Whitney's Team
Miltank
Loudred
Jigglypuff
Noctowl
Girafarig
The New Normal – 8-11 – INTERLUDE – SABRINA & WHITNEY
(Sabrina POV)
After Janine's victory over her parents for the Marsh Badge, neither herself or Whitney had much difficulty against her parents for their own Marsh Badge.
Oh, she knew that her father had tried to make things harder for them, but he was still constrained by the limitations of the 6th Gym Badge. He could not pull off the raw power that she knew that he had, nor make use of his strongest Pokémon.
Her battle against her father was intense. They knew each other's tricks, and while she outclassed her father in terms of pure Psychic talent, her father had significantly more experience at fighting against other Psychic specialists.
But that's why she fought slowly, with methodical precision, focusing on wearing down and fighting extremely carefully as to not get caught up in her father's many tricks. She used the fact that she actually overpowered her father's Pokémon and was more efficient with her attacks to gradually achieve victory with her Psychic types.
It was not the grandest way to win, but it worked. And it was the totally opposite way of how Whitney won, which was to literally power through his Psychic attacks before and overwhelm her father before he could probably set things up.
Whitney's Miltank was powerful.
After their fight, she had seen clips of her fight against her father popping up on BattleCast, mainly in the forums dedicated to Psychic trainers. She felt a surge of pride at being recognized for her Psychic skills, which was only increased when Whitney gushed over the fact that her friend was becoming a 'well-known' trainer on Pokenet.
As always, she was endlessly thankful that Whitney took the chance to become her friend.
With their trio all winning, she asked the other two if she could hang around Saffron City for a little while longer to spend some time with her parents. Past her would have never suggested something like this, thinking that spending time with her parents was overly stifling and boring.
But now that she had gone on her journey with Whitney, she learnt to appreciate her parents and their love for her far more. And she was eager to talk about the many events that took place over her journey.
Whitney was more than happy to accompany her and spend some more time in Saffron. However, Janine asked if she could take the opportunity to head back to Fuschia to challenge her father. She stated that she felt that now was as good as a time as ever to challenge her father; to prove to him how much she had grown ever since she set off for her journey.
Sabrina felt bad for accidentally splitting the group like this, and she could tell even without reading her mind that Whitney was torn between accompanying Sabrina with her parents or cheering Janine on at Fuschia.
However, Janine insisted that she would go and fight her father alone. Though Whitney obviously wanted to support her friend, she ultimately respected Janine's decision and wished her all the best in her battle against Koga while the two of them remained in Saffron.
So as Janine left for Fuschia, Sabrina and Whitney spent most of that time with her parents, doing many things that Sabrina previously loathed in the past, but now found enjoyable thanks to Whitney's encouragement.
This included things like shopping trips, or simple meals outside with the family. They did a LOT more shopping than either had expected, and they ended up buying matching ribbons for each other. In the end, they bought 3 ribbons in total. One pink, one magenta, and one purple for Whitney, herself, and Janine respectively.
Whitney giggled and said that she couldn't think of anything more suitable.
Of course, they didn't only use their break to rest. During their short break, the two of them spent some time doing further research into Blaine's team and fighting style. Her parents saw this and gave a few words of warning.
"Blaine is not going to be easy." Her mother warned, "I've seen plenty of aspiring and talented trainers defeat your father, only to fall short and get stuck on Blaine. He has the unfortunate reputation of being more of a scientist than a trainer, but everyone forgets that he used to be a former member of the Elite Four."
"You may have been too young to have seen Blaine in his heyday, when he used to be in the Elite Four, but he is easily Giovanni's match if they were to fight at their strongest. Even with his disadvantaged type matchups." Her father added, "Here…let me try to show you."
He closed his eyes and Sabrina felt a slight tingle of Psychic energy try to push into her mind. She allowed the tendril of Psychic energy in, and her mind was suddenly assailed by a flash of images as her father tried to project his memory into her brain. A normal non-psychic may have been overwhelmed by the sudden invasion of thoughts, but Sabrina was more than used to this and easily accepted his memories.
She could see flashes of a Magmar torching the entire battlefield into a sea of flames. The torrent of fire so strong that it overwhelmed the incoming Hydro Pump from the opposing Blastoise. There was another image of a Torkoal unleashing a tidal wave of magma and rock that sent the enemy Lanturn wailing in pain as it was buried underneath endless tide of scorching rock.
The images continued to flash through her mind. But there was always one constant. A grinning Blaine, this time with a head full of hair, as he stood victorious over his opponent.
Time and time again.
She shuddered at the thought of him being her next opponent, even if he was going to be limited by the restrictions of the 7th Gym Badge. She was beginning to realize that their shared goal of clearing out all 8 Gym Badges by the end of this circuit was going to be very optimistic.
