Pidegot soared through the night sky as Leaf and Ryan rode on it's back. Unfortunately for Ryan, he soon found parallels between riding Pidgeot and a roller coaster. He started shivering nervously again, but fought with all of his might to suppress his fear. When it didn't work, he closed his eyes and unknowingly tightened his grip around Leaf.
"H-hey!" She exclaimed out of surprise as she turned to look at Ryan, whose eyes were tightly shut. He quickly loosened his grip as his face grew hotter.
"Sorry!" Ryan felt a wave of embarrassment flow through his body. Leaf simply shook her head and stifled her chuckles. "B-but anyways, how did Professor Maple manage to talk to Espeon even though they were miles away?" he asked, wanting to shy away from the current situation.
"Matt and Espeon share a unique ability that lets them do that," Leaf began to explain.
"A unique ability that lets them talk over long distances?" Ryan asked.
"More like telepathy, but it's only between the two of them," Leaf explained. Ryan almost got another question out, but Leaf quickly added:
"I'll explain it another time. It looks like the Murkrow and Honchkrow are lined up on top of the trees! That's odd..."
"Murkrow and Honchkrow?" Ryan wanted get their Pokedex entries, but he figured doing it blindly in midair wasn't a good idea, to say the least. Plus, it'd involve him opening his eyes, which was something he definitely wanted to avoid at the moment.
"And they're all perched in one direction!" Leaf noticed. The Murkrow and Honchkrow were perched on top of the trees, facing in the direction of a mountain range barely visible in the distance.
"You think it's the trail Espeon left behind?" Ryan asked.
"I'm positive. Murkrow and Honchkrow wouldn't do this normally," Leaf explained without hesitation.
"Sounds like she knows her stuff. She's a champion trainer, after all," Ryan thought as Leaf looked in the direction the Murkrow and Honchkrow were directing them towards.
"That's Mount Coronet! Why would the thief be heading there?" Leaf wondered out loud. She had a suspicion on where he was going and if she was right... they had to hurry! "Let's get going, Pidgeot!" Leaf turned back to Ryan, who still had his eyes tightly shut. "You may want to close them even tighter, cause we've got to go faster!"
"Right!" Pidgeot nodded as it picked up speed before Ryan could say anything. Why him, he wondered as he imagined he was somewhere else, preferably standing solid ground.
"Hold still twerp, while we pick ya' to pieces!" An annoyed voice came from the giant mecha robot as it wound a metal fist back, preparing to launch it towards a boy and his Pikachu running at it.
"Ash! Look out!" Brock yelled. Ash jumped to the side as a robotic fist landed on the ground. Pikachu dodged and before Team Rocket could react, started to run up the mecha's arm.
"Yeah! Let's go, Pikachu!" Ash ran up to the fist, before it suddenly lifted off the ground, and started climbing it with Pikachu. Before Dawn and Brock could protest, he yelled back:
"Don't worry about me, keep sending attacks at Team Rocket!"
Dawn and Brock nodded as they pulled out a Pokeball each. They had to trust in what Ash was doing and had to buy him some time. "Buneary, lets go!" Dawn called as she threw Buneary's Pokeball.
"Croagunk, use Poison Jab!" Brock said as he threw Croagunk's Pokeball. The two pokemon appeared and as Brock ordered, Croagunk began to charge, with toxic glowing fists, at Team Rocket's mecha.
"Buneary, help Croagunk out and freeze the legs with Ice Beam!" Dawn pointed at the robot's legs. Buneary charged the energy for a second and unleashed a chilly Ice Beam, freezing both of the robot's legs in place and encasing them in thick ice.
"W-we're stuck!" Meowth accidentally said over the intercom as he wiggled the joysticks that controlled the giant mecha's legs. They were hopelessly stuck in place.
"Well, get us unstuck!" Jessie bellowed. It was a big mistake, as Meowth rounded on her and started asking if she had any good ideas, leading to a furious argument between the two of them.
"There ya go, Brock!" Dawn gave a thumbs up and a wink. Brock returned the favor. Now he had a place for Croagunk to attack!
