~Chapter 2: Pikachu, We Have a Problem~

The Pikachu bounded off the crates, eager for a challenge, lightning coursing throughout its fur. It streaked across the steel floor like a bullet to meet its opponent. Both combatants raced around with lightning speed. Razors the Scyther repeatedly slashed with its blade arms only to find Pikachu darting out of harm’s way instantly. I wondered exactly whose side the Pikachu was on.

Firestorm seemed to want to help, and probably wanted to leap into the fray, but I stopped him. He looked up at me in wonderment. I sighed. “Look…I really don’t think you should get in the way of them. The Scyther’s on a mad rampage and the Pikachu seems like it’s two seconds away from blowing up the plane along with itself.”

Firestorm looked down and nodded. I looked back to the battle and couldn’t help feeling sorry for the experimental Pikachu. It was raised as a lab specimen before finally being disregarded as a failure. Maybe that was the reason why it seemed to loathe every living thing in sight.

“Scyther!” Razors yelled slicing boxes in two. In its mad rush to attack Pikachu, it was destroying everything. Pikachu bounded off of a crate just as the Scyther slashed the crate in two. Small boxes on top of smashed crates fell to the ground, shattering. A package labeled “Confiscated Poké balls” opened, scattering the small red and white spheres across the floor. I guessed that they probably belonged to the other captives.

Suddenly and without thinking, I grabbed the Poké balls and retreated behind one of the many mountains of supplies, ensuring that I was out of sight before I opened the balls and released the Pokémon. In a quick, bright flash of light, they emerged and it was then that I realized what a stupid idea it was. Without their trainers, the Pokémon would probably end up going on a rampage like the Pikachu. Fortunately, that wasn’t the case.

Seemingly the most powerful of the group was the Typhlosion, a powerful and upright beast with sleek black and tan fur and blazing orange and yellow rings of fire burning from the flesh on its neck. Four of the others were also large and powerful and stood with the Typhlosion, separate from the other Pokémon. I gazed in admiration upon the proud and confident fighters.

One of them I easily knew to be a Pidgeot, the adult form of Pidgey. It stood nearly as tall as me, with dull dusty brown-colored plumage and long red and yellow feathers trailing off its head. Another was an immense dog-like Pokémon similar to Rudy’s Growlithe. Its massive frame was heavily muscled and powerful, with dark orange fur striped with black like that of a tiger and large patches of fluffy off-white fur covering its legs, head, and tail. The third resembled a huge, blue-white seal with a horn atop its head for generating ice assaults. The last was a gray wolf Pokémon with long capes of black fur running down its back. It appeared younger than the others and had probably only just evolved into its mature form.

“Whoever owns those has probably been a trainer for a long time,” I muttered to myself. Then I saw the other Pokémon: smaller, weaker ones that weren’t anywhere near as cool and confident as the first group. One was a small, bipedal, bright blue scaled turtle with a thick brown shell on its back and large brown eyes; the other was a dog Pokémon with short, midnight-black fur and shackled paws. It looked incredibly familiar.

A Houndour?

Then it saw me. With a mischievous grin, it leaped up onto its hind legs and put its paws against my chest, trying to lick my face. There was no doubt about it now.

“Ebony?” I blurted suddenly. “Wha—how’d you get here? And in a Poké ball?”

With a flutter something soared down from above me and landed on my shoulder. I turned and was in for another surprise when I saw the bird perched there.

“What is going on here? Swift? Ebony?” I exclaimed, confused. And then I realized what it all meant. The box had read “Confiscated Poké balls.” Rudy was here…somehow.

Taking care not to get caught in the still continuing clash between Pikachu and Scyther, I ran over to the supply closet and saw that it was locked from the outside. I glanced over my shoulder; I still was hidden from both Tyson and the experiments. I opened the door, hoping that the Rocket had done as Tyson said and put the other captives in there.

“Whoa, what the—” someone inside said. Two guys were in the closet, one standing on the other’s shoulders trying to reach something, when the first one lost his balance and fell out. One of them was Rudy; the other looked to be a year older than me and about my height with thick, dirty blonde hair. He had on a green T-shirt and baggy blue jeans.

