Chapter 20: The hate is back again
The first door opened when Mark came near to it. Water flooded into the enterance. The door closed and the water flowed out of the enterance. Then the second door opened and Mark stepped onto the main street of Aqua town.
Aqua town was without doubt the most beautiful city Mark had ever been to. To provide oxygen for all the people, the city had plants and plant pokémon everywhere, all pollution in any form (including pokémon like Koffing and Grimer) was strictly forbidden so there wouldn’t be any unneccessary waste of oxygen and outside the magnificent dome, water pokémon swam freely around.
But Mark was mainly looking for the gym, and May. The gym turned out to be right next to the pokémon center, but it was small and hard to notice. The battle arena couldn’t be full-sized, but it was an official gym nevertheless. He stepped inside to find May and a middle-aged woman handing her a badge. They looked at Mark when he came inside.
“Oh, Mark...” May said. “Listen, I’m sorry I didn’t wait for you, I was just excited to get on and your match was (no offense meant) pretty boring...”
“I met the Dark pokémon trainer. The one with the Mutark. He said his name is Victor, and he wanted to meet you at the pokémon festival in Green town that wil be held soon to talk to you about Mutark.” Mark tried his best to hide his disappointment that May didn’t wait, but he still sounded snappy.
“Well, you’d better battle this gym leader. I have to go and heal my pokémon, and then I need to do a couple of things... just so you know. Meet me in the pokémon center after an hour or so.” May then went out and headed towards the pokémon center. Mark walked to the middle of the arena.
“I’d like a battle for a badge, please,” he said to the woman.
“Sure. I am Marge, the Aqua town gym leader. Six per trainer, two on two,” she said. She spoke very fast and her voice was pretty deep.
“Huh? Do you mean six on six or two on two?” Mark asked, confused.
“I mean that we’ll battle in three rounds of two on two,” Marge said. “Never been to Hoenn, have you? Two on two battles are very popular over there. It’s just like a normal battle, but I use two pokémon and you use two pokémon at a time. A round is over when both of either trainer’s pokémon have fainted.”
“Oh... okay,” said Mark. He had read about two on two battles, but he had never had such a battle.
“Go, Politoed and Vaporeon!” Marge shouted and sent out two of her pokémon.
“Go, Jolteon and Gyarados!”
“Jolteon, Thunderbolt!”
“Vaporeon, quick electric counter!”
Vaporeon leapt in front of Jolteon and melted into a pool of water that touched Jolteon’s feet and also reached the pool Gyarados was in. When Jolteon discharged the electricity, the shock went through Vaporeon and into the pool, thus hitting Gyarados. No need to tell what happens to a Gyarados hit by an Electric attack.
“Politoed, Perish song! Vaporeon, go into the pool! Cover your ears, trainer.”
Politoed started screeching a tune that caused Mark to feel like he was being ripped apart, even though he had his ears covered. Jolteon lay down and tried to cover its ears, but couldn’t, screamed “Joooooooolt!” once and then fainted. Politoed stopped singing.
“Jolteon, return. Go, Dragonair and Sandslash!”
“Come back, Vaporeon and Politoed! Go, Starmie and Lapras!”
“Dragonair, Dragonbreath on Starmie! Sandslash, Earthquake!”
“Starmie, lift Sandslash up in the air and Lapras, use Ice beam on Dragonair!”
Sandslash was slowly lifted up, but hovering in the air, it used a Swift on Lapras to disturb it. Meanwhile, Dragonair breathed those weird flames at Starmie so it released Sandslash, enabling Sandslash to use a large Earthquake as it hit the ground. Starmie fell down and that gave Sandslash the opportunity to jump on top of it and slash it vigorously until it fainted. Dragonair, however, got hit hard by Lapras’ Ice beam and fainted too.
“Dragonair, return. Sandslash, Slash it!” Mark roared.
“Starmie, come back! Lapras, Surf!”
Sandslash jumped on Lapras’ head and started Slashing it. Lapras just kept trying to shake Sandslash off, and finally managed to.
“Sandslash, Swift!”
Sandslash fired spikes from its back at Lapras.
“Lapras, Ice beam!”
“Sandslash, Slash!”
Sandslash slashed Lapras, and it was a critical hit. Lapras cried out and then fired an Ice beam, which Sandslash avoided. Then Sandslash unleashed a powerful Earthquake to finish Lapras off.
