[Pokémon] The Trial of Juno Saga [PG-13]

"WHA HA HA!" Frank screamed and jumped with cheer and laughter, suddenly pointing at me mockingly. "You FAILED Jake! Look who's the loser now!"

"Please," I shrugged as I brushed it off, thinking his behavior was just stupid beyond all means. "Randy totally rigged the battle for you. I don't train grass-type Pokémon, and certainly not those two. I swear, the way you freaks have to cheat at this thing to have a chance is far more pathetic than this flower bullcrap you set aside for me."

"Oh, just pile on the lame excuses, Jake!" Frank giggled. "You totally lost, and boy is it hilarious!"

What an idiot. I turned away and just decided to let the moron gloat it out to no one interested in listening. I could tell him a million times cheating like this was pointless and proved absolutely nothing, but whatever, it wasn't sinking into that big, fat skull of his.

"Moving on..." Randy spoke casually. "Right now, I want to see our best friend Alex have a shot. Jeff, you're up. Make this something fun we'll be talking about for years!"

"Man, I've been itching for this payback!" Jeff grinned with confidence. "Ampharos and Espeon, this is for you!"

"Try me, you jackass," Alex spat back at him. "I'll make you shut that pissing mouth of yours just like I did last time!"

And then, on that gray field, the two of them stood ready for the battle that was about to unfold. I was hoping Alex was prepared to deal with Randy's nasty and unexpected cheating, but I was honestly thinking this wasn't going to be any more successful than before.

It was on those gray battlegrounds that Alex and Jeff had exchanged stares. Alex had beaten Jeff before, and now the only thing Jeff wanted was to win and seek revenge. Alex could be a menace when he got pissed off, and Jeff would be stupid for pushing him that far. But, as easy as it was to see, he was already too late and was going to deserve every bit of rage Alex was going to throw at him.

"Ha, you think you're ready, don't you!?" Jeff laughed at Alex. "You've never seen Pokémon battling like this before!"

"That doesn't matter to me, Jeff," Alex growled at him. "This is between you and me, and you and me only." Alex then gave Randy a dark stare from the corner of his eye, looking vicious even for a guy that got transformed into a rainbow-winged human butterfly, "Hear that Randy? Don't go pulling crap this time!"

But Randy looked away like he didn't hear anything. I could just smell another trick in the air, and it was making me sick.

"Get ready for your worst nightmare, Alex," Jeff smiled, pulling out two of his Poké Balls, "Go, Ho-oh and Entei!"

My jaw nearly dropped when I Jeff declare he was using even more legendary Pokémon. This was just getting ridiculous. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw Ho-oh, the gigantic rainbow bird of complete fiery destruction and Entei, the lion-like legendary Pokémon of fire. There were people that would kill to have Pokémon like that!

Both Ho-oh and Entei glared menacingly at Alex, pressuring him to respond with something. But then again, when Alex pulled out two of his Poké Balls, I could already see the hesitation. Alex's Pokémon were going to have no defense under the power Randy's Quista necklace and there wasn't anything he could do about it. Now, it was up to Randy to decide what Pokémon were going to come out of Alex's Poké Balls and Alex would be forced to have to work with it. And as stupid as it sounded, I could already guess which two Randy was going to choose for him…

"He'd better not..." I heard Alex mutter angrily under his breath.

Alex threw his two Poké Balls anyway, not even declaring who he had selected, not like it would have even mattered. And then to his disgust and Jeff's delight, once the two Poké Balls struck the ground and opened with a flash of light, the two Pokémon Alex was going to be stuck using were a purple-bodied, white-winged Butterfree and a gray Beautifly with red, yellow, and blue butterfly wings and bright, blue eyes. Big, fat surprise, I could have seen that coming from a million miles away.

I wasn't sure which two of Alex's Pokémon had been transformed, but again, neither of them were ready for the body swap that left them totally bewildered and confused in front of two slaughterhouse legendary Pokémon of hellfire. As if the situation I had just experienced couldn't get any worse, Alex's example clearly showed things could go from bad to worse to complete, utter hell.

"DAMN IT, what the hell is the matter with you, Randy!?" Alex shouted back to him, knowing he was the one responsible for that swap. "Can't you keep out of this for once!?"

"Keep going, Alex!" Randy laughed. "I see nothing wrong, seems to me like a perfect fit! And by the way, watching a cute butterfly like you get angry is really, really funny!"

The three of us were furious. How could Jeff even see this as a true Pokémon battle? Randy and Frank were naive, little morons, but I could have sworn Jeff would know better than to stoop to their level. Butterfree and Beautifly were NOT Alex's Pokémon, and I knew for sure he wouldn't use either of them in a million years. But now he had no choice. It was either going to be a severe struggle to win fighting with the two of them, or just plain losing altogether. This truly was Pokémon battling at its worst.

"Ladies and gentlemen…" Randy smiled, nearly laughing, "let the battle begin!"

"Thank you, your highness," Jeff remarked with a smile. "This is for Ampharos and Espeon. Ho-oh, Sacred Fire attack on Butterfree. Entei, burn Beautifly to a crisp with your Flamethrower attack!"

Merciless little freak. He was going to go as far as seeing that Alex wouldn't even get a chance before it was all over with. The massive Ho-oh flew into the air, targeted Butterfree like he was sentencing him to death, and all Butterfree could do was helplessly and hopelessly try to dodge an enormous rush of flames. Butterfree's effort to escape by fluttering frantically was totally in vain as Ho-oh's Sacred Fire nearly consumed it alive with searing flames, leaving it on the verge of death.

Entei stormed his way through the arena, gathering hellfire flames in his mouth before belching a menacing torrent of blazing fire at the disoriented, brightly-colored Beautifly. Again, Beautifuly tried to avoid it, but he was quickly enraptured by the jet of flames and had nowhere to fly away when the stream of fire struck him. Now, Alex was reduced to all or nothing attacks even on his first round.

"The two of you are cowards!" Alex shouted at them both. "You can't even battle for real, that's how pathetic you are!"

"Alex," Randy shrugged, snickering again, "why do I need to keep reminding you? This IS for real. My world is real now, and you have to accept it. There is no other way around."

There was nothing Alex could do but continue. If he really was going to lose, at least he freaking tried. To the three of us, none of this was real. This was Randy's stupid world superimposed upon reality, something that seriously shouldn't have been possible. And the only thing that needed to be done to return Randy to the worthless little punk he was before was to swipe that necklace right off his neck. Unfortunately, we couldn't even get near it. If Randy could just effortlessly transform Pokémon, hand out legendary Pokémon as freebies, and create entire worlds now, I didn't want to see where else it could go if we tried to go after him ourselves. It had to be undone some other way than physical force.

Alex's two butterfly Pokémon were badly roasted, but they didn't give up yet, and neither did Alex. The last thing Alex wanted to do was give Jeff the satisfaction of winning when he clearly didn't deserve it. However, he was going to need more than a miracle to pull this off.

"Butterfree, use your Stun Spore attack," Alex said firmly. "Beautifly, use Sleep Powder. Come on, let's try to make the best out of this crap!"

Alex left no holes in the system. Both of them were going to be inflicted with at least something to slow them down and I could tell getting Ho-oh back on the ground was crucial. Once both of Alex's butterfly Pokémon sprayed all sorts of powder and spores around, Ho-oh barely got a chance to land before he had fallen asleep and Entei was paralyzed, stricken and trying to fight off the numbing pain as he roared in anger and frustration. Now was Alex's chance. Entei had gotten sluggish and Ho-oh was left snoozing.

Alex ordered both of his Pokémon to use Morning Sun to recover the burn damage that had been done. Up above, both butterfly Pokémon called upon the glaring sun and somehow, like magic, the savage and nearly life-threatening burns were healed as the rays of white light reversed the damage to their bodies and allowed them to fight on with less pain holding them down.

Ho-oh was still asleep, but Entei was going to get another chance to try and strike.

"Flamethrower on Butterfree!" Jeff shouted loudly. "Burn, baby, burn!"

Yet again, Entei let loose a savage, lion-like roar before launching yet another violent rush of flames from his mouth to smothered Butterfree with agonizing fire. The paralyzing effects of the Stun Spore were still struck him with pain and agony, but he ferociously fought it off with his adrenaline. The fire damage on Butterfree had gotten worse than before, but Butterfree was dead-set on at least trying to see this one through. I would have hated to say it, but Alex was going to have to go kamikaze if he wanted a chance to win. He was just going to have to forget about the damage that had been done and fight back or face a losing proposition.

"Butterfree, Psychic attack on Entei!" Alex shouted.

Butterfree flew swiftly toward the lion-Pokémon, flapping his white wings furiously and frantically as the aura around him turned a swirling mix of dark blue and violet-colored psychic energy. Entei was hit dead-on as a blue and white flash had covered his body. The psychic strike had attempted to crush and warp Entei's body from all directions, causing the legendary fire lion to roar in anger. However, it certainly wasn't enough to slow him down very much. Butterfree wasn't even a psychic Pokémon, so that could only go so far.

And then, Ho-oh had woken up sooner than expected, and Jeff couldn't have been happier.

"Ho-oh, Sacred Fire on Butterfree," Jeff ordered casually. "Entei, use Fire Blast on Beautifly. Let's get this nonsense over with."

And then, the unimaginable happened. As if the battle wasn't badly one-sized enough, Ho-oh took flight and stormed furiously toward Butterfree, unleashing another ferocious, swirling cyclone of Sacred Fire flames, sucking Butterfree helplessly into the tornado of fire.

I just couldn't watch. He had been further burned to oblivion, and it couldn't handle anymore, dropping helplessly to the ground nearly half-dead and totally fried.

Meanwhile, Entei roared and unleashed his nastiest Fire Blast attack at Beautifly. The asterisk-like gush of flames flew at Beautifly like a death rocket, and upon the menacing impact, embers and tongues of fire were thrown in all directions. When the fire and shrouding smoke had cleared, both of Alex's Pokémon had been eliminated, falling to the ground, laying limply with the stuffing beaten out of them.

He didn't have a chance…

As bad as it was, I wasn't surprised. Alex had an even worse disadvantage than I did. Butterfree and Beautifly just didn't compare to the power of Ho-oh and Entei, however Jeff got a hold of those two ridiculous legendaries. I don't think he could have possibly won that disgusting and shameful match no matter how many times he could have tried.

"Well, that certainly was fun," Jeff smiled. "Nice try, guys. Good game all the way. You both need to improve on your training for next time!"

"There's no way anyone could have won that!" Alex shouted at Jeff. "That wasn't a real match! Those weren't my Pokémon and I'm sure as hell you didn't actually legitimately catch a freaking Ho-oh and Entei either!"

But, then a wave of silence had kept them both quiet. Randy had stood up and looked at the three of us. I was really getting tired of these antics.

"How many silly times to I have to remind you three ladies that certainly was a real match?" Randy told Alex, acting like he knew everything on the planet. "And well, you lost. If you're still not used to this by now, I just don't know what to say. Maybe in a few years you'll understand how things work around here."

"Randy, I'm tired as hell of this stupid world of yours!" Alex shouted angrily. "I'm tired of you and your pathetic cheating. Is this the only possible way you can win a Pokémon match!? How incredibly pitiful is that!?"

Randy found that rather insulting. He looked at Alex, and couldn't even feel pity for him.

"Jeff, thank you for your time," Randy told him. "But now I'd like you to move aside. It's my turn!"

"Wait a minute," Jeff looked to Randy. "Don't the rules say if they don't win against Frank and I, they have to leave? This is Victory City Stadium, and if you don't get victory, you don't belong here."

"I just want to battle the three of them myself," Randy told Jeff. "I made the rules up, so I can change them for this special occasion. Besides, I've been waiting to beat them for a long time…"

I was getting sick of this crap and knew exactly where this was going. How could Randy feel like he was a hero when the only thing that was keeping us bound here and keeping Randy in power was a single, stupid necklace? Plus on top of everything else, I hated being tossed around like a piece of dirt when it was really us who were more powerful than Randy. My Pokémon and I were nobody's punching bag.

"Let's do a three on three!" Randy said with a smile. "One from each of you against three of mine! You guys are in for one epic fight you don't stand a chance against!"

Despite the fact that all it would have taken to end this whole stupid parade was to beat Randy, it was still millions of miles away. We could argue all night long these weren't real battles, but these three morons never saw it that way and they were in total control. Nope, in order to win, they had to go all out and freaking warp reality because heck, doing it the way everyone else had to just wouldn't work. Seriously pathetic.

I shrugged, decided to face the music when it came to this new and stupid fabricated reality Randy created, but if I was going to do that, I was going to make sure it left a burn.

"You know what Randy?" I called back to him. "You're probably right. We don't stand a chance against your necklace."

"It's me who you're going to lose against, my flower dancer friend!" Randy flashed a smile.

"No, idiot," I told Randy firmly. "It's your damn necklace. If we fail to beat your Pokémon, then we lose to your necklace, but not to you. After all, it's that necklace that created all this."

He didn't like that, but it left exactly the kind of message I was hoping to walk out of here with. Randy was getting furious and the truth was getting to him. I didn't want him to start a battle thinking it was through his own hard work, effort, and commitment that was going to get him the win.

"You're wasting time!" Randy shouted. "Battle me already!"

"No, Randy, I don't feel like losing to Quista's little trinket," I told him, really getting under his skin. "Can't you see you're just a hopeless case without your stupid necklace!? Take it off and you're worthless and this place is gone. Now that's reality for you!"

He looked at me with a dark stare and suddenly Jeff and Frank's parade of cheer got rained on as well. He knew the truth, he just didn't want to accept it. But one thing was for sure, he wasn't going to take it off. That was the last thing he was going to do.

"If you're not going to battle me, then I want you out of here," Randy told us, quickly growing angry he was going to miss the opportunity he had been waiting for this entire time and the whole reason he created this nuthouse in the first place. "Come back when you're ready to show a little bravery!"

Bravery... please. There was a big difference between being brave and being a suicidal idiot.

Even though we had come here with a strong urge to defeat Randy and get out of here, I was getting a feeling that unless we found some way to block Randy's power, or swipe his necklace while he wasn't looking, there was no way we were going to win. He already screwed up my Weavile and my Jolteon among a whole truckload of other miserable things. I didn't feel like making the damage any worse.

"Fine, Randy," I said to him, turned away. "Then we're leaving."

Immediately, Alex and David looked at me like I had lost it. They didn't see that we didn't stand a chance against Randy at the moment.

"Jake, are you nuts!?" Alex asked me in shock. "We just have to find a way through his crap antics and we can get out of here! There's got to be something that moron is overlooking!"

"Remember what Black and Depression told us?" I whispered to him. "There's no way we can beat the power of that stupid necklace with nothing to work with. And it's better if we turn down his offer than lose to him. If we lose to him, then he'll want to stay here forever."

"Damn it, what the hell are we supposed to do?" David growled with disgust.

Alex was annoyed, thinking we would only need to stay here for a few more minutes. In truth, I was really aggravated by this whole thing, also, but I didn't want to risk losing to Randy, and that risk was way too high to gamble on. Giving him any kind of satisfaction out of this was a bad idea. We had to dig deeper and find someone or something that would give us what we really needed to step up to Randy. But doing it like this was just dumb suicide. Besides, Jolteon and Weavile had already been through enough hell and I didn't even know how to undo that kind of transformation. I didn't want to throw in yet another Pokémon to get train-wrecked like that.

And as much as it pained us, we then turned around and began to walk out of that giant stadium to at least discuss it away from those three idiots. Randy was truly furious, but we couldn't afford for him to be in absolute glee with a phony victory he would think was the best thing that ever happened to him. We would lose everything and I didn't want to blow the only chance we had.

I've read through the first couple of chapters and they are definitely an improvement. They give a little more insight into the characters and the battles do seem more realistic now that there's an audience and interaction from background characters. I especially liked when the teacher showed up to scold them as well, as something like that wouldn't have gone overlooked on school property.

I found a couple of things I wanted to bring up in this review:

Neo Emolga said:

"Don't let him get away with that!" Another kid shouted to Jeff.

"Wouldn't dream of it!" Alex shouted back with a smile, trying to impress the crowd.

Click to expand...

Was it actually Jeff who shouted back? It sounds like it should have been, so I wanted to point that out.

Neo Emolga said:

Butterfree's effort to escape frantically by fluttering frantically...

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This seemed a little bit of an awkward description and I'm not entirely sure how to structure this one myself.
Maybe 'Butterfree's desperate effort to escape by fluttering frantically...' would work? Try a few things with this and see what works best for you?

Neo Emolga said:

And then, Ho-oh had woken up sooner than expected, and Jeff couldn't have been happier. After rubbing his hands and snickering, he prepared to strike.

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Previously, Jeff had come across as calm and collected, so this seemed a little jarringly out of character to me. Maybe the effects of Randy's world have corrupted him? I'm not sure, but it was a little sudden I think.

I recall seeing some other small typos but I can't pull them out with a second glance over. If I see them again, I'll add them to this review :)

All in all, the progress you've made is really good, and the tables seem to have turned on Jake and his friends, and not in a good 'evil is thwarted' way either. That necklace is evil, imo, and has corrupted Randy and his friends turning them into copies of Jake. It's definitely not good for Randy, and what I am hoping will happen later is that Jake will actually save him from that wicked necklace's powers! (And maybe even destroy it!)

You asked about the edits to the first two chapters and character progression - maybe don't reveal too much too soon about Jake and have it unfold slowly as a bit of a build up to show him as a tragic character? For example, you mentioned his home situation and sister in the first chapter as a reason for him being annoyed, maybe allude instead to his sister having annoyed him or witnessing another argument at home rather than diving too much into detail?

