Chapter 94 – Welcome to the Ultra Jungle, Chu's up for fun and games

Hunter blinked several times in the bright sun. The air was warm and sticky on his fur. It took his small Riolu mind a moment process what had happened. A mere second ago he had beem running from an explosion as Team Rocket's giant sky vessel was torn apart by a laser beam. And now he was standing...somewhere else entirely...

He was standing on a rocky ledge overlooking a gaping abyss. It looked like a jungle down below. A mass of green intersected by a winding blue river. In the distance was a mountain, a mass of brown rock smoking at its peak. And then there was the most peculiar feature. The thing that told Hunter he was not in a regular jungle.

Giant structures were towering before him. Like a cross between a tree and a mountain. As tall as a mountain, but tall and spindly, and covered in leaves and thick green vines.

"What the fuck," he mumbled to himself.

"H-Hunter," rasped a voice from behind.

Hunter tore his eyes off the view and looked around the ledge. He spotted a certain Dewott laying a short distance away. Lying on his back and panting heavily, as though struggling to breath.

"Geyser," he cried, and he rushed over to him. He dropped to his all fours beside. "What's wrong."

"I'm...I'm fine," panted Geyser. "To. To get us off the Halberd, I had to open...an ultra-wormhole." He took a deep breath. "Uses up a lot of energy you know. Is...is...Did everybody else make it."

Hunter stood up and looked around once again. As though on cue, Ashachu and Blade were getting to their paws and dusting themselves off.

"Ugh," Blade groaned when he saw where he was. "Fuck, tell me I didn't die and go to Sneasel hell. Hot, humid and no trees to climb...except whatever they are." He blinked in astonishment at the strange and giant tree like objects all around him.

"Pika," Ashachu murmured looking directly up at the sky. At least it was blue. That was comforting. The only off thing about it was the presence of two suns: one almost directly above, and one hanging lower in the east.

"No, no," breathed Geyser. He tried to sit up, propping himself up with his elbows, but couldn't. "Hunter, could you help sit up. Please."

Hunter obliged him, sitting down on the rock beside the Dewott and easing him into a sitting position. The sight of them sitting side by side caused Ashachu's eyes to narrow into slits and he felt a spark of anger in his chest.

"Don't worry, your alive blade," said Geyser. "We're just in the ultra-space. Like I told Hunter, to get us off the Halberd I had to open an ultra-wormhole."

Ashachu groaned. "Oh, you're kidding me. So, we're trapped on some Arceus forsaken parallel world. AGAIN!"

"Not trapped," Geyser replied. "I can get us back to our world. Just, not right now. I need to rest." He sighed, and Hunter nuzzled his neck.

Ashachu was unsatisfied with Geyser's assurance, however. He folded his arms and scowled at the Dewott. And at Hunter. "And I suppose in the meantime we're stuck here, exposed to an attack from ultra-beasts. Do you even know anything about this place or where it is."

Geyser cocked his head, his face falling. He didn't like the way Ashachu was talking to him. "Sort of. I can sense the worlds in ultra-space. Sort of like an instinct. That's how we ended up in Ultra Megalopolis. At least, that's what Koraidon said."

"So where are Charizard and the eggs," demanded Ashachu, tapping his paw on the ground. "What about the others. Or Ash!"

Geyser bit his lip. "Charizard came with us. Hunter had one of the eggs. As for the others. One of the doors to that sleeping area sealed shut. Hunter and I couldn't get through. Everything was exploding around us. I had to make a quick decision. It was kind of instinctive really!"

"Yeah, where is the big lizard," added Blade.

The big lizard wasn't hard to find. A crystalline structure stood just a short distance away from them. Like a large black pyramid, inside of which was trapped...

"Charizard!" Ashachu scurried over it, horrified, and struck at it with his paws. "Charizard, what happened...ouch." The surface was cold and hard as though made of ice. He tried striking it with his tail instead, though he couldn't make it shatter.

"Is that ice," queried Hunter. He ran a paw over the surface, but yelped as he felt how cold it is. "Yah!"

"What the hell happened to him," Ashachu asked incredulously. He then rounded on Geyser. "What did you do." He approached the Dewott angrily, sticking a paw in his chest.

"I-I didn't do anything," Geyser cried, holding up his claws. Though he was back on his feet, he was still too weak to battle and didn't want to pick a fight. He didn't want to fight with Ashachu period.

"Ashachu. What the fuck." Hunter shover Ashachu hard in the chest with his paw "You can't accuse Geyser like that. You don't even know if it was his fault."