Her father must had read her thoughts, or maybe he simply guessed them based on her expression, as he continued, "You might not have noticed this, judging by your streak of success, but did you know that after the 4th Gym there is a significant jump in difficulty between the Gyms?"
"Really?" Whitney couldn't help but interrupt, "But why?"
"The first four Gyms are supposed to teach you the basics and fundamentals of being a trainer." Her mother explained, "That's why they're much easier to defeat. They're just meant to teach you to develop good habits in training your Pokémon, alongside some basic confirmation that you understand the type charts and stuff. The Gyms are supposed to be reasonable for you to defeat with just some training."
"But once you've beaten the 4th Gym, then the 'training gloves' come off, so to speak. The goal of the Gyms are no longer to train you, but to test you and to force you to push yourself to new heights. To put it more bluntly, it is meant to drill and hone your talents so that you can show off your full potential as a trainer. It would not be unusual for the common trainer to have to attempt and challenge the 5th and 6th Gym Badge multiple times before they can earn their badge. Just ask your father, he's seen it dozens of times now." Her mother described, with her father nodding along in agreement.
"Or, if I could speak more cynically, the purpose of the Gyms after the 4th Badge is to discover and weed out the exceptional trainers among this year's batch of trainers." Her father frowned, "I don't approve of this mindset, as I believe every trainer can achieve great things if given the opportunity, but that's just how things are set up."
"…So, we are considered unusual for being able to get so far on our first try?" Sabrina asked.
"No, not unusual. You're not unusual, but exceptional." Her mother chided, knowing that Sabrina didn't like to be called 'unusual'. "You make us so proud as parents to see you succeed like this. Don't ever let anyone downplay your achievement. Even if you struggle with Blaine, being able to reach us without a single loss is already incredible."
"But we wanted to defeat all 8 Gyms before the end of this circuit..." Whitney mumbled a little sadly.
Her father reached down and patted Whitney on the shoulder, "Having an ambitious goal like that is good…but don't feel upset if you can't reach it. I'm sure your brother would be very happy with you even if you don't manage that." Her father comforted, and Whitney slowly formed a small smile as he hit the nail on the head about her concerns.
She smiled too.
"Did you know that there are plenty of trainers that try to hire private tutors to get past your father's Gym?" Her mother added, shooting them both a smile, "I find the whole concept ridiculous, especially since they charge exorbitantly high prices for their 'training'. And half the time it doesn't even work. You don't know how glad I am to see you not relying on such services."
"And besides, you haven't lost yet!" Her father spoke up with a cheery tone, "Keep your chin up. Keep training hard and keep studying Blaine. Maybe you can even beat him on your first try! But if you don't, don't beat yourself up too hard about it. We all face roadblocks in our lives, and learning how we overcome them is part of growing up."
Whitney nodded firmly, accepting her father's words to heart. Sabrina just smiled; her friend always had more enthusiasm for the three of them. She knew that Whitney could bounce back even from a loss. And if she did fall into a slump, well Sabrina was confident that her brother could get her out of it.
Sabrina knew that the only thing Whitney could not accept was disappointing her brother.
After that enlightening conversation, they spent a few more days with her parents before they eventually had to say goodbye. Janine had finished up her fight against her own father, squeaking out a very narrow victory as her Golbat barely held on after Koga's Weezing Exploded.
Whitney had insisted to watch the recording of the match, and Sabrina couldn't help but think of how similar Janine's match against Koga was compared to her own match against her father.
The fight really could have gone either way, but Janine HAD won. And considering the bright smile and the sheer joy radiating out of her face when Janine had called them, Sabrina didn't think Janine cared about how close it was.
Sabrina was quick to share in her friend's joy, she had felt similarly when she had defeated her father.
She felt a little bad that Whitney couldn't experience something similar any time soon, because her brother wasn't a Gym Leader, but Whitney didn't seem upset about that at all.
Sabrina vowed to help Whitney grow and become strong enough for her to put up a good fight against her brother. Because she knew that was Whitney's dream.
Anyways, with Janine finishing up with her fight, they left Saffron City and decided to all meet up in Cinnabar Island. And Sabrina immediately wanted to leave as soon as she arrived.
Why was this place so hot and sticky?! She knew it was next to a volcano – but still!
At least the trio was fully back together, giving them the opportunity to continue spending time strategizing about how they would defeat Blaine.
As agreed, Sabrina would be challenging Blaine first, followed by Whitney, then Janine.
Right now, they were at one of the training fields near the Cinnabar Island Pokémon Centre training up her team with her friends. Since it was late in the circuit and Cinnabar Island wasn't the most popular of places anyways, this meant it was easy to secure a training field for the entire day.
Although Sabrina did note that there were plenty of scientists rushing about. Maybe there was something big going on? She was tempted to look into their minds, but her friend's frequent reminder to NOT casually invade someone's privacy stopped her.
