"Your majesty, the Lady Mary has refused your offer of surrender.
Her exact words are I quote.
"You want my kingdom, come and get it yourself." "Well if she wants to bring the war to her I will" Turning around he faced a small sandbox in which he started to shape until it matched the terrain of the fire kingdom, looking up he saw that the messenger was still there.
"Ready the troops and begin the march towards the fire kingdom. Dismissed"
"Sir" was the reply as the messenger backed out of the command tent. A few days later at the Lady's Mary castle. Mary was just returning from a practice session, when a young guard burst into the throne room.
"My Lady" he panted. The Earth kingdom is on the move towards here."
Upon hearing this news Mary paled, but recovered before the guard noticed.
"Were our spies able to get a count of the troops?" she asked in a quivering voice.
"Yes milady, our spies report over one hundred catapults, fifty siege towers, and about two dozen battering rams. I'm sorry milady but they couldn't get an accurate count of the infantry. Their best guess would be two hundred thousand soldiers, plus scout parties, and commanders."
Finishing his reports he looked up and saw how pale she. "Milady just so you know. The soldiers in your army would gladly give their lives for you and the kingdom. So please you don't have to worry too much. You have ruled fairly and kindly, and for that it's our turn to repay you kindness." Bowing to her, he left for the barracks to get some rest. Turning towards her adviser
"Began to ready the troops at once. Send our attack pokemon and their trainers to our borders."
"Yes milady..." He trailed off not sure if it was his place to ask. Mary took notice of this "What about that group of mercenaries that came?" "Well they are under contract with me, so send them out as well. However they are to be in charge overall in the field." She said.
"Our field commander is not going to like that one bit."
"If he has a problem with it then he can come and see me about it." she snapped. With all that said she teleported herself to her room and feel on to her bed, where her vulpix was sleeping. Curling up next to her vulpix, she cried until sleep took her into his dark embrace.
When told the news, the group decided to do the unexpected and chose to keep the troops inside the castle. Joe was just about to go tell Lady Mary the plan when Pat stopped him.
"She's asleep Joe, let her be for now. There will be time to tell in the morning" Was the only reason he gave. Morning comes, this time only four people are up to greet it. After eating their morning meal they discussed their plan with Mary. She was upset at first about the change of plans, but after seeing that they knew what they were doing she let them carry on with their plan.
"However" she stated "Because of this siege on my castle I'm only going to pay you fifty gold a week." Pat spoke up for group "That will be fine your lady. We'll make up for it by other means." Standing up from the table,
"If you'll excuse us, we got to ready are supplies." He finished.
"Of course, just make sure that you all come back in one piece." Was her reply, has she stood up from the table as well. Going to their rooms each of them starts to ready their own equipment, Andrew checked his bow for any signs of strain, and made he had extra bowstrings and quivers ready.
Joe was busy repairing and sharpening his claws, and also made sure that he some antidote ready, just incase he slipped while he was sharpening the poisoned claw. Pat seemed to be the busiest one of the group. Restocking their healing potions for both pokemon and for his group. Once they were done with packing, both Pat and Andrew met down in the courtyard waiting for Joe. While they were waiting for Joe, they played a card game.
(for those of you that have played FF VIII you should recognize the game) It was a simple game, consisting of a playing field made up of nine squares, and each player had a hand of five cards. The cards had a group of numbers in the upper left corner. These numbers ranged from 1 - the letter A. on some of them there was a elemental symbol in the right corner. All of the cards had pictures of pokemon on them. (The pokemon on the cards are from the red and blue games...cards with the johto pokemon are out there in the world.) They had just finished their game when Joe finally made down to the courtyard. Seeing that they were putting away their game, he realized that he took to long.
"So we ready to go yet?" He asked. "We've been waiting for you for the past hour, I think you can wait five minutes for us to put our game up." answered Andrew. Once they were done putting away their card game, they started toward the gate of the castle. They had just started under the portcullis when Joe turned and faced the shadows "You can stop hiding now."
Stepping out of the shadows they were shocked to see it was Mary herself who had been waiting. "I thought I would save you some time and help you get a little closer to the border village." "Thank you Lady Mary. This will give us more time to prepare defenses at the village." Teleporting all three of them into an
open plain along with a map. Mary turned and went to check on her pokemon. After appearing in the middle of an open plain, they looked around until they heard Joe cry out in pain. Turning they laughed when they saw what hit him.