This is probably harder from a first person perspective because this kind of stuff will be on his mind all the time, so the way you've done it does actually work. But what I can suggest is later have him really confide in someone - a friend, a new friend he makes on the way or maybe even Randy or Jeff about why he's behaving the way he is. It can be surprising and moving and show his tragic side.

Just some suggestions :) this story is great so far, and the edits work so keep it up!

Delirious Absol said:

I've read through the first couple of chapters and they are definitely an improvement. They give a little more insight into the characters and the battles do seem more realistic now that there's an audience and interaction from background characters. I especially liked when the teacher showed up to scold them as well, as something like that wouldn't have gone overlooked on school property.

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Awesome, okay, glad I'm doing this right then.

Delirious Absol said:

I found a couple of things I wanted to bring up in this review:

Was it actually Jeff who shouted back? It sounds like it should have been, so I wanted to point that out.

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And... yep, I overlooked that one. Thanks for catching that, it's been fixed.

Delirious Absol said:

This seemed a little bit of an awkward description and I'm not entirely sure how to structure this one myself.
Maybe 'Butterfree's desperate effort to escape by fluttering frantically...' would work? Try a few things with this and see what works best for you?

Click to expand...

Yeah, I messed around with that description to make it easier to visualize, and I didn't clean up afterword. That's been fixed, and again, thanks for pointing that out.

Delirious Absol said:

Previously, Jeff had come across as calm and collected, so this seemed a little jarringly out of character to me. Maybe the effects of Randy's world have corrupted him? I'm not sure, but it was a little sudden I think.

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Ah... you're probably right about that. Could go either way, I'm sure the sudden, raw excitement of commanding two legendary Pokémon could cause plenty of trainers to go nuts, but I decided to play it safe.

Delirious Absol said:

I recall seeing some other small typos but I can't pull them out with a second glance over. If I see them again, I'll add them to this review

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Gotcha, I appreciate people being on the lookout for those. Sometimes I just don't see what other people see until they point them out, and then I'm like... "dang, how did I miss that one?"

Delirious Absol said:

All in all, the progress you've made is really good, and the tables seem to have turned on Jake and his friends, and not in a good 'evil is thwarted' way either. That necklace is evil, imo, and has corrupted Randy and his friends turning them into copies of Jake. It's definitely not good for Randy, and what I am hoping will happen later is that Jake will actually save him from that wicked necklace's powers! (And maybe even destroy it!)

Click to expand...

I don't want to give anything away, but yeah, by now if all that Randy wanted to do was teach Jake and his friends a lesson, he should have ended it by now, but... he still hasn't gotten in that one, defining battle he wants with them.

Delirious Absol said:

You asked about the edits to the first two chapters and character progression - maybe don't reveal too much too soon about Jake and have it unfold slowly as a bit of a build up to show him as a tragic character? For example, you mentioned his home situation and sister in the first chapter as a reason for him being annoyed, maybe allude instead to his sister having annoyed him or witnessing another argument at home rather than diving too much into detail?

Click to expand...

The last batch of improvements seems to have worked and this might help build it to the next level. I'm adding a small conflict between Jake and Vicky right after this part in Chapter 2.

Basically, I changed this:

"Meanwhile, dad didn't care to reply to voicemails, and I'd rather stab myself in the thigh with a fork than talk to my stupid sister Vicky. I got home and found both my headphones and my gift cards to Video Castle were missing. It was an easy guess she was the one that stole them, and I really didn't feel like sifting through her jewelry and cosmetics junk to look for them."

Into this:

After taking the bus home and walking through the front door, Mom always asked how school was going, but I just gave her brief and vague answers. She was usually pissed about the divorce issues going on and it usually led to a nasty discussion anyway. Meanwhile, dad didn't care to reply to voicemails, and I'd rather stab myself in the thigh with a fork than talk to my stupid sister, Vicky.

I got home, headed up to my room, and went to drop off my backpack and school junk only to find that both my headphones and my gift cards to Video Castle were missing and not on my dresser where I knew I left them. I hadn't made the bed, my desk was a mess, and I had clothes, board games, movie and CD cases, and papers all over the floor, but I knew I left those headphones and gift cards on the dresser. She had to be the one to take them because my headphones were so much better than her dinky earbuds and she could use the gift cards on anything at the store. I swore, if she used those cards on a stupid chick flick movie or girly cartoon DVD that I wouldn't be able to return to the store, I'd make her pay like hell for it. That was my birthday present and I had been saving them for a good movie to come out.

I headed into her room, and it made me want to puke at how pink, organized, and cute she tried to make it with her pink bed nicely made, her desk chair in the back corner had the chair pushed in, and there wasn't a single thing on the floor. I tore my way through there, knocked over a tiny table she used for nothing more than to put her stupid, oversized Slurpuff plush doll on, and attacked her dresser first, starting with the upper drawers. What a neat freak for junk. What did she need five different combs for? And why so many tacky, plastic hair clips? I rummaged through almost every drawer, not caring if I made a mess of it to find my stuff. However, she came in only a minute later and started screaming at me. I swore, every time I saw her with that fake, blonde hair and that stupid baby blue dress of hers with the asinine Marill on it, I just wanted to rip it all apart.

"What are you doing to my stuff!?" Vicky screamed. "You stupid punk, get your filthy hands out of there!"

"Where did you hide my headphones and my gift cards!?" I shouted back at her. "Stop stealing my stuff, I know you have them!"

"Why don't you first try looking through the crap heap you have for a bedroom before you accuse me!?" She snapped back. "They're probably buried somewhere in all that junk you have! And why would I want your headphones!? I wouldn't want something that's been on your filthy ears!"

I swore, I couldn't stand her guts, and I figured I'd just have to come back later when she wasn't around. I just grabbed the closest pink box of crap I could get my hands on, and threw it at her as I stormed out the door, sending the box and all of the stupid and tacky earrings that were inside of it flying in all directions before scattering on the pink, carpeted floor. The box just barely missed her, but I headed out of there before she was able to retaliate. When she tried to chase me, I quickly headed into my room, slammed the door on her before she could enter, and locked it, leaving her pounding at it, screaming for half a minute before giving up. You'd think she'd learn.

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I think that might do the trick, but I'm open to your thoughts about it and if it was a move in the right direction.

Delirious Absol said:

This is probably harder from a first person perspective because this kind of stuff will be on his mind all the time, so the way you've done it does actually work. But what I can suggest is later have him really confide in someone - a friend, a new friend he makes on the way or maybe even Randy or Jeff about why he's behaving the way he is. It can be surprising and moving and show his tragic side.

Just some suggestions this story is great so far, and the edits work so keep it up!

Click to expand...

I'm... not going to comment. No spoilers on that, just wait and see...

And thanks, your reviews and typo-spotting have been really helpful as well. Glad you're enjoying it, but please, if at any point you think it's falling short or needs something else, let me know, I'll look into it.

It was a long walk to get out of that giant stadium. Longer than it should have been and the thought of going backwards was making me sick. I had no idea how long we were going to have to wait now until we could fight him on his level, but it already began to feel like ages. We were all losing our patience. Some of us more than others…

We were back on the streets of Victory City, where everyone in town hated our guts more than alarm clocks from hell on a Monday morning. I swore, if one of these imaginary bastards called me "Lily Loser" one more time, I was going to make them eat their own arms and legs with an ice pick. We were just about to use a vacant alleyway for shelter from the idiocy before some punk hit me in the side of the head with a glass bottle, which stung like hell for a while.

"Well, that went swell," David snapped sarcastically, looking at me with annoyance. "Just what do you expect to do now, Jake? I swear, he's bound to make a stupid mistake like always that we can take advantage of. It's a much better shot than wandering around this cesspool for longer than we need to!"

I was silent. I really didn't know. I wanted a fast solution as much as David did, but there wasn't one to be found. Still, David was looking at me like I made the worst choice possible.

"Look, maybe we'll come across a solution," I told him. "Randy can't be invincible, not even in his own world. What Black and Depression gave us didn't work, but there has to be something out there that can."

"Well, hotshot," David snapped at me, looking at me with a cold stare, "why didn't we battle him? At least we could have given a try, you know. He's on a power trip, he might let his guard down at some point or another."

"David," I said honestly to him, "if we lose to Randy, we might just be suffering a blow we may never recover from, understand? This is exactly what he wants us to do! It could mean being stuck here forever. You saw what he did to our Pokémon! How the hell are we supposed to deal with that!? I don't even think those legendaries that Jeff and Frank were using took any real damage!"

David still looked at me like I was crazy, but I was guessing his rage was just clouding his judgment and ability to grasp what we were dealing with here. He was letting his hunger to get out of here blind him, and I knew for sure that was going to ruin us.

"Maybe not," David said in a hopeful tone. "Look, it's not for certain Randy would want to stay here even if we do lose to him. Sooner or later he's going to get sick of his own world. It'll get just as dumb and boring as kicking rocks around."

"Yeah, David," Alex said to him, "not soon enough for me. Randy won't ever want to leave this place. If he gets bored with it, all he has to do is change anything and everything to fit his desires and we're stuck having to live with it! Who the hell wants to live in a place where he's in control all the time!?"

David still didn't care. Obviously he wasn't heeding the warnings that Black and Depression had given to him. Still, he felt there was some hope. I wanted to believe there was something I could do about it myself, but the odds kept telling me otherwise. He just couldn't see the reality of the situation…

"I'm not going to sit here hoping we just happen to bump into a solution," David said with annoyance. "We've been walking out there for days and the only things we got out of it were useless trinkets that did nothing to help! I'll battle Randy right now, and I don't care if it's all or nothing. And if I win, then you two owe me big time."

"Go ahead then, David," I told him, giving up on trying to convince him otherwise. "We'll see you around."

And not even a second later, David turned right back around and headed back into the stadium. I knew there was no way he could win. If he couldn't beat Caska, he sure wasn't going to beat Randy. I didn't want to stick around to find out how he lost.

"Come on," I told Alex. "Let's get out of here."

"Where?" Alex asked me, getting annoyed himself. "Back into the middle of nowhere again!? Come on, man, we've been out there! There's nothing!"

"One more shot," I told Alex seriously. "This town hates our guts, and maybe Black and Depression didn't have exactly what we needed. There might be someone else."

Alex really didn't seem to agree. He just looked away and turned back at the stadium.

"Damn, I hate this place," Alex told me, "I know you could be right, but damn, I really, really don't want to go back out there. Come on, Jake, look at what they did to us out there! Maybe we can find something here instead. We can just…"

"Look, Randy would be rolling over in laughter if he saw us arguing like this," I told him. "If you really don't want to go back out there, I'll head out by myself to see what I can find on the outside, and if you want to see what's around this place, go for it. This city seems big enough and maybe it has a dark side to it also."

"Heh, sure hope it does," Alex flashed a dark smile. "Good luck, man, just don't get lost out there."

And that was where we split up. I didn't feel right by leaving Alex and David behind, but I didn't want to stay in this blasted city either. After I said goodbye to Alex, I left them all behind and headed back outside into the wilderness.

I had hoped to find a way out of this forsaken world, even while I was walking away from the very source that could bring me back home. But even then, maybe Alex and David were right. How was I supposed to find the key to our escape by aimless walking? Where would I be going after all?

I felt like I was slowing going insane. After heading out of Victory City and walking down the highway, I was left alone with my thoughts as I tried to think all of options and alternatives over. I would be shocked and surprised if there was a single person in all of Victory City that was willing to help us. The chances of them being in there was next to none.

I started on the highway for the first few hours and just got bored of it, so I decided to just say screw it and not care if I got lost. I really didn't have much to lose at this point anyway. Day one was being alone again and traveling through valleys, swamps, rivers, and forests, day two was all about me nearly losing my mind in anger. I almost felt like I was beginning to just accept all this and admit I was just going to have to suck it up and deal with being a god-forsaken flower in Randy's world like I had no power over anything anymore.

When I reminded myself this would be for forever if I gave up, I got off my butt and decided to shut up and still keep up the effort. I had been walking for nearly three days, which seemed so much longer when I was constantly burdened by these same, endless thoughts and having to deal with Randy's bizarre and unpredictable landscapes and biomes. Not only that, but the only thing I could consume was water. What a nightmare. I wasn't even human anymore and even my Pokémon had been warped because of all this.

I was really getting sick of the strange landscapes that weren't even making sense anymore. Snow on palm trees? A lake that was hot springs on the outside and frozen in the middle? It was easy to lose sanity here.. By now I was too far away to turn back and take my next to hopeless chances, and even if I could, what was the point? Could I possibly hope to accomplish the impossible? Nothing would have changed from before, only my morale would be diminished. At the moment, it seemed like nothing could be done about it, and this is how it was all supposed to end…

But on the evening of the third day, everything had changed.

During my searches that night, I had come across a strange, white, twenty-story office building with large, mirror-like rectangular windows that looked like it belonged in the middle of a big city, not in the middle of a valley with blue grass and trees. Despite the strange landscape, the building seemed pretty normal. I decided why the hell not, I'd take sitting in a cubicle farm for a few minutes to rejuvinate my sanity over the loony landscapes Randy's mind vomited out.

Honestly, I didn't care if death itself was inside, I was ready to cope with anything right now. I approached the opposing double glass doors, grabbed the handle, and walked into what seemed like a totally normal office building lobby. At this point, I had nothing to lose, so I figured even if there was nothing in here, well, at least I freaking tried.

Inside, it seemed empty, except for one large, side office that had an open door. I started looking around, and while it was quiet and motionless among the chairs, desks, and other office furniture, I felt compelled to go toward the one side office that had the only open door. I decided to walk on in to see why this one was different from all the others.

Inside, it was furbished pretty much the same way any senior manager would arrange it with a large desk with a cherry wood finish, shelves with books and a carpeted floor, and seemingly ordinary pictures of landscapes on the wall. Seated at the desk was a busy, middle-aged man with a bald head, a black goatee, and wearing a black business suit sitting in the leather, wheeled chair behind the desk. It looked like he had been busy writing notes in a black, leather journal before he looked up at me and crossed his arms. He had a serious look on his face and seemed to size me up. It made me feel like it was a job interview with an executive from one of the biggest corporations in the world. And here I was standing before this badass guy as a damn "overgrown Bellossom," as Alex put it.

"I have been expecting you, Jake Kossak," He told me, looking at me like this was an FBI interrogation.

"How do you know me?" I asked him, wondering who this guy really was.

He furrowed his brow and his serious, soul-piercing eyes just looked right into mine. I could definitely tell what he was about to tell me next was something he definitely didn't want me to forget.

"I am Randy's hatred, Jake," He had told me. "The name is Coldblood. Look at this place and look at me. Stern. Serious. Formal. This is the future adult life that will inevitably come for him when he will have to earn a living working eight to seven on spreadsheets, forms, metrics, and analytical data after spending half the day in meetings and on the phone. It is everything Randy's childish and imaginative demeanor will loathe."

Wow, that was deep. I really didn't even know what to say to that.

"Think of it as you will, but I am one of the strongest forces of Randy's mind," Coldblood continued, folding his hands together on his desk. "Because of me, his anger, sorrow, and depression exist in their fullest form, and they blind him and force him into making crucial mistakes. And you, Jake Kossak, are my most valuable ally right now."

I was silent. I sure didn't feel like it at the time while looking like this. I felt more like a loser that was a waste of space.

"Do not feel that way," He told me, reading my expression. "I know how you feel. For the last few days, you have been feeling nothing but misery. I can easily take that away."

"Yeah, how?" I asked him, seeing that had to be impossible.

But, he never answered my question, and I never figured it out on my own. He waved his hand in a strange way, and then I felt amazing relief spread all over me like comforting water. When I looked down, the flowers were gone and were rapidly vaporized within seconds. Everything was gone, and I was back in my normal clothing again as a human, something I suddenly appreciated more than I had ever before. But before I could even thank him, he spoke again.

"Jake, someone needs to take Randy out of business, and that someone is you," Coldblood stated to me firmly. "This nonsense needed to be ended days ago."

"Not while he still has his stupid necklace," I told him, hoping I didn't sound like a whiner.

"I understand, but we can work around it," He said to me. "Trust me. I may be all you have left."

Black and Depression had attempted to help us before, and it still didn't work. What could Coldblood do that they couldn't?

"Coldblood, Randy destroyed our protection, and he changed my Jolteon and my Weavile into a freaking Bellossom and a Lilligant," I informed him. "What the hell am I supposed to do against power like that!?"

Coldblood was silent. It almost seemed like… he had been waiting for me to bring this up.

"Give me your Pokémon," He told me, not giving me a clue as to what he was going to do with them.

What could I have done? I had nothing to lose anymore, and if he just blew them up for fun, I'd just shrug and ask him to do the same to me. I had no choice now but to trust him, even if it was dealing with a very dark side of Randy.

He laid out my Poké Balls on the desk, one by one. He placed his hand on one of them, and the whole Poké Ball began to glow white. When the white glow died down, he moved it aside and went onto the next. He had done it to all of them, one after another, and I just stood there just wondering what pray tell he was doing to my Pokémon. All of them, even the mysterious, unknown Pokémon that Black have given to me, had been blessed with something…

"What did you just do to them?" I asked Coldblood when he was finished.

"There," he told me. "Now they are just as strong as Randy's. Your Jolteon and Weavile are completely back to normal as well."

Well, that certainly made things a bit easier if he was telling the truth about all this. I had remembered Black telling me Randy's Quista necklace would allow him to use any attack Randy's whacked imagination could come up with. And I remembered the necklace Black gave us was supposed to protect against Randy's crap, and what a big waste of time that was.

"How are you even able to do this?" I asked Coldblood, wondering where and how he got these kinds of powers.