The newest addition to her team, her newly caught Girafarig, was doing well and was quickly growing to become another valued part of her team. She and Whitney had expectedly taken opposite approaches with their Girafarig. She focused more on developing Girafarig's Psychic abilities, teaching it how to set up barriers and the like for her team. She really valued having a Psychic type Pokémon that wasn't weak to Ghosts and cold actually fight in close range decently well if needed.
She was taking inspiration from John's Wyrdeer in how she wanted her Girafarig to develop. Although being able to create and leap from barriers mid-air was going to take a lot of time to master.
On the other hand, following her Girafarig's more aggressive preferences, Whitney was training her Girafarig to focus more on the physical side, to effectively be the opposite of Loudred. Whereas Loudred mostly focused on Special Attacks but also had a range of physical moves as backup, Girafarig focused on mostly physical attacks with a range of Special Attacks as backup.
Sabrina suspected that Whitney was drawing inspiration from the same source as she was.
Speaking of Whitney's team, they had finally managed to find and acquire a Moon Stone so that Whitney's Jigglypuff could finally evolve into a Wigglytuff. The evolution was long overdue at this point. On Sabrina's part, she had finally decided that now was the best time for her Staryu to evolve into a Starmie, making use of the Water Stone that she picked up a while ago.
With Wiggytuff's new evolved form, and in the subsequent spars that took place between Wigglytuff and her Pokémon, it was immediately obvious that Wigglytuff was now able to do more than make use of status moves, as it now had the power to actually fight back offensively. Not only that, but Wigglytuff was now far more durable than her pre-evolved form.
But, if Sabrina could be honest, her Staryu's evolution into a Starmie was even more important, at least for their upcoming battle against Blaine. It gave her another fast Special Attacker that could hit really hard and blast Blaine's Fire types with powerful Water type moves. Even ignoring the advantageous type matchup, her Starmie hit even harder than Xatu, which was more focused on support moves.
Now, if only she could get her Kadabra to evolve into an Alakazam, but she knew that was some ways off.
However, even with all these new evolutions, the warning from her parents about Blaine's strength remained in her head. She had studied Blaine's past battles, so she knew that he was a hot-tempered trainer with a huge focus on devastatingly destructive attacks.
Personally, she saw him as very similar to Surge. Whereas Surge focused on speed and fast striking attacks, Blaine focused on raw power and explosive devastation, forcefully gaining control of the battle by setting the entire arena alight.
Even Whitney's Miltank, by far the tankiest of their Pokémon, would not be able to withstand such attacks for too long. No, they all knew that they had to somehow beat Blaine by trying to reduce his incoming firepower while knocking his Pokémon out before they succumbed to the scorching flames.
Sabrina felt bad for Janine, who had the hardest task out of the three of them. A good portion of her team were weak to Fire types, meaning that she had to be extra careful when going up against Blaine.
And so, as time ticked by, the three of them spent their days in Cinnabar Island, carefully training up their teams and trying to come up with a plan to allow them to conquer Blaine and earn themselves the Volcano Badge.
To their surprise, their time training around the training fields did not go unnoticed by the local population. And it was to her shock that her group of friends were suddenly approached a long, black-haired scientist lady and a weird guy wearing sunglasses, a fake moustache, and a wig.
No, wait, he had a moustache. But he just chose to wear a fake one on top of his real one. Why?
Also, was the wig actually part of the disguise, or was it because he wanted to conceal the fact that he was bald?
Still, Sabrina had no idea who that guy was trying to fool. The disguise was so obvious that it would take an actual idiot to not see through it. In fact, if it was not for the very official looking scientist lady with the Devon Corp badge placed proudly on her lab jacket, Sabrina might have been suspicious of his intentions.
Just to be safe, she discretely tried to probe his mind, only to reel back in pain as she felt her mind searing with pain. Her mind felt like it was being scorched alive.
Suddenly, her thoughts about the strange man were flipped on its head. This was a powerful trainer.
She didn't know how she didn't see it before, but despite his attempts to look mundane, he was anything but. Was he here to spar against them? She readied herself for a fight, but then the lady spoke, and all the tension broke away.
"I can't believe this coincidence! Whitney, is that you?" The lady suddenly spoke as she approached her friend, shaking Whitney's hand. "I thought I recognized you! Never thought I'd actually meet you. Congratulations on making it so far in the circuit!"
Whitney still had an extremely confused expression on her face, and the lady must have seen that as she was quick to clarify, "Oh my, I forgot to introduce myself. I'm Shelly. I work with your brother and am the branch head of Devon Corp here at Indigo."
Whitney's face morphed into recognition, "Oh! Shelly! Yes, John did mention you a few times! It's good to meet you, and thanks for helping my brother!"
