I felt a cold sweat forming at the back of my neck as the entire playground went dead silent. Everyone-Even Blue himself- had been expecting the battle to end with Blue's next attack. Yeller spun through the air, landing gracefully on his back legs in front of me.
"...What?" Blue asked in confusion. "That... That wasn't Tackle! That was Quick Attack!"
I had to hand it to Blue, the fact that he could tell that at his age was actually impressive. Most of the other kids had just made remarks like 'That Tackle was super fast!' or 'Didn't it seem to move a little strangely?', but Blue had known which move I'd substituted.
"Yeller can be a bit disobedient sometimes, I guess." I shrugged dismissively. "He must have decided to do a Quick Attack instead." Yeller shot me a glance, but I reassured him with my stare. You did perfect Yeller.
Satisfied, the Rattata returned it's attention to the reeling Squirtle, which slowly stood back to it's feet.
"Don't mess with me!" Blue exclaimed, dramatically throwing an arm to his side. "You might've gotten lucky once, but I'm still going to win this battle!"
"Yeller, Tackle!" I commanded as I snapped my fingers, and Yeller once again began to glow with white energy.
See, as an ex-military soldier, I'd had to train my Pokemon with all sorts of crafty strategies for dealing with opponents. Yeller and I had never been as strong as our opponents, so the only way to win was to play underhanded tricks.
One of the best tricks I had was the 'snap' command. Through training and communication with Yeller, I had taught it to substitute the command I said for a different one so long as I snapped my fingers when I said the word.
Tackle - Quick Attack
Quick Attack - Tail Whip
Tail Whip - Tackle
This was just one of the tricks I'd learnt when studying under Red, and one of the most reliable. I couldn't count the number of battles this trick had saved me from.
Blue seemingly hadn't caught onto the trick yet, as he called out to his Squirtle. "Squirt! Prepare Water Gun!"
The Squirtle did as commanded, and was once again slammed by the white energy of Rattata's quick attack, leaving it's water to disperse harmlessly into the ground behind Yeller.
Blue sat in silence, his hand pressed to his chin in thought as Yeller backed off once again. Blue tilted his head forward for a moment, closing his eyes.
"I see. It's the snap of your fingers right? You're using that to tell Yeller to use Quick Attack instead."
!?
I felt a shiver go down my spine. He figured it out that quickly?!
He opened his eyes and met my gaze again, his dark blue pupils staring into my soul. "I'd never considered something like that as a possibility. Looks like I've been underestimating you. I'll stop doing that now."
...Wait, weren't his eyes light grey? Why do they look like they're tinted blue now?
His eyes almost appeared like they were giving off a subtle dark blue light, and the sensation it gave me was almost indescribable. His Squirtle stood, and I felt that it too was different somehow.
"Go ahead." Blue spoke with a calm voice that seemed out of character from what I knew of him. "I'll respond to your next attack. That trick won't work anymore."
I opened my mouth to do another Trick Quick Attack, but as I stared into those eyes I could tell he was right. The quick attack would get countered.
"...QC Tail Whip!" I commanded, pivoting to a different strategy. Yeller once again began to glow with white energy, and charged towards the Squirtle with alarming speed.
"Squirt! Endure the Quick Attack and counter it with a water gun!" Blue ordered, and the turtle once again gathered Water at it's mouth, preparing to be hit dead on with another Quick Attack.
However Yeller wasn't actually attacking this time.
The nimble Rattata danced around the field, gathering more and more speed from the boost the white quick attack energy provided it. Then it did a final charging leap-For the space next to the Squirtle, pivoting all of it's energy into a clockwise Tail Whip.
Blue's gaze tightened immediately. "Cancel and Withdraw!" He snapped swiftly, and the Squirtle abandoned it's water gun as it withdrew all it's limbs into it's body. The tail collided with the Pokemon, lowering it's defence and sending it flying backwards. Unfortunately, it raised it's own defence just in time to nullify the effects.
A noticed a window from the system open from the corner of my eye, but I couldn't spare the attention to read what it said.
"Cancelling a Quick Attack into a Tail Whip. Devious." Blue responded calmly. "You're full of fascinating ideas, aren't you?"
I felt the cold sweat on my neck increasing in intensity. "I preferred it when you were being rash and arrogant." I jabbed.
Blue didn't respond to my provocations, simply commanding his Pokemon again. "Water Gun Barrage."
The Battlefield was immediately assaulted by several shots of water slamming into the ground with impressive force-Each shot was more powerful than the one that had almost downed Yeller just earlier.
"Evasive Manoeuvres!" I called out, and Yeller did his best to deftly dodge all of the shots. Meanwhile, I was counting the shots the Squirtle was shooting.
9, 10, 11... Come on, keep dodging Yeller!
It was a difficult task for the three-legged Rattata, but our only hope of winning this battle hinged on him dodging these shots under his own power. "Hang in there buddy! I've got a plan!"
