“He’s got to be reviving them after we’ve beaten them up,” I growled in annoyance. "There is no way that he has this freaking many Dittos; otherwise, he’d have just attacked the League and taken over by now!”
“It would be the only valid reason for the numbers of Ditto we are facing.” Sabrina nodded even as her pokemon flicked the Arcanine and Rapidash that had taken to chasing us.
As his fastest pokemon on the ground, they were typically always at the front of the pack and therefore the ones that we had to deal with.
Thankfully, Erika’s technique of trapping rooms with spores and using Rage Powder to force them to attack only her Jumpluff had resulted in every other pokemon getting away without any damage to speak of.
Which wasn’t to say that our pokemon weren’t tired.
We’d been fighting a tactical retreat that saw us sweeping through rooms, hallways, and labs for the last twenty minutes.
We typically had enough time to hunker down, allow five or six pokemon to step forward and hold the line and allow others to regather their strength while Karen stripped the data from whatever computers she could get access to.
“Seen any Porygon?” I asked her.
“No, but don’t jinx me!” called Karen from her position in front of the computer even as her Houndoom, now no longer Megaevolved, and her Weavile stood near her. They watched the computer like one would watch a wild pokemon, knowing that at any moment something might shift and they would need to act.
Turning back to the door as a Charizarditto charged through I whistled. “We’re starting to get the Charizard appearing, won’t be long before we have to deal with the Flareon, Camerupt, Magmortar and Torkoal that he has.
Erika tilted her head. “I’m surprised he doesn’t have a Blaziken to his name,” she murmured.
I hummed. The legal answer was that Blaine had been one of the trainers that had been restricted from ever being allowed one of Hoenn’s starter pokemon on pain of sanctions and having his pokemon stripped, but while he’d never legally shown such a pokemon, it wouldn’t have been enough to stop him surely?
“Don’t forget Typlosion, Infernape, Emboar, or even Delphox,” I murmured. Theoretically all of those pokemon might have been accessible to Team Rocket followed by whatever organisation had taken up Blaine afterwards.
“Thankfully the ditto don’t have access to the entire move pool of his trained pokemon,” Karen muttered. “Keep an eye out for any Rapidash or other pokemon that suddenly vanish with Teleport. That will be the biggest indicator that we’re up against him properly.”
“Ninetails…” Sabrina added with a frown. “I haven’t seen him send out a copied Ninetails yet.”
“That… is something that is a good point,” I muttered. Ninetails was actually a pokemon that had been absent during my fight with him during the destruction of Bark Town, but did that mean anything?
He’d had literal decades since then.
In the games he was always depicted as having one I believed. He definitely had on in the cartoon. That and a Rhydon…
Sabrina frowned as I offered up the thought to her. “He should have one,” she muttered.
“In the past he had two Charizard, Flareon, Rapidash, Arcanine, Torkoal, and a Magmar that has obviously evolved,” Sabrina listed, pausing slightly to give me a pointed look about the Magmortar, which was something I had mentioned to her in the past. It was rather annoying that I hadn’t found a way to organically create the conditions for the Guardians or someone else to learn about it before Blaine shoved it in everyone’s face.
“So assuming that he is sticking to just twelve pokemon there are eight other pokemon that he could have which we aren’t seeing,” Erika concluded with a frown.
“Ninetails would make the most sense,” I muttered as we began to trot towards another room, our pokemon rumbling as they moved around us.
“From what I know about Blaine there is every chance he has something else up his sleeve,” added Karen when she joined us.
I snorted. “Yeah, he’s got a pair of flamethrowers up his sleeves.”
Karen blinked at me only to stiffen. “Oh right, you got punked by Celebi and ended up facing him or something? There was a report on that, yeah?”
I nodded as Erika’s head whipped around to me. “When did this happen?”
“Few weeks ago?” I offered with a shrug. “Tried to do something fun, and a Legendary pokemon dropped in on me.”