"More like he's helped me!" She chuckled, "Anyways, this is my friend…uh…Ian!" Sabrina had to stop herself from rolling her eyes at the obviously fake name.
"It's good to meet you." 'Ian' greeted them, "I must say, it's nice to see trainers working so hard to train up their Pokémon. You looking to challenge the Gym Leader?"
"We are!" Whitney exclaimed eagerly, "We're looking to beat him on the first try! But we know he's very hard, so we're training up."
"Oh? That's ambitious. Have you been beating the other Gym Leaders on the first try too?" Ian asked, but Sabrina narrowed her eyes at his question. She had a suspicion that he already knew the answer to that.
"Yep!" Whitney answered with a nod, "We hope to do so for every Gym Leader! And we hope that we can beat all 8 Gyms before the end of this circuit."
Shelly whistled, "That's quite the goal. I wish I was nearly half as ambitious back when I was on my journey. But good luck on that! I'm rooting for you."
"Wow, then you must be really strong trainers, right?" Ian suddenly said, in a voice that couldn't sound any more fake than he tried. Sabrina noticed that Janine had immediately stiffened up at his words.
But Whitney continued, utterly unaware, "Maybe? John always says that there is always someone stronger than you, so I don't think I'm that strong."
Ian nodded, "That's a good mindset to have." He pretended to think for a moment, "Tell you what, I've not had a good battle in some time, and truthfully, I don't like having to hold back so often. Would you be interested in a Pokémon battle?"
Whitney almost instantly agreed, but Ian continued, "Just to warn you. I've seen you practicing, and while I have no doubt that you are all very talented trainers, my Pokémon ARE stronger than yours." He let his gaze sweep amongst the three of them, "I have a proposal. I'll only be using one Pokémon against one from each of you, so it'll be a 3v1. If you can win, I'll give you something as a reward."
Now even Shelly was giving Ian a weird look. And Sabrina had a sneaking suspicion that whoever this trainer was, he was seriously underselling his strength.
"Why are you doing this?" Janine suddenly asked, "If you're so strong, why challenge us?"
Ian nodded as if he expected the question, "I've recently acquired a new Pokémon that I've been really looking forward to testing its strength. Unfortunately, both due to a lack of time and suitable trainers, I haven't had much opportunity to test out its strength to my liking. But I figured that if I fought you three together, I might have a chance to finally get my Pokémon's measure."
"How about it? Does something like this interest you?" Ian asked, falling silent as he allowed Whitney to ponder the suggestion.
Whitney turned to her and Janine, a silent question on her lips. But Sabrina knew what her friend was thinking. Whitney always sought an opportunity to improve herself, and what better way was there than to challenge an experienced trainer more powerful than them.
And so, both Janine and Sabrina nodded back to her friend, who only shot them grateful smiles as she turned back to Ian.
"We accept." She told him.
The grin that Ian had was positively feral.
"Excellent."
(Whitney POV)
Whitney had a slight suspicion that this 'Ian' wasn't who he says he was. She knew she wasn't as observant as her friends, but even she could tell that he was not an ordinary trainer. Especially not with that proposal and the ferocious grin that he suddenly had on his face.
"Prepare yourself," Sabrina's voice psychically filtered into her head. "This will likely the hardest fight that we've ever fought." Whitney subtly nodded back at Sabrina as she readied her Pokéball.
"I guess I will be officiating then." Shelly shrugged and took her place in the centre of the arena. Janine and Sabrina walked over to Whitney's side of the arena as they got ready for battle.
"Shelly, could you ask the Joys to set up the psychic barrier around the arena?" Ian asked her, and Shelly nodded before dashing off to the nearby Pokémon Centre. She returned moments later accompanied by a few Psychic types and a special machine that quickly formed a protective barrier around the training field.
In the corner of her eye, Whitney saw Sabrina's eyes narrowing as the psychic shields were set up. If they thought this battle to be destructive enough, then what kind of Pokémon was Ian going to be using?
Whitney had never fought in a 3v1 before. In fact, this was likely the most unusual battle that she had ever fought in so far. But she was confident that with her friends by her side, there was no way she could lose a fight.
"Trainers! Are you ready?!" Shelly shouted out, getting nods from all the trainers.
"Miltank in front, Kadabra for support, Golbat to distract and wear them down with Poison." Sabrina mentally listed out their plan in their heads. Janine and her tapped Sabrina on the shoulder to show that they agreed.
"THREE…TWO…ONE…RELEASE!"
"Come on out!" The trio threw their Pokéballs as they released their respective starters, their pride and joy. Whitney couldn't help but grin as she waited to test her strength against whoever Ian would send out.
"MAGMORTAR! ITS YOUR TURN AT LAST!" And that grin quickly disappeared as surprise filled her face. What was that? She had never seen that Pokémon before!