"Just like hatred can manipulate someone's mind," Coldbood told me, "I can manipulate some components of Randy's created world with the reality he dislikes. However, I cannot confront him myself and must keep my work secret, because to know one's enemy is dangerous knowledge to expose to him. I need you to be my emissary."

Man, this guy was really something else. Definitely not the kind of guy I'd ever think of double-crossing. He made Black and Depression look like a joke.

"I can do that," I told him, letting him know I was up for the job.

"Good," Coldblood told me quickly. "However, this is not going to be your traditional approach. In order to stop Randy, you have to take your artifice to a whole new level."

I wasn't exactly sure what he meant by that, but I figured digging in deeper would help me do the job we both wanted done.

"What did you have in mind?" I asked him.

"Randy cannot destroy something he cannot see," He said to me. "Necklaces, rings, any perceivable and materialistic object like that is subject to whatever Randy wants to do with them. You need to have an innate power that Randy cannot touch. I am just the person who can give you that. It will allow you to attack Randy's Pokémon with whatever you can think of and this time, it will hurt them the way it is supposed to. Only then will you be put on the same level as him and even the odds."

I was sure hoping this wasn't anything like intensive surgery. But even if it was, I had no other choice. What Coldblood said seemed to be making a lot of sense.

"It only takes about a day," Coldblood told me in a firm voice. "You go to sleep, and a day later, you will have the power you need to fight Randy. But be warned, it is not half as powerful as Randy's necklace, which can do much more than make Randy's imagined attacks a reality. There are some powers that the necklace has that Randy doesn't even know of yet."

And so, after standing up, he took me to a conference room where there was a modern conference table surrounded by sturdy black chairs and a black leather couch in the other corner. He told me to lie down on the leather couch, simply go to sleep, and everything would be done as soon as I woke up.

I didn't know what to expect, but after sleeping out there in the middle of nowhere in dreamland, it was quick and easy to doze off on something normal and believable for once.

Contrary to my first belief, I woke up feeling absolutely no different from before. At that moment, I had already begun to believe that perhaps Coldblood had decided not to go through with this. It was possible. Or maybe he had decided he liked his new physical form and if I ended Randy's world, he would disappear along with everything else.

"How do you feel?" He asked me as he was the only one seated at the conference table. "I trust it was painless."

"I don't even feel anything," I told him.

"That is good," Coldblood told me. "If you did, then something would have been wrong."

Outstanding. Now all he needed to do was tell me how I needed to get it to work. At first, I could visualize just thinking up an attack, ordering which Pokémon to attack with, and that would be it. But, it wasn't as easy as I thought. I still felt like Randy would still have some advantage over me.

"First off," Coldblood told me, "Randy makes it look easy. He comes up with an attack in his head, sends it to one of his Pokémon in a psychic decoded message from his imagination, and because he wants to, the Pokémon he sends it to understands it, and immediately attacks with Randy's desired move in its full form."

"It can't be that easy…" I remarked in disbelief.

"But it is," Coldblood said firmly with a confident smile. "Or to him it is, at least. You will definitely need to focus more on what your Pokémon are thinking. You need to make them realize that in Randy's world, your imagination is probably the most powerful weapon you can wield, and as long as they can listen to you, you and them can make it possible. You need to believe you can break the rules, Jake."

This was crazy. I couldn't believe Randy had even come up with such a thing. Making up your own Pokémon attacks seemed like a pretty difficult task, and I didn't even know where to get started. It seemed like the biggest cheating tool of all time in the history of Pokémon battling, as if what he was doing wasn't bad enough already. And yet, despite all this, everyone acted like it was perfectly okay. Another reason why I hated this place.

And I was already certain that Randy had done this numerous times. Right now, his simple imagination had become a god-like power. No wonder he was so eager to want to battle us. He would wipe the floor with us in no time and get giddy in ways that would just make me sick. It was probably what he was itching to do all this time. All he had to do was see my face, and he would let out his absolute worst. He must have slaughtered David's team if he really battled him…

Obviously, he was expecting me to show up again for a battle. He would probably be enraged that I was no longer the flower princess precious that he expected me to be, but that was just tough for him. I was thinking it would probably be a far better idea to go in some kind of disguise than show my face to his. He wanted to crush the three of us more than anything, but I had to try and fight him looking like someone else…

"You're absolutely right," Coldblood told me, reading my mind again. "Randy cannot be allowed to recognize you as you are. And I already have something in mind."

Coldblood had already helped me out immensely and I felt like I was deep in his debt. Right now, I was all ears for another good idea of his. Unlike the others, this guy was trustworthy. He could have screwed me over if he really wanted to, but he didn't. Not like I had much more to lose anyway.

"I have seen what Randy has done to you," Coldblood said. "He wants you to feel demoralized and pathetic the moment you step up to battle him. And he would easily do it again given another opportunity."

"Yeah, no kidding," I replied, looking away and thinking about how much I hated Randy for that.

It all definitely sounded familiar. I felt embarrassed as hell when I was in that stadium, and I'm sure that wouldn't have changed one bit if I were to do it again. I really was hoping Coldblood knew exactly how to fix this stupid mess.

"I know of a way you can make Randy feel demoralized, effectively disguise yourself, and encode your commands to your Pokémon, leaving Randy without any idea of what you just said to them," Coldblood smiled with a hint of sadistic delight in his tone.

PERFECT!!! I loved that idea! As if Randy didn't have enough to worry about now, he was just about to see something that was going to make him piss his pants even more. If Randy couldn't understand the commands I was giving to my Pokémon, and they were going to be made-up attacks just like his, he was going to be in deep trouble. Now this was a much better chance and was exactly what I was hoping for, although I could tell it was going to be quite a lot of insanity. Two battlers that could make up their own attacks? What the hell was Pokémon battling coming to?

"So what is it already!?" I shouted, eagerly waiting for Coldblood to reveal his outstanding plan.

"I want you to assimilate yourself as the one Pokémon Randy has hungrily desired for all the years of his life, but has been unable to capture and train," Coldblood smiled with a nefarious grin. "Seeing this Pokémon will surely bring back some rather bitter memories that Randy will not want to be reminded of. On top of that, Randy will not know it is really you, Jake. Not even with his powers will he be able to deduce your true identity once this assimilation is complete. And third, your Pokémon will understand your commands as you talk to them in their own language, but Randy will have no clue as to what you have told them."

Well, that certainly fit the criteria, but it wasn't what I expected. I had never once remembered Randy so desperately wanting a single Pokémon that he couldn't get. I tried to imagine what Pokémon it would be, but I had no clue. My guess was he kept it a pretty hard secret. Good thing for him too, because I'm sure Alex, David and I would have taunted him to death over it.

And then, I knew that Coldblood had figured out what I was thinking. He was just about to tell me everything…

It was then that Coldblood had told me about Randy's childhood, and how even as a little kid there was nothing more he wanted than this one Pokémon. Coldblood told me he asked for it every single damn birthday and Christmas of his entire life but was left disappointed every time. He also told me how he had failed to capture it on three separate occasions, as if luck itself just hated his guts. At that point, I think I would have been pretty frustrated myself.

"For the longest time, Randy had desperately desired a Pikachu above all other Pokémon," Coldblood had finally revealed. "Even at this time, deep inside, Randy still wants a Pikachu, but after focusing only on being the best rather than following his heart, his mind is possessed by power and his own idea of what his personal image should be. Therefore, he only has the best Pokémon possible rather than having the one Pokémon he used to long for."

Fantastic. Now Coldblood wanted me to square off against Randy as a Pikachu? Things were really starting to get loony now. I had only been normal for a few hours. Couldn't I at least have a few moments to spend as myself? Why was Randy so enticed by an electric mouse anyway? I had one for a short while before I turned him into a Raichu and I had no regrets. Was it because he thought they were cute or because one just happened to smile at him the right way?

"Randy always loved giving his Pokémon nicknames before this whole incident," Coldblood recalled. "He called his Growlithe 'Striker,' his Nidoran 'Spike,' his Pidove 'Storm Wind' and his Sewaddle 'Enigma'. He never called his Pokémon by their nicknames while you three were around because he was afraid you would make fun of them."

Yeah, we probably would, even though for once I personally didn't feel they were that bad, though his Pokémon were terrible and sure didn't live up to those kinds of names.

"If he had caught a Pikachu, he would have named him 'Juno,' and he would have been overjoyed," Coldblood told me, informing me of this mysterious Pikachu. "Of course in Randy's world, there is such a Pikachu already in existence, but he lives too far underground and too far away in the caverns of what is forgotten and neglected to make any use of. Instead, you will inherit Juno's place and confront Randy. You will become the one Pokémon in this world that Randy craved so desperately, born from Randy's most passionate imagination and fondest dreams before being the winner and the ultimate champion was all that ever mattered to him. I do not need to tell you how much power that can hold in this place."

It was a bold and sneaky move to fight Randy as something he truly once wanted and desired but abandoned after he made this zoo. Randy would surely hold back some of his power, but I certainly wouldn't. It would certainly make my day if Randy lost to me just because he didn't want to hurt the feelings of a Pikachu he once really wanted. I loved Coldblood's whole plan. It was cleverly delicious and sinister, just the way I liked things. It was totally worth the cost of becoming a cute, yellow, electric mouse. You'd never suspect something like that of being up to dirty deeds, and it made it that much more satisfying.

"Alright, Coldblood, I'm ready for this," I told him, really wondering what it was going to be like living as a Pikachu for a while. "If it makes Randy sweat, I can work with it."

"It is not that easy," Coldblood warned me. "Once you become Juno, the real Juno will become a part of you, and you will be remain as him until you find a way to break Randy's dream world dimension. You will have to take his role from here on in, and that means Jake Kossak the bully will have to be gone. You will be Juno the Pikachu, and you will have to remember that you are Randy's most coveted Pokémon and must act that way and not make him believe otherwise. Defeat him as if you want to remind him of what he has forgotten, not because you just want to end his world."

Good point, but it really didn't seem that hard. The plan was way too good to let go, and I had to act upon it. It was definitely worth the risk, even if it meant staying as a Pikachu for the rest of my life. I wanted to be free of Randy's mind, and I wanted that chance at any cost.

"Let's go already," I told Coldblood firmly. "I've made up my mind."

"Very well," Coldblood said to me as he focused his concentration and energy.

At first, nothing seemed to happen. I waited, wondering just how this was even going to work. But then a few seconds later, I felt something was being drawn to me from dark within the forgotten centers of Randy's world. It tingled me deep inside, feeling like nothing I had ever felt before.

When I shut my eyes to get a better sense of what this force was, I caught a glimpse of this Pikachu named Juno, and I swore I had never seen anything like him. He was still a Pikachu, but he seemed so much more... angelic, charismatic, and genuine. I could tell this Pikachu was created from some serious, very fond imagination and even though a Pikachu like this would never, ever be possible in reality, it was interesting to see how it would have been if it could be...

Slowly, I was enveloped with a white and golden glow, and I suddenly began to change. Gradually, I felt like my human body was dematerialized into pure light, and then I felt like I was shrinking little by little. I felt myself coated with the yellow fur of a Pikachu, followed by having two, long, black-tipped ears emerge from my head before a Pikachu's signature thunderbolt-shaped tail materialized on my rear. My hands were shrunken down to paws while cherry-red patches formed on my cheeks as the place where every Pikachu held their electric power. I almost trembled from the sensation, and before I opened my new, shiny black Pikachu eyes, it was like I could hear a faint whisper...

...Starchaser...

And that was when it hit me in full force.

Suddenly a massive, roaring pulsation of brilliant, white light was unleashed from all directions as I realized my soul had been connected with a Pikachu made from dreams, and now that dream had what no other did. Everything in the room was hit with force and wind, and even Coldblood himself had to steel himself against the celestial wind as the whole building trembled from what was something more profound and intense then I could have ever imagined.

Everything in the room became huge, as if I was lying on the floor. Meanwhile, the energy around me was affecting me in ways that I never thought it would. I looked down with my new eyes and looked at my paws, almost seemingly glowing white for a few seconds before it settled. It actually took me a moment to start breathing again.

There was something far more powerful behind this than becoming a simple Pikachu. Juno… without a doubt… was definitely born from dreams, and there was something about him that was even affecting me deep inside. I didn't know what it was, but suddenly, by becoming him, I felt strangely purified, empowered, and ended up stepping into something so much deeper than I thought I could ever imagine...

Even after I had totally become this Pikachu named Juno that Coldblood had described, I clenched my chest with my now tiny, yellow paws, feeling some kind of light and warmth that was so strong that connected with my soul. I even began to tremble as the connection was completed, and then suddenly, what was a simple unity at first was turned into a full assimilation, made just as a bright, blinding white light came over me. When it finally settled down, I was left with a feeling of being overwhelmed for a moment… suddenly as if I became more of Juno than I was expecting to...

When the dust began to settle and Coldblood regained his bearings, even he seemed surprised.

"I wasn't expecting that kind of reaction, but..." Coldblood muttered, taken back at what he had just seen, "...it seems to have worked."

And yet, to me, it was okay. I suddenly felt like I could actually enjoy this.

"How do you feel?" Coldblood asked.

"Now this is... incredible," I told him, a bit surprised at my new slightly lighter-pitched Pikachu voice. "Juno..."

I made it pretty clear that even though something definitely unanticipated happened, I felt alright with it. In fact, I could easily see why Randy used to like this Pikachu. Heck, if he didn't want him, I'd take him!

"We need to continue with the plan," Coldblood reminded me.

For a minute, I had almost forgotten about what the plan was. While I knew ending Randy's world was the goal, the idea of reminding him about Juno, this awesome Pikachu he had imagined, just seemed like something that needed to be done.

Coldblood handed me the belt with my Poké Balls, only now they felt huge due to my smaller size. It was like tying basketballs around my waist. And I couldn't help but think that when I pressed the button the prep the Poké Ball for use, it would grow to the size of a giant beach ball. I quickly realized why there weren't any Pokémon trainers that were Pokémon themselves…

"You must be careful," Coldblood warned me. "Anyone that loses to Randy immediately becomes his servant. That is exactly why happened to Alex and David. David had lost badly against Randy, and after Alex heard the news, he immediately challenged Randy only to fail. If you lose as well, there will be nothing to help bring the three of you back to the real world. Most likely, if you lose to Randy, you'll be stuck as his favorite Pokémon to train and care for. I'm sure that's not what you want."

It was true, I wasn't all too crazy about that idea. It was hard to think that now, David and Alex were Randy's slaves, the one thing in the world they didn't want. Heck, it made me shudder thinking what else Randy probably did to them. As if turning them into a fairy princess and giant butterfly wasn't humiliating enough...

"Normally, you cannot fight Randy whenever you want to," Coldblood told me. "There will be a tournament held in only a few days, and the winner of the final round will challenge Randy for the ultimate prize. To anyone who beats Randy in a Pokémon battle, they will be allowed one wish. Anything they can think of, and Randy has the power to grant it to them."

Well, that kind of prize would definitely reap in quite a bracket of trainers to work with.

"If you were still were Jake Kossak," Coldblood continued, "you could challenge Randy whenever you wanted to because there's nothing he wants more than to beat you, but now is different. You don't want to give Randy any hint that you're Jake in disguise. Therefore, you must enter into the tournament and rise through the rounds to face him."

As if this didn't even need to get more challenging. I figured if I got wiped out of the tournament, that was a really good sign I wasn't ready yet and needed to work on something else.

"Obviously, no one has ever won this tournament other than Randy," Coldblood told me the obvious. "Anyone that loses to him becomes his slave, and already several challengers have fallen victim to it. You have to be the one to fight Randy in the final round, and you have to be the one who wins. I can only wish you the best of luck from here on in."

As I walked out that door and bid him farewell, I had no idea what I would have done without him. But in the meantime, I was still feeling that strange and pure feeling from being Juno deep inside…

Bardothren said:

Hello. Thought I'd pop in and give you a quick review of your latest chapter.

As far as advice goes, you need to be careful with adverbs. I'll throw in a few examples to make my point.

Simply 'forgotten' will suffice. Almost completely does convey the idea that he remembered a tiny bit, but this distinction ultimately does not matter. In truth, it's using three times the number of words to present a nearly identical idea, an inefficient means of writing that will bog down your efforts.

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Maybe... let's meet midway and just roll with "For a minute, I had almost forgotten about what the plan was."

I think that should suffice and still keep the idea that Jake was so mesmerized with the transformation that he almost forgot, meaning it was still a bit in the back of his mind, but with all that had happened, it had been pushed back. Taking both words out would imply he really did forget everything about the plan, and might start to allude that he's not as careful or that he's easily forgetful about certain things.

Bardothren said:

'Obviously' is not necessary at all. 'Probably' is debatable, but I think it would serve you better to trim this word as well.

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Nah, I honestly think you're stripping out too much. Taking out the "Obviously," well, maybe that could be replaced with something like "I figured" or "I was pretty sure." Taking out the "probably" to make it "he would be enraged" is just wrong because while Jake thinks it's quite likely, he doesn't ultimately know that for sure. Dropping that makes it sound like Jake definitely knows, which how could he unless he's psychic? Maybe Randy would be, maybe Randy wouldn't care, and maybe he would just see it as an opportunity to have something new and unpleasant land on Jake next time. Jake doesn't truly know for sure, but he has his assumptions. Realistically, don't we all have that?

Bardothren said:

Your most prominent use of adverbs is to nitpick the probability of certain ideas. This bites you in two ways: first, it bumps up your word count without adding anything concrete to the story, and second, it incorporates the idea of unreliability in the narrator.

Your most prominent use of adverbs is to nitpick the probability of certain ideas. This bites you in two ways: first, it bumps up your word count without adding anything concrete to the story, and second, it incorporates the idea of unreliability in the narrator.

