Chapter Five 
 
 
Eterna City had been cloaked in panic. Lola had met her friend in the 
Condominiums and had been given Spook's new PokŽmon. 
	'What can I do for you, Lola?' he had asked. 
'I need a ground-type, now,' Lola replied. 
'How's a Baltoy?' 
'Nope.' 
'Sandshrew?' 
'Look. Just give me a random one and I'll be off, O.K?' Lola had gotten 
annoyed with her friend Andrew before. He always asked the questions, never 
gave the answers. 
'O.K, then.' Andrew handed Lola a Great Ball. 'Now for my pay. Hand it over.' 
Lola gave him a Nugget. Andrew gawped at her. 'That was a Great Ball!' She 
gave him another. 'Thank you.' 
	But she was with Spook again now, and he had his mystery PokŽmon. He 
had insisted that he only releases it in a dangerous situation. 
	Now was a dangerous situation. 
	The PokŽmon Centre that they were planning to stay at had people 
running around and screaming inside. When they got inside, a hole was in the 
wall and a Gligar was rounding up scared people. 
'Dean!' Lola shouted. A man broke away from the crowd of screaming people and 
looked incredibly calm. 
'Lola, my dear!' he said. 
'Dean! Stop terrorising people! Wherever we go, you two cause panic and 
corruption!' 
'Temper, temper,' was all that Dean said before melting back into the crowd. 
'Dean, I challenge you to a battle!' Spook said, not being able to control 
his rage. Dean jumped onto a desk and settled everyone down. 
'A battle? With me? What's the catch?' 
'If I win, you let the people go. If you win, you get to take my PokŽmon.' 
'Your PokŽmon? You are putting your weak PokŽmon on the line to save these 
people? Why?' 
'Because that is what being a trainer is all about,' Spook said boldly. 
'Deal,' laughed Dean. The whole trainer speech had amused him. 'Two-on-two?' 
'You're on!' Spook released Slash and waited for Dean's first move. 
	He commanded all of the people to huddle in the corners, and they 
followed promptly. 'Gligar! Vicegrip!' And the claws opened and closed around 
Slash's body. 
'Slash!' Slash responded with a hard Slash Attack, which made the Gligar back 
flip. Slash then used Metal Claw and sent the Gligar to the floor. 
	Gligar stood up and launched himself into Slash, who reeled and brought 
a shelf full of plants crashing to the floor. Nurse Joy screamed. 
	Slash fought back with a Quick Attack, which narrowly missed Gligar, 
but hit Dean, and sent him flying into the back wall. 
'Sorry, Dean!' cried Spook. 
	Dean just about managed to lift himself up and swear at Spook before 
falling back onto the wall. Nurse Joy ran over to him and checked him. 
'He is unconscious! Spook wins!' A loud cheer erupted from the crowd, but 
they were interrupted by a small man. 
'I will take Dean's place!' he said. It was Terry. He was followed by a 
Drifloon. 
'O.K!' Spook said. 
	Slash shot at the ghost-type with a massive Metal Claw, which knocked 
the foe straight out. 
'Next...' Spook said. 
'Pinsir!' and his Pinsir shot at Slash, who once again was hit and sent 
reeling. Spook told Slash to counter with a hard Slash Attack, that knocked 
Pinsir a couple of steps backwards. 
	Pinsir shot back with a Vicegrip, that Slash dodged by flying upwards, 
then swooping down and taking out Pinsir's legs. Pinsir fell over cried out. 
	Slash was about to finish him off when a blast of fire shot across his 
view, obscuring his vision of Pinsir. 
	Magmar and Dean were back. 
	'Spook, let me step in! We'll be a team!' Lola shouted. The sweat was 
dripping down her face. Her brown hair was covering her eyes. The tension was 
too much. Spook couldn't lose again, not to Dean again anyway. 