"It is likely a Magmar evolution, based on the appearance and name." Sabrina's voice remained calm as she spoke to her telepathically, but even then she could tell Sabrina was a little rattled. "Definitely a Fire type, but it might share a secondary typing we don't know about."
"Take to the skies and Confuse Ray, Gol-"
"Flamethrower! BURN EVERYTHING!"
Janine tried to Confuse the opposing Magmortar, but before Golbat could even take to the skies a huge stream of searing fire suddenly split the battlefield in half, creating a trench of scorching flames that split up their Pokémon. Her Pokémon were forced to dodge out of the way, but Magmortar had just gotten started.
Never letting up for even a second, Magmortar continued spewing out flames from its cannons as it flooded the battlefield with an ocean of flames. Within seconds, the battlefield had suddenly turned into a furnace that her Miltank was trapped inside.
But that didn't mean they weren't ready to fight back.
"Light Screen, Kadabra!" "Rollout and Rock Throw, Miltank!" "Circle around and Toxic, Golbat!"
A huge screen of light shimmered into existence in front of the team, forming a protective barrier that should hopefully lessen some of the power of the Magmortar's attacks. At the same time, Miltank curled up into a ball as she began rolling and launched a huge slab of stone straight towards the Magmortar. In the meanwhile, Golbat carefully circled around and tried to fire off a glob of pure poison at the opposing Fire type.
But Magmortar didn't even have to move as it simply launched an even more intense lance of flames at both incoming attacks, its flames now turning a dangerous blue as Magmortar ramped up the heat. Both the globule of poison and the incoming Rock Throw instantly melted as they touched the blue flames.
But even as her rock shield melted into nothing, Miltank continued charging forwards, fully relying on the Light Screen to offset some of the damage.
But the Light Screen wasn't able to block as much as they'd hope, as even her Miltank, her tankiest and strongest Pokémon on her team, staggered backwards and was almost forced out of her Rollout as the searing flames blasted her body. Miltank was instantly Burned.
However, her Miltank persevered, continuing to force herself forwards as she endured through the roaring flames.
Realizing her ally was in trouble, Kadabra teleported behind Magmortar and fired a Psychic to distract it. Magmortar stumbled as the blast of Psychic energy impacted it, but before it could recover, a barrage of Air Slashes cut into it, flinching and distracting Magmotar for long enough to give Miltank just enough of a reprieve for her to close the distance.
Magmortar let out a grunt and tried to retaliate with another blast of flames towards Golbat, but then Miltank slammed into it with a powerful Rollout that transitioned into another Body Slam as Miltank grappled the Fire type. Not giving Magmortar any time to recover, Miltank roared and crashed another Hammer Arm straight to the face.
Yet before Whitney could cheer – Magmortar suddenly caught one of Miltank's arms in its own, revealing that it was far healthier than Whitney thought, before countering with a flaming punch that dug deep into Miltank's stomach.
Miltank staggered back, and Magmortar stepped forwards with one of its fists glowing white as it moved to follow up, but another blast of Psychic knocked it off course.
Then Golbat swooped in from above with a Confuse Ray, this time succeeding to dazzle Magmortar with a dizzying array of lights.
Magmortar's attack went wide as it began to stumble around confusedly, and Whitney knew this was the moment to attack.
"Rollout into it, Miltank! Pummel it!" "Thunder Wave, Kadabra! Paralyze it!" "Brave Bird, Golbat! Hit it hard!"
"IGNITE!"
However, before her team could get close, Magmortar suddenly fired off a thick cloud of gas that spewed out around it. Whitney looked curious at what Magmortar was doing before Sabrina suddenly shouted at the top of her lungs.
"EVERYONE PROTECT NOW!"
Her Miltank, having trained with and trusted Sabrina, instantly responded by forcefully stopping her charge and forming a Protect shield. The shield barely formed in time before a deafening explosion shook the arena as Magmortar detonated and ignited the cloud of gas with its flames. The weak psychic barriers were hardly able to withstand the explosion as they instantly shattered.
Whitney winced and covered her face as she felt the huge wave of force blasting her back, her ears ringing loudly from the sheer power of the explosion, and her eyes blinded as a cloud of dust was kicked up and covered the arena. She could feel the sweat dripping down the side of her head as she felt the sweltering heat of the flames.
Worse, she couldn't see what was going on with all this smoke and dust obscuring everything.
Luckily, they had Sabrina, "Our Pokémon are still up, but they're badly injured." Sabrina told her psychically, "Miltank and Golbat were closest to the blast and took the most damage. I sense that Golbat may be unable to fly and Miltank may have almost been knocked out. Kadabra was able to Teleport out in time and was mostly fine.'