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Here, Jake is considering the possibilities and probabilities of certain outcomes, which is a character trait. That gets followed up with his opinion and reflection on the matter, sometimes using emphasis in words like "obviously" and "absolutely" which is honestly a major reason why the story is written in first person to get that effect. If he just walks around declaring the expected outcome of his efforts in phrases like "it will work" instead of "it would probably work" and "that choice would be successful" instead of "that choice would likely be successful," it shows realistic doubt. Otherwise, if you strip all the adverbs out, it just makes Jake sound like a psychic robot that knows all the outcomes.

Second, is the narrator unreliable? Actually yes, because he doesn't know the future and gives the reader his own thoughts and reflections on the situation and possible decisions, but doesn't declare the choice he makes or the outcome until it happens before him. This in turn creates a realistic outlook on him.

For example, if you had a character named John driving to work and John just said "I would arrive at the office just fine," how does he know that for sure? Maybe he would get stuck in traffic, his car would break down, or heaven forbid, get into a car accident. Now, let's look at it saying "I would probably arrive at the office just fine," meaning John recognizes the likelihood of something unexpected is small, but hey, there's still a chance and John hasn't ruled that out. If you nix the "probably" adverb, you're creating a whole different situation, character reflection, and it's like you're telling your reader "oh, don't worry about John, he gets to work just fine, so no need to care about the commute because you know the outcome already!" If you do this throughout the whole story, you're pretty much littering it with spoilers.

Anyway, dude, I thank you for your feedback, but I hope you can see what I'm trying to say here and that in plenty of places, the adverbs are necessary to create a character that perceives the reality of the situations and has his thoughts and considerations, but definitely doesn't know them for sure, and that in turn gets the reader wondering if he's really right or not, or something completely different will occur that even the narrator didn't ever expect. To me, this is the way I like to keep a story unpredictable, interesting, and keep the reader going on to find out the answers. Also, the readers ride along with a main character that has their own assumptions and guesses, but is always exploring, fighting, and digging in deeper to find them while learning and experiencing new things along the way. If you just spoil the outcomes ahead of time with "concrete" phrases, you're killing the surprise.

That, and I like to use adverbs as ways to emphasize, amplify, and to down-tone phases, which link in conjunction to Jake's character and reflections on other characters, events, and situations in the story.

Bardothren said:

A narrator is whomever is telling the story, and in your case, it's Randy (aka Juno). Narrators need to have a firm enough grasp of their surroundings to tell a story that readers can follow, and while Randy does fill this role, his use of dubious quantifiers (probably, maybe, etc.) gives the reader the impression that his assumptions about the world around him might not be accurate. This isn't that prevalent a problem in your story, but it's worth thinking about.

Click to expand...

Umm... Jake/Juno is the narrator, not Randy. Also, Jake doesn't have a firm grasp of his surroundings at first, and the story is told in a way that keeps it so that Jake is trying to learn more about it through taking guesses, trying things, experiencing, and taking risks as opposed to just dropping the outcome of everything before it even happens. Instead, you get:

1. Jake gets presented with a new situation.
2. He expresses his personal thoughts about it, making assumptions, predictions, and contemplates over possible outcomes and how he feels about them.
3. He steps forward and makes an attempt or takes a risk, experiencing the effect before the next step is taken and a new situation presents itself.

And this is the method I'm using to tell the story each step of the way.

Bardothren said:

Other than these nitpicks, this was a pretty good chapter. The biggest problem in this chapter is it could use some more background objects, and there's a ton of ways to accomplish this. Examples are as follows: body language, facial expressions, characters touching certain objects or moving across the room, something in the background that interrupts the conversation, incorporating objects into the dialogue, and more. Good writers know how to sprinkle their moments into dialogue to create a richer story; you're punctuating dialogue with Randy's thoughts. His thoughts shouldn't be told to the reader; they should be expressed through his own dialogue, body language, etc.

Body language is my favorite tool in writing. What characters do is a triple whammy - it keeps the dialogue from racing forward, adds another concrete image to the reader's mind, and reveals another aspect of your character's personality.

So, there's my two cents. I look forward to seeing what comes next.

Click to expand...

Ok, now this I can agree with and I think I know of a few spots that could benefit from this. If there were any specific examples of parts that you distinctly remember that really seemed to lack body language, expressions, and activity, please let me know.

It was a long march back to Victory City, but things were looking better than when I had left. The three day trek wasn't so bad this time, even though the distance felt greater now that I was much smaller. I felt like I could march even in the middle of the night, but I didn't want to exhaust myself. Surprisingly, when I had arrived back in Victory City, the place was extremely active, totally unlike before. Excitement for the tournament was fever pitch, and everyone was talking about what they would wish for if they won.

The strange feelings that had hit me when I became Juno were starting to feel natural now. It made me begin to wonder how much thought Randy put into this one Pikachu that I had become. On the outside, sure, Juno was still a Pikachu, but there was so much more about him that just seemed much more... special.

To everyone else, I was simply a stray Pikachu and not someone they knew about. Oddly enough, inside, I was feeling sensations that I'm sure regular Pikachu never feel. I just didn't know how to explain it other than having the sense Juno was dreamed to have powers and abilities a typical Pikachu could only dream of.

It wasn't hard to find the stadium again, since it loomed over the rest of the city and easily became a permanent part of the city's skyline. All I could do was just keep walking toward the giant stadium. As the streets were filled with cars and people, it was nice not being called flower-related names not having things thrown at me.

Once I had arrived at the stadium, all I had to do was register at a small desk, but it was quite a shock. Only a tiny handful of names had been on the list, which made me immediately hesitate. My guess was while everyone was excited for the tournament, they were far more interested in just watching it than having the guts to actually enter and risk freedom for a wish.

Nonetheless, I registered my name as "Juno" on the list. The young blond-haired, blue-eyed lady there just looked at me in wonder, blinked twice, and just shrugged. I figured this must have been the first time a Pikachu signed up for this thing.

"It begins tomorrow at 6," She told me. "You'll be against Sigon in the Quarter-finals. Remember, you have to be here at 6 or you're disqualified. Got it?"

She was acting like I was already going to get cold feet and not show up. Was this a usual thing around here? My guess was while these were still Randy's imaginary, made-up people, even they were extremely cautious about challenging him. In any case, I still wanted to go for it. True, part of it was to wash away this dreamland Randy made up. The other part was to remind Randy of Juno. With the way I felt and now sensed things about myself, Juno was special. That and... somehow this sincere and blameless Pikachu was really... really bringing out a much better side of me...

I simply walked away and spent the rest of my day preparing and thinking about how to handle this with the Pokémon I had. I had my Raichu, Weavile, Jolteon, Ariados, and then I came across the fifth Poké Ball I had. The one Black had given me, containing yet another Pokémon born from some aspect of Randy's dreams and imagination. This one, I knew, I had to be careful with. If I used it too early, it might cause unwanted attention in the tournament. I knew... I had to save it for just the right moment.

Other than everything else that was going on, the only trouble I had was finding a place to sleep. I managed to make a decent shelter out of a nearby second-story balcony. The place didn't seem like it had residents, so it would work for now.

Still, I couldn't believe I would already be in the quarter-finals. On the other hand, Randy had defeated so many people that very few people were brave enough to join. I figured it would only be a matter of time before Randy created his own doomed contestants in this world for the sole purpose of being destined to lose against him. Nonetheless, I told myself not to use any imaginary attacks or the special Pokémon Black gave me until I got to Randy. I didn't want to cause suspicion, blow my cover, and reveal my secret weapons.

That next day at 6, I got a quick taste of what the beginning rounds were like. Most of them were hosted underground in large, metallic vault-like rooms made to withstand heavy fighting and intense Pokémon battling.

Sigon, the first of the opponents I faced, was a disheveled, dirty, and likely destitute trainer who probably had high hopes, just couldn't deal with me. The battles were all two Pokémon each, and he just couldn't hang in there. He seemed pretty surprised to be battling with a Pikachu named Juno, but it wasn't the surprise that made him lose, my Pokémon were still trained better than his, and he still couldn't understand the commands I was giving them. I made short work of his Meowstic, which seemed like it hadn't battled and trained for a long time, and his Swanna, which just seemed to be really unlucky. Jolteon and Ariados, despite being very surprised they now had me as a Pikachu for a trainer, seemed to understand this definitely wasn't reality anymore and it seemed like they were getting used to the wierdness.

But when it came to Sigon, it made me wonder... did Randy dream of this guy to be like this?

"I don't know who you are, but you've made me angry!" Was the last thing Sigon had said to me.

In truth, from what I saw, these other contestants were in no way prepared to deal with Randy. It seemed like this whole tournament was just for Randy's own imagined people to battle among each other only to become Randy's servant in the final round. Truthfully, it did seem like after living a life where he couldn't defeat anyone, he turned the tables around so much so that the total opposite was true now. I sighed, knowing this was no way to become a better trainer.

When Sigon was beaten, that was that. The referee just told me to come back at 7 and that's when I would be fighting some person by the name of Storm. I just shrugged and walked away, knowing these definitely weren't ordinary humans. It just seemed like no one really cared about these battles and there was no audience besides the strange referees that moderated the whole thing. The only thing the big crowds were here for was to see Randy dominate the tournament winner at the end.

The next battle was no different. Storm ended up being a tough, punk female trainer with a pink Mohawk haircut who had actually bothered to raise her Pokémon diligently, but not enough. She ended up sending out a Greninja that looked like it had been in a bad bar fight and a Skuntank from the inner city slums. I was glad that was over when it was, because the smell from that Skuntank was ungodly. Still, I said nothing and she walked away.

"Your final match will take place at 9 in the evening tomorrow," The stern referee told me. "There you will be fighting against the one they call 'Ironclyde.'"

I could easily tell no one was actually using their real name, or at least a name that was anywhere close to reality. Already, I had faced people who I knew deep inside wouldn't have lasted against Randy, and I was already thinking this next guy truly didn't know what he was in for either. It was likely Randy saved the better contestants for when they fought him.

And when the next day had arrived, there were a whole lot of surprises I wasn't expecting...

Ironclyde wasn't the human with a unique call-sign as I was expected. Instead, I had been confronted by an eight-foot humanoid high-tech robot that clearly looked like it was from the future with black armor plating, outlines and lights with cyan-colored neon glows, and glowing blue eyes that made me blink twice and ask if this machine really trained Pokémon. Never in a million years did I see a machine doing that, but then again, in Randy's world, logic didn't have a home here.

Again, if Randy could easily beat an intimidating machine like this, it made him look that much more powerful. I could see where he was going with the whole idea.

And yet here I was, just a lone Pikachu born from imagination like everything else around here, standing before a machine warrior that was all high-tech intimidation. I wasn't sure what was going through its brain, or... CPU, but I figured it very likely didn't think I was a threat. Despite that, the battle was started, and I was really curious to see exactly how a machine would battle Pokémon.

"Let it begin!" The seemingly normal human referee commanded, shockingly showing no second thought a Pikachu was taking on a mechanical colossus in a Pokémon battle of all things.

"Deploying Absol," Ironclyde stated in a cold, robotic voice.

I then got to witness Ironclyde grab a gray and white Poké Ball in a hidden chamber on its metallic hip, which it prepped for release and then hurled into the metallic arena.

And out of the white and gray Poké Ball came a vicious Absol with the most aggressive attitude ever rubbed off on a Pokémon. I was just hoping he didn't think I was his opponent. He looked pretty well-trained unlike all the others I had faced in this tournament, with a sharper horn and fierce, white fur. I didn't like looking into his red eyes, either.

I didn't have any fighting-type Pokémon, so I grabbed the next best thing I had for the situation. I looked over to my left side, slid Raichu's giant Poké Ball out of the belt, prepped it so it became huge and nearly too big to handle, and hurled it into the arena.

"Go Raichu!" I shouted, using both paws to launch his Poké Ball into the arena like I was shooting for a 3-pointer in basketball.

But of course, Ironclyde didn't understand a word I said, and he really didn't know what Pokémon I was bringing out. It almost made me laugh knowing all this intimidating robot could hear was "Pi-Pikachu." I tried to hold in the laughter. It was quite comical, and I had to admit if anyone was watching this, it would be pretty funny seeing a Pikachu battle a massive robot that had to have been inspired from a sci-fi movie or game Randy knew about.

When Raichu came out of his Poké Ball, he felt something strange and he looked behind to see me. When he saw I was the one who sent him out, it caused him to look at me with a very peculiar look in his eyes.

"What the heck happened?" Raichu asked me. "Where's Jake?"

I then realized Raichu must have been the only Pokémon I hadn't used in the tournament yet, and was the last one to discover I was no longer human.

"It's me in disguise!" I told him. "But don't go telling anyone."

"How the…?" Raichu asked, still wondering how it was even possible. "Just what is... going... on?"

I figured Raichu hadn't been out of his Poké Ball enough to see the weirdness of Randy's world. Still, after looking around at the strange vault-like fighting arena, seeing the nefarious Absol, and then the hulking metal robot that was the Absol's trainer, he was really beginning to question what was going on.

"This is..." Raichu stated, his jaw nearly dropping, "...what the... heck am I... looking at!?"

"I'll explain later!" I told him, knowing we had a battle we badly needed to win. "We need that Absol taken out! It's still a Pokémon battle!"

Raichu nodded, but I could sense he was baffled none of this was normal in the slightest. In the meantime, it was funny how here I was actually speaking to one of my Pokémon, and he had absolutely no idea what was going on. Despite that, I had a battle to win.

"Use a Brick-Break attack on that Absol!" I told Raichu. "It's one of his top weaknesses."

"Come on, Jake, you know I know that!" Raichu replied, playing it out despite how odd this must have looked to him.

"Call me Juno," I told him with a smug smile. "Gotta keep this a secret."

And then, Raichu turned around and had advanced on Absol, and Ironclyde had no idea what attack I had just declared nor did he know how to respond to his Absol to work against it. He watched Raichu carefully trying to make the determination, and by the time he realized what was happening, it was too late. Absol was hit with a blazing, bone-cracking punch from Raichu's glowing fist. Despite that attack, Absol got back on its feet and prepared to strike. I knew Pokémon trained like that sure don't go down easy.

"Night Slash," Ironclyde declared.

"Dodge it!" I shouted to Raichu.

And this is where things really got funny. Ironclyde thought I had declared another attack using the language of Pokémon. Absol rushed toward Raichu, and Raichu barely jumped out of the way from Absol's viciously sharp, black horn. Absol was so into the swing that he stumbled and needed a second to recover.

"Use your Thunderbolt!" I shouted to Raichu.

"Heh, you got it!" Raichu agreed, jumping into the action.

The tip of Raichu's whip-like tail had struck the ground, he clenched his brown fists, and he had charged up an intense Thunderbolt, lighting up the orange electric mouse like a light bulb. Just when Absol turned around, he saw a massive jet of electricity rip and tear its way to him. Absol was struck painfully as the sharp electricity coursed through his body, and he cried loudly from the agony. Absol stumbled and fell to the ground, moaning from the exhaustion.

"I... can't… take it anymore…" Absol moaned in pain.

It was so weird understanding everything they were saying. I would never look at Pokémon battling the same way again. Despite that, Ironclyde was just totally indifferent to the way the battle was going, just giving a cold and emotionless stare. It only had one more Pokémon to use, and I really wasn't sure what kind of Pokémon it would be using next. Nonetheless, I was ready for anything.

Ironclyde had already realized it didn't know what attack it's Pokémon were going to get struck by until it was already too late. I could already imagine the same thing would happen with Randy. For once, things were seemingly hopeful...

Despite that, Ironclyde prepared its next Pokémon to enter the battle. It launched it next night-black Poké Ball into the arena. Now it was looking toward me with a cold, soulless stare that seemed a bit disturbing.

"Deploying Haxorus," Ironclyde confirmed in its cold, hollow voice.

The black Poké Ball struck the ground fiercely, and moments later and after a flash of light, Ironclyde's Haxorus had emerged ready for combat. I hadn't seen a Haxorus before, and it wasn't pretty. Nearly six feet high, clad in jade and black scales with crimson claws and scythe blades on both sides of his face, this was definitely not a kid-friendly Pokémon. And he sure didn't have a nice attitude either. He looked at the two of us and gave us a dark stare.

"This is all!?" He growled in a low tone, bearing rows and rows of shark-like teeth. "You runts will never be enough to sate by blood thirst!"

Raichu looked to me, and he really didn't look too happy.

"Maybe YOU should try fighting this guy for once, Juno," Raichu told me, pushing me a bit into the fighting arena. "See this as a great opportunity to get a firsthand experience seeing what Pokémon battling is like as a Pokémon yourself! Wouldn't be such a bad learning opportunity, you know!"

"Hey, man," I told him honestly, really not sure about this. "I never once said this was easy, okay? Just give it your best shot."

That wasn't the answer he wanted to hear. "Just give it your best shot" meant he had the odds against him and he was going to feel pain because of it. Of course, I never really thought he would complain to me about it.

"Go on!" Raichu urged me with an obviously acted-out smile. "How about you give it a try? Who knows, you might like it!"

And then, Raichu moved far aside leaving me and this burly Haxorus alone on the field. The ultra-violent Haxorus just looked at me with a dark snicker, and then made his advancement. As much as I hated to say it, I was going to have to finish this myself.

"Initiate Earthquake," Ironclyde declared.

This was certainly a rare instance where the trainer himself had become the Pokémon he would fight with. As Haxorus lifted up his clawed foot to rip apart the floor, I just had to embrace the hard reality that it was me who was going to fight this guy and deal with an attack that was, quite frankly... a Pikachu's worst nightmare.