"Well she does have a sense of humor." Pat said as he picked up the scroll that had hit Joe on the head. "Come on we should be able to cover a lot ground if we hurry." After a long days' walk the trio stopped for the night beside a river. Both Pat and Andrew let out their gyarados, Pat also throws out a dragonair. The two trainers let their pokemon go exercise, the rest of the pokemon were also let out. The trainers let their pokemon hunt for their own dinner if they wanted to. For those that chose not to hunt there was food for them. None of them were worried that their pokemon would run away. All of their pokemon had been raised from their birth and all had bonded with their trainer. Joseph's and Andrew's houndour were from the same litter, as were all of the eevee evolutions. The gyarados' came from the same egg group, and were a matched pair as well. All through out the night smiles crept on to the faces of the trainers, as some unlucky pokemon became dinner for those that chose to hunt their dinner. The trainers themselves had a dinner of stantler that Andrew had killed. The trainers didn't go to sleep until all of the hunting pokemon had returned. Once they had settled in for the night they chose did first watch. The night passed without anything happening, much to Joe's disappointment. At first light the trio broke camp, and scuffed the campsite around to make it look abandon for a few days. Elsewhere just over a days ride was the beginning of the earth kingdom's army. At the front of it was a scouting party. All members of the scout had the quickest pokemon, rapidash's, dugtrio's, electrode's and a few arcanines. The few arcanines were for backup in case the other pokemon couldn't continue the fight. In between the trio and the scout party laid a small village. The town's leader Michael in an effort to stop the oncoming army decided to fight using his pokemon and the pokemon the town had. The village was allied with Lady Mary, so they had to try and fight the army and send a warning to the castle. They sent a lone rider out on a solo rapidash. After seeing that their warning was being carried to the castle, the town's people begin to prepare for the battle that was soon to come. The women and children were sent to try and make it to the castle, were they hoped that they would be safe. The men stayed in town knowing that would most likely die fighting.



The men brought out their pokemon, the pokemon that were brought out were a wide variety. These pokemon were Tauros, Milktanks and Sycther's. Other grass pokemon ranging from Venusuar's to Butterfree's to Meganium's. The town leader even had a Snorlax. With their pokemon all set the townsfolk set about gathering weapons. The most common weapon was the pitchfork. There were axes, scythes, a few meat cleavers, even a few bows in the weapon mix. The total amount of men that were going to fight was eighty-three. They were going up against a scouting party with about two hundred professional soldiers.
"Why are we even bothering to attack this stupid little village?" asked a private in the earth army. "Who knows, more to the point who the hell is going to miss it anyway." joked his friend. "Yeah your right, no one is even going to remember this village" "Hey you two idiots, shut the hell up. We're in enemy territory, not a tea party." shouted the scout leader. "What have we got to fear from a bunch of farmers?" the private muttered to himself. As if to answer him three arrows shot out of the trees. Muttering in surprise he falls dead. The other two arrows make themselves a new home in the chest of the scout leader, and the private's friend killing them both. After the arrows flew pokeballs started flying through the air as well. "Go Sycther" "Miltank"
"Venusuar come out" more pokeballs came flying out of the trees most of them hitting the soldiers as well. As the pokemon came out, attacks soon followed. Vine whips, Razor leaf, Solar-beams and all of the powder attacks were shot at the soldiers. The quicker soldiers were able to get out of the way and bring their own pokemon out to join in the fight. Those that didn't get out of the way of the attacks fast enough took those the attacks themselves. Those who took the attacks were affected right away. Those hit by the powders felt the effects of at once, and were left open to other attacks. As the soldiers started to fight back, they slowly gained the upper hand. To flush out the farmers that were hiding in the forest they pulled out their arcanines. Having them use their flame-throwers attacks they set fire to forest. Killing most of the farmers that were in hiding. The last four farmers, the town leader Michael, were still alive. Fighting a group of several soldiers with whatever they could get their hands on. Lying around them were the corpses' of several other soldiers. Michael was the only one who still had a pokemon left, his Snorlax.
Using his Snorlax at the front of his group Michael was able to fight off the group of soldiers. With the Snorlax in the way, there was no room for swords. The soldiers forced to use daggers as such quickly killed the four remaining.
During the battle a cold wind started blowing, this wind got worse over time biting everyone that was still fighting. The soldiers ignored the wind, and kept attacking the few farmers that were still alive. Seeing that the farmers would fight to the death of themselves, two of the soldiers broke off and rushed the small group of farmers. Throwing any and everything that they could get their hands on in the attempt to slow down the soldiers, the farmers stood their ground. Michael leading the farmers set them selves to receive the charging soldiers, holding their pitchforks at angle so that someone would impale them selves. The soldiers rushed straight into the pitchforks and were still moving for a few seconds after they had impaled themselves. Michael noticed that the lead soldier had been able to dodge around the barrier of pitchforks, and rushed him. The soldier seeing that Michael was armed only with a dirk, set himself in a defensive stance ready to parry any attack. His sword was ready to cut Michael from shoulder to hip. Michael was able to get in a quick swipe with his dirk. The blow however was deflected by the soldier's armor. The force of the blow knocked the dirk out of his hand, at the same time the soldiers started to bring his sword into play. Bringing his sword down, as to cleave Michael in half he found that he was swinging at empty air.