“Lapras, return! Go, Feraligatr and Quagsire!” Marge shouted. Mark suddenly realized that he was in trouble. His two pokémon left happened to be the rivals Scyther and Charmeleon. Making them battle together in a two on two battle seemed as impossible as making George Bush talk peacefully to Saddam Hussein. But it was his only choice.
“Return, Sandslash! Go, Scyther and Charmeleon!”
When they emerged from the balls, they first looked at each other, Charmeleon with disgust and Scyther just looking puzzled. Then they looked at Mark.
“Guys, you’re my last pokémon in this two on two battle. You have to work together and win. You just have to be able to pull through one battle in peace. Let’s do this!”
Scyther nodded and turned to Quagsire. Charmeleon grinned broadly and turned to Feraligatr. Maybe this would work after all...
How very wrong he was. Charmeleon used a Fire blast on Feraligatr, and it just happened to be exactly at the place that caused some of the fire to hit Scyther. Charmeleon looked at Scyther with an even broader smile than before, then said “sorry” as sarcastically as possible. Scyther shared a quick look with Charmeleon, then turned back to Quagsire, flew forward and used Slash.
Then Charmeleon was at the other side of Feraligatr, and when Feraligatr countered its attack with a Hydro pump, Charmeleon leapt out of the way and Scyther just happened to be in the Hydro pump’s way. It got soaked. Charmeleon replied to the nasty look Scyther gave it with the words “didn’t that cool down the burn?”.
The third time was when Charmeleon shot a small but very hot fireball straight at Scyther’s left wing, with the excuse “oops, I sneezed” and the grin getting broader than ever. Scyther shot yet another nasty look at Charmeleon, just like the other two times. Except that it didn’t turn back to Quagsire.
Scyther stared as Charmeleon started to laugh. Then suddenly, it roared and shot at Charmeleon as fast as it could. Charmeleon stopped laughing, used a Fire blast which Scyther evaded. Scyther raised its scythe, but never managed to attack Charmeleon because the red beam sucked it back into its ball. Charmeleon too.
“I give,” said Mark, “those two aren’t really the best pair in the world...” Then he went to the pokémon center, healed his pokémon, and then told Scyther and Charmeleon off (one at a time, of course).
He started with Charmeleon. As soon as Charmeleon came out of the ball, it said “Did you see that? What did I tell you! That Scyther is dangerous. It would’ve killed me if you hadn’t recalled us.”
“What do you think you’re doing???” Mark spat angrily at Charmeleon. “Don’t aggravate Scyther! Scyther has never done you anything!”
“No, thanks to you,” said Charmeleon. “There you see what Scyther can do. One little joke, and it comes to kill you. Just wait... if you don’t do anything about it, Scyther will kill both of us sometime when we’re sleeping.”
Mark didn’t feel like talking to Charmeleon more about this and took out its pokéball.
“Charmeleon, return.”
“See ya in the afterlife,” were Charmeleon’s last words before it disappeared into the ball.
“Scyther, why did you attack Charmeleon? You could ignore it, you showed it the first two times! Why did you end up attacking? Everything between you two is going to hell!” Mark usually didn’t swear, but when he felt like that, he just had to use strong words.
“I won’t let myself be humiliated like this anymore!” Scyther hissed. “Charmeleon makes fun of me, and thinks it can do anything to me without me even caring! I can’t stand this any longer!”
“Scyther – I don’t want two of my pokémon fighting,” Mark said seriously to Scyther.
“This is a private problem, Mark. It’s just between me and Charmeleon. We can handle this ourselves. It’s none of your business.”
“OF COURSE IT’S SOME OF MY BUSINESS!” Mark roared. “YOU’RE MY POKÉMON!”
With an incredibly quick movement, Scyther’s left scythe came flying towards his face. It stopped about two centimeters from his nose. Mark didn’t dare to move or even breathe. He just stared at the deadly blade that was oh, so close to killing him.
Scyther looked strangely at him, then lowered its scythe slowly. As Mark caught his breath, he fell backwards to the floor. Scyther kept staring at him in that same strange way, then suddenly turned around and said “Sorry... this just... happens... when I’m angry... managed to stop myself before...”
“You gave me a heart attack,” Mark muttered. Scyther turned into a red beam and went into the pokéball by itself. Mark was left on the floor, still getting over the shock, and wondering if Charmeleon was right.