“I knew I’d be able to get us out!” Rudy said climbing off the other one. The other guy sighed and shook his head. “What’re you talking about, you didn’t get us out, that girl opened the door.”

“Huh…Jade!” Rudy said all of a sudden, standing up. “I was hoping you’d be here.”

“What’re you doing here?” I asked.

“When I finished doing my chores, my dad got home and didn’t even know I did ‘em late. He said he’d talked to one of my teachers and I passed the Pokémon exam. I got my license and a Pokémon and wanted to show you, but you weren’t home. Then Swift flew over and kept trying to lead me into the forest. I followed him and saw several jeeps driving down an underground ramp thing. Then I got caught,” he explained.

“So that’s why your Pokémon were in Poké balls. You had to recall Swift into one when you were caught, right?” He nodded. “But what’s with the Squirtle?” I asked. The turtle Pokémon had walked over and stood by his leg when we were talking.

“Oh…they didn’t have any Charmander at the place where you register with the Pokémon League. I had to settle for Squirtle…or else wait a few more weeks until they got some more,” Rudy said. “So I guess you released all the Pokémon along with Spencer’s—that’s the other guy’s name, by the way.” I turned to see Spencer picking up the scattered Poké balls and recalling all of his Pokémon except the Typhlosion back into their Poké balls. He handed Rudy’s Poké balls back to him.

“Oh, Jade…here,” Rudy said, recalling his Pokémon into their Poké balls and giving me the empty one I had released Swift from. “I don’t need it since this one now only works for Swift.” That was the way Poké balls worked. Once a Pokémon was captured by one, the Poké ball would only work for that specific Pokémon. I took the ball from his hand and recalled Swift, leaving Firestorm still standing by my side.

“You got any plans on how we’re supposed to get outta here?” I asked Spencer.

“Err, not really…though Typhlosion here could definitely be a big help,” he replied.

We were all still in the corner by the supply closet, hidden from view by a mountain of crates. Spencer strode over to where Tyson was still battling against the experimental Pikachu. Blackened remains of boxes littered the “battlefield.” I was glad we were in such a large plane—a battle would have been impossible otherwise.

“Stupid experiment,” Tyson muttered. “Its heightened power made it practically impossible to defeat through speed or physical force. And I’m not allowed to kill it, so I gotta knock out the damn thing before it blasts the plane itself with one of its Thunder attacks.”

The Pikachu, however, was worn out. It sparked uncontrollably and gasped for breath, struggling to stay in the fight. The Scyther was just as bad off, with huge electrical burns completely covering its body.

“Wha—how’d you get out?!” Tyson yelled suddenly, noticing Spencer and his Typhlosion.

“Err, is that a trick question?” he asked, snickering slightly.

Tyson swore furiously under his breath before pulling out two more black Poké balls and releasing more experimental Pokémon. Bursts of black light took the shape of the modified beasts. The first one, a Rhyhorn, pawed the floor with its forelegs, its rock-armored, rhinoceros-like body tensing up as it braced itself mindlessly for any commands and lifted its oversized horn at us.

The other Pokémon stood considerably shorter, yet glared just as menacingly with its blank eyes. It outstretched its huge, blade-clawed forelegs and let the sleek black fur covering its weasel-like body stand on end, raising the pink fins on its back and head apprehensively.

“Alright, Typhlosion, let’s see how tough those Pokémon really are,” Spencer said. Typhlosion bellowed its battle call and charged forward into the fray.

Lightning flew wild. The Pikachu, enraged at the interruption between its clash with Razors, shot sparks wildly at Typhlosion and the Rhyhorn and Sneasel. Seizing the chance, the Scyther streaked toward it, blades flashing. In an instant, Typhlosion shot a spurt of burning flame at Razors. The Scyther stopped just short of slicing Pikachu to attempt to avoid the Flamethrower attack.

Pikachu turned and refocused its attention on Razors and finally was able to hit the Scyther with all its power. Caught in the midst of the attacks, Razors was struck by the lightning and hit by the flame, despite its incredible speed. It was caught in the incredible rush of power, unable to move as the electricity drained its energy and the fire seriously burned it.

“Scy!” it cried out pitifully before dropping to the floor, exhausted and in pain. Tyson pulled out its Poké ball and swore again while recalling it. “Alright,” Tyson said after a long time. “You beat my best Pokémon.”