"Well, he wasn't like this before Geyser got us here," snapped Ashachu. "So, it must be something do with him."

He felt a claw on his shoulder and looked up to see Blade behind him. "He. Let's not jump to conclusions kiddo. You know we all have to."

"Shut up Blade, no one asked you." Ashachu brushed the Sneasel off, causing him to scowl at him.

"You won't get far with that attitude."

"Ashachu, I swear," pleaded Geyser as Ashachu advanced on him again. "I didn't have anything to do with this."

"Have you considered that it could have something to do with that beam that hit the Halberd," Hunter suggested forcefully, stepping in front of Geyser again to stop Ashachu hitting him. "It could have hit the big guy as we were escaping through the wormhole. You heard Team Rocket talking about Team Plasma' Kyurem cannon, didn't you!"

Ashachu coxed his head. "No! How could I?"

"Well, you've heard the stories our parents talked about the attack on Op...AHHHH".

Ashachu had stopped listening. In his rage he let off a powerful thunderbolt attack, striking both Hunter and Geyser. The two Pokémon both collapsed to the ground, leaving Geyser exposed. The next thing the poor Dewott knew he had Ashachu standing on his chest.

"Ashachu...G-get off m..."

"YOU'RE GOING TO GET HIM OUT OF THAT THING."

Ashachu's face was very closed to Geysers and his claws were digging into his neck. Geyser couldn't move. He could feel Ashachu's hot breath on his fur and see the fury etched on his face.

"Ashachu please."

"UNDERSTAND."

"Ashachu! Get the fuck off him!" Hunter got back to his paws and, while Ashachu's attention was focused on Geyser, kicked him in the side. As Ashachu collapsed, winded, he grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and threw him off, before helping Geyser back to his paw. "Are you alright buddy."

"Y-yeah," stuttered Geyser.

"Good," Hunter sighed before turning back to Ashachu. "What the fuck is your problem. You're way out of line."

"No Hunter," growled Ashachu. "He's a piece of shit. Ever since he hatched it's been bad news. All he's even done is undermine me and try and steal you away from me."

Hunter's eyes went wide at this comment and his mouth felt open. "What! Are you serious Ashachu. He didn't steal me away from you. You pushed me away by getting all agro and letting that Sneasel fuck you." He gestured to Blade and then added, "Sorry Blade."

"Not at all," said Blade holding up a claw. And then to Ashachu, "Come on kiddo, this isn't helpful."

"Like I haven't seen the of you together, or his constant flirting with you. I saw you nuzzling him right now. Geyser's a no-good boyfriend stealing little fuck of an otter, and you're a little slut for letting him, Hunter." He pointed a paw accusingly at the Riolu.

A dark expression fell over Hunter's face. "You take that back!"

Ashachu folded his paws and turned up his nose. "I stand by every word."

"What about you and Charizard, huh," Hunter retorted, practically shaking with rage. "You let yourself get groomed by a Pokémon ten times bigger than you and a hundred times your age. I mean, how exactly do you to fuck. The sheer mechanics of it."

"Oh, go suck otter cock!"

Ashachu and Hunter started to hurl a combination of insults and accusations at the other. Their shouts echoed through the valley.

"You were everything to me Ashachu. You were my best friend pretty much forever. Ever since you hatched from your egg, I knew you would be my best friend. It took me months to work up the courage to tell you about my feelings for you. And as soon as I did, I found out you'd been sneaking around with Blade, and then let him fuck you. And when I feel like I'm finally ready to move on, you get all jealous of the one other boy who like me."

"Tauros shit, Hunter! You never gave me a chance. I had one escapade with Blade. One! And we didn't even mate properly. And it came at the end of all the other crap I had to deal with at the time, like being stalked by a psycho legendary, and having my tail cut off by captain nutjob."

They were speaking so loudly and over the top of each other, that neither heard, nor indeed cared to hear, what the other had to say. They brandished and made grand gestures with their paws and bared their teeth.

Geyser groaned, rubbing his temples with his paws. "Come on guys, this isn't helpful. And you're giving me a headache."

"One escapade! Really, Ashachu. You'd been sneaking off with him almost every night we were in struck in Po Town. All behind my back. Did it never occur to you to tell me, your supposed best friend what was going on. You two could have been doing anything with that slutty Sneasel...No offense Blade."