“Long story short, it wasn’t a super fun adventure, but it was…” I mulled the misadventure around in my mind, recalling the anguish of knowing I was back in time to a world gone to war. The hurt in the people, the way they’d been so suspicious. Then there had been the people and pokemon that I’d helped. “...meaningful,” I eventually finished feeling like the single word did little to impart everything I’d gone through.
Erika nodded slowly. “I hadn’t read that report yet, guess I will after this.”
“It wasn’t vital intel at the time,” I muttered.
“Au contraire!” declared an annoying voice from a set of speakers. “It is very important!” boomed Blaine’s voice as speakers and screens around the computer lab that we’d entered flickered on.
I frowned. The way the room was set up… it reminded me of an old video of the space landing with NASA and other space agencies. That or a computer lab with there being a large lectern at the front.
A lecture hall? Was this the new Rocket Academy? If so it was… better, which was actually a horrible thing to think, but still.
I swept my eyes over the room again even as we trashed the cameras and turrets that popped out of the walls to try shooting us.
Something about this room was niggling at my memories. Was it the way the computers were set up? The lectern? What was with that weird glass diamond located in the corners of the room?
That seemed familiar in a way that caused an itch in my brain.
“Brock! We need to keep moving!” called Karen.
“Blaine what are the—
“Don’t respond to him! And shut up about the reports now!” barked Karen, reminding us that we needed to be quiet as the walls sometimes had ears.
I grunted in response and doubled down on wrecking the room, still oddly unsure about what was causing my unease.
I had to admit that it was rather cathartic to break things with there being few downsides.
Sometimes it was nice being the good guys raiding a bad guys base.
“Answer a few questions and I will do the same for you,” taunted Blaine, causing me to pause in destroying the last speaker in my area.
Karen noticed my hesitation and snapped her fingers. Houndoom melted the speaker.
“Don’t fall for his tricks, Brock! He's not going to be answering shit!” she growled.
Nodding, I decided to follow her lead. She was right, I shouldn’t get into a battle of brains with a man widely known as the brains of the original Elite Four.
Of course, Blaine wasn’t going to leave well enough alone.
“Oh, come now! Intel is a precious resource that should be garnered wherever possible should it not? I thought Agatha taught you better than that Karen?” he taunted as we entered another room only to begin trashing it.
Karen grunted in reply, not answering his words with anything behind a sneer at a camera.
“I have two Charizard on my team as you rightly know Brock, but I have added others!” he chuckled, the camera turning towards me before it was yanked out of its socket.
“We know about your freaking newly evolved Magmar!” Karen growled as she broke apart the speakers on a computer before plugging in.
A new screen appeared with a cartoon Blaine wagging a finger back and forth at her.
“Ah ah ah! That won’t work any more! You don’t really think I’m going to hand over my precious data to you that easily, do you?” he taunted through the final set of speakers.
Karen growled as she pointed a finger at them which had Weaville slashing them apart.
“Should we… perhaps negotiate with him?” Erika suggested as Sabrina and I inspected the rudimentary map that she’d been creating.
Hmmm, it didn’t feel like it but we’d slowly been moving upwards at a steady incline that curled around in a spiralling pattern.
Damn! This place really was gigantic! What had he built it for? Doomsday preparations?
I tapped my foot idly as I noticed that there were rooms off to the side that we had yet to access. Indicating said doorways on the map, I gave Sabrina a questioning look. She nodded and directed her map to Karen, highlighting the area.
Hmmm, perhaps those were elevator shafts? They did match up with certain points along the spiralling hallway.
To avoid becoming too predictable we cut a path back down the spiral this time around and swept around to cut into the pokemon that had been surging towards the destroyed sections.
In doing so we caught several men and women in lab coats by surprise.
“Ah! They're here!” screamed one, only for most of the humans to find themselves levitated into the air as Sabrina’s pokemon grasped them and lifted them out of the fighting that ensued.
We swept through the host of fire type pokemon and then turned our attention to the men and women.
Karen barely waited for them to touch the ground before getting in their faces. Her aura spiked unpleasantly as a darkness wafted over her.