“That means we’re in charge now,” Spencer said matter-of-factly. “Tell the pilot to land this plane at one of your Rocket headquarters and let us off…and also get us pizza,” he added as an afterthought.

Tyson stared irritably, but then with a slight smirk he said, “This isn’t over just yet. You know by now that the early failed experiments are incredibly unstable.” He nodded toward the Pikachu. “Can’t even control when they use their own power once in battle. Though that just makes battle more interesting.” He then retrieved a small device from his pocket and pushed several buttons on it. At once, the other sedated experiments in the cages sprung to their feet with the urge to fight. The Pikachu gained a blank look in its eyes and started to walk toward Tyson with the other Pokémon, but then jumped back, sparking again.

“Never could control that thing like the others,” Tyson said. “Alright, attack!”

“This won’t work, there’s too many Pokémon fighting,” I said to Rudy. “Sooner or later, one of their attacks is gonna miss and hit the inside of the plane.” Then I realized that that wouldn’t happen. The experimental Pokémon were only using their physical attacks—except the Pikachu, that is. It continued to let its electricity fly wildly throughout the battle. Although it couldn’t manage its power and seemed to just discharge energy at random, it had incredible control over where it sent its attacks; not one of its lightning bolts had hit the plane itself.

But it was suffering. It had let out all of its energy and couldn’t generate any more power. It made one last attempt to jump over the Pokémon and blast them all, but failed. It fell to the ground and collapsed off to the side of the plane.

It was separate from the rest of the Pokémon fighting, so I ran over and picked it up. It glared up at me and attempted to create enough power to shock me, but came up with nothing but sparks.

“What’re you doing?” Rudy said, walking over. “It could blast you like it did to that Scyther.”

“Pikachu’s out of power and, well, I think it sucks that it’s just been tossed off as a failure like that. Besides, Tyson’s got all his Pokémon out to get it.”

At once, Pikachu stood up in my arms and yelled, “*First of all, I’m a guy, not an ‘it.’ And my name’s not Pikachu, it’s Chibi.*”

Chibi? The name sounded kind of…small and cute: not really fitting for the personality. Ignoring the thought, I said, “Fine, you could’ve told me sooner.”

Chibi was about to say something, but then he stopped. “*Oh, you can—*”

“Yes, I can understand you,” I said irritably.

He stared at me for several seconds before leaping out of my arms and running away.

“Wait, come back!” I yelled, but he continued to race forward toward the front of the plane.

I hoped he knew what he was doing…cause I sure didn’t know what I was doing. Spencer and Chibi were the only ones involved in the fight against Tyson’s experiments. I felt really awkward just standing there and watching it with Rudy.

It was then that the plane lurched suddenly. We all were knocked off our feet when it jerked to the right and started to move in a completely different direction. The battle ceased.

Tyson yelled a sentence that seemed to be made almost entirely of cuss words before storming off to the front of the plane toward the cockpit. He threw open the door and was about to rant some more but stopped.

“Wha...what the—?!” he said.

I couldn’t help it. I ran over to look inside. When I did, I had to desperately try to keep from bursting out laughing.

The pilot was knocked out on the floor, and Chibi was in his seat, tilting the control wheel in random directions and rapidly pushing as many buttons as he possibly could.

“Get outta here!” Tyson yelled.

Chibi glared at him before muttering something that sounded to me like “drop dead” and letting sparks cover his body. He had obviously charged up limited energy in the past minute. I noticed what that meant at about the same time as Tyson did.

“No, wait!” he yelled, lunging forward and slamming a button with his fist.

In charging up power while still using the controls, Chibi automatically discharged his energy into the plane. The control panel short-circuited and shot sparks everywhere.

“You stupid rat!” Tyson ranted. “You almost blew the controls with the plane on manual! We’d all be dead now if I hadn’t switched to autopilot!” Chibi showed no reaction and his face seemed blank of emotion.

“Are we gonna crash?” Spencer asked a bit franticly.

“No, stupid, the engines are still fine,” he said.

The second Tyson said that, I swear I knew exactly what would happen next. Chibi was raised in captivity. He knew English.

I glanced at the pilot seat. Chibi was gone.