Taking advantage of the soldier being off balance from his attack Michael tackled his opponent onto the ground, knocking the sword out of reach. Scrambling to their to feet, they started fighting as if they were inside a tavern room brawl. Knocking the soldier back down again, Michael reached into his boot and pulled out his second dirk he had hidden there. The next time the soldier stood up, he was kicked in the kneecap by Michael. Falling back down, this time hitting his head on a knocked out Electrode, stunning himself. Seeing that his opponent was stunned, Michael preformed a coup de grace on him killing him. Seeing that the battle was getting out of hand a scout force leader threw a pokeball into the middle of the fray. The pokeball opened spitting out an electrode. "electrode explosion attack, full power." He shouted over the fray. "electrode, elect" The electrode using it's most powerful attack blew itself up, the resulting explosion killed everything that was within a thirty foo t radius around it. The blast killed Michael, his Snorlax, and all of the remaining farmers, and ten more of the soldiers that had not gotten clear of the blast zone. "Electrode return. Now wasn't that easy." The force leader joked as he walked away. "Tend to our wounded and search the rest of the village for supplies" he commented as he walked past. "Yes sir" came from those who had escaped the blast. The soldiers went about recalling their pokemon and tending to their wound comrades. A few hours later there was a meeting of all the scout leaders. The scout commander, Lawrence Zapdos, was present so that he would know what to report back to Lord Brett. "Alright. First things first. How goes the clean up?" "All signs of the farmers have disappeared. We still don't know what caused that cold wind during towards the end of the battle. The forest fire that was set by the attacks of the arcanines, and electrode has spread a another mile and a half." Came the report. "Very good. How many men did we lose?" The scout leaders all looked around at each other, none of them wanting to be the one who said their loses. "Well?" A note of iteration reaching Lawrences voice. "Umm....We..ahh we took some heavy loses sir, Our last count shows us at being at half strength. We have lost over forty percent of our pokemon forces as well. All of the electrodes have to be revived as well sir." A young scout leader spoke up breaking the uneasy silence that had settled inside the meeting. Just before the commander could speak. The camp was rocked by an earthquake. Cracks appeared in the ground splitting in all directions. Stem shot up from the cracks. Some of the steam shot up underneath some of the soldiers scalding those who got caught in it. Before the ground had sealed back up ten more soldiers were killed. Some of them crushed by the earth resealing itself, or burned by the steam, that had boiled them alive. Those that had been boiled alive their faces had the look of those in extreme pai n, but it was not the look of pain one would have if boiling water had been dumped on them. No their faces were frozen with the look of pain one would have if kicked where no man should be. Just as soon as it had all started the, it stopped. The quake itself had lasted twenty seconds. Rushing out to check on the damage, Lawrence's saw a man standing on
top of the hill that overlooked the camp. Flanking the man were three arcanines. At the bottom of the hill were the guards that had been on watch, laid sprawled out in a spread eagle form. The man stood at 6'2 and looked to be close to two hundred and fifty pounds, all of which must be pure muscle. Lawrence thought to himself. "Your men won't last long out here in the wild." The man said. The young scout leader spoke up right then "Ahh sir there was one more thing I was going to report on. There is a rumor that this forest has a protector, a druid to be exact." glaring at the young man, Lawrence snapped at him. "What do I care about a simple druid, a druid is still a human. KILL HIM where he stands." With a wave of his hand, a group of soldiers charged up the hill. When they got with in twenty feet of the druid they open fired with a volley of flaming arrows. These were destroyed by the arcanines flame-throwers. The druid slammed his maul into the ground causing the ground shake. The so ldiers that were charging up the hill, were now rolling the hill and bowled right into the camp's supply tent. Slamming his maul once again this time, he brought fourth a rolling mass of earth and magma.
This he sent rolling down into the camp along with his arcanines. The molten boulder crashed into the small group of soldiers that were now standing up from their roll down the hill, killing all of them. The arcanines bounded the hill and began to wreak havoc in the camp as well. The last thing Lawrence saw was the jaws of an arcanine coming down on him.

                       (end chapter 3)