations of Ukko and Dancer. Nurse joy tapped one of the difficult-looking diagrams, but it must have made sense to her because she muttered out loud. "Strong case of exhaustion, paralysis on one, mild scratches and bruises..."
"So, are they gonna be ok?" asked Mandy.
"Yes, it seems that they are going to be fine" said Nurse Joy. "However, they must rest here for quite a while, if you want them to be in top condition for the contest"
"How long is that?" asked Mandy.
"About... nine hours" said Nurse Joy, looking at one of the diagrams.
"Nine hours? Then that leaves us..." said Mandy, looking at her purple poketch. "Wah! Twenty minutes left to practice before the contest!"
"I don't want to go to the contest anymore..." mumbled June, hiding her face behind her hair.
"Oh, come on, you're not gonna sulk all day, we'll go sightseeing meanwhile, and when we come back, Yukko and Dancer will be ready, besides, you still have Moon, right?"
"His name's Ukko" muttered June, but Mandy was too engrossed in listing all the things they were going to do meanwhile they waited.
"And we can go to that museum where they revive Pokémon from fossils! On second thought, no. Who the heck wants to go to a museum? We can go to some shops near Onyx Street, I've heard of some good ones, we can buy some contest outfits... come on already!" babbled Mandy, grabbing June by the hand and pulling her roughly toward the exit.
Within a few hours June and Mandy had found Onyx street and were staring at rows and rows of expensive, but beautiful contest dresses. June walked with her head hung but Mandy was happily looking at the shops like she were in Disneyland.
"Wow! June look! That one has so many rhinestones in it! How many do you think there are? Hundreds? Thousands? It's so pretty... but, oh no. 500! Oh geez..." said a slightly disappointed Mandy. "But look! This store has bargains! Come on, let's go in!" she said, dragging June in the shop.
Soon they were inside the shop, browsing dresses (although Mandy was the only one doing the browsing, June just hung around behind her carrying the dresses).
"Oh wow! Look at this one June! There's so many dresses here... do you like this one? Too many sequins? ... Oh, wow! These are purple! The so go with my eyes" she chanted, throwing about twelve dresses at June although she was already drowning in cotton and satin folds.
"Mmmh... Fmmfmhh" mumbled June through the many dresses.
"Hmm... maybe we could find you an amber one, June! Ok, I'll look in that pile and you look in that one, okay?"
June threw off the dresses off her head and went to look in the pile Mandy was pointing at obediently and began browsing.
"...please help me find her..."
June stopped midway of examining a tacky golden one and craned her neck over the pile of clothes. Someone was missing? She thought, I'd better listen, I mean, I might have seen her in the street. Just as she was thinking how lame her excuse sounded, the woman muttered something.
"... quite short... brown hair...amber eyes..."
June frowned. Short? Brown hair? Amber eyes? She blushed, but drove the accusing thoughts away, after all. Many people have brown hair and amber eyes...
She hoped.
"Yes... eh... June Elizabeth Fletcher"
June stared. It really was her! But who would be searching for her? She hadn't done anything bad... had she? She walked on to see what this person wanted with her. The person was a woman with fading brown hair and worried amber eyes...
Amber eyes?
Was that her mother? She crept closer and sure enough, there was her mother, talking to a blue haired policewoman. The officer Jenny nodded and wrote down June's characteristics that her mother was describing. Why's mum here? June thought, she thought about running away but she knew that was a stupid idea, after all, her mother must have a pretty good reason to have tracked her down all the way to oreburgh...
Blushing, she crept toward her mother and cleared her throat loudly. Her mother turned around and when she saw June she let out an odd, high pitched squeal and gave her a bone-crushing hug.
"Oh June, I've been so worried... back at home, I called professor willow to check that you had gotten there safely, and when she told me you'd left without a starter..."
"Mum... can't... breathe..." muttered June through her mother's arms.
"Oops, sorry love" said her mother, releasing June from the hug. "Anyway, how've you been?"
"Fine thanks... uh mum? How did you know I was going to be in Oreburgh?"
Her mother smiled. "I know my little girl June. I knew you wouldn't miss this contest for the world, and I was right! Besides, I had to give you something" her mother reached inside a blue handbag and pulled out what looked like crumpled up, cobwebby fabric.