“No, Chibi!” I yelled running out of the cockpit and toward the back of the jet, where the engines were. Chibi looked back at me with an apologetic look and drew more energy from within him than should have been possible. He then fired all of his limited remaining power in the form of a neon lightning bolt and collapsed.

Everything happened so fast. Chibi’s electricity blew a hole through the back of the plane. A massive explosion blew me back toward the cockpit. In an instant, Spencer pulled out a Poké ball to release his Dewgong, the white seal I had seen before. Its horn shone with a bright blue light as a wave of water streamed forward from its mouth. The second the flame burning from the explosion had been doused, it fired an immense glowing beam from its horn that completely sealed the gaping hole with huge, glittering ice crystals.

“Wow, that was close,” I said.

“Yeah,” Spencer said, turning to his Dewgong. “Nice job,” he said, recalling it.

The opening may have been closed, but that didn’t change the fact that the plane no longer had an engine. I sprinted over to the window in panic. We were quickly losing altitude.

“Oh, don’t waste your time worrying,” Tyson said, rolling his eyes and pushing a red button on the wall.

Large rockets on the wings turned on, bursting out jets of stored energy and causing the plane to even out, but we were still descending slowly.

“The power for the extra jet packs is separate from the rest of the plane. It wasn’t affected by the electricity,” Tyson explained.

“Is there any way we could land normally?” I asked.

“The Pikachu screwed the controls. The chances of us just happening to land at the base we were supposed to would be a million to one, not to mention that we’re way off course now.”

“So…we’re gonna crash?” I asked.

“What is it with you guys and us crashing? I’ve got it under control,” he said. “With the controls messed up, we’d normally just go in a straight line, slowly descending until we ran out of fuel and crashed. But if I lower the power, we’ll go lower. If I can time it right, I can make so that we’re pretty damn close to the ground when the fuel runs out. It’ll be rough, but I think it’ll work.”

I didn’t ask how long it would take. Tyson seemed really ticked at the whole situation. Probably the only reason he didn’t just kill us outright was because he wasn’t supposed to be the one to deal with us. For what seemed like hours but was probably only slightly less than one hour, Spencer and Rudy talked a bit, and I stared out the window in silence while Tyson handled the rockets on the wings.

I looked over and noticed that Chibi was still unconscious at the back of the plane. I walked over, picked him up, and sat on a crate, holding him. Firestorm walked over and sat next to me. I had almost forgotten about him.

In an instant, the plane jerked up and shook violently. We were thrown to the floor and were once again caught under the falling crates and boxes, which, fortunately for us, were completely emptied by now, but I was covered in all sorts of loose items. Tyson pounded the button that he had pushed before and the jetpacks shut off. He struggled to make his way to the cockpit. Several seconds afterward, the plane slowed to a jerky stop. After sifting though the supplies, I looked out the window and saw that we were surrounded by the forest and in a clearing of grass at the base of an immense towering mountain.

Rudy crawled out from under a mound of boxes. “Man, why didn’t ya warn us?!” he asked, irritated.

“What, you think I care?” Tyson asked.

“Well, could you at least tell us where we are?” Spencer asked.

“Most likely near Mt. Moon,” he answered.

“And where were we ‘supposed to’ land?”

“What’s it to you, you’ll be there soon anyway,” Tyson said, as though this was obvious.

“What?” I asked, turning from the window.

“Jeez, you all are more stupid than I thought. You honestly didn’t anticipate reinforcements?” he asked, grinning at the anger and confusion in our faces.

“But, when Chibi sabotaged the controls, that should’ve killed the radios,” I said.

“Who needs radios? All Rockets have a private communicator issued to them,” he said. “And why do you keep calling it Chibi? What, you wanna make it a pet or somethin’?”

I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. Rudy whispered in my ear, “There’s three of us, think we all can take him down?”

I groaned. “Rudy, no offence, but you’re barely even five feet tall and you weigh, like eighty-five pounds. And Pokémon-wise, it’d be Spencer doing all the work. We don’t even at least have the advantage of having Chibi in the fight against Tyson’s experiments.”

Spencer walked over and sat down next to us like Rudy had. “I think we should run for it,” he said. “Your Charmander could melt the ice at the back of the plane.”

