Chapter 18 - Overheat
Overheat? Celeste froze in shock for a moment.
"Rey, tell your larvesta to stand down!" Olga said, for the first time letting emotion dip through the cracks in her words.
Option one, return Powder. End the battle.
The audience around Celeste seemed to be shouting something. She was too focused on her vulpix to listen, however. Her little baby Powder just stood there looking at the larvesta, waiting for her trainer's commands.
Option two, avoid the attack. There is nothing for Powder to hide behind, but maybe she can dodge?
The five blood red horns around the bug were glowing like burning steel, generating small embers. Those were not being shot over to the vulpix, though. They were gathering into a bigger, spiralling flame. Partially shielding the larvesta.
Option three, attack. Powder could use Tail Whip and Powder Snow. Powder Snow could be useful. The ice might take away some of the energy from the fire. Make the overheat more bearable… The move made some wind as well. Would it fan the fire or cut off its oxygen?
"Powder Snow," Celeste yelled. Was this the right idea? Powder hadn't even been able to freeze Pat's water gun…
The vulpix let out her snowy move. It was no use. The snow melted long before it reached the fire. And that wasn't even the worse. Powder was struggling with the heat.
Celeste felt the sweat on her forehead, on her neck, on the palm of her hands. The heat was intense, but so was the beating of her heart.
She pressed her lips together and shouted for Powder to stop as she reached, with her sweating, trembling hands, for her premier ball.
It slipped.
Of course it slipped.
"She is going to return her vulpix. Tell your pokémon to stop!"
Celeste didn't know who yelled. She only saw Rey, whose eyes trailed down the ball rolling in the sand.
"More power, Flamer," he said with a glint in his eyes.
The girl widened her eyes in return. The spiralling flame above the larvesta was growing faster. "Powder, go to your ball."
Option four, put herself between the fire and Powder. He wouldn't attack a human… right?
The vulpix was moving slowly. Rey might be holding on and not letting his pokémon shoot the giant fiery spiral, but the heat and the stray embers were hurting Powder, anyway.
She was just a baby. Why did Celeste send her to battle?
Her legs felt heavy, but she made them move. It was her duty to protect her pokémon. As she moved closer, the heat became worse. Too much for her, way too much for an ice type.
"Please stop, Rey. You won," Celeste said, as soon as she was in the line of attack. People were yelling for her to get out of the way. She didn't want to be in the way, for starters. Still, she thought her body would deal with the fire better than her baby ice fox.
"Apologise," he said.
Olga yelled something, the audience yelled louder, but Celeste's mind was too far away to listen.
Her mind was back in Alola. Back to the day she had held on to an egg protectively. She could almost feel the ninetales licking her cheeks as the tears rolled down. But she would not cry now.
"I'm sorry for insulting you," Celeste said, her words drier than her eyes. She was proud, but only to a point. Glancing behind her back, she saw the premier ball and the vulpix. Powder was panting but not going into her ball.
Of course, she was not just going back.
"You could do better," Rey snorted. "But fine. Flamer, stop."
The larvesta glanced behind in confusion. It didn't seem to know what to do with the inferno above its head.
"I said stop the move. Cancel the overheat," he insisted. His pokémon was squirming around, clearly in distress.
"Tell it to shoot it up," Celeste said in panic. "Or to the ocean."
"Don't tell me what to do," Rey grunted. He kept barking orders to his pokémon. It was no use. In the end, what could he do?
This was a larvesta after all…
—*—*—
Two years ago
"Admiring the view, Celly?" Otto asked, leaning over the balcony railings. The gentle breeze ruffled his greying brown hair and his chocolate brown eyes shone warmly as he glanced over to his daughter.
Celeste looked up at him and waved the book she was reading. "Your meeting was boring. So I found something more interesting to do."
The man raised an eyebrow. "What is this book about?"
"Pokémon migration patterns and… uh… other fun facts?" the girl answered. "There was a pile of those in the corner. I figured professor Juniper wouldn't mind me taking one."
Otto laughed. "Cedric will love to know you think he wrote a book about fun facts."
"Well, I'm learning fun facts. Like this," Celeste said as she pointed to a picture of a white and red bug pokémon. "This is a larvesta. Seems meek, but it's one of the rarest bug pokémon in the region."
"Ohh, pokémon. How interesting," Otto grinned mischievously.