Her eyes also glowed an unsettling red. “Who do you work for, and what is your purpose here?” she rasped hoarsely.
The man she’d approached almost wet himself with fear. “I-I I can’t tell you that! Blaine will have our heads!”
“Blaine isn’t the one you need to worry about,” replied Karen.
Sabrina stepped forward lightly. “She’s right, nothing Blaine can do to you will be as bad as what I can,” she stated mildly.
There was a plastic smile on her face and her eyes had a hollowness to them that I didn’t like.
Rather than speak up however, I allowed the charade to play out as I crossed my arms and made myself look menacing.
It wasn’t hard when you could project your aura to loom over a crowd.
“Ei! It’s just that Blaine doesn’t tell us much! We’re supposed to stay in our sections! He’s paying us really well!”
Karen snorted, and I rolled my eyes. Of course, crime pays well. Criminal science mut pay even better.
“We’ve been creating medicines for people with ditto to help regenerate damaged organs or nerves!” proclaimed one in the back who cowered as our collective attentions shifted towards them.
“Regenerative surgeries?” I asked, my mind recalling a specific surgery I’d recently watched take place and how it had helped… shit. Blaine had his fingers in a lot of pies didn’t he?
“How is he distributing this research?” growled Karen.
“He has a holding company that talks with research companies. They buy up the discoveries or bid for the chance to block others from getting hold of them!”
That… sounded just like what a corporation would do, wouldn’t it? If they couldn’t use it, why not just stop others from profiting from it? Even if it was better for everyone.
Urgh. I glanced up and down the hallway, mindful that we’d paused for longer than we had in the past.
Despite this there didn’t seem to be any more reinforcements coming.
On a whim, I stepped up to one of the technicians and opened the labcoat, unsurprised to find a revival powder in their belts. “You’ve been the ones following along after us, reviving various downed Dittos, haven’t you?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
Karen sniffed. “Erika, do the thing,” she ordered.
Tangrowth rolled forward and I had a moment of alarm as I saw the vines sweep over and around me. Sudden images of various websites from my past life flashed before my eyes.
Not like this! I thought worriedly only for Tangrowth not to touch a hair on my head or more importantly, any other part of me.
Which didn’t mean it didn’t have the technicians and researchers bound up tightly.
“Oh! Sorry about that Brock! Tangrowth is rather eager to restrain people. He wouldn’t have hurt you!” Erika hurried to apologise.
Akren snorted. “I don’t think being tied up was what Brock was worried about.”
Sabrina gave me a singular raised eyebrow. I met her gaze blandly. I’d had my dark aura up while intimidating that technician; I was safe.
Sabrina’s other eyebrow rose and I reconsidered that idea.
She hadn’t learned how to get past dark aura mind defenses had she?
I pictured what she’d look like in her wedding dress while imagining happy thoughts but there was no softening of her expression in the slightest. 'Alright, good, defenses were still up,' I thought to myself.
Lola patted me on the arm. “Your father and I—” I put my hand on her mouth to silence her.
“No, just no,” I stated, not wanting to even touch that, like ever.
With the group bound we shoved them out of the way and back into some of the destroyed rooms that should see them safe.
“What if Blaine gets the self-destruct function happening again?” Erika asks, causing several of the bound men and women to stiffen in fear.
Karen gave Erika a pointed look. “You think he’d care to warn this lot?” she asked.
The reminder of said systems had me pulling out the map once more to inspect them more thoroughly.
“Where would you put a backup self-destruct system if you had to?” I asked out loud.
The girls shrugged while Lola helpfully pointed out several points on the map which caused us all to blink. “I’ve already disabled a few such systems in some of the rooms we’ve been through.”
“You have?” squawked Karen. “Why the hell didn’t you say anything?”
“Oh, well it wasn’t important at the time?” remarked Lola.
I put a hand to my temple and rubbed it. “It kind of was?”
Lola simply shrugged. “Well we have to see to these other sites for any other potential explosives anywho!” She said with a chipper tone as her fingers jabbed at several more sites on the ‘proposed’ map that Sabrina had drawn up..