'No,' he replied calmly, 'I'll send in Mystery PokŽmon.' Lola nodded and 
stepped back. 'Now, come on out...!' 
	What followed was not what Spook expected. He had expected a huge 
Rhydon, or Golem, but no. A Trapinch stood in front of him. Spook quickly 
decided on calling the thing Flick and called in Slash. 
	'Now guys,' he said to his two PokŽmon. 'This one is big. This could 
determine our fate. Dou you want to leave me, Slash?' Slash shook his head. 
'Flick?' Flick looked at Spook. He didn't quite know what to make of him. Was 
he nice? Was he like the man with the fire-type? Whatever, he wanted to try 
and make a good impression, so he nodded. 'Good. Now. Tactics.' 
	After explaining tactics, the three trainers stared ahead of them. 
Spook at Dean and Terry, Dean and Terry at Spook. 
	The first attack came from Pinsir. It was a Vicegrip and almost caught 
Flick, but he avoided it. Then Slash went for a Metal Claw, which hit 
Pinsir's face, sending him running around blindly, until he ran into Magmar, 
causing him to send off a fireball that went through the roof. 
	The hostages gasped as rubble fell onto the PokŽmon Centre floor, or 
the Battlefield as it would be temporarily known as. 
	Flick managed to burrow his way into the mass of rubble and steel. He 
waited until Magmar had sent off his Flamethrower Attack, then he sprung out 
of the pile and pushed Magmar backwards, his little orange and white legs 
pushing into its stomach. His orange body glowed in the light of the moon. 
Spook saw his massive mouth open as he flipped over backwards, after pushing 
Magmar down. Dig Attack. He had heard that Trapinch were good at it, but not 
this good. 
	'Stupid, little, desert roaming ant thing!' Terry shouted over the 
cheers of the hostages. Pinsir had tried tearing at Slash with his hands, but 
it was too fast. Pinsir's hands went up, down, left, right, but Slash just 
went the opposite way too quickly. In the end, a Quick Attack from it, 
followed by a Bite Attack from Flick had knocked it out. So by the two-on-two 
rules lay down by Spook, Spook should have won, but Terry and his Skorupi 
were now fighting. Spook protested, and lost. Terry and Dean would have to 
cheat and lose, losing the hard way would teach them of Spook's newfound 
power! 
	'Flick, Dig again!' Flick burrowed its way into the rubble again, so 
did Skorupi. 
	Flick saw a gap above open, and then seal itself again. Had Skorupi 
followed him? His answer came soon after. A quick Scratch Attack to the face 
and Flick forced his way back up, crying with pain. 
'No!' exclaimed Spook, 'Slash! Pick Flick up!' Flick screamed even louder 
when Slash followed suit. He flailed and kicked and tried biting his 
partner's scythes. 
	Why didn't Spook answer when he cried. Couldn't he tell that he was 
pain and hated heights? 
	An even bigger shock came when Slash dropped him. Flick tried to put 
his feet facing downwards, but Slash had thrown him. He was now plummeting 
from about ten feet, head first, at Magmar. He understood, suddenly, that 
Spook had wanted Slash to throw him. It was his job to finish the fire-type 
off. 
	He opened his jaws wide slammed them down around Magmar's arm. Magmar 
waved his arm, crying out. He shook Flick off and his eyes rolled. He then 
fell backwards onto the floor. Dean sprinted over to his fallen warrior and 
stroked his head. He was out stone cold, (Well not that cold. He was a fire-
type for crying out loud!) and didn't move. Dean returned him to his PokŽ 
Ball and stood back to watch Terry against Spook. 
	The battle afterwards panned out well, for Spook. Straight after 
Skorupi resurfaced, Slash flew into him, whilst he was in mid-air, and sent 
him flying at Flick, who then jumped up, flipped, and hit him down with his 
back as he was flipping. 