Hunter took a brief pause from shouting at Ashachu, to glance at an apologise to the. Not that Blade had been able to make out either what it was that Hunter had said, or Hunter's apology. He looked exasperatedly between the two bickering Pokémon. Like Geyser it was giving him a headache.

"No wonder Ash wanted to ship your ass back to Pallet Town. Then you attacked Axew. Then you joined Team Rocket, you traitor piece of shit. And when I was stupid enough to try and make amends with you, you let your fucking new boyfriend eat me. Like, actually fucking eat me."

"Yeah, that's right Hunter, you're the victim. Forget the fact that you attacked our egg. I mean what was Charizard supposed to do. Ever heard of not poking a dragon in the eye."

"Okay boys, that's enough." With Hunter and Ashachu only inches apart, each getting right up in the other's face, Blade had decided it was time to intervene. He interposed himself between the two of them, pushing them apart with his paws. "You two have got to stop fighting."

"Well don't blame me," grumbled Hunter, folding his arms. "Zard-bitch here started it."

"Go suck off Geyser," Ashachu retorted.

Blade sighed, flicking his head back towards the sky and rolling his eyes. "Could you both shut up, and just hear me out? I don't expect you to just shake paws and make it up, or any of that human lovey crap. Nah, you two need to resolve this, but you aren't going to resolve it through words...You need to fight it out."

"Oh, I'll take him on any day," pipped up Hunter. He tried to grab at Ashachu, but Blade forced him back.

"Always trying to be the tough guy, are ya," growled Ashachu. Though unlike Hunter, he didn't try to attack. "For a Pokémon who's scared of the dark."

A horrified look crossed Hunter's face. "You take that back."

"Did you know that Geyser," cried Ashachu loudly. "Hunter's scared of the dark."

Blade literally had to push Hunter, hard in the chest and grab a hold of him, to keep him from getting his paws into Ashachu. He threw Ashachu a dirty look over his shoulder as he held Hunter back.

"Alright, here's what I proposed," he shouted, as he pushed Hunter so hard that he almost caused the Riolu to fall over. In fact, the only reason Hunter didn't land on his butt was because Geyser leapt to his paws to catch him.

"Gotcha."

"Thanks."

"I'm going to back off in a minute, then you two are going to battle it out. Just get all of your aggression out physically. Like really go for each other. I'll add some incentive too. The looser has to lay down and lick the winner's paws."

The suggestion had the intention Blade had been hoping for. It momentarily caused Ashachu and Hunter to stop trying to kill each other and focus their attention on him.

"WHAT," they both chorused together.

"That's a terrible idea," Geyser whined….Though his little otter mind quickly filled of unbidden images of Hunter, all strong and heroic, with his foot paw pressed against Ashachu. He felt a tingle in his nether-regions and hoped it wouldn't become something obvious.

Hunter too looked unimpressed by the suggestion. "Yeah, I'm not sure," he started, but was cut off by a foolish outburst from Ashachu.

"What, you scared Hunty!"

"Oh, fuck off Ashachu!"

"I'll make you my bitch again, the way Geyser made you his!"

A dark expression crossed Hunter's face at these words. "Fine," he said. "I'll take you on. Just don't expect any mercy when I kick your cute little butt."

"That's the spirit," said Blade. "Save it for the battlefield, though!"

[Pokémon]

The peak they were standing on, was just large enough to be a rudimentary battlefield, provided no one strayed too close to the edge. It was something that would likely confine each Pokémon's strategy and shorten the fight….Which was what Blade wanted. Ashachu and Hunter stood a few paces apart from each other in battle ready stances. Paws apart, tails low to the ground. Ashachu on all fours and Hunters with his paws raised like fists.

"Remember kiddo," Blade whispered from behind Ashachu. "Instinct. Let your body do the work. Don't hesitate and don't overthink it."

"You can do it Hunter," Geyser cheered from the opposite side. "Kick his ass."

"Alright…GO."

Ashachu charged into action at Blade's call. Focusing all rage at the Riolu, he let off a thunderbolt attack. Hunter had been prepared for exactly that type of move. He held up his right paw, opening a palm. A shield like barrier formed in front of him, made of a mystic energy. The lightning bolt struck it but could not penetrate through to Hunter.

"Ha light screen," the Riolu boasted as Ashachu's attack ended. "Uncle Hirosaki taught me that one!"

Ashachu responded only with a growl, before coming charging towards Hunter. Hunter licked his lips, as he watched Ashachu closely.

"Using quick attack. Perfect."