“That many spots?” I asked weakly.
“To start with,” replied Lola with a shrug. “Don’t worry though! If the self-destruct starts up we should have a few seconds warning and we can just tear our way into the surrounding bedrock! We'll just tunnel away with the lesser systems activating!” she proclaimed.
We all stared at her.
“Riiiiight, that sounds like plan Omega, now who has a proper suggestion?” asked Karen. “Cause right now I think we’re literally going in circles trying to find Blaine and the longer this goes on, the more I suspect he’s not here and is fucking with us.”
“But the copies of the pokemon?” Erika pointed out.
“Blaine is an annoying guy,” Karen replied.
Seeing as we didn’t have much else, I gestured to the map. “We need to investigate these rooms outside the spiral. I’m really hoping he’s kept the structure contained to just a spiral, but Sabrina and I have highlighted several points where there might be elevator shafts… or even passageways to other facilities from these points.”
“Please be elevators,” muttered Erika as Karen nodded and waved for us to start moving.
“Hmm, a good enough goal for now until we can find the command room of this base. That’s where Blaine will be, if he is here,” she announced as we began to jog towards one of the doors in question.
When we passed several still knocked out Ditto I hummed.
It would seem doubling back like we had paid out in more ways than we’d been expecting as the reinforcements weren’t coming after us and there had now been a lull of a few minutes of any pokemon attacking us.
“Well that’s good, I was getting tired of swatting down those Ditto,” said Karen.
I glanced towards her only to tell instantly that she was lying. She’d been loving swatting them down.
Rather than say anything I instead directed my attention towards the doorway that we suspected led to an elevator.
Straight away, I could tell it wasn’t an elevator however.
Mostly because of the large warning signs plastered all around the door along with the serious looking security lock along with multiple fire extinguishers and large blackened windows.
“A fire type testing site?” I suggested, worried that opening it would result in us facing some actually strong pokemon.
Lola once again proved to be more courageous than smart as she walked up and unlocked the door.
It swung open to reveal a large shaft.
I blinked, stepping closer as a hot wind blew through the room. Ignoring the suddenly dry lips and mouth I had I stepped in to find myself staring into a metal shaft with a vast empty space in the middle.
“It’s a missile silo,” I murmured as my mind connected the dots. “This isn’t an elevator shaft but a chute to launch missiles out of.”
“Missiles?” hissed Karen. “He’s been launching missiles?” Then she snorted. “Yeah, no way he’s done that without bringing most of the entirety of the League down on him.”
“You impress me once more, I thought you to be rather average intellect Brock!” proclaimed a voice.
We all looked up to find Blaine staring down at us from a gantry that spread across the middle of the chute. At his sides, several pokemon stood, relaxed and ready to start a fight.
Two Charizard, a Magmortar, a Flareon, a Torkoal, an Arcanine, and a Rapidash stared down at me.
Without having to see anything more, right away, I knew this had to be Blaine himself.
The pokemon themselves caused the very air around them to distort slightly and each pokemon were strong in a way that the various Ditto simply lacked.
A gleam, or edge, to them, as it were.
That and the eyes. They had actual proper eyes that glinted like malevolent stars rather than tiny pinpricks.
“How many missile chutes do you have?” I asked, worried about his ability to wage a war that was suddenly growing.
“Ha! Just when I compliment you, you prove my earlier assessment accurate! These are no mere missile chutes!”
I frowned only for an earlier room we’d sprinted through to flash through my mind.
“Rockets… you’ve been making rockets and launching them,” I said as behind me Karen subtly took in the chute and everyone’s positioning.
Ah, they were getting ready while Blaine and I talked? Smart.
Right, new plan, get the bad guy to monologue!
“Do you think the people of Cerulean are all that clever? They have their entertainment and so they are placid. Did you know that nowhere else in all of Indigo do they have as many celebrations involving fireworks?”
“You launch your rockets during the fireworks displays?” I asked, stunned by the… simplicity of the act.