As the ringing in her ears slowly faded away and she processed her friend's words, and she studiously ignored how one attack nearly brought down her Miltank, her mind settled in what she had to do next.
"SLACK OFF, MILTANK! HEAL YOURSELF!" She shouted, hoping that Miltank could hear her words.
"ROOST UP, GOLBAT! DO THE SAME!" Janine ordered the same, putting their entire defense on Kadabra's shoulders. It was not ideal, but they had no other choice.
As the cloud of dust and smoke cleared away and the psychic barriers were reformed, the grisly sight of the battle revealed itself to them.
Miltank had been painfully blasted back, her body leaving a trench in the ground as the explosion sent her flying. Her arm wobbled badly as she struggled to even pull herself up, the other arm hung limply to her side. She had one eye sealed shut and her face was bruised and twisted in pain with black soot marks covering most of her face. She had evidently taken the full brunt of the explosion, as close as she was to the initial detonation.
Golbat was barely doing any better. It flailed weakly on the ground as both its wings were limp and refused to move and small wisps of flames continued to linger on its skin. It too had been blasted backwards as it fell into a small bed of loose rocks.
Neither Pokémon were in any condition to fight.
Fortunately for them, Magmortar did not escape from its own explosion unscathed. Its once pristine arm cannons were now marked with scratches and scars, and the flames on its head and shoulders no longer burned as intensely as they once did.
Yet despite all this, Magmortar's eyes were still burning with fighting spirit as it took a step forwards, eager to continue the fight.
"Fire Blast, Magmortar! Finish them off!"
"Psychic, Kadabra! Hold it back!"
Seeing that two of its opponents were busy healing up from their injuries, one of Magmortar's arm cannons flashed as an enormous ball of white fire formed within them. Forming a vicious smile, it fired off the searing ball of pure flame straight towards Miltank – the opponent it saw as the greater threat. As it flew, the ground crackled and burnt as the orb of white flame scorched everything its proximity.
To make matters worse, the Fire Blast was accompanied by another lance of flame as Magmortar unleashed a second Flamethrower as well, intent on finishing the fight right here and now.
But Kadabra Teleported in front of Miltank and retaliated with a powerful blast of Psychic, his eyes closed as he dedicated every bit of concentration in fending off the incoming flames, but the sheer power of Magmortar's attacks forced Kadabra back.
Kadabra remained defiant as he continued to dedicate every last scrap of Psychic power he had into the holding back the attack. Kadabra's entire figure began to glow a bright blue as Psychic energy began to leak out of him as he strained his Psychic power to the limit. His singular spoon wobbling uncertainly as it was unable to withstand the sheer amount of Psychic energy being channelled through it.
Just to buy an extra few seconds for Miltank and Golbat to finish healing up.
Despite all that, it wasn't enough. Kadabra was STILL giving ground.
In that moment, Golbat had also finished healing up. While it was still badly injured, it had at least regained enough strength to assist Kadabra. Determined to help its friend, it shot forwards, diving under the Flamethrower as it sliced Magmortar's side with an Aerial Ace, doing enough damage to cause Magmortar to cut off its Flamethrower.
Golbat quickly circled around and landed a glob of Toxic on the distracted Magmortar, badly poisoning the Fire type and turning its once bright red form into one far more pale and sickly.
However, while that did put Magmortar on a timer, there was still the incoming Fire Blast to deal with. Even without the support of the Flamethrower, the Fire Blast was still gradually moving forwards as Kadabra collapsed onto his knees – his reserves of Psychic energy bottoming out.
And Miltank was still healing herself up and was still immobile. She could not dodge in time.
Whitney grimaced, realizing the situation was doomed.
It was then that Janine suddenly spoke up, surprising them all, "Golbat! FORM A PROTECT AND DIVE INTO THE ATTACK!"
Never once even questioning its trainer, Golbat let out an affirmative screech as she fell into a dive and launched itself straight into the path of the Fire Blast. All of the trainers, and the small crowd of spectators that their battle had inadvertently attracted, stared with widened eyes as Golbat sacrificed itself for the good of the battle.
A Protect shield formed around Golbat as it crashed into the Fire Blast, sending an enormous explosion of flames to erupt at the point of contact. The flames scorched the entire arena, sending the small crowd of spectators screaming for cover as the arena was invaded by an army of fire that spread out in a wide cone.
As a thick cloud of black smoke covered everything, Whitney's first instinct was to turn to Janine and check if Golbat was doing okay. But a sudden mental shout from Sabrina cut that off.
"Magmortar is charging up another attack, but Miltank is back up!" She said urgently, "Get Miltank to dodge in any direction and rush it down! Kadabra is exhausted and we can't win at range!"
There was no time for other thoughts. Whitney immediately shouted out Sabrina's orders, yelling them out in hopes that Miltank could hear her.