"Thanks! Okay, Croagunk, go!" Brock pointed at the legs. Croagunk quickly approached the legs, jumped up as it's hands glowed with a purplish glow of power, and jabbed them into the icy covering surrounding the legs. The ice shattered into a sea of shards as the mecha's legs began to wobble back and forth!
"Knowing Team Rocket, they probably bought another cheap robot..." Brock said as he and Dawn waited for the mecha's legs to collapse from the swaying. However... the dead opposite occurred. The mecha's legs suddenly stabilized as it posed in a mocking, triumphant pose. James's laughter echoed.
"That hunter was right; this thing's indestructible!" James carelessly declared as he finished breaking up Meowth and Jessie from their fight.
"Say... where's the twerp dat was clim-" Before Meowth could finish, Ash popped into the robot's cockpit where Team Rocket sat.
"Pikachu, Thunderbolt!" Ash said, pointing at the joystick controls in front of Meowth.
"Thunderbolt!" Pikachu jumped up with a charge around his body and shot it straight at the joysticks as Team Rocket watched in horror. It was a direct hit! Sparks and smoke started to fly from the controls as Team Rocket started to panic.
"Come on Pikachu, lets get outta here!" Ash felt Pikachu hop onto his shoulder as he started a hurried climb out of the mecha's cockpit. The smoke was growing, as well as Team Rocket's bickering in the background about inside insulation. Ash emerged onto the top of the mecha head. Without thinking, he quickly started climbing down the mecha's arm. A jump from atop the mecha's head was suicide!
"They're not gonna make it in time!" Brock realized as heavy smoke started leaking from the mecha. Ash was just starting his descent down the mecha's arm.
"Meowth! Do something!" Jessie yelled in command.
"Hold on, what's this blinkin' thing for?" Meowth noticed a yellow blinking light on the control panel. It was separated from the other controls, and it had a strange protruding receiver above it.
"That's the signal! We need to go!" James said as he scanned around for a certain button on the control panel. "Aha! Here we go!" James pressed a button with a picture label of a spring on it.
"No! Not that one, you-" Jessie was interrupted from her angry rant as she, Meowth and James were flung out of their seats and out of the mecha's control room, through the top.
"Why'd you press that button?" Jessie yelled at James.
"Look down there!" Meowth said, pointing back towards the mecha. Sparks could be seen coming from it now. The mecha was seconds away to exploding!
"If we had stayed there longer, we would've been fried Magikarp!" James commented, smug at his quick decision.
"Whoop de do. Now, how do we meet up with the hunter?" Jessie asked through her irritation.
"I-I... don't know," James finally admitted. Jessie and Meowth looked at him with a sweat drop, disbelief kind of look. There was going to be time during their landing to find out, but it was time for one of their trademarks...
"Looks like Team Rocket's blasting off again!" The trio yelled as they disappeared with a twinkle.
The mecha was starting to fall apart! Nuts and bolts could be heard flying around in the mecha's insides, violently shaking it. "Pikachu! Hold on tight!" Ash said as he tightly held onto the metal arms. He had a long way to go to get down, but there wasn't enough time! Violent shaking loosened Ash's grip, and his sweaty hands weren't helping either. Suddenly, Ash felt himself sliding down... and back! Pikachu had slipped off from Ash's shoulder!
"Pikachu!" Ash called as he caught his friend in his arms, before he started to plummet. Dawn and Brock cried out his name in shock as Brock quickly pulled out another Pokeball and lobbed it into the air.
"Happiny! Catch Ash and Pikachu!" Brock called out.
"Happiny!" Happiny cried out as it appeared below the spot where Ash and Pikachu were falling. Thanks to it's unnatural strength, Happiny was easily able to catch Ash and Pikachu in it's small arms.
"Happiny! Thanks!" Ash said as Happiny happily nodded and quickly set them down.
"Run! It's going to blow!" Brock yelled as he quickly returned Happiny to it's Pokeball. Ash continued to hold onto Pikachu as he made a mad break for it. Small explosions sounded close behind him, quickly growing more and more ferocious!
"Get down!" Brock yelled as he covered Dawn and in her arms, Piplup. Croagunk followed suit and did the same for Buneary. The rumble behind Ash made him dive to the ground, huddled over Pikachu. There wasn't anymore time...
Boom.