Blaine smirked. “A mighty man does not need to expend himself dealing with chaff,” he replied.
I stared, surprised, only to give the chute another look. It wasn’t that big, so it couldn’t have too big a payload, but there should have still been a bit of notice.
“It doesn’t make sense, no-one is that blind that they’d miss a rocket launching into the air.”
“Ha! You think that but there are plenty of ways to achieve it!” he crowed.
“What could you even need so many rockets for?”
Blaine grinned. “The world is divided at the behest of various pokemon. Nations, islands and entire groups of people have been lost to each other. Old wrongs have gone unaddressed, and the world has been effectively put in a ‘time out’ by the various Legendary pokemon.”
Blaine’s grin turned sharp. “But if we can control our view of the world, we know where the continents will shift! Where are the people? We can control the world instead of wandering blindly!”
“You say that like there aren’t any pokemon in the void of space,” I remarked drily.
“Ah, you know about it as well? The Legendary pokemon Rayquaza, no? Well knowing is half the battle!” he announced with a mad grin.
I snorted.
I probably shouldn’t have but I couldn’t help myself.
“There is more out there than just one Legendary pokemon,” I declared, “Just as there is more to the world and the people. You’re holding to a view that doesn’t allow the world to grow. Instead you’re clinging to old grudges.”
“Ahhhh to be young and so cocksure of yourself. Come speak to me when you have to wade through a field of sunken corpses, or crawl your way out of a forest of splinters. Come talk to me after you’ve told the hundredth wido—”
“Don’t pretend to care!” I roared back at him, my voice echoing in the chute as I glared up at him.
“Don’t toy around! I was there at Bark Town! You weren’t some tragic hero! You were a sicko burning down civilians' homes and doing so with a laugh!”
For a long moment, Blaine didn’t speak.
Then he began to laugh.
His laugh echoed and rang out with all the wrong reverbs to be merely a cackle or a chuckle, it was a snigger crossed with a guffaw.
“Oh, that’s right,” he bit off his laugh. “I forgot!” His face went blank, and his dark glasses glinted as he stared down at me.
“I keep forgetting that I don’t need to pretend anymore,” he whispered, and I suddenly knew that he wasn’t talking to me, but himself.
Oh, shit.
Then, as one, his pokemon inhaled and loosened a wave of fire.
I staggered back just in time for the door to swing shut in front of me and twist.
A shuddering breath ran through me as the image of Blaine’s transformation was held in my mind. He wasn’t a sociopath, he was something else, a psychopath
The metal began to glow red and I threw myself out of the way as around me everyone else moved further away from the fight.
“Shit! Move back! Move back!” Karen called over the sound of groaning metal that slagged and peeled off the wall.
“I thought you said that was a rocket chute?” Lola called as she clutched my arm and ran away from the molten metal.
“It was! I think he built it to handle rockets, not his own pokemon though!”
Which was just a bit crazy to consider.
“Alright! Well we’re holding here!” Lola growled, turning and planting her feet as she pointed towards several pipes that her pokemon didn’t hesitate to rupture, causing water to spill out over us.
Right. Right, we could potentially fight him here if we wanted to. Back there was a bad position.
Actually, it was a downright terrible position.
With Blaine having not just the high ground but cover to brace behind, our fight with him would have gone poorly for us.
“Are we…” I glanced around and grimaced as I realised it was just me, Lola and Erika on our side of the hall. Karen and Sabrina were both on the other side, separated by the sea of magma.
“Can you teleport across to—” Sbarina appeared next to me.
“Oh good,” I murmured, only to glance back to Karen who looked pissed.
“Uhmmm,” I pointed to Karen.
“Her dark aura is interfering with my Teleport. I can’t take her as she is. She’s going to have to go around,” Sabrina stated calmly.
Karen glowered as she came to the same conclusion, and rather than calming down, pointed her own pokemon towards a wall on the inner part of the spiral to set them loose, destroying the room so she could make her way around.
My gaze swept over to the melted wall.