The Rattata desperately flung itself around the field as the ground got muddy and puddles began to form in the battlefield. I continued to intensely count the shots of water as they flew by.
24... 25!
"Now Yeller! Quick Attack him!" I pointed at the Squirtle, and the Rattata accelerated rapidly as white energy trailed from him.
"Counter it with Water Gun!" Blue commanded confidently.
But I just smiled, because I was sure I had counted correctly. After all, Water Gun is a move you can only use at most 25 times without rest, and there's no way Blue had this Squirtle long enough to increase it's limit.
The Squirtle balled up water in it's mouth, but it splashed out harmlessly. Blue recoiled in shock, but recovered quickly enough to issue an alternate command. "Wh-Tackle!"
The Squirtle and Rattata met head on, the Quick Attack contesting the power of the Squirtle's tackle.
I clicked my tongue in annoyance. I was hoping that blue would remain off-balance long enough for the Quick Attack to land, but that wasn't the case. And we'd established earlier that Squirtle had the edge in physical power. The momentum from Quick Attack was making it even for now, but Rattata would eventually be pushed down.
Just as I was about to concede, I noticed the window which had appeared in my peripheral vision earlier.
[You have reached 100% in Normal Type Proficiency Lv 1!
{Claim Reward}]
Wordlessly, I pressed the button and the window refreshed.
[For reaching 100% Normal Type Proficiency, you have been Rewarded with the skill S.T.A.B.!]
"What?!" Blue called out, diverting my attention back to the battle, where an unbelievable event was happening.
Yeller was overpowering the Squirtle.
With a powerful smash, Squirtle was sent spinning through the air, the Quick Attack landing successfully. Blue and I both stared on in shock.
"But-Squirtle was stronger! We saw that before!" Blue objected. "Was your Rattata holding back this whole time?!"
No... I had a different idea of what might have happened. Swiftly I opening up my status menu, flipping through to my new skill.
[S.T.A.B (Same Type Attack Boost) Lv 1
When a Pokemon of a Type you have 100% or more proficiency in uses a move of the same type, the power of that move is boosted by 10%.]
"Unbelievable..." I murmured in disbelief.
What the hell is this broken skill!? A flat 10% power increase?
"Enough!" Blue growled, the anger returning to his face. "I've had enough of this! Squirtle, we're finishing it with this next tackle, pronto!"
The Squirtle deftly charged towards my Rattata. "Yeller, take him down with Quick Attack!" I snapped in response.
But as I glanced and met Blue's eyes, I realised I had made a mistake.
Yeller charged in to meet the Squirtle, and Blue issued his second command immediately. "Tail whip!"
The Squirtle flipped, slamming it's tail into my speedy Rattata and redirecting him into the muddy ground. It was the same trick I'd used on the wild Rattata back in the woods.
Yeller slammed head first into the muddy ground, taking damage and losing the traction needed to dodge the attack that came next. The Squirtle slammed it's body into my helpless partner, knocking him unconscious.
The entire crowd sat in stunned silence, the brutally intense Pokemon battle finally over. Blue retrieved his partner into his Pokeball, and turned to leave without saying a word.
I stared down at Yeller. The yellow-furred Rat was covered in dust and mud, scratched and beaten into the ground. The puddles around him reflected my own solemn expression back at me, because I knew the deeper meaning behind these battles.
To the kids watching, these battles were just for entertainment, a sport of sorts. But to me, I could compare this to a life or death battle. If I had met Blue on the actual battlefield, Yeller would have died, and I probably would have too.
"Damnit! I was so close!" I growled to myself in frustration. I had once again lost to a prodigy, despite all of my experience and effort. It had been close, but I'd still lost.
I bended over, resting my hand on Yeller and gently scooping him into my arms. The unconscious Rattata was wet and dirty, but he still exuded a faint warmth. I may have lost the battle, but the stakes were low. We still lived another day. I hugged my partner close to my chest.
I felt a tug on my shirt, and I turned to look, expecting to see Chee. Instead, I was faced with a handful of the kids from earlier-A boy at the centre pulled his hand back, clearly a little intimidated. He had short brown hair, and his eyes were a darker shade of brown.
"U-uh..." He stuttered. "That battle was... Really splendid!" The boy suddenly announced. "I've never seen anyone stand up to Blue like that!"
A girl at his side chimed in. "That's right! His battles are usually over in like-a flash! But you almost won, right!?" She also had brown hair, but her eyes were a light emerald colour.
"I just used a couple tricks. I lost because Yeller wasn't as strong as his Squirtle." I answered defeatedly, hanging my head forward. It was a little hard for me to talk to all of the other kids, especially after I'd just lost so badly in front of them. Being praised now was a bit...
"You were awesome!" A third voice chimed in.
"Hey, what's your name?" A fourth voice spoke out.
I perked my head up, and I realised that the group of kids had grown larger, more and more of them were coming to talk to me. "I'm Cyan-"
"Cyan! Teach me your tricks!" One voice called over the crowd. "I wanna be as strong as you!"