Haxorus's foot came thrashing down, and the metallic floor began to crack open. All I could think of at the moment was to jump, and jump high. I sprung off the ground, and for a strange moment, I felt like I was effortlessly floating, and everything suddenly went into slow motion. The arena was slashed apart into pieces, and I remained above the chaos untouched. Strangely enough, I had just done something I've never, ever seen a Pikachu pull off.

I then focused my energy and burst into flames. I then flew toward Haxorus at mach speed, but it was actually much faster since it felt like we were fighting underwater. I slammed into Haxorus, and energized embers of fury were thrown everywhere, and I landed back on the ground. I didn't think Juno would know such a powerful rendition of Volt Tackle like it was a walk in the park.

I saw for an instant Haxorus was slowly stumbling, trying to get back on its feet. I then began to move much faster, while Haxorus was moving slow like molasses. I must have appeared to be a blur to the others, unable to be seen. I jumped off the ground, jumped off the wall, advanced toward Haxorus, jumped off the wall again right above him, and targeted his head with a vicious Thunder attack, letting it charge forward from my flaring cheeks right into his face. He was still letting loose a loud howl from the last attack, which honestly felt like it was half a minute ago to me but only a split second in actual real time.

I must have been breaking every law of physics and reality I could think of with what Coldblood provided me. But there was something else about this... was this what Juno was really capable of? It was even escalated with the ability to manipulate and redirect the forces of Randy's world and reality to however I wanted to facilitate them. Even so, I never thought it would be to this extreme degree. Things that I thought would be impossible to manipulate were at my fingertips. I could dance around Haxorus at this speed and he wouldn't even know I was there. But then I began to wonder… was this really Coldblood's power…

…or really Juno's own innate potential…?

I stood there suspended in the air just watching Haxorus get his butt whipped by me. I put my foot forward, and I flew down toward his head, and slammed down with a thunderous force. Haxorus took a vicious blow to the head, and felt a shock now being thrown in two completely different directions in split seconds. Once I landed on the broken ground, Haxorus was falling, but before I even let him crash to the ground, I then gathered all the electrical power I could, and I could feel an intense energy gather. A storm of electricity flared from my cheeks, and I looked up and directed the intense electrical carnage at the hopeless Haxorus that was seemingly floating in the air in the form of some higher-powered Thunderbolt attack.

The blazing thunder struck him violently in ways I had never seen before. At first it didn't do anything much because of a dragon's resistance to electric attacks, but only half a second later the power was too intense for that to even matter. Haxorus was roasted thoroughly, and as he slowly came and fell back toward the ground, landing on his back as I simply back flipped out of the way. Haxorus had crashed down, never expecting to get so wasted in so little time. Only then did everything come back to normal speed. Ironclyde looked like he was ready to lose it.

"How the... heck did you do that!?" Raichu shouted in complete shock, looking at me strangely.

"You'll never guess how…" I told him, looking at the defeated Haxorus.

Bardothren said:

Hello again. I wasn't planning on giving you a review, then I started seeing things I wanted to point out, and next thing I knew, I was writing down here.

To start with, I still contend that you need to limit your adverbs. A few are fine, but I feel that you're using them in excess. Here's an example where you go overboard:

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Yeah, that's true and I'll admit it. I'll try to limit and minimize them, but I don't think it's a good idea to strip them all out.

Bardothren said:

For comparison, here's the sentence without the adverbs: The strange feelings that had hit me when I became Juno were staring to feel natural now.
You're correct in saying that adverbs can convey more information, but as far as economics go, adverbs have the least bang for your buck. You'd be far better served describing Victory City, something you have definitely neglected to do.

Click to expand...

You didn't think this was enough?

Up ahead, this Victory City was easy to make out. It was just as big as Saffron, but it looked like it was futuristic and high tech. From the distance, I could make out many neon lights, huge skyscrapers, and it definitely seemed like a busy place.

...

He had a point there. I nodded as we walked along the road, knowing it would be at least another few hours before we got to the city itself. As we got closer, I took a better look at the stadium itself, and I knew that would have cost billions to build if it was actually real. If Randy really was in there, man, he sure liked to overcompensate.

Victory City was pretty much Randy's paradise. The whole city was high-tech and neo-futuristic. Meanwhile, everything he liked to his favorite colors, sports teams, video games, and whatnot was the focus of attention all over the place. Everywhere from the hologram television screens, billboards, on massive neon signs, and anywhere else you could stuff an advertisement. Either you had to like what he liked, or you'd never find it. I swore, not even the biggest celebrities got anything even close to this kind of fame.

As we stepped further into the city, the kind of people that inhabited this place were pretty much whatever Randy could dream up. Most people were dressed in the exact same kinds of clothes Randy liked to wear, and they were the kind of people Randy would think were "cool" and "awesome." There were people with blue jeans, graphic t-shirts with all of Randy's favorite things, and black sneakers. Others seemed to wear more of the fashions Randy would probably like as well from sweatshirts, hoodies, cargo pants, and a few had leather jackets also. Meanwhile, though most of them were human, some of them were completely different races, like half dragon half human hybrids, werewolves, vampires, and other races yanked out of fantasy stories, now totally made as if they were real.

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It definitely wouldn't be hard to add more onto that, but I wouldn't consider four paragraphs as "definitely neglected."

Bardothren said:

There's also this descriptive issue that caught my eye. It isn't serious, but it's a puzzling error:

The clunkiness of this passage aside, the color of the pokeball changes from when it's revealed to when it hits the ground for no discernible reason. Mention the color only once, unless there's a reason for the change, then describe the change.

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Yeah, that was a consistency mistake. Thanks for catching that and flagging it down, I went back and changed it.

Bardothren said:

Also, while directly saying emotions is fine, I highly recommend replacing direct expression words that can't be visualized (aggressive, shy, joyful) with corresponding descriptions of body language (gritted teeth and furrowed brow, downcast eyes and crossed arms, jumping and smiling) that can be seen. Simply put, it's more bang for your word count, and that's a vital element of compelling story-telling.

Click to expand...

I like this, and I think that you're right and that's a more effective way of doing it.

Bardothren said:

You had me until the word 'literally'. I know it's a voice thing more than anything else, but as a writer, I cringe every time I see that word, particularly coming from a narrator.

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Ah, alright, I clipped that one out of there. And yeah, I can see your point on that one.

Bardothren said:

Then again, it may be an issue with me more than you. I'm most accustomed to using third-person narrators to avoid having the voice interfere with the storytelling, which is something I'm feeling as I read. It's not a problem with you as a writer, it's simply a Catch-22 you've put yourself in. You can either maintain Juno's voice by adding all the adverbs a typical, illiterate teenager would use, or you can spruce up the writing and make your high-school bully sound like an educated dork. My advice would be to meet in the middle, removing the more annoying and less helpful adverbs while keeping some of them in. If you ever use more than one adverb in a sentence, I recommend trimming the sentence down to a single adverb.

Click to expand...

I think the consideration here is that when you're writing first person, the narrative will reflect the personality of the character. In third person, it really shouldn't and should be neutral.

Bardothren said:

I also have one other warning for you: don't make Juno too powerful. It's a temptation I fell into as an early writer; I made my main character so powerful that he could thrash just about any threat thrown at him. Good protagonists need weaknesses. You've probably addressed this problem in a later chapter; I simply wish to make sure you're aware of it.

Click to expand...

Well, save this point for now and we'll come back to it later after you've seen Juno in action for a little bit more. This was mainly to show that Juno has gotten a hang for manipulating the new reality of Randy's imagination, and that he may be at least somewhat prepared for what occurs next.

Bardothren said:

His walk through Victory city also made me aware of how neglected Victory City's scenery is; you'd be very well served by providing a few paragraphs worth of detail about the city, especially since it's such a vital part of the story.

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Well, I did give a lot of description in Chapter 6, but yeah, I can see where it would be necessary to remind the reader with small cues of scenery and interaction with it.

Bardothren said:

And now for my compliments: you nailed the robot's personality and efficient dialogue, as well as the exchange between Juno and his Raichu. You also did a slightly better job with descriptions in this chapter.

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Ah thanks, I'll keep that in mind and if I have some extra time to go back, I might look into dropping a few reminders about what Victory City looks like as Jake, Alex, and David walk through the streets again.

Bardothren said:

My recommendations remain the same: add more descriptive language and trim some adverbs. Unless I find something new to recommend, I don't think I'll give you chapter-by-chapter reviews for a while. until I read the next chapter and find myself compelled to make comments

Click to expand...

Not a problem, but yeah, I'll keep what you said in mind. Again, thanks for your guidance and advice. I appreciate the time and effort you spent to be helpful with this story. :D

It was all over with. Ironclyde had recalled Haxorus back into his Poké Ball, and the battle was finished. We had won, but this victory would only be short lived. The real battle was coming up, the one that would determine whether the three of us would finally reach home, or we would be doomed to stay in Randy's world forever. After seeing all this, I knew nothing short of defeat would ever make Randy let go of this place.

Ironclyde simply left without saying anything, although I knew I had spared the machine from becoming yet another one of Randy's servants. Although I did wonder... if Ironclyde were to even win against Randy, what would a robot wish for? But in the end, it would never have the capability to win against such an adversary. And I knew what it all came down to.

Imagination. It was the ultimate force in Randy's world. It would be the weapon of choice on the gray battlegrounds of Victory City Stadium and anyone that couldn't wield it was doomed right from the sart. It would come down to one final test, and someone was going to have to lose everything. Either Randy would lose the chance to live in his own world, or the three of us would lose our freedom and be under Randy for the rest of our lives. And it made me anxious to think that Randy could be right, and that our lives would never expire in this bizarre realm of his. I absolutely didn't want to live here forever. There was just something really wrong about this place.

The days that we fought Randy in the parking lot now seemed like a lifetime ago, even though it was little more than a week since those events had happened. Randy wasn't thinking logically anymore and this had gone far beyond teaching three bullies about empathy and compassion. We didn't belong here and none of this should have ever happened.

We were told by the referee to come back to the stadium tomorrow at 10 again. There was a total lack of enthusiasm on his emotionless face, and he seemed to show no interest in our effort whatsoever. It was then he told us that we would be confronting Randy in the stadium, only just now putting a lot of admiration into even just saying Randy's name. I really couldn't like this guy's attitude. He almost made it seem like the real honor was losing to Randy and serving him for the rest of time. I figured let them think that way for now.

When I finally stepped out of the underground battling arenas, I once again stepped into the concrete and asphalt streets of Victory City and all of the neon-lit buildings and hologram billboards, bathing everything around in subtle, colorful glows. Everywhere, the entire city was preparing for tomorrow's battle with advertising and promotional marketing on a limitless budget. As I saw the city swept up in excitement, I learned of one alarming thing. They were only here to watch Randy. It was Randy's face, name, and fame that was everywhere on the hologram billboards, on the sides of mass transit city busses and taxi cabs, and he was the only one that was being talked about in the streets. It was totally impossible to even tell I was the challenger!

I walked by plenty of civilians, both humans and humanoid fantasy creatures, and not a single one even knew I was Randy's challenger for tomorrow's battle. As I overheard the conversations, it was all about "what Pokémon do you think he'll use" and "how fast do you think he'll win this time." I just couldn't help but think of how... boring it would all become in time if everything was normal.

As I made my way through the crowds, dodging feet and taking less-traveled walkways and building ledges to get around, I tried to mentally prepare as best as I could, and as dusk soon came to pass and the colorful neon-glows illuminated the city even further as the high-tech city's nightlife soon became alive, I wasn't sure what to expect tomorrow, but I knew I had to bring everything. In a battle like this, there was no such thing as overcompensating too much.

When I got back to my makeshift, cardboard shelter on the balcony of an older-looking apartment building, I could barely sleep that night with the anxiety and excitement that was surrounding me. Everything had built up to this moment. Randy needed to learn something about this unnatural world he had crafted for himself. True, I had begun to realize torturing Randy was wrong and I didn't know whether it was some part of Juno or something else deep inside that was trying to bring me back to the light, but I really didn't feel like continuing any kind of bullying once this was over. I felt like I learned a lot out of this, and I now knew how much it hurts to be ridiculed, to lose horribly, and to feel abandoned and neglected. Even if all this wasn't truly real, it still felt much like it and it was downright awful.

But in the meantime, Randy needed to learn this was no way to build a strong Pokémon team. That had to be done through effort, determination, and love for one's Pokémon.

When morning came and I hadn't gotten much sleep, I was a bit worried my fatigue might cause me to slip up in the battle. Still, I took it easy, just trying to admire whatever I could. Victory City did seem like an interesting place, especially at night, and it was almost strange to think this high-tech and futuristic metropolis was simply the creation of one boy's mind.

I had only gotten my rest during that afternoon as I was finally able to push aside the thoughts of anxiety and concern. When I had awoken, the hours were counting down. I made my way to the stadium and through the massive amount of fanfare, excitement, and commotion there was for the tournament final challenge. Fireworks, confetti, banners, neon-light shows, and excitement was everywhere. Everywhere you turned, Randy's name was lit in one way or another, flashing, animated, and celebrated.

And all the people that were gathered... cheering, celebrating, and taking part in the festivities... they only wanted to see Randy defeat every trainer who confronted him in the most nastiest, merciless, and unfair ways of all time. I knew then that not a single soul in that crowd would be supporting me. They would hate every moment of victory I could ever taste, and they would roar in delight at every defeat I went through. Trying to keep one's morale and concentration up in the face of such a thing was a real, serious trial.

When I entered the stadium and followed the usual directions they gave to the final challenger, they put me in a closed room behind a metal door. The blank-staring referees simply devoid of all emotion recognized me as Randy's challenger, but only used it for directional purposes.

I was led toward the room that was just outside the final arena. Inside, it was nothing more than a concrete-walled room with a steel door that was currently closed at the moment. Another mirthless referee that had the mirth and emotion of a zombie just told me to wait for an official. And then he left me alone. It was unsettling to think about how robotic and monotone their actions and conversations were, as if it all just seemed to be a routine to them, as if they were just robots following commands and directions and had no actual life or purpose outside of these tasks.

I stood there for a solid five minutes, not able to see very much, but I could hear and slightly feel the vibrations and commotions from the outside as exciting rock music was played to get the audience and spectators revved up and excited. Then, from behind me, I had been caught a bit off guard and noticed someone came. I almost jumped from the surprise a bit, but it was even more of a shock when I realized the official was Alex Harper himsef. While he no longer looked like a butterfly and was back to normal, he looked mirthless, almost as bad as the other nameless referees. He just walked up next to me, looked down, and faced the metal door.

"You will be using four Pokémon in a two-on-two double match," Alex told me, not even realizing it was his best friend he was talking to. "Once one of your Pokémon goes down, you are to replace one of them as soon as possible. The battle ends once all four of one person's Pokémon can no longer fight. Understood?"

I just blinked twice and said nothing, not that he would have understood what I was saying anyway. I decided to put it behind me and carry on. As the minutes until show time counted down, I could hear the cheering getting even louder through the metal door. When there was a sudden and massive roar, I knew that must have meant Randy had arrived, thinking he had become the equivalent of a celebrity god.

I felt like my heart was beating harder and faster, knowing I absolutely had to do what no one else could. The pressure was definitely on hard.

And then, suddenly the metal doors opened slowly, revealing just how festive and almost crazed the now fully-packed and swarmed stadium had become. Alex then urged me to go out and meet Randy in the center of the stadium. I walked out, and the sight of the stadium was painfully familiar from the last incident when Alex, David and I confronted Randy, Frank and Jeff, only to lose painfully. Now, the big difference was there were a million people watching us, and I absolutely had to battle Randy in a winner takes all match. I could swear this was all madness.

"Welcome into the stadium," An announcer's voice shouted loud and clearly, "Juno the Pikachu, Randy's challenger!"

It was followed by a round of sarcastic clapping, booing, and mockery. I had no choice but to shut it out of my head, or else it would just grind my sanity down. It was a shame to think here I was, a fond, forgotten memory of Randy's childhood and desires, booed and ridiculed by people that Randy had imagined and created himself. When I felt that ping, I almost didn't even think about ending Randy's world anymore. I was thinking more about showing them all that Randy made a grievous mistake by carelessly forgetting about a truthful, good-hearted, and genuine Pikachu.

However, I could guess Randy was absolutely shocked upon learning who his challenger was right now. I guess he didn't expect he would be squaring off against his favorite Pokémon and the one Pikachu he had hoped to raise, train, and travel alongside in his earlier, childhood years.

And when I got closer to Randy in the center of those gray battlegrounds of the luxurious, high-tech Victory City stadium and all its restless spectators, he was still wearing his silly black leather jacket and his mirrored sunglasses. He stood there at his respective side of the stadium, waving, smiling, and thinking he was the world's best hero. Still around his neck was the Quista necklace, the whole reason this mess had begun in the first place. Randy now depended on it, just like it was his lungs or his heart. Without it, this world was gone and shattered.

It was a shame to think that instead of trying to grow strong, he relied on this necklace like a crutch. The truth was, anyone could be in Randy's seat with that necklace on, but it took real strength, training, and courage to become great and truly heroic on their own. This was what I needed to teach Randy. Taking the easy way to success was wrong and hollow, and forgetting past dreams was a dire mistake.

We had faced each other. Already, Randy was looking at me very strangely, and I could see from the look on his face that this was something he never would have expected and wasn't according to his plan or design. He obviously didn't think he would be seeing the Pokémon he once longed for and now forgotten looking back at him, and he was becoming tense. There was no doubt about it. While I, Juno, was still a Pikachu, there were very distinctive characteristics that separated Juno from any other Pikachu. I stood before him exactly as he imagined me, and to him, it was alarming.