“Why isn’t Blaine pushing his advantage?” I murmured.
Sabrina narrowed her eyes.
“He’s posting guards on each shaft so we can’t ascend easily,” she murmured.
“That shouldn’t matter as long as we hit one of the shafts fast enough to ascend. He shouldn’t be able to beat us at repositioning as long as we deny him intel on where we are coming up,” I pointed out.
“We could always divert the river into the facility to flood him out!” suggested Lola.
That, weirdly enough, wasn’t a terrible idea.
“Let’s make that a fall back option,” I suggested. “But good thinking,” I said, making sure to compliment her this time.
Lola perked up and I suddenly felt like I’d made a mistake.
Thankfully, Karen chose that moment to smash her way through a wall to rejoin us.
I gave the room she’d emerged from a passing glance, noting the smoking offices, cubicles and various turrets and cameras. Once again, in the corner of the room, there was…
My gaze shifted to Sabrina, then back to Erika. “Hey… did Silph Co ever get the internal teleport pads sorted out?” I asked.
Everyone’s eyes turned back to the glittering plates in the corner of the room that I was looking at. They’d looked merely like glass cornerpieces, but to be fair, we hadn’t really seen them before we’d destroyed the power supply to the facility.
Which, now, I was doubly glad for.
Still, it created a problem for us. “If he’s got an emergency power grid set up, what are the chances he can teleport around using that to get to places we’re going to be?” I asked.
Sabrina grimaced as Karen cursed. “Fuck! I thought it was weird he wasn’t blowing the place up or fleeing! That asshole thinks he can beat us!” she growled.
I chewed my lip and considered us. We’d been fighting for a while now, whereas Blaine had only just launched his first attack.
He was fresh and had mobility on his side, the bastard, where’as we—
“Let’s revive the Electrode in the basement,” Sabrina suggested suddenly.
We all blinked. “Uhmmm, I’ll bite, why?” Karen asked.
“We repower the Teleporter system, but have me positioned on it, so the instant it activates I can overpower it. Psychic energy is being used alongside large amounts of electrical energy but I should be able to bend the system to my needs.”
Sabrina pointed at the dull diamond. “We reactivate that, I break the system to force it to project us to the top of the facility, and suddenly we’re in an ambushing position.”
Karen smirked. “Alright, that’s a plan I can get behind!” she crowed. “Let’s do that!”
Lola sagged. “Awwww, I wanted to drown him,” she murmured.
I shot her a look, unsure if she was joking. Again, I decided I didn’t want to know the answer… well…
We jogged back to the powerplant having already acquired a lot of revive powder.
Erika, as the most personable of us, stepped into the room to revive the Electrode and get them back on side.
It took a few minutes but she walked back out of the room as the lights around us flickered, her hair stood on end, full of static as she shot us a thumbs up.
As one, our gazes swept to Sabrina who was standing atop the Teleporter pad that we’d missed on the way through previously.
It flickered for a moment and Sabrina’s eyes narrowed. A moment later the glow strengthened and then began to grow brighter until it was like staring at a small sun. Then something clicked into place and Sabrina vanished in a flash of Teleport.
“Soooo did it work or did she just—” Karen started to ask only for Sabrina to reappear.
“Quickly! Move now!” she barked as she reappeared with an odd twisting motion that wasn’t normal for most Teleports.
We raced onto the pad and vanished.
Teleports with Sabrina had spoiled me.
I knew from prior experience that Sabrina was easily the best Teleporter around, as she was gentle and able to go vast distances, as well as chain multiple Teleports one after the other.
This… this was easily one of the worst Teleports I’d ever experienced.
It was like I was being twisted while my head and feet remained in position only to then be stretched and compressed at the same time.
I reappeared in a flash of light, disoriented, and didn’t even stop to think as I spun to the side and threw up. It was more training than any real thought, but I released Selene, Shin, and Shrek from their pokeballs.
All of them shuffled away from the entry point with disgusted looks.
Sabrina levitated Erika out of the puddle, earning herself a mumble that might have been a thank you.
