Chapter 9: the entrance to victory

when we made it back home, we started prepping for what we needed for our final gym battle, this was our last step before we try to become pokemon league champions so you had better believe we're excited.

"alright, Emburn could you get the stash of hyper potions in the attic?"

"yeah sure, be right back" i flew up to the attic, to get the hyper potions from the chest in there, as i grabbed them out, i noticed a smaller chest inside and decided to take it out and show it to Ryan.

"sweet you got the potions now i'll just-, hey whatcha got there Emburn?"

"i found this while looking for the potions, and i thought you might have wanted to see it." he just looked at the chest in my hands and then took it, but he just stood there like he was remembering something. then after a few moments of silence he looked back at me with a small look of sadness.

"this was a chest my father gave me before him and mom went off to study different kinds of pokemon, and find out secrets no one ever knew before." i could tell that Ryan's voice was starting to break.

"i heard the news a week after they left, both of them were caught in a cave in over at mount moon, *quivering sigh* i-it was 5 years ago this happened, i was 11 at the time, the cops showed up at my door and told me about my parents. I was in utter denial that this had happened to me, i tried to think that it was all a nightmare, but i-i... i'm sorry i can't talk about this anymore." he then started to break down, and i saw tears starting to form, i didn't know what to do, so i just walked over and wrapped him in a comfort hug, and tried my best to make him stop.

"i know exactly how you feel Ryan."

"h-how could y-you unders-s-stand the loss of fam-m-mily."

"because it did happen to me."

"what?"

"it was two months ago, 3 days before you caught me, my brother and i went out to train after we ate, we thought everything was going good that day, until we both returned, and saw our siblings and mother dead before our eyes. but unlike you, this was no natural disaster, an Aggron caused it, he murdered my entire family except for my brother, i can still remember that face in the flames with one horn. also, i never even knew who my father was, which made it all the more painful by not having someone to turn to." after i told my story, Ryan seemed to finally calm down.

"wow, i didn't know, and i only lost my parents, i can't imagine losing siblings and a mother, along with not really knowing your father. so is that also how you got that bracelet?"

"yeah it is, my brother gave it to me before we parted ways with each other, i hope i get to see him again." Ryan then looked down for a while. we just stood there in silence for about a minute, until he spoke up.

"well, enough with all this talk about loss and stuff, how about we see what's in this chest." he opened up the chest and inside was a picture frame with a picture of him and i presume his parents. along with it came a note.

"what's this. 'Son, i'm writing you this because even though we're far from you, we'll never leave, your mother and I will always be with you, no matter what happens, be strong Ryan, even when things get rough, try to fight it out and keep going, don't just wait for something to happen. Love: dad'. wow i never knew that he wrote this all, and he's right, i can't just sit around not doing anything, i have to keep moving forward, and you'll also be with me every step of the way, won't you bud?"

"you've got that right, now let's show that gym what we're made of." we finished packing, and then we went off to challenge the gym. the flight was pretty fast, we walked up to the gym and met up with the same security guys. Ryan just showed them that he had seven badges and we were allowed in, i got back in my pokeball, in order to spectate what was happening on my virtual screen inside my pokeball, and only come out when the situation was bad. Ryan walked up to the platform where the challenger stands. the lights turned on, and there was the gym leader by the name of Giovanni, and from what i heard, he was the leader of a criminal organization called Team Rocket, or something, a few years back.

"so you managed to make it to the final gym, i must admit, i'm impressed, only a small few trainers make it to this gym, and it seems you're one of the lucky ones. well now, i should stop talking and start battling, let's begin." he sent out his Ryhorn first, this gym shouldn't be too much of a challenge if Wake can barrel through these guys. sure enough Ryan sent out Wake first and the battle was kicked off, Wake easily dished out some pain with a surf attack, then countered it's horn attack with an ice beam which finished the job. after that came his dugtrio, and what better way to deal with it than a waterfall attack to the face-s, well that almost took it down, and Wake got hit by an earthquake attack, didn't hurt him that much, but it laid down a good amount of damage. Wake finished it off with a surf. he sent out a Nidoqueen next, this might not be good for Wake, it hit him with a poison sting first, then followed up with a body slam, Wake got poisoned, but he still shot one last ice beam to freeze it, then a surf to finish it off. Wake wasn't gonna last long in this condition, Giovanni sent out his Nidoking, Wake knew that one good hit and he would be done, but he had a trick up his sleeve, he used perish song, right before he got hit with a horn attack, and then went down with the poison, pokemon poison won't kill anything, but with enough time, it will send you into unconsciousness. Ryan then sent out Punchout to deal with this, he dealt a good amount of damage to the Nidoking, but he did too, it was like they were equally matched, they each knew that the next attack would end it, but right before anyone could do anything, Wake's perish song took effect, and it was lights out for Nidoking. for his final pokemon he sent out his Rhydon, i thought that this would be easy for Punchout, until it used fissure. Punchout was easily down for the count with that move, unless you can float above the ground, getting hit with a fissure is like getting hit with an earthquake, multiplied by 10, along with a level 10 magnitude attack, multiplied by ten, at the same time, so in short terms, one hit K.O.

the team was getting destroyed by that Rhydon, Sharktooth may have landed a few hits but that Rhydon wasn't fazed easily, Sharktooth got hit with a horn drill three times and then got finished off with a stomp. Crusher who was now a Tyranitar, did a small bit better but still was taken down in the end. Nightshade did better with him being a ghost type, so stomp and horn attack didn't do anything to him, after dealing some damage with shadow ball and a few nightshade attacks, the Rhydon was on the edge, but it then used the nightmare that is fissure, Nightshade was immediately taken out. It was up to me now to finish the job.

i was sent out of my pokeball to greet the Rhydon, the fight started, it tried to hit with a horn attack, but i just whipped right back with a dragon claw, it hurt him pretty bad, i shot a flamethrower at him, then used a shadow claw, i was going to finish the job with flare blitz, when it used fissure. i looked at it and laughed at the attack below me, looks like the joke was on it, charizards aren't affected by ground type moves, in it's moment of confusion and shock, i flew behind Ryan and charged up my flare blitz. I flew towards that thing as a giant flame cloaked missile, when i reached Ryan, with split second timing i connected my mega stone with his key stone and mega evolved, now others may call it overkill, but i call it getting the job done. i hit that Rhydon with such force and power, that i even felt some pain, but that's a small cost for epic domination. that Rhydon fell like a domino after i hit it, which meant that i won the battle.

"congratulations young trainer, you have beaten the final gym, and now have access to the pokemon league, but in order to prove it, you must take this badge with you to show access and success in beating the leaders."

"thank you, and it was thanks to my partners, and my best friend here Emburn that i was able to do this." we left the gym to the pokemon center in order to get the team ready for the pokemon league.

"so you just had to overkill that Rhydon huh?"

"it's called getting the job done, now don't question me, or i'll give you a tan." he just laughed at that, we started our flight to victory road, we could have flown all the way to the pokemon league, but going through victory road is a trainer tradition that we don't want to break. we made it to the entrance in about a minute, and now the fun really begins.