Still, as he looked more at the crowd instead of me, he simply returned back to his egotistical nature and didn't seem to worry about a thing anymore. The smiling, confident, and smug expression on his face made it look like he had already won. He took one more glance at me, and I simply flashed him a small but simple Pikachu smile, as if to say everything was a-okay and this battle was supposed to be harmless fun despite all the massive amount of pressure and spectatorship going on.

In only a few moments, we would be engaged in the most outlandish Pokémon battle ever. There were no rules now, no limits, no nothing to stop the two of us from spawning ultimate chaos.

And as luck would have it, I found out Jeff was going to be our referee. Not good. Randy's Pokémon were going to have to be on the verge of dying before Jeff would even consider taking them out of the battle. I could already predict there were going to be plenty of false calls and dirty tricks under the table just like last time. Truly, I couldn't see how anyone was supposed to win against Randy through conventional methods, but the crowd didn't care in the slightest.

Regardless, Jeff stood between the two of us. Randy already had his Poké Balls ready, but I was going to wait to see which Pokémon Randy was going to chose before releasing my own.

"This is a match between King Randy and Juno, the challenger!" Jeff's voice boomed all over the stadium. "This is a two-on-two double battle, and each combatant is allowed to use only up to four Pokémon!"

The audience roared, itching for excitement. The tension was making me sick and anxious, but I had to shrug it off and just play it like it was all one, big game. While I couldn't lose this battle no matter what, I just had to keep calm and maintain a level head. I already knew Randy was going to play more tricks to try and win, just like he did last time. And then, at that moment, Jeff initiated everything.

"Let the battle begin!!" Jeff shouted loudly, his voice blasting all over the stadium.

Randy hadn't waited a second longer, and tossed two of his Poké Balls into the air as the audience went wild. With a smirk on his face, he looked on appreciatively as the two Poké Balls flew through the air and hit the ground and flared brightly with a blast of light. And then, his two Pokémon came out…

And I began to grow cold and tense when I realized the Pokémon he had chosen were Mewtwo and Arceus, just barely able to recognize them simply by rumors and legends. The dull-purple and white humanoid that was genetically created to be a psychic powerhouse of destruction and the white, centaur god of all Pokémon across the planet were now staring me down, just waiting for me to select two Pokémon to challenge both of them.

Randy was definitely not pulling any punches here.

Indeed, there they were all right, in the flesh, just staring me down and waiting to unleash their wrath. It was truly clear that Randy had access to any Pokémon that existed, and any Pokémon he wanted was his to own. But that wasn't even the end of it...

"King Randy has chosen Mewtwo and Arceus!" Jeff announced to the crowd. A loud applause had thundered out, and the audience was obviously anticipating a quick and very easy win.

I didn't even know where to begin when it came to taking on these two monstrosities, but I had to choose wisely. I didn't have legendaries like Randy had now. That was already going to be my first disadvantage, and it was a very major one. But I had to keep smiling like it wasn't such a big deal. The moment Randy noticed anxiety on my face, he was only going to get stronger and let his arrogance be his power in this place. I just couldn't let that happen.

At that moment, I chose to rely on Jolteon and Weavile. They have always been extremely loyal to me, and have helped me pull through all this misery. Now, I needed them more than ever.

"There's no way you can win…" I thought I heard Randy whisper to me.

I just had to keep on smirking and give him the look of "whatever." By now, he had probably become so accustomed to winning constantly that any thought of loss probably didn't even come to mind.

I prepared my two Poké Balls, and then hurled them far into the air, again, throwing them one by one like giant basketballs. And then, something really strange happened…

Both Poké Balls burst into flames, and looked like flaming fireballs. Forks of strange, blue and violet-colored electricity were encircling them, and I winced as I thought they were going to explode and kill both of the Pokémon that were inside each one. However, to my relief, when the Poké Balls hit the ground, there were my Jolteon and Weavile, completely untouched.

Jeff and Randy just looked at them in disbelief. Jeff was shaking his head, as if something had gone wrong. Meanwhile, Randy was looking at the two Pokémon with the look of irritation on his face. A sense of shocked and surprised irritation, but nonetheless, he shrugged it off. To him, I imagined a Jolteon and Weavile still wouldn't be a match.

And then I realized what the fire and electricity were about. Randy had tried once again to change my Pokémon, but this time he had failed. I could have laughed at the just desserts, but I simply kept it a secret and retained my simple, gentle, Pikachu smile. But in the end, Randy was going to have to expect way more surprises than that…

It wasn't long before Randy had snapped out of his brief trance. He looked at his two Pokémon, and prepared to give his first commands. Now was the time I needed to be more prepared than ever. Right now, I had no idea what their weakness was, and I had a feeling that the only way to discover it was through battling and experimentation.

"Mewtwo, use Celestial Starlight Barrier!" Randy commanded, "Arceus, use Divine Protection!"

Black, Depression, and Coldblood all warned me about this, but seeing it happen before me was something I'd never get used to.

And then both of Randy's incredibly super-powered Pokémon were covered by two extremely powerful shields, raising their defenses to the point of being arguably invincible. Mewtwo and Arceus had a translucent gold and silver bubble shield surrounding them, giving both of them obscene levels of defense.

It was crystal clear any standard attack my Pokémon used against them would end up doing nothing for damage. I couldn't imagine how demoralizing this would be to anyone who tried to fight Randy by the rules. First, get your Pokémon swapped in for something terrible, and then this? Coldblood was right, someone had to put an end to this.

"Try getting through that!" Randy taunted, much to the roar and excitement of the audience.

As the cheering and praises to Randy grew only louder and stronger, I knew that would have been a serious problem if I wasn't creative and didn't come prepared. I could admit, I was going to need to be resourceful in ways I never had to be before, but we hadn't even really gotten warmed up yet.

"Jolteon, use your Thundersurge Chain Lightning attack!" I shouted, "Weavile, use your Shadow Hurricane!"

Randy, Jeff, and everyone else in the stadium understood nothing of what I said. The look on Randy's face was quite comical when all he could hear from my mouth was "Pi", "Pika", and "Pikachu" in a confusing and untraceable mix of syllables based on Pikachu's name. Still, he wasn't too worried and shook off the anxiety rather quickly. But I could see in his eyes that he had never dealt with anything like this before…

Meanwhile, I used my imagination to send my ideas of a "Thundersurge Chain Lightning" attack to Jolteon and the details of "Shadow Hurricane" to Weavile. In this world, imagination on the level Randy and I could wield was a strange but highly potent form of psychic power. As if sending a message and giving them the power they needed to use it, they suddenly learned how to perform such insane, unnatural assaults, and the power they suddenly experienced was unlike anything a Pokémon has ever felt before.

"Yeah, baby," Jolteon snickered, just itching to strike with what he had just learned. "Give me a piece of these punks!"

Jolteon thrust his front paws into the ground, put his head down, and released a tremendous bolt of thunder and lightning from his yellow, spiky-furred body. He then directed the massive, electrical discharge right at Mewtwo and Arceus. They didn't know what attack it was either, but I could tell by their surprise, they never suspected this unique Pikachu named Juno was capable of highly-powerful forces. While they were able to understand the Pokéspeech that I called it "Thundersurge Chain Lighting," it didn't tell them anything about the real nature of the attack. I had only just created it. Meanwhile, Randy himself couldn't tell whether I had given Jolteon an attack order or told him to stand on his head.

Chain Lightning came out exactly as I imagined it and I was pleasantly surprised at how this amazing power worked. Tremendous bolts of thunder and lightning bound together in a furious discharge of jagged electricity. Meanwhile, Mewtwo and Arceus were suddenly caught right in the middle of it, not sure how the lightning attack would behave. And to their surprise, both of them were inflicted with paralysis unlike anything they've felt before. Even though their incredibly powerful shields absorbed and resisted most of the damage, they were not able to stop the paralyzing effects.

The crowd highly disliked this and shouted their contempt at me, but I tried my best to push their jeers and insults out of my mind. While something on this level was never intended, I needed this to be an even battle. If Randy was not willing to battle by the rules, then someone had to rise to his level and even the odds.

Meanwhile, Weavile had just stood still silently, and the world around us had become pitch black. Then, all I could see was a sudden storm of dark shadows bursting from where Mewtwo and Arceus were standing, moments before being consumed in a shrouding, black cyclone. Both of them were locked in a storm of dark, wicked haunting, as if thrown into a vortex of eternal shadow. Mewtwo and Arceus were badly confused, and this time it wasn't going to go away. It was really too bad for Randy that a simple and totally legal move like Safeguard could have saved him from so much misery.

"No way!" Randy shouted out in disbelief. "What the hell just happened!?"

"How… could… they…?" Mewtwo moaned, his head and body throbbing with agony and torment. "It's... impossible."

The audience was in complete shock, and shortly after, clear displeasure about what they saw before them. They truly had never seen a battle of this magnitude before with any contender being able to pull off anything even close to what I was doing. However, many of them were still cheering avidly for Randy, thinking this was just nothing more than him allowing me to have hope only to destroy me with it later on.

"Nice job, you guys!" I said to both of them, keeping that confident Pikachu smile and cheer.

"This is so awesome!" Jolteon said in awe, looking at the devastation he had just caused, "You're incredible, Juno, you know that!"

Randy sure wasn't happy after that. However, now he was the one with the disadvantage. And since his poor Pokémon with twitching with pain, it was us who were going to get the first strike this time.

"Jolteon, use your Diamond Breaker attack on Mewtwo!" I commanded. "Weavile, once the barriers are down, target Mewtwo using your Black Oblivion Anguish attack!"

Again, I dreamt up the details of both attacks to both Pokémon, and sent it across to their minds. I was using this power to the absolute maximum I could, because I knew if I slipped and gave Randy even more of an advantage, it could mean losing everything.

Jolteon then rushed up to the gold and silver walls that surrounded Randy's Mewtwo and Arceus, unleashing a blinding white, forked beam from his roaring mouth. The powerful surge split into a Y-shaped strike, which then slammed into both Arceus and Mewtwo, overloading both of their shields and causing both of them to shatter, much to the anger and distaste of the audience.

Mewtwo and Arceus lightly stumbled, though the barriers had taken most of the hit. As the humanoid psychic powerhouse and the white and gray god Pokémon looked back in savage anger at that strike, I knew dismantling their defenses was key. Both of them were trying to discern what the next attack was going to be like, but not even the two of them were ready for Shadow Hurricane... an attack that didn't even exist until now. Weavile prepared an all-out nightmare attack on Mewtwo and Arceus now with their shielding removed.

Weavile gave them a harsh, cold stare. He arched back his head a bit, and then unleashed a tsunami of darkness and pure, all-consuming fury of pure blackness upon Mewtwo and Arceus. Both of them never suspected something like that was even possible. For a solid ten seconds, Mewtwo and Arceus were swallowed alive by the nightmare. Randy's face turned pale, but I knew it wasn't over yet. When the darkness cleared, Mewtwo hadn't been able to bear it so well.

As Randy painfully found out, this is what happens when a psychic Pokémon tries to stand up against the fury of the night...

The audience seemed to be in chaos, totally in disbelief and thinking some kind of technical error had happened. I seemed to have a bit of an edge for now, but I was not about to suddenly depend on luck.

Mewtwo lay dazed and confused on the ground, not looking like he could handle any more. While Arceus was fine and ready to strike, Randy didn't look too pleased, and seemed to be in complete denial that anything that happened during the last few minutes actually happened. And Jeff just stood there, and refused to acknowledge Mewtwo was out and unable to battle. Meanwhile, the audience was just looking on and some of them were standing up from their seats, many of them in total disbelief that one of Randy's Pokémon actually fainted. Randy and Jeff certainly didn't believe it.

"Come on, Mewtwo, get back in there!" Randy demanded. "Psychic Endgame on that Jolteon!"

But Mewtwo, despite his best efforts to try and make one more attack, just couldn't bear the exhaustion and pain, fully losing consciousness only a few moments later. Randy just held Mewtwo's Poké Ball with dismay, not sure if he could recall the legendary psychic Pokémon or if there was some way to get him back up and fighting again.

"He's... he's gone, man," Jeff told Randy softly. "Look, just recall him and bring out your third Pokémon. We'll just forget this ever happened. I'm sure it was just an accident and he must have fainted on a technicality."

"This doesn't make any sense!" Randy exclaimed as he pointed to his fallen Mewtwo and glared at Jeff. "He shouldn't have...!"

But he couldn't find the words for what he wanted to say. Or, as I suspected, he was about to say something that would make it obvious he was cheating.

"This... Juno..." Randy stated in growling anger and he clenched his fist, "I... don't know what he's up to. I don't understand how he's doing all this."

Then, Jeff looked curiously at Randy. Something else seemed to be picking at his mind, and I knew I would be thinking the same thing I would have been thinking in his position…

"And that Pikachu?" Jeff asked curiously, looking at Randy with an odd look in his eyes, "There's something... different about him, you know? Do you know him?"

"No…" Randy muttered back to Jeff, still trying to fight his disbelief, "never saw him before…"

I figured he couldn't help but lie in this situation. Randy was just acting like he didn't know me, but I knew deep inside his heart, this was really beginning to burn. Regardless, Randy decided not to squeeze blood from a stone. He pulled out Mewtwo's Poké Ball, aimed the red recall beam at the unconscious Mewtwo, dematerialized him into a shroud of red energy, and returned him to his Poké Ball.

The audience had realized what had happened, and they had gasped. It was obvious Randy never had a Pokémon faint on him before, or at least in his world he hadn't. Suddenly they became livid, and I could hear all kinds of anger, swearing, and jeering. I just tried to treat it as white noise and not even think about what they were saying.

Instead, Randy went back to his belt holding his Poké Balls, underneath his black leather jacket. He fingered through each of them, pulled out the one he desired, and held in tightly in his hand. The battle wasn't over yet, and it was only just about to get worse. As I figured, Randy would use nothing but the best of the best when it came to Pokémon, and not the ones he truly loved and wanted.

"Juno, I'm not going to lose to you!" Randy screamed to me as he pointed an accusing finger. "You're mine! You can't defeat me!"

But I just lightly smiled in a way that said "oh, it's okay," as if I was forgiving him for a wrong he hadn't even committed yet. It was making him tense, but that alone wasn't going to defeat him.

"Go, Groudon!" Randy shouted as he forcefully clutched his Poké Ball and furiously tossed it into the arena.

Randy's Poké Ball struck the ground hard, and a moment later and after an intense flash of light, a great shadow appeared over the three of us. As a little Pikachu, looking up at a Groudon, a giant red and black colossus juggernaut, is like looking up at a skyscraper that hates you and would love nothing more than to utterly crush you. Groudon looked like a walking wall of destruction. We nearly fainted just looking at him.

The audience shook off their anger and returned back to cheering for Randy. I had only knocked out one of Randy's Pokémon, and that still meant there were three other overpowered monstrosities I had to fight down.

"Oh man…" Jolteon remarked in hesitation, "this is going to get ugly real fast."

"This kid is a freaking psychopath!" Weavile exclaimed in shock as he took a few steps back.

"Randy may have powerful Pokémon," I told them both, "but it's not over yet. We still have a chance at winning this. A good chance if we stick together."

But Randy wanted to have fun. And to him, having a Pokémon faint on him was exactly what he didn't want. He wanted to win, and he felt like he was entitled to it just because he was the one wearing the Quista necklace. I couldn't believe him…

"Go, Groudon!" Randy screamed loudly as he pointed at his targets. "Use your Storm Chasm attack! Crush them both, and make them suffer!!"

Groudon let out a low growl, slowly took his foot off the ground, and slammed it into the ground. I instantly lost my balance and fell to the ground as everything around me shook violently and forcefully. I should have jumped earlier, but this earth-shaking superpower was unlike anything I could have imagined. The ground below us was ravaged with cracks, fissures, and jutting rocks ripping up and down from the ground. I shut my eyes and winced trying to clear as much distance away, not even wanting to watch the outcome. After a long phase and violent trembling, slowly, the terrible shaking decreased in magnitude, and everything became normal. I was far enough away from the mayhem, but Jolteon and Weavile were caught in the worst of it.

As if the attack Earthquake wasn't bad enough, Randy had created something even more vicious than that. Storm Chasm was nothing but pure, earth-ravaging ruthlessness and mayhem. And the worst part was Jolteon had a weakness to it. As I slowly put my hands on the floor and lifted myself off the ground and stood back up again, Jeff was laughing hysterically.

"Jolteon is unable to battle, the victory goes to Groudon!!" Jeff laughed, announcing it to the whole stadium.

As soon as I heard that, and the audience roared with cheer and excitement, I quickly turned to see Jolteon. He was lying on his side, badly hurt and utterly exhausted from the earth-shattering tremors. Weavile was hurt very badly too, but he looked like he could still go on, even after a terrible attack like that. But Jolteon…

He had turned to me with the last bit of strength he had left. He wasn't looking well at all with his body covered with dirt, cuts, and bruises. I grimaced at the sight and didn't expect him to continue at all. He had never faced anything like that before, and it totally took him by surprise.

"I'm sorry…!" Jolteon cried out to me, looking terribly exhausted, "I wanted to go further, further than this! I wanted… to win together, with you!"

"No, don't worry about it!" I told him quickly with a reassuring smile, telling him he shouldn't fear this. "There will be other days. You did an outstanding job, Jolteon. I couldn't have done it without you."

Jolteon was silent for a moment, nodded lightly with a weak smile, but then collapsed from the exhaustion.

I then pulled out his Poké Ball, held it with both hands, aimed the recall beam at him and returned him to his Poké Ball. The audience was cheering once again, thinking Mewtwo's defeat was nothing more than just a fluke that had already been forgotten.

"Weavile!" I called out to him. "Do you...!"

"Don't worry about me!" he shouted to me. "I'm gonna make these two clowns pay for that!"