“Hey, what are you all whispering about!” Tyson yelled all of sudden.

Spencer leaned closer. “Think we should?” I turned to Rudy. We both nodded at the same time.

Rudy and I took off running in an instant. Spencer pulled out his Poké ball and released his Typhlosion. The large flame beast roared and stood between Tyson and us.

“I knew it!” he yelled, pulling out his black Poké balls again to release the experimental Pokémon. “You aren’t getting through this so easily.”

I turned back to what I was supposed to be doing and ignored Spencer’s diversion. “Alright, Firestorm,” I said. “Couldja help us break through this ice?” I asked, gesturing toward the huge crystals. He nodded and inhaled deeply, exhaling out a long, narrow stream of orange flame that burst through the ice. The flame was small, though, so he had to do it several times to make a hole big enough for us to get through.

“Alright, that’s good, c’mon, Spencer!” I yelled.

We all ran toward the opening while Spencer’s Typhlosion stayed back to fend off the experiments. I jumped out through the hole and landed on the twisted remains of the jet’s engine. From there, I jumped to the ground and although I landed on my feet, it still hurt from being fairly high. Rudy and Spencer jumped out after me, followed finally by the Typhlosion. Several seconds later, the ice shattered into millions of tiny shards as the experimental Rhyhorn burst through to land on the ground behind us, its thick, rock-hard hide absorbing the impact. As it pawed the ground and lifted its horn at us, it looked even more like a rhino than before.

“We’ll help your Typhlosion so your other Pokémon can save their energy for the ‘reinforcements,’” I said before nodding to Rudy. We had just pulled out our Poké balls to release Swift, Ebony, and Squirtle, but I then noticed that the battle seemed to be going nowhere. Tyson hadn’t signaled his Pokémon to attack and was looking out in the distance. “Right on time,” he mumbled.

“What…?” I said, turning to see several vehicles far off in the distance. “Wha—how’d they get here so fast?! We only crash landed like, five minutes ago!”

“I actually figured out that we’d crash near here when I was handling the wing rockets. I told the others in advance when I called them,” Tyson explained, grinning.

“Ugh, this day just gets more insane by the minute!” Rudy exclaimed before we took off running. We soon realized, of course, that that wouldn’t do any good. The Rockets would catch us anyway.

“Well, you think this would be a good time to go ahead and release all my Pokémon?” Spencer asked with a touch of sarcasm as he pulled out his Poké balls.

I laughed slightly and simply responded, “Yeah, I’d think so,” as he released the remainder of his Pokémon in a flash of white light. By now, we could see the jeeps that were rapidly getting closer. Spencer’s Pokémon shifted nervously.

And then I felt the movement in my arms.

I looked down and saw Chibi struggling to stand and jump away, but this time he was truly out of energy.

“No, you gotta save your strength,” I said to him. He looked up at me and attempted to create electricity, but failed. He lay back in my arms, swearing under his breath.

The jeeps pulled up and skidded to a stop, throwing dust into the air. Tyson jumped down from the plane and walked over with his Pokémon. He glanced at the Rockets in the jeeps before finally finding one that he wanted to talk to. I couldn’t really see the Rocket from the distance and angle I was at, but I could hear snatches of conversation.

“You know, Tyson, when you said the transport jet was gonna crash I never guessed it’d be ‘cause of a couple kids that you were supposed to be bringing to me.” The voice was that of a girl, and evidently, she was the Rocket Executive I was supposed to be taken to.

“They’re not just kids. One of em’s a teenager and his Pokémon are a match even for my experimental Poké —” Tyson said.

“Tyson, your experiments are just plain sad. I never got why you’d waste your time training twisted freak Pokémon,” she said.

“It was what I was assigned to do!” Tyson yelled. “Of course you wouldn’t know what that’s like cause the second you joined you were—”

“I was NOT always an executive, and I’m sick of people always thinking that for me!” she yelled. I had absolutely no idea what they were talking about and I was especially confused at the fact that the Executive’s voice and overall way of talking made her sound like a teenager. She probably was, but I was surprised that someone so young could be allowed to be an Executive on Team Rocket.