And not a second later, a huge spear of flames suddenly cut through the thick clouds of smoke, narrowly missing Miltank who had barely scrambled out of the way. Before Magmortar could fire off another shot, Miltank instinctively ripped up a large slab of rock off the ground and hurled it blindly into the smoke towards where she thought Magmortar was.
A sudden grunt of pain emerged from within, showing that Miltank had somehow landed a lucky hit on Magmortar.
Miltank then formed into a ball as it dashed forwards with a Rollout, dispersing the heavy cloud of smoke as she rolled through the many flames that lingered around the arena. As the smoke cleared off, Whitney adamantly ignored Golbat's unconscious figure as she stared right at Magmortar, who had apparently fallen over from the impact of the previous Rock Throw. It was barely able to pull itself up when Miltank came crashing in with another powerful Rollout, her eyes alight with rage at her fallen ally.
Magmortar's head spun as Miltank smashed a Brick Break right into its face. It tried to fight back with a Fire Punch, but Magmortar was also becoming exhausted, and the attack came slow enough for Miltank to catch pummel it with a Hammer Arm first.
As Magmortar was knocked back, Kadabra suddenly fired off a beam of white light towards Magmotar.
"Kadabra got off a Guard Split! Magmortar's defense has been heavily lowered!" Sabrina explained for Whitney, who immediately knew what to do.
"GO ALL OUT MILTANK! NO LETTING UP!"
With its defense heavily lowered from the Guard Swap, Magmortar no longer had the durability that it once had to defend against Miltank's attacks. Coupled with the intensifying Toxic that was spreading throughout its body, it was unable to react in time when Miltank suddenly picked up its entire body and threw it over her head, slamming it down into the ground once again with a suplex.
"MILTANK!" Miltank let out a feral roar as she stomped on the ground, unleashing a powerful Earthquake that sent supereffective tremors throughout Magmortar's body, throwing its prone form up and down into the air as the ground shook violently.
But despite all of the punishment it was receiving, Magmortar refused to be knocked out like this. Using whatever energy it had left, it raised one of its arm cannons towards the stomping Miltank. Quicker than Miltank could react, flames came roaring out of its arms as a huge spear of blue flames threatened to engulf Miltank.
"Ally Switch!"
However, just before the scorching flames would have blasted and knocked Miltank out, her body shimmered in place as she disappeared, only to be replaced by a heavily injured Kadabra. Accepting his fate, Kadabra simply closed his eyes as he was took the full brunt of the incoming Flamethrower, instantly collapsing as he was blasted back by the attack and sent crashing into the psychic shields. Faint embers of smoke wafted off his unconscious body.
But Kadabra's sacrifice bought Miltank one last opportunity to finish Magmortar off. Having been teleported right behind Magmortar, Miltank recklessly and brutally slammed into Magmortar's fallen form with a devastating Body Slam, sending the two of them falling through the ground as the impact cracked and pinning the Fire type underneath her.
Magmortar let out a pained grunt, but once again tried to raise its other arm to blast Miltank with another jet of flames. But Miltank moved first, letting out another defiant moo as she crashed their heads together with a ferocious Zen Headbutt.
Not giving it another chance to recover, Miltank rained down a brutal barrage of blows as Hammer Arm after Hammer Arm came crashing down on Magmortar's wounded form, finally knocking the monster of a Fire type out.
"…I can't believe it! But Challenger Whitney, Sabrina, and Janine are the victor!" Shelly declared after shaking herself out of her stupor. Following on from that, a huge roar of applause came out from the impromptu spectators, and Whitney looked around and saw that large crowd had somehow gathered during their fight, attracted to the exciting sounds of battle.
But more importantly than that, she turned to her friends, and was relieved to see the bright smiles on their faces. A big smile broke out around her mouth as well as she shared in the happiness and relief of their shared victory.
That was easily the hardest fight that they've ever had to fight in.
She knew it was only a matter of time, but this was the first opponent that she couldn't simply overpower with her Miltank. Magmortar would have utterly destroyed Miltank in a one-on-one fight. Even in a 3v1 fight, they were barely able to scrape off a win.
And now that she was thinking straight, she found it odd that Magmortar never bothered to set up the sun with a Sunny Day. It would have been a very easy way to boost its own Fire attacks, and they didn't have a way to counter it at the moment since none of their Pokémon knew Rain Dance.
But Whitney put that thought aside for now as she withdrew her victorious Miltank into her Pokéball, patting her Pokéball gently as she gave her Miltank her well-deserved rest.
The sounds of footsteps caught her attention, and she looked up to see Shelly and Ian approaching her. But it wasn't Ian anymore, because his disguise had all burnt or fallen off during the fight, and her eyes widened as she realized who their opponent was.