Weavile was going to need a supporting companion, and soon. He was working off of adrenaline now and I knew that couldn't go on forever. I needed to think of a new strategy, because Randy was going to believe I would use the same one again. It was obvious he wasn't going to hold back now. I had defeated his Mewtwo in his world, and I could tell that was enough to drive him to anger.

But I refused to lose, I refused. Not after all I had gone through…

They were all waiting for my next choice, the next Pokémon I would decide on to continue this tribulation. I took a glance at Randy's Pokémon, his Arceus was still in strong fighting shape while his Groudon gave me a cold stare, waiting for another victim.

I turned back to the Poké Balls on my belt, and went through them one by one. I couldn't use Raichu, since he was the electric type and Groudon would just knock the stuffing out of him just like he did with Jolteon. As for Ariados, I wasn't sure if he could take attacks like these. It would be taking a serious risk…

And then, I came across one Poké Ball too long neglected. It was the Pokémon Black had given me, untouched and reserved for the moment I really needed it. Inside was a Pokémon that was also created from Randy's dreams, but I didn't even know which one it was and if they would be able to help. However, deep inside, I knew if dreams were what created this world, I was going to have to trust them. I was, after all, one of them now.

I made up my mind. I took the mysterious Poké Ball, released it from the leather strap, and prepared to launch it into the arena. I could only hope it was a Pokémon that would be able to help me through this nightmare. I put both of my hands firmly on the Poké Ball, and then threw it forward.

They had all watched carefully, all of them, the audience, Jeff, and Randy. There was complete silence as the Poké Ball flew gracefully through the air, and then began to fall toward the ground. Jeff and Randy watched it carefully and anxiously, as if it were a grenade about to explode into pieces. When the Poké Ball struck the ground firmly, it opened with a flash of light.

When the blinding flash had died down, I realized who Black had sent to me as a helper, a protector for all of us. It was none other than the powerful crimson and snow white bird-like dragon and psychic Pokémon Latias. The jet-shaped legendary seemed to float and levitate effortlessly, and only just a second later, she opened her beautiful topaz-colored eyes and smiled, ready for anything. She floated in the air before Groudon and Arceus, smirking confidently and showing no fear what so ever.

"Nice choice…" Jeff remarked, unable to hold back the admiration…

"Shut up, Jeff," Randy growled bitterly at him.

She had turned to me, and was a bit surprised I was the one who was her trainer. However, she lightly giggled, thinking it was cool and comical.

"Hey, so you're my trainer!?" The Latias smiled, thinking it was cute. "Wasn't expecting a cute, little Pikachu, but that's cool! You ready for this!?"

"I was born ready!" I smiled, really admiring this incredible Latias I now had as an ally.

She. Was. Awesome. Before, I wasn't sure if I was on the brink of anxiety, dismay, or even insanity, but her optimism and casual nature just washed away the fear and dread like it there was nothing to it.

"Go for a Draconic Hyperfire attack!" I shouted to her as I sent her the details of the attack, really happy to have a Pokémon like her as an ally. "Go for Arceus, we need him taken out!"

And then, at that critical second when I gave her the intense and ferocious imagined attack, her eyes suddenly went wide and she realized I certainly was no ordinary Pikachu. As I used my imagination and sent her the details of the attack in mind, which she was able to instantly learn, she had felt new power, and I was the source of it.

"Holy... sweet mother of mercy, how can you..." she replied before quickly just shaking off the surprise and heading into battle. "Ah, whatever, I'm going for it!"

Then, she flew off the ground, and rushed at a lightning speed toward Arceus, letting loose a loud screech from the wind that was blazing past her. All Arceus could do was look up, dazed and confused and unable to move, not sure how to respond to it. Latias stormed her way to meet her target, and in a split second, the air itself was sliced violently with a loud and furious screaming sonic boom, and Latias had hit her mark with flawless accuracy. The slash sounded like a sharp rake tearing into thick metal while green and jade-colored flames and embers were thrown violently in all directions. It sounded terribly painful. And then just as she flew away, Arceus was swept with a fiery, draconic explosion of golden-colored flames and fire.

"Ouch…" Jeff grimaced as Arceus took a nasty blow.

And in no time at all, Latias had returned to my side, almost to my own surprise.

I had just looked at Arceus, who just completely forgot about the pain in his chest and howled in agony over the terrible, burning pain in his face. After he had staggered to stay up, he had fallen onto his side, and lost the will to fight. No one could believe what had just happened.

"This cannot be happening…" Randy growled angrily. "No... freaking way!! NO WAY!!!"

"Arceus is unable to battle…" Jeff muttered calmly. "The victory goes to…"

"Shut your rotten mouth, Jeff!!" Randy furiously shouted at him. "I can't lose, remember!? Just who do you think will be getting this victory, huh!? I'm not going to lose to a pathetic… little… Pikachu…"

There was a strong, dark feeling in the air as Randy recalled Arceus, not even thanking him or telling him he did a job well done. The audience had mixed feelings now. Some of them were angry, others were struck dumbfounded and silenced, while others were still rooting from Randy and thinking this was probably all just intentional.

I felt a very cold aura of anger and darkness as Randy decided on his final Pokémon. What freaked me out the most was he chose it very quickly. He yanked one last Poké Ball from his belt, and held it with a tightening fist, almost to the point of crushing it. Randy was brimming with fury and it was starting to get frightening.

"Now you're dead," Randy grinned maniacally with dark fury in his eyes. "You, him, her, everybody. All of you are gone! You won't exist anymore!!"

He was truly losing it. This level of anger would make him reckless and impatient, but it would also make him merciless, destructive, and I was afraid he might just never stop attacking even after we lost.

Randy then grasped his Poké Ball, primed it for release, and then angrily threw it into the arena. The shiny Poké Ball struck the ground hard, and after a brilliant flash, we lay eyes on yet another, towering titan. The three of us looked up in shock and bewilderment as we saw one of the most powerful legendary Pokémon of all time, Lugia, standing before us like a skyscraper of destruction and mayhem. The massive silver and blue aquatic bird with whale-like skin looked down at us, using his long neck to glare at us with his sharp, blue-pronged eyes.

"Oh, what a day, man!" Latias exclaimed in surprise. "Look at that dude! He probably thinks we wouldn't even suffice for lunch!"

"No... kidding..." I replied.

Despite her surprise, she still wasn't giving up and neither was I. Her spirit was unlike anything I've seen before, and she just seemed immune to virtually any kind of fear or intimidation.

Lugia had looked down at us, flashing a sinister smile. I couldn't stand the way his dark, menacing eyes glared at us. Between him and Groudon, it felt like I was seconds away from being stepped on and reduced to nothing but a puddle of goo.

"I'm going to shred away every last fiber of hope you have," Lugia taunted us. "And trust me when I say there's no one to clean up after broken dreams!"

Quickly, Randy wanted to keep the battle going. His reputation and dreams were on the line and he was not willing to give up to preserve them until the end of time.

"Go Lugia!" Randy shouted loudly. "Destroy that Weavile with an Ultra Nova Blast!"

Lugia just turned his back to us, looked at the suffering Weavile, and just looked curiously at him.

"Well," Lugia remarked with a dark smirk, "this doesn't look like much of a challenge…"

Lugia opened his mouth, and a brilliant, white sphere of power and energy took form in his mouth. As the sphere accumulated more energy, it become larger and larger until Lugia released his power, and fired a tremendous white beam at Weavile.

"Run!" I shouted to Weavile, knowing he had to find a way to fight the pain that was crippling him.

He really did try to dodge it and leapt as far as he could away, but there was too much to evade. It was like trying to doggie paddle away from a tidal wave.

"NO!" I shouted as I hopelessly watched the massive beam slam into Weavile.

Weavile cried in pain, just before the massive and deafening explosion silenced everything. Torrents of white energy created a shockwave and rocked the entire stadium. I couldn't even see Weavile anymore, buried somewhere in that blazing white, explosive chaos. Latias and I quickly fell back to avoid being caught in the destructive mayhem, hoping to not be swallowed up by it as well. Thankfully, we were able to move away just enough, but I knew the situation was hopeless for Weavile.

When the explosion died down, I looked everywhere for Weavile, hoping there was anything left of him besides ash and dust. And then, I saw him, on the ground and completely motionless, crumpled up into a heap. Randy had just pulverized my second Pokémon. Even after all this effort, we were only even now.

"Weavile is unable to battle, the victory goes to Lugia!" Jeff cried out, seemingly relieved he had something to celebrate now.

As the audience roared in delight, I pulled out Weavile's Poké Ball and returned him. He had done the best he could, and that was all. Now, he needed time to rest more than ever after that level of anarchy. I secured the Poké Ball in the leather loop and then decided on my next Pokémon, the last one I could use. Once I made a decision, there was no turning back.

And then I made a choice I won't long forget. I couldn't grab the courage to send either Ariados or Raichu into a battle they could easily get clobbered in, but I couldn't let Latias fight alone. She needed someone to help her…

I decided that if in the end I was going to lose to Randy, I wanted to know that I couldn't have done it any other way. I reached for the buckle that held the leather straps of my belt together, and separated the straps. I then grasped the belt with my Poké Balls, and threw it aside, far away from the fighting area.

I knew what I had to do…

Randy and Jeff looked at me with a bizarre look in their eyes, wondering what I was doing. Then, Jeff had suddenly realized what I was actually going to try and pull off. As I stepped besides Latias, I felt I was ready for this.

"Juno wants to fight the battle himself…" Jeff said in disbelief. "I've never seen anything like this before."

"Well, if he really wants to suffer too, that's fine with me," Randy growled. "It's payback for thinking he ever had a chance!"

Latias had looked at me, and suddenly realized what I was doing. She was surprised, blinked twice, but she seemed to also like the idea.

"Oh, wow, you want to get in on this lunacy yourself!?" Latias laughed. "These two big buffoons versus you and I! Hey, win or lose, this is going to make an awesome conversational piece!"

I almost thought I was going crazy for laughing with her, but she had this amazing optimism and sense of humor that just reassured me everything was going to be alright no matter how dark things got. Some would consider my decision crazy or reckless, but here she was, totally fine with it, and supporting me every step of the way.

"Bigger they come... harder they fall," I told Latias, knowing these two shouldn't underestimate speed over raw strength.

It was going to take both of our greatest efforts to take down two of the nastiest Pokémon of all time, two of the strongest legendary Pokémon I've ever encountered. We had been through so much that I was almost forgetting what was real and just made-up.

"Let's get on with it!" Randy shouted, just pushing the battle onward. "Groudon, let's show Juno how painful a Storm Chasm attack is!"

"With pleasure," Groudon growled in sadistic delight.

I began to look frantically for a way out, but I saw none. Then, Latias frantically leapt off the ground, and flew toward me, effortlessly levitating in midair.

"Jump on, dude!" Latias shouted to me. "I don't come with seatbelts, but it's a heck of a lot better than staying on the ground!"

I then quickly leapt off the ground, and landed on Latias's back, and held on to her neck. We then flew off the ground and went up into the air. I felt the wind blazing across my face, coursing through my yellow fur and causing my long ears to be whipped in the wind. Groudon slammed his foot onto the ground, shaking the ground tremendously, but we were totally untouched with the two of us now airborne. We circled around Groudon until we were able to see his back.

"Go for his head!" I told Latias as we flew at an intense pace. "Hit the back of his head with a Draconic Laceration attack!"

"Ha, ha!" Latias laughed as she swiftly flew around the arena before the bewildered and pointing audience. "He's sure going to feel this in the morning!"

And then, Latias flew at Groudon, and everything became a blur, everything inspired by what I dreamed of what a "Draconic Laceration" attack would look like. Hard, painful, crippling, and of course, explosive. To me, there was something cool about a slash attack that exploded like a grenade after the strike.

After I focused through the blur, everything around us began to move slowly again while we kept flying at normal speed, just like when I fought Haxorus. It seemed like Groudon couldn't even move, and then Latias moved in for the strike. For a split second, I heard an ear-splitting shriek as Latias's claws sunk into Groudon's rocky armor, and tore into it effectively and mercilessly with her claws. Once she flew off, a fiery explosion detonating against the back of Groudon's head caused the colossal, red-plated dinosaur-like Pokémon to stumble and grow angrier.

Groudon attempted to try and hit us by wildly swinging his arm, but Latias dodged with finesse as he encircled around Groudon again. Really, instead of trying to attack where we were, he was going to need to attack where we were going to be. I certainly wouldn't be the one to inform him of that crucial fighting tactic. If he hit us just once, we were going to go flying.

"Lugia, get after those two!" Randy shouted furiously. "Destroy them both!!"

Then, Lugia spread his giant, silver wings, jumped off the ground and flew into the air, vigorously flapping his wings to stay afloat, blowing dust in all directions from the furious wind gusts. It didn't take Lugia very long before he was on our tail, relentlessly chasing us as we circled around the stadium much to the shock and awe of the audience. Latias had looked behind her for a moment, and saw we had serious trouble right behind us. Our only advantage was Latias was smaller, more nimble, and not as easy to hit. However, I was sure being bigger, stronger, and more endurable in Lugia's case wasn't such a bad deal.

The audience kept cheering Lugia on, but I drowned it out by focusing on the massive, whale-like bird and what we would need to do to bring him down. Trying to fight both of them was going to be hard, but we still had a chance.

"Are you serious!" Latias called out to me. "That big lug is going to try and attack my butt!? What did my butt ever do to him!?"

"Rear gunner reporting, target acquired, 6 o' clock!" I told Latias as if this was just a game. "Don't worry, I'll keep your butt safe!"

Playing along with her light-hearted, comical banter was not only fun, but it was washing away the anxiety and fear. Her smiles, optimism, and reassurance were bringing out the best in me and were doing more our goal of victory than even the most potent adrenaline could.

"I hear that, rear gunner!" She shouted with a comical smile, enjoying how I was playing along with her. "Aqua Turkey's all yours, fire away!"

I had to chuckle at the way she called Lugia "Aqua Turkey." We attempted to move at blitz speed again, only Lugia had been catching on and easily kept up the pace. I didn't think he would be able to follow us at this tremendous speed, but now it was just me and him and I needed to figure out a way to bring him down.

Lugia was now attacking on his own free will. He had been blessed with Randy's intensive Ultra Nova Blast, and he was already preparing to unleash another beam of destruction on us. After seeing what that thing did to Weavile, I seriously didn't want to share the same experience. Lugia had an extremely aggressive look in his narrow eyes, and he almost seemed to smile while the extreme onslaught he was about to let loose upon us was only growing more powerful and intense by the second. Then, I saw he was about to fire another devastating beam. And it was aimed right for us…

"Pull up!" I shouted to Latias quickly.

She quickly responded and we ascended just in time, as a giant torrent of white, blazing energy blasted below us at a thunderous pace. A moment later, there was an intense explosion under us, sending dirt and debris scattering everywhere. I swore, the blast was deafening and I felt like my ears were ringing. Getting hit by that would probably be even worse than getting hit by a flaming train.

"Holy smokes, I hope that didn't kill anyone in the audience!" Latias remarked at the massive torrent that flew right past us.

Everything was moving so fast that I didn't even look. Again and again we circled around the stadium at a feverish pace. If I wanted to get Lugia off our tail, I was going to have to return fire, and now. But how was I going to do it when I needed to hold on?

I slowly turned around, carefully holding onto Latias's wings tightly with my hands to avoid being flung off. After carefully getting repositioned, I was now facing Lugia straight in the face, and it wasn't exactly the most pleasant and welcoming sight I've had to lay eyes on. I knew that if we got struck by just one of those beams, that was going to be the end of everything real fast. Already, Lugia was fully charged with another shot. I hated to say it, but he was getting better and faster at doing this...

"Bear right!" I shouted to Latias.

She did just that, and just in time. Just only five feet away from us was a torrent of absolute carnage. The blazing fury of the white beam was so close to the point where I could still feel the force of the attack rushing past us, but thankfully it was mostly harmless.

"Hey, we're over here!" Latias taunted Lugia, trying to mess with his head. "Do I really have to paint a target on myself or what!?"

As I looked at Lugia getting annoyed at that comment, I tried to think of an idea. The only way we were going to get Lugia off our back was if I kept attacking him. Otherwise, we could be flying around forever... or until Lugia got lucky. I gritted my teeth, held on tighter, and my cheeks began to flare up with intense electrical power. Then, I looked toward Lugia, and aimed for the area between the eyes. I then let loose a powerful Thunderflare Stormstrike attack that forked its way violently toward Lugia, and struck him right on his forehead. It stunned him for a moment, but he was able to get back on his pursuit very easily, now bearing a dark and angry smile that was just thirsting for revenge.

"You're going to regret that when you pay it back in pain and agony!" Lugia snarled.

As he flapped his wings furiously, causing gushing windstorms to sweep around, I was keeping both Latias and myself from getting hit by me being her rear vision, giving her the heads up when another attack was incoming. Meanwhile, Groudon, incapable of flight slow to move around and attack, was left to mostly watch the whole pursuit.

I prepared to strike again, this time aiming for Lugia's abdomen, hoping it would hurt him more if I hit him there. At the same time, Lugia was preparing another Ultra Nova Blast. It was going to all come down to who hit first…

I let loose my attack, and the blazing thunder struck Lugia furiously. I thought he was going to go down for sure but he just fought off the pain yet again. And then, he fired his beam of destruction, and I didn't even have half a second to warn Latias…

It blasted its way right under us, and for a sickening moment it felt like we were riding on top of it. I could feel the intense blast even stronger now.

"Holy crap, that hurts!" She cried out.

And then, Latias's had started to lose control of her flying, and all I could think was that she just got hit by the beam. We had done a barrel roll almost three times, and I looked ahead to see we were about to crash right into the ground.

