Chapter 3! *Kaori eats a lollipop while phantomness waves*
I don’t expect complaints. Misty is in character. She doesn’t show any signs of affection to Ash in the first few episodes of Kanto, anyways.
Chapter 3: Barring Strength
“Key that hides the power of the stars, reveal your true form before me. Your master under the seal of contract Ashura commands you, Release.”
Ash’s eyes glowed as he gripped his key tightly.
“Ready?” Charlotte asked, as she pulled out a card.
“Yes.”
“Very well.” Charlotte said. “Twin card, attack!”
Out of her magic card shot two yellow giggling spirits. One grabbed Ash’s staff away from him, while the other knocked him to the ground and attempted to tie him to a tree.
Ash teleported away from the first and used Thunderbolt to fry the other, but when he tried to capture them inside of a Whirlwind attack, they broke loose.
“Eh?” Ash said in confusion. “Did I not weaken them enough? Guillotine!”
Both twins jumped away, and then picked up a tree and smacked Ash with it.
“Ow!” With a thought, Ash summoned Registeel’s armor to cover himself, before flinging himself at the nearest twin and squashing it.
The second twin ran away into the woods.
Ash immediately attempted to use Whirlwind on the twin again, but again, it broke out.
“What am I doing wrong?”
The second twin returned and revived the first and then they both sprang at Ash again.
“Eep!” Ash grabbed his staff from the turf it had been lying on, and smacked them both as he swung it around. They both stayed motionless for a second, and this time, Whirlwind worked.
“Have you figured out the secret now?” Charlotte asked, from her vantage point in the air.
“I think so. I had to take them both out at the same time, correct?’
“It’s demonstrating unity.” She explained. “When there are two, only getting rid of one is not really a good policy.”
“I second that.” Lance said, walking out the door.
“Oh.”
Ash accepted the energy bar she handed him, wolfed it down, and then took a defensive stance again as Charlotte let loose a barrage of fireballs.
“Yeow! Hot!” Deciding that wearing steel armor was now a bad idea, Ash swapped for a shield of water energy and began canceling out her moves with bubblebeams. Then, he shifted into Gyarados form.
Charlotte reeled back from a Hydro Pump attack, and then teleported behind him, before jabbing two pressure points on his back, which dropped him to the ground.
Ash tried to move, but found his torso paralyzed. “Charlotte!”
“What?” She asked. “One day you might run up against someone who knows how to do that. Try to counter it.”
After much struggling, Ash managed to break free, albeit belatedly, and sighed as he collapsed on the ground.
Lance healed him with her Viridian Power, and gave him a slight push. “Take a break… I still have your physics lesson for today.”
Ash teared up, and nodded.
Physics was _evil_.
Especially now that Lance-chan was trying to explain something dealing with the universal gravitation constant, which he really didn’t understand at all. Why did the mass of the earth have anything to do with the escape velocity of a rocket?
And not a member of TR either…
He sighed and focused on his page of problems, before grimly taking out his calculator and erasable ink to begin the horrendous torture.
Poor Ash.
He fought his way out of the homework after an hour of slaving, although Delia did help explain it, which made a little more sense.
The four ‘family’ members sat down around the dinner table together, as Delia served chicken marinated in sauce and steamed cauliflower. Ash masticated his food slowly, thinking to himself.
He didn’t know how much more training he had to go through, but he did admit that it was trimming his body and sharpening his mind.
Neither of those was vile or despicable, he just wished the routine would become easier.
Perhaps in time it would.
Seeing his slightly forlorn expression, Charlotte smiled and whipped a napkin off a basket of frosted chocolate cookies.
At least the food was delicious!
Ash helped himself to six cookies after dinner, having tasted the minestrone soup and deciding it wasn’t as nice as he had hoped.
He preferred split pea.
However, his mom had worked hard, so he obligingly drank a second bowl.
That night, Charlotte only spent a few minutes discussing how to conjugate estar in the past preterite tense.
Luckily, Ash caught on fast enough. It would have been a long, tortuous trek through grammar otherwise.
He slept well, almost ten hours, that night.
And so, the training continued on…
“Firey, Windy, combination attack!”
Ash eeped as Suicune and Kyogre were both vanquished. “No way!”
“Yes way.” Charlotte grinned, as the two spirits set Ash on fire and trapped him in a tornado.
“Eek! Acid Armor!” Ash cried, borrowing Vaporeon’s power.
Lance nodded approvingly as Ash used Flail to break out, before launching a counterattack with six different water pokemon, blocking off any escape routes.
“Now, Golbat, supersonic!” Ash said, using Confusion to temporarily distract Charlotte before he bound her with Caterpie’s string shot.
Two minutes later, Charlotte broke out again.
This time, Ash fell into a crack in the earth and had to tunnel his way out. It was rather tedious work, but finally finished.
His speed was improving though. Good point.
End Chapter!
Started 1/19/04, completed 1/31/04