How in Arceus did she not figure this out sooner?! She whirled to look at both her friends, only to see none of the surprise she would have expected on their face. Was she the only person that didn't know?! WHY DIDN'T THEY SAY ANYTHING?!
"That was a great battle, kiddo!" A grinning Blaine spoke up, "First time in a while that I could show off my Pokémon's full potential. This was definitely way more exciting than your standard Gym battle."
"You still held back though." Sabrina interrupted, her eyes narrowing slightly in suspicion, "You only made use of simple moves."
Whitney nodded. He didn't even use Sunny Day!
Blaine only responded with a shameless grin, "Well of course I did! It wouldn't have been fair to you otherwise. But that doesn't mean I lied, that fight made my fight boil in excitement. You just don't get that kind of feeling when you're forced to hold back so much in a Gym battle. And you gave me the opportunity to properly test out Magmortar's capabilities in a fight, even if it was holding back slightly."
"That Magmortar was a Magmar evolution, wasn't it?" Janine spoke up, "I am guessing that this is a project you've been working on, right?"
"That's right." Blaine nodded, "You'll see this in the papers soon, but yes, I created the Magmarizer specifically as an evolution item that allows Magmar to evolve into a Magmortar…In fact, you three have just done me a huge favour in helping me advertise the power of this new evolution! You could say that this whole thing was a burning success! HAHAHA!" Blaine laughed out loud as Shelly palmed her face, failing to restrain a groan at Blaine's bad puns. A feeling that Whitney earnestly agreed with.
Blaine shook himself out of his laughter, "Anyways, I did say that I would reward you for a prize for winning." He said as he rummaged through his coat, before pulling out three identical red badges that gleamed in the afternoon sun. "I'm sure I don't have to explain what this is. But it's yours. You've more than showed off your fiery spirit today!"
"Are you sure that's okay? We didn't even fight your Gym Trainers…and this wasn't supposed to be an official Gym battle!" Whitney couldn't help but protest, her desire to just grab the badges overruled by her desire to do the right thing.
But Blaine just scoffed, "You would easily beat my Gym Trainers in a fight; they'd hardly be much of a challenge to you from what I've just seen. And as for the fact that this wasn't 'official'…" He mimed making air quotes, "You three have more than proved your capabilities to be deserving of the Volcano Badge." He stated.
"Not only were your Pokémon all individually very strong, especially at your young ages, but the fact that you were able to work so well in a team and had so much trust in each other is proof of both your talent as trainers and the trust that you have in each other." He said seriously, his joviality gone, "I noticed during your fight that there were moments where your Pokémon all displayed an unwavering sense of trust and obedience to not only their trainers, but also to the others as well. Any kind of trainer who can foster that kind of relationship between their Pokémon is more than deserving of the 7th Badge, you can take my word for it."
He looked each of them in the eye, "Each and every one of you have done your parents, and brother, proud. This I am certain of. I look forward to seeing what you three would be able to achieve in the future." He handed over the Volcano Badge to each of the stunned trainer, placing it in their hands.
Janine was able to break out of her shock first, "Thank you, Gym Leader Blaine." She said, falling into a bow. Sabrina and Whitney quickly followed her, and the three of them bowed to the chuckling Gym Leader.
"No need to thank me." He said, "You all achieved this from your own hard work. As I said, I wish you all the best with Giovanni. Make sure to not to rush – and challenge him only when you're confident that you're ready. He's the last hurdle for you three, but I'm confident you all will be able to surpass it."
And then Blaine left, leaving the trio alone with a smiling Shelly.
"Ignoring the bad puns, I don't have a single doubt that whatever Blaine had told you was false. I might not be a good trainer, but even I could see the potential that you three have within you." She said to them, "Your friendship only nurtures that. And I too, am excited to see what you three will do in the future. I'm rooting for you."
She patted Whitney on the head before walking away. All Whitney could do was stare down at the Volcano Badge sitting gently in her palm.
But she was broken out of her thoughts as she felt a hand resting on her shoulder, and she turned to see Sabrina staring at her with a smile on her face. Whitney shot her friend a smile of her own, before reaching over and pulling Janine into a big group hug.
They earned their 7th Badge! Just one more to go!
A.N. As you can probably guess, this was supposed to be split into 2 Interlude chapters. However, considering that people don't like back-to-back full chapters of Interlude, I combined them into one.
I hope you liked this chapter. I really wanted to give space for the fight to breathe and to showcase Blaine at his 'strongest'. I also wanted to take a short break from John and Cynthia for a moment.But more importantly than that, I wanted to show just how strong the trio have become, and how they are able to work together extremely effectively in fights to conquer opponents that are normally far beyond them.
This chapter has been BETAed by Allute! Cheers! And to anyone who wants to support me, please check out my p atreon at CartecTNN where you can read 8 advanced chapters! Thanks to those who have supported me already!