"Ta da! See, it's a contest dress!"
To be frank, it was hideous. It was a ballroom-like dress with what looked like a whole truckful of frills and dark navy bows, the dress was made of navy-black, light blue and yellow layers of the delicate, floaty fabric, it had a small, strapless blue top with about the same amount of frills as the dress and big four-pointed yellow plush stars stuck in the front, and a black cape.
"Do you like it?"
June sighed and stared at the dress, trying to think of something positive to say.
"Um... it's very... nice" said June, thinking how pathetic that sounded, but her mother was delighted.
"Ooh, really? It used to be mine, you know. I wore it for a play when I was your age, it was called, 'the dark night', everybody admired it..."
June stared; it must have been a very dark night for someone to admire this...
Just as she opened her mouth to try and convince her mother that she should wear another dress. A loud voice interrupted her.
"Hey June, where've you been? Oh, hey there Abigail!" said Mandy, suddenly appearing behind June.
"Oh, hello. Mandy" she said coldly, eyeing Mandy. "So, accompanying my daughter on her journey, eh? Well, I certainly hope you take good care of my daughter and what is this?" her eyes darted toward a small burn in her jeans. "So, still have that... thing? Well, I really had expected..."
"Muum" groaned June. "could we come out the shop, please?"
June's mother blinked and smiled "Of course honey, come on, I've heard of some good cinemas around here"
"Cinemas? But... won't we be late to the contest?"
"We won't, we still have... three hours to the contest" said Mandy quietly.
"Exactly! And along the way, you can tell me what you girls have been up to" said June's mother happily.
Meanwhile, in the Pokémon centre, a small figure slowly stirred awake.
"Yawn... huh? This isn't the training ground," said Ukko, looking around. "Hey, Dancer! Wake up..." he said, nudging the bud Pokémon awake.
"Hmm... oh hello Ukko" said Dancer sleepily. "What happened? The last thing I remember was training over there then..."
"We blacked out" nodded Ukko. "I know, but... where's June?" he looked around the centre and tried to smell her familiar smell. "Man... I wish I was a luxray and look through walls"
"Your trainer's gone," said Moon, suddenly appearing by them. "She left you guys to get better"
"Get better for what?" asked Dancer, sitting up.
"Well, obviously for the contest" said Moon. "It's the only thing she cares about; she even trained you to exhaustion"
"No, she didn't" said Ukko. "She fell asleep and we just continued training..."
"Well... you were the idiots then," said Moon in an annoyed voice. "Why would you continue training until collapsing?"
"We wanted to get some good appeals," said Dancer, smiling. "We wanted to win an egg for June, so she'd be really happy and we woul-"
"Who cares if she's happy?" snapped Moon. "Seems like getting caught melted your brains..."
"Wait a second, you were caught too" said Ukko, starting to dislike Moon's tone. "And I wasn't caught..."
"Then you were born an idiot" said Moon. "Besides, I wasn't caught by her"
"What's so bad about her, Moon?" asked Dancer innocently.
"Well... if you want my opinion, she's pathetic," said Moon.
"Nobody wanted your opinion," growled Ukko.
"I did," piped up Dancer.
"Dancer, you're not helping," growled Ukko.
"Hey, calm down, little blue..." said Moon worriedly, sensing Ukko's anger growing. "It almost seems like you were defending her, she took you from the wild..."
"She. Saved. My. Life. And. I'm. UKKO!"
Ukko roared and threw himself at Moon, catching her by surprise; Dancer screamed and threw a cloud of stun spore involuntarily in the air, which floated around them in a golden cloud. Ukko tackled Moon and sank his fangs into her leg but she kicked him off and pinned him down with her claws, Ukko bristled and snarled, spitting at Moon's face but she remained calm, a sneer drawing onto her face.
"Give up, little blue, did you really think you would win?" scoffed Moon, her claws digging into his shoulders. "How pathetic, you are just like your trainer," Ukko growled and shut his eyes. Moon, thinking Ukko had given up, relaxed her grip. However, Ukko wasn't done yet; he snapped his eyes open and roared, unleashing the strongest electrical current he could muster. Moon screamed in agony and dropped to one side, completely paralyzed.