The Rock Smash Attack had finished it. Terry daren't send out his last 
PokŽmon, Houndour, for he knew that Flick could easily send it down. Both 
Dean and Terry bolted, again, through the city of Eterna, leaving Spook, 
Flick and Slash, Lola and the hostages gawping at the damages that had been 
done. 
 
Meanwhile in the tall building at the opposite end of the city, a blue haired 
man admired the wreckage that was in the south of his city. 
	The thorns on the side of his building stuck out like hands reaching 
out as far as they could. A statue of a planet was on top of the building, 
symbolising his quest for cosmic energy. 
	Cyrus knew that his two ex-operatives had caused the panic, for he had 
seen them. He also knew who stopped it. The boy with the PokŽdex. He had 
sensed that the child had exceptional skills in being a trainer. He had seen 
it once before, in a child of about the same age, the same child that had 
trapped him in the Distortion World for a year. Cyrus had wondered what had 
become of this child. He heard that he was still traveling, and had become a 
wandering Gym Leader, or Frontier Brain. Wherever he was and whatever he was 
doing, Cyrus would take his revenge, and the boy wouldn't live, and nor would 
his brother, Spook. 
 
Spook stood next to Lola as the hostages were one by one reunited with their 
partners. Lola looked at Spook and moved closer to him. She went on her 
tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek. 
	Spook blushed and turned to her. 'What-' 
'For being a hero,' said Lola, as if she'd read Spook's mind. Flick gave a 
little whistle and Spook scowled at him, then laughed. After all, it was him 
who had gotten him that kiss. He picked him up hugged him. 
'You're a hero too y'know,' Spook grinned. 
'Of course. How could I forget?' said Lola and she kissed Flick too. 
	Slash was safely in his PokŽ Ball, resting. He had helped save the day 
too, and had earned his rest. He couldn't help but think about what he saw in 
Spook's eyes when Dean was injured. The joy that was going through him had 
scared Slash. Was he turning into the same kind of person as Dean? If he was, 
Slash couldn't stay with him. He had been waiting for Spook, he was sure he 
was the one, but after tonight, he wasn't sure. 
 
Andrew had given Spook and Lola a place to sleep for the night, and for that 
they were grateful. Spook had also thanked him for the PokŽmon. He told him 
the story of Flick's performances and he was astonished by its sheer power. 
'All that came from a squirt who's afraid of heights?' Andrew had said. 
'Isn't that bad? He evolves into Vibrava, who flies, but not as much as its 
next stage, Flygon. It's a dragon-type. It will need to fly!' Lola had said. 
'It'll be fine when it evolves, I'm sure of it,' Andrew reassured them. 
	Glamour had curled itself up under Lola's chair. Flick was on Spook's 
lap, biting anything that moved: bugs; dust, even the tablecloth in the wind. 
Andrew had two PokŽmon: Heracross and Ponyta. Heracross was asleep in the 
corner, Ponyta next to it, gently snoring. 
	Spook wondered if Slash and Flick would get along as well as those two. 
They had fought well, and seemed to get along. He would just have to see. 
	'Bedtime then kiddos!' Andrew said around eleven o'clock. 'If you're 
facing Roark tomorrow, you better have some good rest, boy.' 
'Good idea. Do you mind if Lola and I set an alarm?' 
'Now hold on,' Lola protested, 'Lola and I. I'm not getting up early for you! 
No matter how cu-' She paused before she said the word cute. She didn't want 
Spook to know that she liked him, even though the kiss was probably a hint. 
She cleared her throat. 'No matter how confident you are.' 
'Come on, Lola.' This was Andrew. 'Wake up with your boyfriend. He needs a 
friendly face next to him.' 
Lola raised an angry fist. 'He isn't my boyfriend!' 
Spook blushed. It hurt him to hear her talk like that. It probably didn't 
matter. He thought that Lola was the one girl that he could talk to normally, 
without trying to impress her. But hearing her talk like that, he wasn't 
entirely sure if she was just another one of the girls around Sinnoh.