Cinder looked around anxiously, nervously rubbing his paws together as he did so. He had no idea what he was supposed to do. There were plenty of Pokémon around. Some of them were attacking inanimate objects, and some of them were attacking other Pokémon. And all of them looked like they knew what they were doing, unlike him.
He had absolutely no idea what to do with himself.
Should he approach another Pokémon? Should he just concentrate some attacks on practice dummies? Run around with some weights? He wasn't sure. He didn't want to get in anyone's way, and he was also a bit worried about having to interact with other Pokémon. His timid nature always got the best of him in these situations.
He surveyed the Pokémon in the dojo once more. There were all types of Pokémon, and it was still a bit overwhelming. He noticed a Snorlax lifting some weights. He found that curious. Snorlax were hard to miss in general, considering they were rather
large. He had thought that they were also incredibly lethargic, like Slaking. So seeing one lifting weights confused him, to say the least.
Cinder sighed in frustration. He wasn't going to get
anywhere at this rate. He needed to train. He needed to become stronger. He needed to get past his stupid inner inhibitions and learn to handle himself in the world. He needed to better himself, to become strong. He needed to become an individual.
But how in the world was he going to do that?
*****
Still fuming from the events of the day, Adalia stormed through the doors, muttering inaudibly to herself. Her gaze flashed around the room, looking for a Pokémon that wasn't already preoccupied. The hound's gaze caught a few things: Pokémon walking off losses; a Snorlax that, oddly enough, wasn't stuffing its face or sleeping. It puzzled her, but she was too agitated to ponder this.
And there it was: the perfect target; a small Cyndaquil with oddly colored fur. She smirked, nasty plots stirring in her head. Sure, it was a bit unconventional to attack one that hadn't even evolved yet, but it was the only Pokémon that wasn't occupied by something or the other.
Adalia sauntered up to the little Cyndaquil, her pompous attitude radiating off of her like a stench.
"Hey little Cyndaquil, how about we spar a bit?" She tried to smile to look friendly, although it came off more as malicious.
The Cyndaquil turned towards Adalia, slightly startled. It regarded her with a curious, albeit somewhat uneasy, expression.
"Who are you?" the little Pokémon asked.
"Name's Adalia," the larger Pokémon responded.
"And yours is?"
"Cinder," the small rodent responded simply.
"Well, Cinder," Adalia started, still trying to keep a pretense of friendliness,
"how 'bout a round or two of combat training? I'm sure we could both use it." Adalia grinned, although in doing so she revealed her canine teeth, turning the expression sinister.
"Well, um . . . ," Cinder trailed off, not sure of what to do in this situation. He regarded the Houndoom with what he considered to be a proper amount of caution and a tiny hint of fear. Her creepy expressions, combined with the scar cutting across her left eye, made her out to be . . . something other than
friendly. Then again, he had little experience in socializing with other Pokémon, and he couldn't recall ever speaking with a Houndoom, so it could have just been his imagination. Any Houndoom that he ever saw from afar did almost always look rather intimidating, after all.
"S-Sure, I guess," replied the flame mouse, stuttering slightly.
Adalia's grin widened.
"Good," she said, sounding just a little too pleased with herself.
Cinder flitted around aimlessly for a second, eyeing out a good area for a battle. Once he spotted a corner with few Pokémon in the area, he motioned for Adalia to follow. The Houndoom was a bit skeptical about following a rodent, but so long as she got to stomp on it later, she could compromise with herself.
"Okay, r-ready?" Cinder asked once they had reached the corner.
"Of course," Adalia stated, becoming impatient.
"Well, then . . . fight?" Cinder declared sheepishly. Adalia grinned, eyeing over the Cyndaquil once more. After a moment of pause, during which Adalia had taken the opportunity to boost her powers with Nasty Plot, a wave of dark energy formed around Adalia. She concentrated the Dark Pulse and launched it at the Cyndaquil.
Caught off-guard, Cinder barely managed to dodge the attack, allowing the malign energy to graze his back right leg. He winced slightly, but it only stung a bit.
Cinder landed on the ground and curled into a ball, protecting himself with Defense Curl. As he did so, Adalia ran at him, mouth open wide as her teeth began to spark from Thunder Fang. Before she could reach the mouse, however, he had began to spin rapidly, transforming his Defense Curl into Rollout.