"Hey I was talking to him first!"
"Wait I've seen you before! You're always running in the mornings right? Is that why you're so strong?"
The kids began to speak over one another, assaulting me with questions and statements. I sat in stunned silence as they fought to talk with me, but I finally understood. All along, these kids respected battlers, but they had never seen me as strong. Once I'd shown that I could stand up to Blue, some of his popularity had rubbed off on me.
My mind drifted to the stampede that destroyed Pallet town in my past life. When it occurred, only Red and a handful of others had survived. But what if all of the trainers had been strong? Instead of being regular kids, what if they'd been trained with army tactics?
"Would... Would you guys like to train with me?"
...
The amber hues of the early morning sunlight drifted across the pallet town playground. I stretched to the left, then to the right, and the group of kids and Pokemon behind me tried their best to mimic my movements.
It had been almost a week since my battle with Blue, and I hadn't seen him since then. The training with the kids was keeping me pretty busy, but I'd been surprised by just how persistent the Pallet town trainers had been.
When they said they wanted to train with me, I'd told the group that I'd help train anyone that was willing to get up early enough and join my morning run. Most of the kids had immediately decided it was too much effort, but even on the first day two kids had joined-The brother and sister who had talked to me first after my battle with Blue.
The boy with brown eyes was named Rick, and his partner was a Weedle-A small caterpillar-like yellow bug-type Pokemon with a pointed horn on it's head. His sister with green eyes was called Brittney, and had a young female Nidoran-A small blue mammal with a pointy horn, similar to the Pokemon Professor Oak had shown us on catching day.
For the first two days, they had been the only two that joined me for my morning run. So when the afternoon came, I taught them as many tips and tricks as I could before I went to hang out with Chee. I also showed them some general tricks for making their Pokemon more resilient, and told them they should try to win as many battles as possible to strengthen their Pokemon.
The third morning, an additional 3 trainers showed up.
Apparently, after just the two days of training I'd given Brittney and Rick, they'd gone to battle with the other kids. The two of them combined had been able to beat most of the kids they'd fought, and stirred more interest in my training.
On the fourth morning, another 5 kids arrived.
Now on the fifth day, with 13 kids following my lead, I jogged around the entire town. They all tried desperately to keep pace, because they knew that if they didn't last through the morning jog I wouldn't teach them in the afternoon. Mostly because it was already difficult for me to be teaching army tactics to a group this large.
...
I slumped against the tree, watching with a sense of satisfaction as the group of kids furiously battled one another. The field was filled with the sounds of scratches, moves, snapping fingers and other battle tactics I'd taught them.
Yeller curled up on my lap-Equally exhausted from all the practical demonstrations he'd had to perform. As I rested, I gently stroked his head. "You've done good Yeller. It's been pretty rough, huh?"
I heard a quiet crunch as a girl flopped down beside me, her waist-length brown hair almost hitting me in the face. She folded her arms behind her head and leaned back. "'Sup leader?" Brittney asked with a grin.
"Leader...?" I looked at her incredulously. "Why are you calling me leader?"
She shrugged. "Iunno, just sorta felt like how it is now. You're our leader, leading us to be better trainers! Like, we're your students or summat."
"My sister's crude language aside, I have to agree." A boy's voice called out-This time belonging to her brother, Rick. "Your training methods are spartan to be sure-The morning runs are exhausting- But the results speak for themselves. I for one, would be proud to call myself your pupil."
Once I'd gotten to know them better, the brother-sister pair had gotten more proactive around me in their own unique ways. Brittney had started slinging around slang like it was going out of style, whilst Rick had gotten stiff and articulate, like he was trying to prove that he was intelligent.
"Crude shmude!" Brittney jumped to her feet, offended. "I'm just talking like a regular human! At least I'm not acting likea robot."
The two of them began to bicker back and forth about which one of them was weirder, but I didn't care enough to listen to the details. My attention was drawn to a crunching of leaves from the other side of the tree.
I placed Yeller back on the ground and walked around the tree, ignoring the arguing siblings. Hiding behind the tree was a shorter girl with black hair holding a Pikachu plushie.
"Hey Chee." I waved at her cheerfully. She jolted in surprise, looking at me with eyes wide.
She had come by every few days, but she still wasn't good with large groups of people, and the training group had become larger than she was comfortable with very quickly. I could tell that despite her brave face she still felt very nervous around other people, so I quietly left with her whenever I spotted her hanging around.
She frowned abruptly, like she was upset with me. Her eyes indicated that I had done something wrong, but I wasn't sure exactly what.
"What did I do?" I asked, struggling to read her thoughts.
She stuffed a crumpled note into my hand without warning, stuck her tongue out at me and then ran away. "Chee!?"
She didn't respond, quickly trotting out of sight. With a sigh, I opened up the note and looked at the contents-A messy message that looked like it had been scribbled in a hurry.
You Battle Maniac. Stop looking for Red.
"I thought I did...?"