“Oh, it doesn’t matter, I’ll deal with them,” she said, climbing out of the jeep. And then she stopped and stared long and hard at us. I couldn’t see why, but regardless of that, the motion of pulling out a Poké ball was as recognizable as ever.

From the Poké ball burst out a flash of bright light that moved toward us with incredible speed even as it took its true form. It was an Arcanine, almost identical to Spencer’s, with its thick orange and black coat and fluffy cream-colored mane. The firedog moved toward us swiftly and it was then that I could see the differences between the Rocket’s and Spencer’s Arcanine.

The mighty Pokémon was much larger for one, but its eyes had a certain ferocity only seen in one who has defeated nearly all they have challenged. It gave off an air of pure arrogance, the attitude of a seasoned fighter. It was right then that I realized that all of our Pokémon could never defeat all of the Rocket’s Pokémon.

“Arcanine, cut off their escape and defeat that Typhlosion!” the Rocket yelled, her hand on another Poké ball in case it was needed.

I was lost on what to do. Spencer looked as though he had just realized how hopeless the whole situation was. Rudy however, took off running behind us and yelled, “We can hide and attack from behind there so that her Pokémon wouldn’t be able to attack us!”

I looked back and saw a ridge of rock jutting out from the mountain. What Rudy said made sense.

“We’ve got no other choice,” Spencer said, recalling his Dewgong because it couldn’t run.

We sprinted after Rudy toward the rock wall, the Arcanine not far behind. Spencer’s Typhlosion had stayed behind to protect us, but things weren’t looking good. Despite the speed characteristic to Typhlosion, the Arcanine had managed to get in three slashes with its claws, only mildly burned in one place, while Typhlosion’s fur was already scorched.

We reached the ridge and ducked back behind it. Spencer recalled his Typhlosion right before releasing, once again, the icy white seal known as Dewgong. The Arcanine let its whole body glow with flame before unleashing an immense wave of fire.

“DUUUUUgong gong gong!!!” Dewgong cried, shooting out a surge of water to meet the flame. Despite the Arcanine’s incredible power, the water extinguished the bulk of the attack, leaving only small spurts of flame that hit the rock and died.

Of course, if the Arcanine really wanted to attack Dewgong, it could go around the rocks, but we could ambush it if it did. The Arcanine seemed to realize that and didn’t come after us. Several seconds later, we heard the charging of more Pokémon. And then the obvious flaw in our spur of the moment strategy showed. We hadn’t really thought about what would happen if we had to face multiple opponents.

Spencer clenched his teeth and said to his Pokémon, “Just wait for ‘em, guys.”

The second the Rockets’ Pokémon turned the corner, Spencer yelled for all of his Pokémon to attack. Rudy’s initial idea for hiding behind there worked—at first. Caught off guard, the Rockets’ Pokémon were struck by several of the attacks. The victory was short-lived, however. Tyson’s Rhyhorn and Sneasel and the Arcanine were among our attackers, only now there were three others as well.

The first and fastest was a Ponyta, a fairly small, off white horse, with a mane and tail made entirely of long streams of fire. The second, a Magmar, had no real resemblance to any kind of animal, but it was stood upright and was vaguely reptilian with an orange beak, shiny crimson skin, and yellow flame patterns from its waist down. The last one greatly resembled Chibi in that it was a Raichu, the mature form of Pikachu. Its short fur was smooth and dull orange with a white belly, and its tail was long, black, and skinny except for the part at the end, which was yellow and jagged.

But though it resembled Chibi, when I looked in its eyes I saw nothing but blank confidence. Not like the weird combination of rage and torment that Chibi seemed to give off. Right then, I wondered at exactly how much like Pikachu Chibi was. With normal Pokémon, you could see intelligence, emotion, and thought in their eyes, but with Chibi, it was sort of like there was more to his expression and emotion than there was even to humans’. I had a sudden wonder why Pokémon were treated like animals. Most of them were much more powerful than humans were and smarter too. Humans were so backwards. We controlled our superiors.

“Typhlosion, Fire Wheel, and crap, Dewgong’s down…this isn’t working!” Spencer yelled.

I was shaken from my thoughts to see Spencer’s Pokémon losing badly. He had just recalled the ice seal in a beam of red, but I put down Chibi and turned to Firestorm, who had been standing next to me for the past few minutes. I pulled out of my pocket one of the few things I had salvaged from the items in the plane. I knelt and held out the item to him. It was small and red, shaped mainly like a flat case that was open at the front to reveal a CD-sized disc.