Adalia reared back, trying to avoid the attack, but she had gotten too close. The small rodent slammed her directly in the face, causing her to fly backwards a bit.
Adalia got back up, shook her head, and then snarled at Cinder. Now she was annoyed. She gathered a large amount of dark energy around her and loosed another Dark Pulse, at the same time launched a Fire Blast from her mouth. The combination was both beautiful and frightening. Cinder tried to avoid the attack, but its range was too large and he was caught in the blast.
Dust and debris was sent up, but Adalia didn't even wait for it to clear. She jumped right into the cloud of dirt and grabbed Cinder with a Thunder Fang, sinking her teeth into his side and shaking him viciously. The dog had captured the mouse, and was now shaking its prey to the last.
Cinder was gasping for air, trying to find something,
anything to hold onto. His thoughts were scrambled and the pain was intense. He didn't think. He
couldn't think. Instinct just took over, and his flames flared up and scorched the inside of Adalia's mouth. They normally burned bright blue and white, but his body had turned up the heat tenfold, causing every bit of flame to become white-hot, allowing it to burn his assailant, even with Adalia being part Fire-type.
Adalia yelped, causing her to drop Cinder. Cinder scrambled away, his flames dying down to their natural blue and white state. He turned around and caught his breath, taking a moment to piece together his scrambled mind. Once he had done so, he looked up and caught Adalia's eye.
Adalia was furious. She wasn't going to allow herself to be bested by a tiny, insignificant
rodent. She opened her mouth and began to gather flames, preparing for an all-out Fire Blast.
On instinct, Cinder coughed and released a Smokescreen, obscuring the vision of every Pokémon in the area. No doubt there had been many stunned onlookers at this point, and a few had probably had to dodge some of the attacks and debris from the battle. Cinder felt a little bad about that, but it certainly wasn't his fault.
No. It was this psychotic Houndoom's fault. She was absolutely wild! Cinder had to do something, or else something bad might happen. He took a deep breath, gathered some fire in his mouth, and then began to twirl viciously towards Adalia whilst using Flame Wheel.
Seeing the disturbance in the smog from the light emanating off of Cinder, Adalia launched her Fire Blast. It engulfed Cinder, and it seemed like the flames on his back flared up almost large enough to match the attack, creating a twister of red, orange, blue and white flames. It was dazzling, but it was also huge and it kind of started to set a few things in the area on fire.
Oops, Adalia thought, looking at her surroundings. They had become just a little destroyed during her fight. Apparently their attacks were more potent than Adalia had thought.
She was going to step forward and stomp on the weakened rodent that lay on the ground in front of her, and then
maybe do something about all of the destruction, but she was stopped by a powerful blast of water that appeared between herself and the Cyndaquil.
"I think that's enough," came the voice of a Blastoise off to the side, his voice filled with authority. Or, as Adalia took it, arrogance. She didn't like it when other Pokemon gave her
commands.
"Do I need to stomp on you too, fatty? I'm sure if I smashed that shell you'd make a great trampoline." Adalia's eyes narrowed, and she showed her fangs in a snarl.
The Blastoise's expression didn't change. It just moved its cannons into position, aiming them at Adalia. He was then joined by a Starmie and Crawdaunt, both readying their own Water-type attacks.
Adalia glanced between the three Pokemon. She growled, but she realized that she wouldn't be able to take on three evolved Water-types on her own. Not with her power being this drained, at least.
She snorted one last time, releasing a small puff of smoke, and then fled from the dojo. She would have to finish this later.
After Adalia had gone, a Charmander ran over to Cinder.
"You okay, guy?" the small fire-lizard asked.
Cinder coughed a bit, releasing more smoke from his nostrils. His flames had died down, and he was both physically and mentally drained, but he seemed to be okay. At least, he wasn't hurt too severely.
"Yeah, I'm fine," Cinder muttered.
He looked around, searching out the area. Adalia had gone, but he had a feeling he'd be seeing more of her. As he scanned the dojo, however, he did notice the Yamask from earlier, grinning at him devilishly. It faded into the walls once Cinder's eyes caught it, leaving a faint red glow where its own eyes had been.
Cinder shuddered. This had been an interesting first day, so far.