Kangaskhan: The Parent Pokemon.
Kangaskhan is one of the most parental pokemon ever documented, hence its defining category, the Parent Pokemon. Hardly ever does the infant within a Kangaskhan's pouch leave the sight of the mother, and if endangered, a ferocious parent is soon to come thundering.
This seemingly almost overprotectiveness stems from generations of tradition, of which the family bond is ingrained within each child to be paramount in importance to survival of the species. In the case of Kangaskhan's mega evolution, the ability retained is Parental Bond, enabling the infant to actively attack along with the parent.
A Kangaskhan is also well known for its punch, from [Dizzy Punch] to [Drain Punch] to [Thunder Punch]. This wide variety of punches that Kangaskhan can learn makes them a staple in Pokemon boxing matches -infant watching by the side, of course. The Kanto Federal Pokemon Boxing League touts Kangaskhan Cup Winners for six years in a row, alongside other pokemon such as Hitmonchan and Hariyama.
Kangaskhan can be found domestically along the rural hinterland of Saffron City, often bred and trained by martial artists and breeders near the Karate Dojo. However, wild Kangaskhan can only be found in the Safari Zone of Johto, and the Rock Tunnel on Kanto's Route 10. They are omnivores, able to both graze and hunt independently for food such as fish or meat.
It was Charizard who made the first move. I could feel a quivering on his back, muscles tensing up and rippling. He was waiting for my order to launch himself into the fiery passion of single combat.
"Let's settle the score. We aren't so weak as before, Charizard. Hit him with [Air Cutter]!"
The hulking lizard blasted its wings down, gaining altitude. We blasted past Zapdos, who gave a chiding glare at us in amusement. It screeched, and in an instant, drew bolts of lightning from the thundercloud to itself. They seemed to form a crackling orb around the legendary, blinding our sights.
"Launch it now. It's using [Thunder]." Charizard bellowed, and whipped its body around, launching blades of wind in all directions. They expanded outward to crash into the lightning sphere and knock it back, scattering electricity in all directions; however, Zapdos came out unharmed, with eyes glowing. Untouched and unphased, it seemed that from the outset we were going to have an uphill battle to fight.
"[Dragon Pulse]!"
Charizard sucked in air like a vortex, and then spat it out towards the enemy, ripping the mist in front of it with massive shockwaves. It slammed into the Zapdos with incredible force, knocking it down from its perch in the air with a squawk. But immediately after, it dispersed the force of the attack with its wings, and performed an aerial backflip, glaring down on us.
" 'idn't get it. It was just testing us. Back up, now!"
Charizard swung his tail to blast a flurry of gusts at the Zapdos honing in on us, and we sped off into the thunderclouds. Lightning arced around us, as if taunting our escape. I looked behind, and the yellow bird stared back with golden eyes, as if not amused. Static spread from the tips of its feathers, and suddenly, we were enclosed in a field of lightning bolts, raining down around us and stopping our flight.
"Not good. Get closer to the water and use [Dragon Pulse] within the cover of the waves."
Then began a chase between us and Zapdos's [Thunder] attack, lightning bolts evaded by an arm's length as we attempted to dodge and seek for an opportunity to hit the adversary from afar. Towering waves, churned up by the work of the legendary's [Rain Dance] crashed around us, giving the battle a look of mysticism and power, like a deity exerting its fury of heaven upon the puny mortal.
But we were no puny mortal, instead retaliating by launching [Dragon Pulse]s from every angle imaginable, barraging Zapdos and whittling it down. However, we were too far, and Charizard quickly depleting in much stamina, to keep up a fight of attrition. So we waited for a chance moment.
In between a thunderbolt glancing off my partner's wings, and a tsunami-like wave from our backs, we surged towards Zapdos, spinning in mid air while avoiding its attacks as it sought to cluster [Thunder] around it again in an attempt to suppress us.
"[Flare Blitz]!"