“It’s a Technical Machine,” I said, seeing the puzzled look on his face. “I don’t think it’s fair that Spencer’s Pokémon have been doing all the work. We should help too—” I stopped. We? What was I going to do? Nothing—that was just it. I shook the thought out of my head and continued. “This thing can teach you to use all of your power to create an attack called ‘Fire Blast.’ Would you be willing to learn it to help us fight them?” I asked.

Firestorm nodded almost immediately. I wondered if he realized what kind of danger it would involve. I sighed, held the device several inches from his forehead, and pushed the biggest button. The disc glowed for a few seconds and began spinning, giving off a sort of wave from what I had once read on TMs. Firestorm froze and looked as though he had been seized by some invisible force. Slowly, the disc slowed and I pulled it away, but he still had a sort of blank stare on his face.

All this time, the battle had been going very wrong. Spencer had recalled his Arcanine, and things weren’t looking good for the others. I started to pull out Swift’s Poké ball, thinking he could stir up a sandstorm with his wings, but that would make all the Pokémon unable to see, not just the Rockets’.

And then, there was a brilliant flash of flames from behind me. A huge column of fire formed itself into a star shape and soared over us, filling the air around us with flaring embers. As I turned to see Firestorm spouting the intense flames, I wondered if he would always be able to attack like that.

It ended, and he sprang up and ran toward the fray, excited at his new power. Firestorm stopped and glowed, gathering energy again before blowing out a spurt of flame toward the battle. The second attack wasn’t nearly as impressive as the first, though.

“Wha—what happened?” I asked.

Spencer turned from the battle. “What Charmander did before was just the initial reaction to the TM. That wasn’t its real attack power. Teaching a weak Pokémon a powerful move doesn’t really work. Trust me, I’ve tried it. But when it gets stronger, its attack power’ll be something more like this,” he said, turning back to the battle. “Typhlosion, use Fire Blast!!!”

The flaming Pokémon stopped what it had been doing and began to glow with an orange light. Suddenly, from the flare around its neck came an immense wave of flame that swept over the battlefield before becoming a star shape and aiming toward its target—the Raichu.

It tried to dodge the attack, but it was caught by one of the star’s points and thrown into the swirling inferno. But then the assault ended, and it was thrown to the ground, burned, as the flames dissipated into the air. I had been thinking of how incredible the attack had been when I suddenly remembered the Entei…. Its power…it had been so much more than even the awesome attack I had just seen. Running with flames erupting from its very skin. Miles of forest burnt in an instant. Just how powerful could Pokémon get?

With the Fire Blast attack, the battle was temporarily turned in our favor. But the odds were soon in the Rockets’ favor again. Now just Typhlosion, Pidgeot, and Firestorm were still able to fight on our side. We needed help. And serious help, for that matter. I considered having Firestorm use Fire Blast into the air again to possibly signal to another trainer. Flying on Pokémon was a very popular way of travel, but then I remembered that Firestorm wouldn’t be able to do the attack with as much power as he had the first time. And if Typhlosion stopped battling to try signaling for help, then we’d lose the most powerful fighter on our side.

“I can’t think of anything more we can do!” Spencer said.

“But, we can’t lose!” I said. “If we do….” I left the sentence unfinished. At least Tyson wasn’t in control of us anymore. I figured that I’d rather be captured by the other Executive. But even still, what would she do to us?

In an instant, a huge high-pitched sound filled the air as an incredible orange and yellow energy beam surged through the air. The beam struck the Rockets’ Pokémon perfectly, striking them with such force as to be only one attack—Hyper Beam. I looked up in the sky where it had come from and saw a tiny dot in the sky getting closer.

“AeeeeeerrRRRRRAAAAAAW!!!!” the dot called out, and from the voice, I determined it was an Aerodactyl. As it rapidly flew closer, I could see that there was a person riding on its back.

“Hey, Jade!” the trainer yelled.

I jerked in surprise. I couldn’t see who it was clearly yet, but I could never, ever forget that voice.

“What the—Ajia?!” I yelled.