The Asmodeus duel comes to a conclusion. But it comes with a price.

This Episode is a fair bit gorier than all of the rest combined, just warning those of a squeemish nature so I don't get complaints.

Anyway, I would appretiate comments/reviews.

Episode Seventy-Two: Blood Ties

The Nido-horn speared Asmodeus in his burnt flesh, but he stayed standing. He somehow managed to yank it out of his gut, dispite having nothing even resembling paws or hands. Asmodeus dropped the horn to the ground and started walking towards me.

He suddenly griminced and looked down at his chest wound, a small green goo was leaking out of the wound.

"Still poisoned," I laughed, "not so nasty now, are you?"

"Ugh. I don't care if I go down, I'm taking the whole lot of you with me!" Asmodeus yelled as he began sprinting fowards, powered by sheer rage.

"Damnit Flame!" Squirtle called across to me, "stop pissing off the bad guys."

"Suggestion noted," I replied, watching as Asmodeus got closer.

I reached out with my working arm and found Blacky's head. I grinned to myself as I spotted him look up at me.

"Get out of the way," I said, "this one's mine."

"What?" I heard him reply but I shoved him away without even a glance, "Go."

I focused as hard as I could on Asmodeus' throat. Asmodeus was only a few meters away from me by now, so I puffed in as much air as I could with my injured ribcage. He was close now, Squirtle couldn't blast him from behind without catapulting him into me.

I shot my fireball towards my target but, even at such close range, Asmodeus managed to use one of his blade thingies to slice the fireball and direct the blast around him. He kept on coming and his other blade slammed into my, already injured, shoulder and pinned me to the wall.

"Nice try Charmander," he told me, while I was trying not to pass out, "but you lose."

I slowly reached my working arm towards the blade in my shoulder but ended up with the other one up against my throat.

"Oh no you don't," Asmodeus laughed, jiggling the blade in my shoulder and I had to bite my tounge to stop me screaming.

'Another plan that backfired rather painfully,' I thought to myself, before my brain went into lockdown due to the pain.

"Flame!" Blacky yelled, diving for Asmodeus. Again, the fake Kabutops was quicker and brought his free blade down on the Umbreon's head.

"And you managed to defeat Gengar? A weakling like you," Asmodeus laughed at my adopted nephew.

I used his distraction to grab onto the blade that impaled me to the wall and yanked it out. Asmodeus swung at me but I ducked and managed to slam his blades into the concrete behind me.

"None of us are weaklings," I snarled as I clenched my fist and slammed it into Asmodeus' throat.

Asmodeus fell backwards, pulling himself free of the wall. I'd cracked the armour on his upper torso and throat, leaving his entire front exposed to attack.

"Bastard," he muttered as he got to his feet and glared in my direction.

I glared back, holding onto my injured arm, "You only just noticed?"

He stepped fowards, raising both blades to strike me down. But before he could, Scyther got him in what looked like a hug.

"Scyther doesn't like you," he muttered as one of his own arm blades moved up to Asmodeus' throat. The peusdo-Kabutops eyes widened as Scyther wrenched his blade across before releasing his grip.

Asmodeus crumpled to the floor and lay, face down, in a puddle which rapidly turned red.

"Give me a Raichu anyday," I said as I looked up from Asmodeus and nodded at Scyther, "thank you."

"Flame is welcome. Scyther was going to kill it eventually anyway."

"I still cannot believe that Scyther actually said 'you'," Squirtle said as he walked up to us.

"Scyther does that sometimes, when really angry," Scyther replied.

"Sure Scyther does," Squirtle laughed, before sighing, "aw crap. Now Scyther had Squirtle-I mean me- doing it."

My arm was really starting to hurt due to the adrenaline wearing off and I was knackered. I looked over my shoulder and spotted Blacky collapsed on the floor, "oh no! Blacky."

Both Squirtle and Scyther spun round and spotted the downed Umbreon.

I managed to dash over to Blacky and croch down beside him. He was covered in hundreds of small cuts but the nasty one was on the top of his head, right between his ears. His black fur was being stained crimson.

"Blacky!" I yelled, no answer, "no. This can't happen again. They can't take another one away from me."

I couldn't see any sign of movement from him, not even the slightest sign of breathing. I could feel the tears welling up but I fought them back with everything I had. However, while I could stop teardrops, I could feel my own blood running down my arm and dripping onto the ground by Blacky's head.

"Damn that Asmodeus!" Squirtle yelled suddenly, the sudden noise making me look up. He ran over Asmodeus, picking up the Nido-horn on the way. He was about to flip the bastard over before Scyther stopped him.

"Squirtle, that thing is dead. Mutilating it will get us all no where."

"How can you be so calm about this?" Squirtle yelled at the bug Pokémon, which was pretty much what I was thinking.

"Because Scyther sees no need to get so upset."

"Blacy is dead! That is a bloody good reason to get fecking upset."

"Do dead things open their eyes?" Scyther asked Squirtle, looking down at Blacky with a smirk.

I glanced downwards and, true enough, Blacky was looking up at me. His eyes were unfocused but he was alive, which was the importent thing.

"Can you tell Squirtle to stop yelling? I have a headache," he croaked, while I ended up smiling dispite myself.

"Sure thing, kiddo. Just promise me that you won't peg it untill we can get you to a Pokémon Center."

"Will there be food there?"

"They'd better," I grinned, before my shoulder twinged and made me curse to myself.

Blacky fell asleep again, this time I could see his ribs move with his breaths so I could tell that he was alive.

"Flame?" Scyther asked.

"Yeah?"

"How are we going to get Blacky to a Pokémon Center. Squirtle isn't big enough and both of us are tired and injured."

"We'll manage. We have too."

My shoulder agreed with a particually nasty throb that made me wince visibaly. Scyther looked concerned but I brushed it off with a wave of my paw

"I'll be fine."

"Flame'll run out of blood before we get to the Pokémon Center, that is a bad wound," Scyther protested, so I glanced at my shoulder and breathed fire.

While I didn't hit the wound directly, doing so would have burnt the inside of the wound which would have made it a lot worse, the heat caused the blood to dry up and seal it shut. I wouldn't be able to put any weight on it, but I wouldn't bleed to death anymore.

"Shame I can't do that to Blacky," I sighed, "he isn't fireproof."

Squirtle trotted up, passed the Nido-horn to Scyther and stopping in front of Blacky.

"Do you think you could walk on three legs?" He asked me, dropping onto all fours.

"I could but I'd have to go very slow," I replied, wondering what he was asking me for.

"It doesn't matter. We'll carry him on our backs, I'll take this end and you take the head cause it should be a little lighter."

"And Scyther?" Scyther asked, not wanting to be left out.

"You can navigate for us, we're going to be a bit busy trying not to drop Blacky to do it ourselves. When we get closer then you can tell everyone that we're on our way so Nurse Joy can be ready for us."

"But first, you can give me a hand getting this lump on my back," I piped up, dropping to all fours.

We managed to get Blacky on our backs and set off, very slowly. As we turned the corner, I glanced back into the alleyway. I noticed that Asmodeus was gone, but I decided not to tell anyone. No one would dare bother us now, considering how much damage we had done and the way we looked right then.

"Hold on guys," Scyther said, heading off a little way ahead of us, "the Center isn't that far away."