Charizard spat out a raging [Fire Blast] at Zapdos, while flying into it to create a torrent of flames that licked our bodies. I could vaguely smell the burnt scent of clothes, and the heat of fire on my hair, but the wind and the rain wiped it out in an instant before again being reignited. This was the feeling of euphoria, dancing on the cusp of life and death as we flaunted our courage against the powers of old.
Zapdos didn't even have time to finish clustering its lightning defense before we smashed into it, static charges rolling off our skin like water droplets, and landed a critical hit against the legendary pokemon. It spun down towards the waters and we were almost sure that it had been done for, until it snapped open its wings and halted, only meters above the surging sea. It was mad because we had dealt significant damage to it, and we could see its fury from the bolts that burst from irs tips in all directions.
It shivered, and the air around it began to distort, forming irregular shapes. Illuminated by the flashing lightning amidst the rain, we could see rocks being drawn into the space. [Ancient Power]!
"Dodge, now!"
Charizard folded its scaly wings around itself to protect its body, and we dove towards the lurching sea as giant boulders flew past us. A single hit would be devastating, possibly ending the fight in one hit. But Charizard was agile, and he curved in rapid flips to dodge the projectiles. One almost hit us in the flurry, but he struck it with a flaming [Fire Punch] and shattered it into pieces.
We reached the sea level, almost threatening to plummet into the waters itself, and Charizard angled off steeply, wind tearing at our bodies. I saw what he was trying to do, and we neared Zapdos, I gave the order.
"[Seismic Toss]!"
We blew apart another boulder at point blank distance, and grabbed the bird by its non conductive talons. It screeched in indignation as it was swung around in startling momentum before being flung deep into the murky depths below the surface of the waters.
With our panting breaths, it was for certain that the next move would be the deciding factor. Rising up, we watched carefully, scanning for any movement of the bird.
Flashes of electricity shone through the spot where Zapdos had sunk in, and we knew that it was coming, and it was coming with a big attack.
"[Blast Burn]."
Charizard's eyes turned ruby red for a moment, rays of light piercing through the air before us. The temperature, chilling after being soaked in water and slicing through the sky, began to heat up, at first almost imperceptibly, but quickly rising. My vision grew red, and in my partner's mouth an orb of pure heat formed.
At that moment, Zapdos emerged from the sea, visibly angered as the nimbus clouds thundered and sparked. The previous last ditch effort with [Seismic Toss] did a decent amount of damage to hit it where it hurt.
It screeched, scratching at my eardrums, and with tremendous power, called down a hail of thunderbolts, to surround it in a sphere of pure energy. The scale of this [Thunder] was obviously on a different level than before, and likely, anything within half a kilometer of this place would be immediately electrocuted if it went off.
But we were waiting and ready. Charizard released [Blast Burn], and the red scenery grew dark as the heat became unbearable. It created a cloud of steam as it passed through the rain and water vapor, and collided with Zapdos's [Thunder] cage. We were blasted by hot and humid air as the resulting collision tore the sky above the sea apart, resulting in a pillar of flame that engulfed the pokemon's location, accompanied with a myriad of twisting and twining bolts.
I could feel the muscles in Charizard's wings spasm and relax, fatigue coursing throughout his body, and we plummeted down into the sea.
It was by sheer luck that I managed to stay conscious after diving headfirst into the turbulent waves - the impact felt like smacking into a concrete pillar. My head throbbed in frenzied bursts, and I struggled to retain the oxygen in my lungs as I fell further into the murky darkness. Just when my velocity had slowed to nil, I began to extend my arms, and push back up.
After the shock of the impact faded away, the first sensation was of the blistering heat. Charizard's [Blast Burn] still penetrated the area, and short of boiling, probably any wildlife in the vicinity would be currently fleeing to cooler grounds. Not like I had any option to do so, though. My body was sluggish, as if I was swimming in viscous tar. Time seemed to have halted in place, slowed down disproportionately to match my failing lungs, which coursed carbon dioxide into my blood veins in a desperate attempt to extract every last drop of oxygen.