Lola appeared, threw up and flopped on the ground causing me to shudder in disgust. Lola rolled over, and looked at me hopefully.
I sighed and lifted her to the side, trying not to touch her too much.
Guess it was true, the older you get the worse your inner ear gets for things like Teleports and rollercoasters.
Karen rose, wiping her mouth as she stepped over the various puddles of puke we’d all left bar Sabrina.
“What the fuck—” she paused for a moment as her cheeks bulged, only to swallow it down. “—was that?” she finished.
Sabrina sighed. “That was a jury-rigged teleporter that I just rode roughshod over to reprogram. If I’m right, we’re now at the very top of the facility.”
“I’m—” I shuddered as the urge to throw up rose within me, only for me to clench and push it down. “I’m not feeling so hot. Think we’ve got time to recover?” I murmured as I tried to get my guts in order.
Proving that I shouldn’t ever tempt fate with such questions, a Rapidash swept into the room only to stiffen in surprise.
Instantly, my pokemon blasted it back out the door it had come through.
“Shit, Blaine is going to know we’re here,” I muttered, wiping at my mouth as I tried to march towards the doorway only to still feel off balance. Lola grit her teeth and copied me.
“I’ll come with you!” she growled. We’ll need to fight him back now that we have the high ground."
“He still knows this base more than us,” Erika commented. “We will have to be mindful of more Teleport pads he might have access to.”
That got a grunt of annoyance from me even as Sabrina turned her attention to the pad we’d entered through. “I’ll work to disable it.”
Karen sighed. “I’ve got a better idea. Time to call reinforcements,” she grunted, lurching towards another door.
She opened it, looked around and nodded as a ladder was revealed. She released her Weaville once more, and it took one look at her and made a face of disgust.
“Oh fuck off, I could have made you go through the Teleporter,” she snarked. She pointed up the ladder and handed over her transceiver. “Get up there and click this button four times quickly,” she ordered.
Weaville vanished as it raced up the ladder with there only being a momentary flicker of light.
A rising heat was the first sign that Blaine knew where we were. Rather than remain in the room I stepped out into the service hallway.
Blaine paused, looking up at me as I released my team of pokemon. Lola did the same.
“Hmmm, think you’ve got the drop on me do you?” he remarked with a vicious smirk as his Magmortar rounded the corner and grinned at us as two Charizards, an Arcanine, and his Flareon formed a line with Blaine at the centre.
His Rapidash shook itself off, having skidded from the doorway. It tottered to its feet only for something out of sight to splash what looked like a potion on it.
“Let’s see, we got around you just now, snuck into your base, wrecked all your stuff and now you’re going to have to fight us to get out,” I replied as the hallway started to become blisteringly hot.
“Oh? And you think five trainers like yourself bother me?” he remarked calmly. Far too calmly for my liking… He smirked. “I’ve stacked trainers like you into ditches by the hundreds, Brock. You are not special.”
I drew upon my aura as I released my team to form a line in front of the exit. “Guess we’ll see about that,” I remarked as I began taking everything in.
With Lola and I here we had seventeen pokemon in a slightly crowded space. Not ideal but still not bad.
Against us was Blaine with his six pokemon. Where were the other six?
Before any of us could order our pokemon to attack, a metal panel fell from above, causing a loud clang. With it came a square of unfiltered sunlight.
Blaine and I both looked up, surprised by this odd turn of events.
Then a shadow flickered, causing me to tense.
I just had enough time to brace myself as the shadow resolved itself into a white mass that caused a small boom as it landed. A small shockwave of air washed over me and I frowned.
I blinked, staring at the man who had landed in a perfect three-point landing, his labcoat drifting slightly as he rose to his full height.
He wasn’t a tall man, but standing before him, I felt small as his aura blazed around him like a constellation rather than being a single specialisation.
“Blaine, long time no see… old friend,” Samuel Oak remarked.
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A.N. Thanks go to my patreons for your continued support!
It also goes to Twmmy for proofreading this chapter.