Ukko sighed and hopped to one side to comfort Dancer, who was whimpering in the corner.
"Are you ok?" whined Dancer, examining worriedly the cuts on Ukko's shoulders.
"I'm ok" smiled Ukko. "But you've gotta watch out for that old hag" he said, motioning to Moon, who was staring at them with hatred.
"She's... gonna be ok, isn't she?" asked Dancer.
"Yeah, the paralysis will wear off after a couple of minutes" said Ukko. "Actually, maybe even quicker, I can hear that nosy nurse coming towards this room, bet she's gonna come in and say: 'whatever has been going on in here?'" chuckled Ukko, imitating Nurse Joy's voice.
The door flew open and Nurse Joy walked in, a worried look crossing her face. "Whatever has been going on in here?" she asked concernedly.
Ukko and Dancer looked at each other and burst out laughing, much to Nurse Joy's bewilderment.
June, Mandy and June's mother lounged on chairs in a small restaurant, after having decided that they were all still hungry after the popcorn.
"So, there I was, a thousand starly were chasing Ukko and me" said June. "And when we though all was lost, Ukko released a huge thunderbolt and then..."
Mandy might have already cracked a rib from trying not to laugh if June's mother hadn't interrupted June.
"Wait dear" she said, she took out a small chip from her bag and smiled at June. "Would you please give me your Sinnoh dex?"
June nodded and handed her the Sinnoh dex, which beeped loudly when it touched June's mother's hand. She took it, turned it around her hand for a bit and, with a satisfied click, pressed it in place.
"Uh... what did you do?" asked June.
"The chip I installed contains updates and new things for your Sinnoh dex, try it"
June stared at the sinnoh dex for a while.
"Oh, please," giggled her mother. "Don't tell me you don't know how to use it!" she took the Sinnoh dex and said. "Menu"
The Sinnoh dex beeped twice and a dozen little pictures appeared on it. "Look, here. This one is your pokedex" she said, pointing at one of the pictures that looked like a small book. "This one is a video call, you can call anyone that has any kind of pokedex or video phone... there's the egg scanner, the personality checker, poffin or pokeblock taste scanner, radar, map, item teletransportation..."
"Whu? I can get sent items with my Sinnoh dex?"
"Only small ones, like Poké balls, berries, anything that can fit on top of the screen" she said. "Well, it's been lovely girls, but I must go, you two should go too..."
They nodded and went to pick up their Pokémon from the Pokémon centre, who were very happy to see them (although June suspected moon wasn't as enthusiastic as the others to meet her) and set off towards the contest hall.
The Oreburgh contest hall was a huge round steel structure like a football stadium and glittered under rows and rows of giant light posts. The most intriguing of its features was the inside, which had been decked with royal blue and silver balloons and other decorations, June stared in awe at these decorations, marvelling at the fact that such a rough and dusty city could have so much luxury in one place.
They gratefully took their numbers at the entrance and headed toward the dressing room, where they tried on their new dresses.
"Juune... come out of there"
"No"
"June, bet it doesn't look that bad"
"It does..."
"... Just get out of there."
June sighed and walked out of the changing cubicle.
"Oh god, you were right, it does look that bad"
June groaned. "Aauugh... I can't wear this; everyone will laugh at me..."
"Quit your whining, I know how to fix it" said Mandy, delving into her bag and taking out a pair of scissors and began dancing madly around June snipping and cutting.
"Ookay! First, bye bows!" said Mandy, snipping the bows off.
"Whoa! Hey, watch out!"
"Shut up, I know what I'm doing, now, bye frills!... wait, they look loose enough... maybe if I tug it here..."
RIIIIIIPP
"Oops, maybe not loose enough..."
"Waah! What did you do to my dress?" screamed June, staring at the big gash on the front.
"Chill, look, we take some of the capeeeee... and wrap it around like thiiiiis... and, voila! See! Actually, that looks pretty good"
"Hmm" said June, admiring the bow Mandy tied.
"Okay, now. We gotta make it shorter...aaaand... there!" said Mandy, cutting the dress so it stopped right above the knee.
"Wow... it looks... so cool!"