A shadow darted past me, a Horsea fleeing into the darkness. It seemed phantom like, a delusion concepted from my failing brain. I changed directions, following it as if it was a game of tag… Soon after, I breached the surface. The humid air hit me, and I gasped for breath, grateful for release. Looking up, I could see the red afterglow of the sun fading across the sky, remnants of Zapdos's thunderclouds dissipating into the east, colored slightly pink and lavender.
I then realized how tired I was, adrenaline that was once coursing through me fading all at once. I oriented myself to float upon the dense saltwater and spread my arms out, sleep slowly taking me. The cries of seabirds and Wingull sounded off into the distance.
I took several hard jabs to the ribs, which were very sore, before I woke up. Opening my eyes, I was partially blinded by the midmorning light filtering through the window of the hospital room. To my left was Gold, brows furrowing and relaxing in relief. Blue looked in from the doorframe, giving me a thumbs up while smirking.
It didn't take long before Professor Oak and Mother, with Pikachu in her arms, to enter the infirmary and explain what happened while I was out cold.
It seems, that the A.S. Aeroacrophilia managed to land right before the storm hit shore, ten foot waves lapping the breakers and spilling out onto the mainland. It was pretty fortunate that Vermillion was built on raised ground, preventing the most of the damage due to its geography.
Right after landing, the trainer who saw me fly off into the maelstrom reported back to the captain, and the crew sent out a request to the coast guard to brave the tempest. It was only after they saw the pillar of flame burst from the sea to engulf Zapdos did they move in, eventually finding me floating in the water like it was the Dead Sea.
Meh, a little anticlimactic for my tastes. Usually the boat would capsize and horde of Tentacruel would start rampaging on the wave back.
At that point, I was electrocuted by Pikachu and reprimanded for endangering my life even though I was trying to save the lives of others. Eventually, everyone calmed down, and Nurse Joy (looking exactly as spiffy as her other several dozen counterparts) came in to confirm Charizard's recovery. He was only mildly suffering from hypothermia -who knew that even fire-types got hypothermia, although I admit flying at a hundred and fifty kilometers (90 mi.) per hour in rain was reckless- and fatigue so he should be fine with a couple days of rest.
A thought occurred to me, and I then asked Gold, who had lost interest in my condition and pulled out a GameBoy from his pants pocket (Pokemon Fire Red being inserted in the cartridge slot), what day it was.
"It's the 22nd, dummy. You've been out for two days."
Several choice anathemas immediately came to mind. Doesn't that mean that the ship was leaving tonight for Castelia?
"Yup."
Several minutes later, a Chansey was trying to restrain me from jumping out of the second story window. I vaguely remember shouting something about "Rematch with Surge!", but I was probably dreaming. Yes, I was probably dreaming. That would be horribly embarrassing.
Gold and Blue had visited the Vermillion Gym yesterday, only to find that it was under renovation, and that the lieutenant had left for Sinnoh to talk business with the Sunyshore City Gym. Kanto and Johto actually has lot of infrastructure in place to capture wind energy along their extensive shorelines and shared mountain range, but it seemed like we were soon going to divest into solar assets as well.
Well I digress. In the end, I was strapped to a gurney (I apparently had two bruised ribs and a slightly fractured femur - sometime during the battle I got hit by one of the remnants of Zapdos's [Ancient Power] attack) and wheeled up into the S.S. Anne.
And at sunset, while I was in my cabin reading about archeological excavation reports from the Ruins of Alph…
A screech sounded out from the distance, and a wild shockwave shattered the porthole of the room. I looked out, and the majestic figure of a giant bird swooped past into the blazing sun. And I had one response for it.
An angry fist and a hearty, "SCREEEEW YOUUUU!"
I later had to reimburse the company of the S.S. Anne for all of the broken windows caused by its buffoonery.