"Dad! Don't start with that again."
"I'm not. It's just that most kids jump at the opportunity of having a pokémon partner. Your friend Lyra got a scorbunny, didn't she?"
"Well, you and mom always tell me I'm not most kids." The girl rolled her eyes.
"Há. Touché," Otto said as he made an exaggerated gesture. "Guess I'll tell Cedric you will decline his offer of a pokémon, then…"
Celeste blinked at her father. "He offered me a starter?"
"Your mother is already attached to the fire one, though. She thinks it will be lovely to have you running around with that little tepig."
And there it was. It would be lovely for ratings, surely.
"I… I'm good, dad."
Otto studied his daughter for a moment.
"We worry about you Celly…" he said in a quiet voice. Then he bumped his shoulders with the girl and giggled. "You know, when I was your age, I couldn't wait to make friends with a pokémon. Your grandfather took me out to—."
"Catch a fidough." Celeste grinned. "But you ended up befriending something much less apartment friendly. You told me this story a million times. Tell me something I don't know for once."
"All right," the man said, as both he and Celly contemplated the garden. They were on the second floor of professor Juniper's lab. But, despite what one might expect from a pokémon professor's lab, there weren't any roaming around. The lab was rather small, and the man specialised in fieldwork. Still, Celeste thought it was as boring as the rest of their visit.
"You are interested in larvesta, aren't you? They are rare, like you said, but did you know many civilisations considered them to be holy?"
"Is it a legendary pokémon?" Celeste frowned at the picture in the book.
Otto shook his head. "It's just a bug. A very strong fire bug." He pointed to the sunny sky above them. "But the people of Paldea called it the larva who stole the Sun. In Unova there are some who still believe larvesta are born from the Sun itself. Either way, the pokémon was, and still is, considered sacred by many. They say larvesta is a burden and a blessing."
"Why is it a burden?"
"Because it is powerful. And that is especially problematic for fire types." Otto said sombrely. His starter was partially a fire type, after all. "I'd say this is the burden of responsibility. Unfortunately, not everyone is responsible. Larvesta have too much power, but it is also a first stage pokémon, so it lacks control, especially when it's young. And people get both scared and reverential of something that often causes fires and other accidents. "
"So people get scared, and then what? They prayed for it?" Celeste looked at the book in silence for a while.
"They prayed for the larvesta, the rain, the trainer, the hunter. To whoever made the fires stop. You see, it is rare for a reason…" He said gloomily. "But champion Alder has brought a lot of awareness to the cause."
"I see… it is scary. But also… sad."
"It is. Like I always tell you, respect the fire." Otto said, still quiet. "That is a lesson most people learn, eventually…"
"And yet you offer me a fire pig?"
The man's smile widened as he studied his kid. "Well, the best things in life are a little scary, aren't they? Now come on, kiddo. Enough with the loner act. Cedric invited us to dinner and you are not bailing on that."
—*—*—
Rey was yelling at his bug, ordering it to do things it couldn't. The larvesta had raw power, but no control. Rey was no Alder. He was not the responsible type of trainer. Quite the opposite, really.
The more Rey yelled, the more unstable the fire spiral got.
As soon as he was distracted, Celeste jumped to her ball and made the vulpix return to it.
"I'm ordering you to keep control," Rey said, while shielding himself from an ember. There was venom in his words. "If you make the flame, you can control it."
Why was he so careless with his pokémon? Not only the larvesta. The capsakid too. He let it endure an attack, even though the battle had already been lost. What was the point of letting your pokémon be in pain like that?
Celeste gritted her teeth. There was no pointing in dwelling on that, either. As soon as she tucked Powder's ball away, she payed proper attention to the situation around.
Most of the audience had gone away. The overheat had got too big for most people to just stand around. Delia, always the helpful one, hadn't left. She, together with Olga, was talking to a small group of trainers.
"Anyone with water, rock and ground types, we better put the fire out before they completely lose control." She had already let Shelly out and Luan was beside her with his lunatone floating by his head.
Celeste rushed to join the group, but as soon as she stood up, she felt someone's icy hands on her shoulder.
"Hydro Pump," a female voice commanded.
Celeste didn't even have time to look back. The most powerful stream of water she had ever seen flew by her, putting the fire out in an instant.
The tentacool's Hydro Pump she had experienced before seemed like a joke now.