He dodged at the last second, jumping aside so that Ashachu narrowly passed him. The electric mouse quickly skidded to a halt and spun around on the spot ready for another attack. His tail turned a bright metallic colour, and he swung it at Hunter. Hunter brought his paw upwards to meet it, striking back a force palm attack. The trick worked, and Ashachu bounced off him.

"Pika Chuuuu!"

Almost as soon as he landed back on his feet, he fired off another thunderbolt attack. Hunter didn't have enough time to dodge this one, and hit it head on. He gritted his teeth as the pain surged through his body, willing himself not to faint. The pain passed a moment after it had come. Hunter fought to recover his breath. His insides felt like they were on fire. He forced himself to look up at Ashachu, waiting for the next attack. As he did so, he leapt backwards twice increasing the distance between himself at Ashachu.

"Chu!"

Ashachu launched into another quick attack, charging at Hunter once again. Hunter lowered his stance, keeping his centre of gravity low preparing to stand his grow. As soon as Ashachu was just a couple of steps away, he lunged, hitting out at Ashachu with force palm. He caught Ashachu in the chest with his paw, sending him flying backwards in a great arch. Ashachu landed hard on his back with a dull thud.

"Pii."

The attack had not been enough to knock him out. Ashachu was still conscious. But when he tried to sit up and get back to his paws, he found that he could not. His body was no longer responding to brain's commands. He couldn't even move his fingers or his tail.

"Shit," he squeaked, louder than he'd intended to. "Not paralysis."

Hunter, who'd been readying himself for another attack, couldn't believe his luck. His face lit up in delight and he did a little paw pump in the air. "Oh yiss."

"Whoa," cheered Geyser, clapping his paws in a little round of applause for his triumphant crush. "Nice shot, Hunty!"

Ashachu groaned and rolled his eyes. "Ugh, now he has a pet name for you!"

Blade folded his arms and let out a low whistle. "Wasn't expecting that. Fuck Ashy, the one time you actually truly battled on instinct, and it's against an opponent who anticipated your every move."

Ashachu felt his heart thunder in his chest in anticipation as Hunter leaned over him. He certainly did not like the evil, satisfied grin Hunter was giving him.

"Oh, how the mighty have fallen," the Riolu said gleefully. "Time for you to accept your place, bitch!" Hunter lifted his right foot paw and held it over Ashachu's face, just to allow him to get a good look at it. He wiggled his three toes, just to taunt him.

Ashachu gritted his teeth, knowing what was coming. He glared at Hunter with as much ferocity as he could manage in his paralysed state. He wanted to say something either threatening, sarcastic or clever, though his mind was coming up blank at that moment in time.

The best he could manage was, "I'll get you for this, you jumped up Riolu. You just wa...i-t..." And he was cut off before he could finish his threat as Hunter placed his paw over his muzzle. It covered his mouth and nose almost perfectly.

"Yeah, whatever Ashy-boi," Hunter retorted. "It's a little hard to take you seriously, when you're lying on the ground, under my foot, like the paw slut you are." Like Blade, he folded his arms and grinned. "Now here's a threat by someone that's actually in a position to make it. Start licking my feet slut, or else."

"Mmmmgfhhf." Ashachu gave a muffled cry, but realised quickly there was no point in trying to retort. His aim at that moment was to preserve as much dignity as he could. He clenched his jaws shut, refusing to lick Hunter paw. It was a weird feeling having Hunter's paw pressed against his face. It was a typical canine paw, with firm padding on the heel and toes, and the rest covered in soft black fur. the scent of musk, sweat and whatever Hunter had been walking in assaulted Ashachu's nose, threatening to overwhelm him. Ashachu felt something stir deep within him. Something he wasn't keen to explore at that moment in time.

Blade started to laugh loudly. Every chuckle made Ashachu start to feel very warm in the face.

"Ahahaha...Well this certainly turned out...interesting, didn't it. Normally I'd take pity on ya kiddo but given how much of a pain you've been recently. Can't help but feel Hunter kind of deserves a little revenge. That, and he did win according to the terms, YOU seemed so enthusiastic about." He lent over Ashachu and grinned toothily at him. "Terms which included licking his paws, so open that maw, rodent-boi."

"Or we could just find ways to persuade you," added an equally gleeful Geyser as he appeared above Ashachu. He held up one of his shells for Ashachu to see. "Like sticking a Scalchop up your butt. Or heck, I could just use psychic or hypnosis on you, to get you to comply. Totally up to you!"

Ashachu clenched his jaw to stifle a groan. It would be a long time before paralysis wore off.