"I know, I'm awesome, aren't I?" said Mandy. "What would you do-" but whatever June would do became forgotten when a boy and a girl burst unexpectedly through the changing room.
"Hey guys!" said a carmine haired boy with an abomasnow themed sirt. "Seen any gastly around here?"
"Haagh! What the heck? Get out moron, we could have been changing!" screeched Mandy.
"We were just wondering if you had seen any gastly, they kinda floated off, you see..." said a girl with tan brown skin and black and midnight blue hair, wearing a similarly colored dress with a silver sash around it.
"Well, it's a bit stupid looking for ghosts that can go invisible, isn't it?" snapped Mandy.
"Mandy! Stop being mean" said June, she turned to the boy and the girl and smiled. "Well, we haven't seen any gastly here, but if you want I could help you look for them, and say. Aren't you that boy who I battled with the other day?"
"Yep! That's me, Noel!" said Noel, grinning.
"Cool, nice to see you again, Noel" said June, walking out of the room with Noel and the girl.
"So... came here to win an egg?" asked June.
"Nah... Not that into contests, y'know, I came here to see some contest appeals I could maybe use in battle" said Noel.
June nodded and turned to the girl. "I haven't seen you before, what's your name?"
"I'm Aretha, nice to meet you," said Aretha sweetly.
"Mmm... I'm June, so... came here to win an egg?"
"Yup, I've just started being a trainer, but I managed to drum up some good appeals for tonight" she said happily. "Someone told me one of the eggs was a shiny, so, I've decided to give it a go!"
"Oh, wow. A shiny? Those are rare, aren't they?"
Sheeyeee... CRASH...
"Whu... did anyone hear that?" asked June.
"Hear what?" said Noel, cocking his head to one side in confusion.
"The... the screech... and there was a crash... kinda like when you drop a vase and it breaks"
...CLANK...SHEEEYIEEE!
"I heard it! Sounds like it's coming from behind this door" said Aretha, pointing to a large brass door. June, Noel and Aretha pushed the door open and revealed a scene of total chaos.
It looked as if a clawed, fire-breathing tornado had swept what have once may have been a nice dining room, scores of shattered plates, mugs, vases, glasses and teapots filled the ground, the tables had deep scratches and some were on fire, the curtains had been torn to shreds and smoking in some parts, and in the middle of all this chaos was Ukko.
Ukko was being chased by what looked like a pair of floating black beach balls with odd purple smoke drifting eerily off them. One of them would occasionally cackle and beam a black laser from its eyes. Behind them, a charmeleon glowered and blew tall pillars of fire at the two ghosts in annoyance while its trainer, a boy with spiky brown hair, tried to stop them.
"Charmeleon! Come back!" he hollered, trying unsuccessfully to trap him in his ball.
"We can't recall them" said Noel. "They're moving too much!"
"Wait, I've got it!" yelled Aretha through the crash of a broken china set, she fumbled around her bag and pulled out what she had been looking for, a Poké ball with a diamond sticker stuck on the button.
"Right, go Obsie!" she cried, flicking the Poké ball high into the air. The Poké ball glowed white and an enormous rocky snake-like Pokémon materialised from it. "I suggest you cover your ears," she said, covering her own. Everyone copied her.
The onix growled and flicked his tail in annoyance, waiting for the battle commands to be uttered out. "Okay Obsidian, use screech!" happy to obey, the onix smirked and opened his mouth, an ear-splitting screech emanating from the gaping mouth. June and her friends cringed and cowered from the noise, but when obsidian saw this, he smiled and screeched louder.
"Make... him...stop!" screamed June over the racket.
"Obsieee... stop!" yelled Aretha. The huge rock snake stopped and admired his work. The four Pokémon, Ukko, the charmeleon, and the two gastly cowered and shook slightly, the trainers recalled their Pokémon and June picked up Ukko, who was still shivering from the enormous screech obsidian had made.
"Thanks for that" said June happily, scratching Ukko behind his ears.
"No problem" said Aretha.
"Uh... you girls should probably get going," said Noel. "The contest is nearly going to start, and you don't want to be late, right?"
"Right, come on, June!" said Aretha, walking out of the dining hall.
June smiled at her new friend and followed after, onwards to the contest hall.
A/N: Gaah... bit of a rushed ending...