"Rey, please recall your pokémon." The stranger's voice was gentle and collected. But Celeste knew there was an edge there. She was polite about it, but this wasn't a request.
"You shouldn't have meddled," Rey said. His voice, in contrast, was shaky and loud.
Celeste glanced at the person by her side. The woman was only marginally taller than her, even though she was probably in her late teens. Her ginger hair was tied in a sloppy ponytail, and her black blouse, high wasted skirt and cat-eye glasses gave her an air of seriousness and elegance.
"You had no control over your larvesta," she said, gesturing to her pokémon. "We needed to de-escalate the situation."
Celeste couldn't help but marvel at the pokémon beside them. A lapras, of all things. She was seeing an actual, real, lapras up close.
Rey groaned.
The woman chuckled, but never lost her composure. "Overheat is too powerful a move for your pokémon. It's not because you have money to buy a TM that you should."
Rey and the woman glared at each other for a moment. Until the boy finally huffed and left, with the larvesta, who was still out of his ball, following closely behind.
Celeste barely managed a sigh of relief when her body tensed up again. Olga was walking in her direction.
"Once more you were the life saver, Lori," the Ice Boutique owner said with uncharacteristic casualty. "I'm glad you were around…"
"Always happy to help," Lori said politely. "But Rey…"
Olga let out a sigh. "He will be the end of me… I tell you."
Celeste looked at the shop-owner in disbelief. Was that really all she had to say about that psycho?
"And you were very irresponsible." she added, turning to Celeste.
Seriously?
Before the girl could blurt out anything, Lori once more put her hands on Celeste's shoulders. "I think there is some nobility in protecting a young pokémon like she did."
The young trainer felt her face burning. Even more so when Olga looked at her with disdain.
"Being noble is beautiful, but pointless. It will only drag you down, kid," the woman said. "Anyway, Delia told me this morning about the whole firing thing. You should know my son does not decide who gets fired or not in my shop… He doesn't decide anything, in fact. Talk to an adult before you act stupid again." Finally, she turned to the other woman and nodded. "See you at the festival."
How was she the one at fault here? If she was being stupid and irresponsible, maybe Olga could have called the battle off instead of refereeing.
As they watched the woman and her vanilite leave, Lori let out a chuckle. "Don't mind her. She is hard like that to everyone."
"She treated you nicely enough," Celeste muttered.
"Well, I had years to mellow my way in to her heart." Lori shrugged. "It's Celeste, right? That was a… nice battle, you know?"
The young trainer blinked at her veteran and dropped her shoulders as she let out a heavy breath.
"I lost," Celeste said.
"Yes."
The woman looked at the ocean. Her glasses reflected the sunlight, that was back to normal, and the breeze gently blew through her hair. To Celeste, this stranger seemed to have enough confidence to control the elements themselves.
"… Yes," Celeste repeated. Was that it?
Lori looked at the younger girl and a small smiled formed on her lips. "Expected me to say more?"
"Kinda…"
"Sorry, I don't really do advice." She shrugged. "But don't be too sad about losing. It happens."
Celeste thanked the older girl. She wanted to talk more… learn more. It was a pity Lori was not interested in teaching.
She sighed.
This day couldn't end soon enough, but before leaving, Celeste turned to the woman once more.
"Sorry, I never caught your name. Was it Lori?"
"Lori is short for Lorelei."
The girl nodded. She had thought Rey was a strong trainer she might want to follow. That she would try to catch some of his gym battles on TV… But this woman, Lorelei, she was in a whole other league. This was someone she was keeping an eye on.
A/N: So that is the conclusion of Rey's battle! Hope you enjoyed the last few chapters with the training and the battle. :)
And yes, that is Elite four Lorelei. Only not quite elite four yet. She is 19 at this point in time, and has not finished with her badges yet.
To make things easier, also, here are the teams for the main characters, so far:
Celeste: Aria (Eevee), Powder (Alolan Vulpix), Patrick/Pat (Slowpoke)
Delia: Shelly (Shellder)
Rey: Moody (Capsakid), Mag (this is short for her real name, though.) (Eevee), Flamer (Larvesta)
Luan: Munna (Rev), Lulu (Lunatone), Menace (Hoothoot)
And Olga's vanilite is called Vanilite.
NEXT CHAPTER: The Last day at One Island.