The mecha finally erupted in a chain of violent explosions. Flames flew into the air as more and more explosions occurred. It was... the end, Ash thought. But something was weird- the explosions, although they were loud, they sounded a bit... muffled. And oddly enough, Ash didn't feel himself getting launched or burned by flames!
He opened his eyes and turned around. "E-Electabuzz?" The yellow and black bodied pokemon was struggling to hold a green barrier against the forceful flames of the explosions. Standing behind Electabuzz was a familiar sight to Ash.
"Paul? What're ya' doin' here?" Ash asked in shock. Paul looked back at Ash and gave a blank, unreadable stare then turned his full attention back to Electabuzz.
"Electabuzz, is that all you got? We'll never make it past the first round with this pitiful excuse for a Protect!" Paul called to his pokemon. He continued on and on, while Ash finally realized- this was practically training for them!
"Focus! Otherwise you'll get burned by the explosion," Paul continued to warn Electabuzz. Electabuzz seemed to heed those words as it's Protect barrier seemed to thicken in strength! The added focus was enough to contain the final explosions from the mecha, which was now a burning pile of scrap.
"P-Paul? What's he doing here?" Dawn asked as she and Brock looked up from their spot and started to get up.
"He must've used Electabuzz's Protect to save Ash!" Brock concluded as he checked on Croagunk and Buneary, who were both unhurt by the explosions.
"Wow, great job Electabuzz!" Ash praised Electabuzz as he got up from the ground. A slight hint of a blush seemed to linger for a second on Electabuzz.
"That wasn't," Paul objected at once. "Electabuzz should've been focused in the first place. A strong opponent would've finished it in a second," Paul finished as he quickly returned Electabuzz to it's Pokeball and began to walk away.
"Paul! Wait, I haven't thanked you yet!" Ash yelled out.
"You don't need to. All I saw was a perfect training exercise for Electabuzz. You just got lucky," Paul simply put without looking back and continued walking away. He eventually disappeared from Ash's and the others' sights.
"Pikachu, we're gonna beat him and win the Sinnoh League, right?" Ash suddenly said with determination.
"Yeah! Of course!" Pikachu agreed with a raised fist.
"Hey, Ash!" Ash turned around to see Dawn and Brock run up to him, along with Croagunk and Buneary, the latter of which looked beyond relieved.
"Pikachu!" Buneary cried out as she hopped over. Pikachu was knocked off of Ash's shoulder as Buneary hopped onto Pikachu and started to fiercely hug him.
"I'm so glad you're alright!" Buneary said.
"T-Thanks! But you don't have to hug so t-tight..." Pikachu said as he was crushed in Buneary's hug. The others couldn't help but laugh while Piplup jumped out from Dawn's arms and joined Pikachu and Buneary on the ground. With a grin on his face, Piplup walked over.
"Pikachu's got a girlfriend! Pikachu's got a girlfriend!" Piplup mocked.
"No I don't! W-we're just friends-" Pikachu stopped himself as he realized what he had just said in front of a sensitive Buneary. Buneary looked like her heart had split in two, and was close to tears!
"B-Best friends!" Pikachu returned the hug Buneary gave him earlier, which stopped Buneary from crying, but left Piplup in a dramatic pose.
"B-B-best friends? I thought we were best friends!" Piplup jealously asked.
"Oh... This could take a while," Pikachu thought as his ears drooped and a single bead of sweat dripped down his face while Piplup continued talking.
"We should probably go see where Professor Maple is," Brock suggested. "He was trying to contact Ryan earlier, so we'd better find him."
"Right, Brock! Okay, Buneary, take a nice long rest, okay?" Dawn said as she returned Buneary to her Pokeball.
"You too, Croagunk. Nice job!" Brock did the same and returned Croagunk into it's Pokeball.
"Phew," Pikachu couldn't help but sigh as a hugging Buneary disappeared back into her Pokeball.
"Your girlfriend giving you trouble, Pikachu?" Piplup playfully mocked while Dawn picked him up into her arms.
"Hey! At least I have one... Wait, what?" Pikachu thought as he hopped onto Ash's shoulder. With the smoke of the defeated mecha behind them, the group started their search for Professor Maple, and for an update on Ryan's situation.