"Latias! Are you okay!?" I shouted frantically. "Pull up, or we're going to crash!"

"Whoa, hang in there, this is going to get rough!" She warned me, trying to regain control.

I held onto her wings as tightly as I could, bracing myself for impact. I couldn't believe this was how it was all going to end. It was going to be so quick and furious, even when we had been doing so well. We blazed faster and faster toward the ground, and I could tell the impact was going to be extremely painful for Latias, as well as myself when I was going to go flying right off of her.

But then, at that last critical second, Latias slowly began to arc upward, but I realized it might just be too late. Just as she regained control of her flight, we made contact with the ground, and I heard a loud scrape. Latias shut her topaz yellow eyes and winced with pain. At that moment, we started to head upward again. But I could tell Latias was hurt.

"Yeahh... that's gonna hurt in the morning," She winced a bit.

"I'm really sorry about that," I told her, knowing I shouldn't have risked it by thinking attacking back was more important than keeping us protected.

"Ha, we're not out yet!" She reassured me. "He only got close, and close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades!"

I smiled and nodded, knowing we could still pull this off. While I suddenly saw my life flashing right before my eyes at that moment, we could still make this work. I turned back to face Lugia, who hadn't given up the fight at all.

"Does it hurt?" Lugia laughed. "Just wait until you both get a taste of what a direct hit feels like!"

Lugia then began charging up one more Ultra Nova Blast, trying to make it as huge as possible to the point where trying to dodge it would be almost laughable. I waited patiently for the moment to arise, but I knew trying to dodge this was going to be close to impossible.

Then, as the white, glowing sphere of energy was large and filled with a tremendous amount of glowing, white power, I focused hard on my own energy, and my cheeks flared up with more electricity than ever before, and I could feel the intense power surge throughout me. Lugia was within moments of firing off a beam that was so giant that we had no chance to avoid it. It was now or never. I released the most powerful Stormthunder Crusher attack I could, and aimed for the one spot that was going to change everything. I aimed right for the gathering energy in Lugia's mouth. When the intense thunder and lightning clashed with the charging energy Lugia was gathering for his attack, there was a massive explosion of electric and windstorm energy, and Lugia's mouth was ground zero.

The white explosion was so massive that Lugia's entire body looked like it had exploded, and the wave of white energy slowly crept toward us as we tried to race away from it and just barely managed to outrun.

"Fly as hard as you can!" I shouted to Latias.

She quickly did, and the sudden surge in speed to avoid the explosion almost sent me flying off of her like a leaf in the wind. I held on tight, knowing losing my grip would be the end of everything for me.

Moments later, the explosion died down, and Lugia recklessly slammed right into the ground, violently tumbling over and over several times as white fire and electrical discharge blazed all over his body. When Lugia stopped tumbling, we saw he lay unconscious, never suspecting his own intense power would be turned against him. After rolling over one last time, he was on his back, surrounded by the dust clouds and smoke that his tumbling body had created. He absolutely refused to move, regardless of how much Randy demanded for him to get back up.

"NO! " Randy shouted, angry about Lugia's defeat. "Get up, you dumb birdbrain! Come on, what are you waiting for!?"

"Oh man, that was epic!" Latias cheered, looking at what my attack had done. "Game over, Aqua Turkey!"

Despite his shouts and tantrums, Randy had no choice but to recall Lugia. In all honesty, I had never seen his face turn so red with angry and unending rage.

I turned around with a sigh of relief and then faced the same direction Latias's was facing, preparing to finish this.

And then, seemingly out of nowhere, a giant, spiked pillar made of chrome metal with razors on its end suddenly threw its way upward right into our faces, and forcefully slammed right into us. I didn't even have time to scream.

Latias was struck in the head extremely hard, and I was immediately thrown off of her, sent catapulting into the air. I waved my arms, trying to grab onto anything that would stop me from falling, but it was hopeless. I then crashed into a stadium support column head first right near the stadium seats, which hurt tremendously.

I shut my eyes from the pain as I fell backward, and all I could feel was a soft wind gust from underneath me as I kept falling and falling. Then, moments later, I slammed right into the ground hard, and I was pulsing with hot, burning, crippling pain all over my body. I rolled over a few times, and lay on my back. I was almost paralyzed from the agony, not even sure what really happened.

I opened up my eyes slowly, and gazed up at the stars in the black sky as hot, boiling pain continued to cripple my body. I couldn't move it was so bad. Then, seconds later I heard Latias cry out in pain as she hit the ground and tumbled close by. I heard the tumbling get closer, and she stopped only a few feet away from me. I could hear her moan in pain, never suspecting to be hurt so badly...

When I slowly turned my head, I saw it was Groudon who was responsible for hitting us. In trying to take down Lugia and deal with his nearly apocalyptic Ultra Nova Blasts, I had totally forgotten about him and didn't think he would have been capable of striking us down like that.

He had hit us with his massive tail, right at the point when he has used a similar attack to Iron Tail, only it felt like we crashed into something far more durable and stronger than even that. I was breathing hard, hoping I could get back up and try fighting again, only it seemed so distant. Jeff had just looked at the two of us fallen on the ground, and he just smiled.

"Juno and Latias are unable to battle!" Jeff shouted out with triumphant glee. "The victory goes to Groudon, making Randy the winner!"

After I heard those words and the audience roar with fiery, passionate cheer, I grabbed every last ounce of energy and willpower to get back up. Determination and adrenaline kicked in like never before and I felt a second wind come over me, refusing to accept the consequences of losing. If I stopped here and didn't get up now, I would lose everything and probably regret it forever.

I slowly rolled over onto my chest, thrust my hands firmly into the ground, and pushed myself off the dusty floor to stand right back up again. I told the pain and agony coursing through my nerves to back off, forcing willpower and mental determination to take over.

I was going to enter the fray once more…

As the audience was still cheering, I was hurting all over, the bitter sting of pain surrounded me, but it wasn't strong enough to stop my determination. If I was going to lose here, then I was going to lose everything, and I just couldn't accept that. We came so close and to lose now would have made it all for nothing. If Randy won this, everyone would just forget this close call ever happened and nothing would change.

"It appears…" Jeff said in a calm tone, "Juno hasn't given up. He still thinks he can fight."

The audience had suddenly quieted down, only just realizing that it technically wasn't over and Jeff's call had been declared too early. A Pokémon is only considered unable to battle if it loses consciousness, and I was definitely still awake.

"Really!?" Randy asked in gleeful amazement, "Heh, Juno mustn't be too smart then. Groudon, let's prove to this little wimp that he didn't stand a chance in the first place. Oblivion Razor Claw, now, Groudon!"

I couldn't believe Randy's lust for winning had gone so far that he was willing to go to this extent to destroy a once-fond memory and aspiration just to appease imaginary people he had created for himself.

But in the meantime, the audience was amazed I was still standing. However, I couldn't bring myself to move. I could barely walk, and only moments later, Groudon came stomping forward, approached me, slashed me furiously across the chest, and in a split second I found myself thrown off the ground and flying into the air. I must have flown fifty feet before hitting the ground again, and rolling around and around until I hit the back wall. I felt weaker than ever before from the intense pain. This was insane. I felt like I was going to be reduced to ribbons and there wasn't a darn thing I could do about it. A Pikachu trying to fight a Groudon? It was almost a joke, but I had to keep telling myself there had to be something beyond this.

Meanwhile, the audience was rendered silent as they watched me get thrown across the stadium. It had all seemed so hopeless now. I had turned to Latias, who was now very far away from me. She had fainted, unable to help me now. I was alone, completely by myself. And right now, I didn't see any hope for me to make it out of this alive. Then, even as I was lying on the floor, trying get back up, Randy decided to strike at me again. I told myself I had to move, or it might just be all over with.

But it was too late. Groudon had stood above me, bent down and grasped my body, and I screamed for him to let me go. But instead, I suddenly felt a great blast of wind rush past me as I was thrown again, flying out of Groudon's grasp, and flying through the air before hitting the ground once again and rolling over and over again before stopping again.

I didn't want to die like this, but I didn't want to give up either...

I had to expel the pain, or else it would never end. If I failed here, what kind of message would that send to Randy? That his delusion of victory was now the standard? That it was okay to abandon everything that had meaning in life just to win?

I had to win, because I wasn't just doing this for my own good now. I was doing it for his. Groudon had to be stopped and there was no question

"You haven't had enough!?" Groudon growled humorously. "How much more pain do you want!? Please, keep trying, because I'm loving every minute of your prolonged defeat!"

"There is no attack Juno has that can hurt Groudon." Randy remarked firmly. "That hope ended when he lost Latias. This will be over in seconds."

And as much as I didn't want to believe it, he was right. No electrical attack was ever going to hurt Groudon no matter how much effort and energy I put into it. I was scared at that moment. The only thing I could do now was just stand here and lose. Perhaps Randy had grown far too strong to handle. Maybe there really was no way to truly defeat him. I couldn't believe it. All because of a stupid necklace.

But, I could have smacked myself for thinking like that. I had turned to Latias, and I realized she hadn't given up after she hit the ground. She worked as hard as she could so we would still have a chance at winning. The two of us had worked so hard to get so far together. The last thing I wanted was for her to wake up and find out we lost, and it was all for nothing. All the hell that David, Alex, and all of my Pokémon had done for all of us was going to be for nothing.

But Latias... even in the face of the biggest threats she's ever faced, remained cool, calm, and spirited. I wanted... no, I needed to be like that. When she woke up, what kind of news was I going to give her? How was I going to tell her how it all went down?

It would all start with a smile.

I had rushed toward Groudon, trying to think of some, even small, possible way of stopping him. But like Latias would, I didn't care about the details, I just needed to get there first and now.

There had to be something. I had a strong feeling it wasn't meant to end like this.

And then, the perfect solution had come to mind…

Groudon had attempted to stomp on me several times as I made my way around his feet, trying to grab onto his back. He kept turning around and around, but I was far too fast for him to keep up. I didn't care what pain tried to drag me down, I wasn't going to accept it and my heart and will forced my nerves to stand down and cease fire. I leapt toward Groudon's back, and latched on hard, determined never to let go until what had to be done was done.

"Get him off of you!" Randy shouted furiously.

Groudon had attempted to hit me with his tail, but was left to strike at random as he could not see me. I slowly and carefully used the black grooves on his back to make my way upward. As I drew closer to the top, Groudon had struck me successfully, and it made the pain even more agonizing. I had to go slower then, struggling and twitching to try and reach my target as I climbed higher and higher. I refused to let him stop me here...

And finally, at last I had reached the point where Groudon could no longer hit me with his tail, or be able to reach for me. His tail couldn't reach the spot I was at and neither could his claws. Meanwhile, he couldn't try to shake me off either.

Then, I had come across the one way I could have a chance at winning this battle. I had found the area where Latias had struck Groudon in the back of the head with the Draconic Laceration attack, and the claw slashes had gone deep. I then approached the cuts in the back of Groudon's head, and realized in one small area, his rock plate armor had been cut and broken away to reveal the softer skin area behind it. I placed my hands on the soft skin, and then focused my energy.

My cheeks had once again flared up with incredible electric power, and I sent the harsh amount of electricity right into the exposed area where my hands were with an attack I decided to call "Stormbreaker Thunder," the most powerful electrical attack I could imagine. The powerful electric storm had bypassed Groudon's armor and had begun to electrocute him within his own rocky skin. He had tried to shake me off, but I held on as tight refusing with all my will and power to not let go as I was determined to channel as much of this attack into him as I possibly could.

I continuously poured in as much electrical power as I could into the open cut, not even once caring about Groudon's pleas to make me stop. I poured in everything, all until there wasn't a single spark left in the electric sacs in my cheeks.

The onslaught had lasted almost two minutes, and by the time I had finally stopped, Groudon had begun to collapse. Just before he slammed face-first into the ground, I quickly jumped off, and landed back on my feet, utterly exhausted. Behind me, Groudon had fallen, no longer able to fight, and I had turned around to face my fallen enemy. Randy didn't want to believe what had just happened. But while Groudon had fallen, I struggled to keep standing. I knew as long as he was down and I still stood, victory would be mine.

"Groudon, get up!" Randy shouted. "Get up! Get up you useless lug!!"

I stood there, silently, still trying to fight and endure all the bitter and crippling pain I had been though. I was, however, able to flash a tiny Pikachu smile.

"Randy…" Jeff told him. "I don't... I don't think there's anything he can do anymore…"

"Jeff," Randy told him, "Groudon will be getting up, I know it."

The audience was silent and struck dumbfounded, standing quietly, as if suddenly rendered quiet at the sound of a funeral dirge.

But Jeff shook his head, not believing the totally unpredictable result either, but still acknowledging the fact that Groudon had been finished. There was nothing that could help him. All four of his Pokémon were down.

"I'm sorry, Randy…" Jeff said calmly. "It can't...

"No!" Randy shouted, "NO!! This is not supposed to happen to me! Never! NEVER!! This should not be happening!!"

And then, Randy let loose a hideous scream of agony and frustration. It seemed to get louder and louder, and then seemed so loud it was unreal.

It was at that moment that Randy's world had begun to collapse. The starry sky suddenly shattered like glass, and all the fragments were sucked into the void. And then, suddenly everything in Victory City was starting to crumble into rubble, including the stadium itself, piece by piece. It all floated upward into the void sky, and suddenly, my heart sank in ways it had never done before...

I ran frantically toward Latias in desperate tears. I knew... as a part of Randy's dreams, if the rest of Randy's world was going to crumble apart and fade away, so would she. For that moment, nothing else mattered. As the world crumbled down to nothing and Randy's scream still rang on, I just leapt toward Latias, and hugged her in what I knew would be those final moments. As the void swallowed every last fragment of Randy's world and the only thing remaining was that crumbling stadium, I held onto Latias.

She had suddenly woken up and opened her bright, topaz-colored eyes. She was weak, tired, and worn, but deep inside, she knew we had won. She had this way about her that could just tell.

"Stay... awesome," She smiled to me.

"I still..." I muttered, tears running hard and hot down my face. "...he still... owes me a wish..."

He did. That was part of the deal.

"I wish..." I spoke as the last bits of the world around us were falling away and being sucked away into the void, "...I wish... for you... to come with me..."

...I had finally found a friend that knew how to reach out to my heart and make me happy. To guide me toward being better. And as this world faded away, I could not bear to lose her...

I didn't think about the details or what was possible and what was impossible. I didn't think about how it would all turn out for real. I didn't think about anything but her, and how she deserved a chance to carry on, away from this place, and live on. I put my tiny, yellow paws on her body, closed my eyes, and just wished and prayed with all my heart...

I felt an incredible chime of light and hope come over me, and for a split second, I felt like we had been bound together. I was lost in a sudden moment of uncertainty, but something, someone, somewhere... assured me at that crucial moment that it would all be as it was meant to be...

Then, everything went instantly black, and I heard a tremendous shattering sound, as if a million panes of glass had been broken. Everything was gone. The stadium, the gray battlegrounds, Randy's Pokémon, and his entire world... just like that.

When the awful sounds had ended, there was only the silence of darkness…


It all felt like the worst dream ever.

When I came into consciousness, I felt myself face down, cheek pressed against the hot, black tarmac. I opened my eyes and the first thing I saw were cars in a parking lot in the middle of the afternoon sky, simply waiting there like nothing ever happened here. I then realized where I was.

I was back at school, lying in the parking lot. After pushing myself up off the ground, I quickly realized from the length of my arms and legs and the shape of my body that I was no longer Juno the Pikachu, but instead as my human self, Jake Kossak. I had my normal blue jeans, white t-shirt, and all my regular clothes on, as well as belt with my Poké Balls. I then felt them with my human hand and fingers to make sure it was all real.

And then something stopped me as I suddenly recalled something. I quickly got up and did a head count on the belt with the Poké Balls.

I counted Raichu's, Ariados's, Weavile's, Jolteon's, and...

...I could not believe my eyes when I saw the fifth. I took it out and looked it over, not sure how it was possible or if I really did pull that Latias out of Randy's dream world. Did that wish... did... did it really happen? It trembled in my hand, but I knew... I could not open it until I was alone. If the others knew...

I checked my watch and saw it was still 2:18, only a minute after we had met them on that last day of school before the incident. Alex and David had gotten up, and were right beside me.

"Man, what the hell happened?" Alex asked, getting up off the ground. "For a moment, I heard this hideous scream and then it felt like…"

"It's over..." I sighed, still barely able to talk.

I had seen Frank, Jeff, and Randy only a short distance away. When I looked at them, they only began to walk away even faster and had no intention of saying anything. They simply walked away from it all, and Alex and David showed no desire of pursuing them.

"That was..." David muttered, still in shock, "...damn, that was no dream, was it?"

"Whatever it was..." Alex said, watching Randy, Frank, and Jeff walk away.

There was nothing left to do. After standing there for a few moments, trying to process everything that had happened, I knew it was time to leave it all behind and head home. I

After looking at each other, Alex and David had simply turned around, and began to head home, still overcome with a million different thoughts and not sure how to interpret it all. Meanwhile, I stood there for a few seconds, just content to see the normal world again. The air of real reality had never smelled so good.

And then, tiny red, blue, and black glints from the asphalt reflecting the afternoon sun had caught my eye, and I realized it was the Quista necklace, only now it was in pieces. As I continued to stare at it, it slowly crumbled even further, and turned into dust that was gone with the wind. I was glad that hideous torture device was finally out of my life. Never did I think something like that could ever exist.

But still, I had once again held the Poké Ball containing Latias, not sure if the wish I should have been promised actually did come to pass. Was it really possible that I could pull something out of a world of dreams and imagination into the realm of reality? If that was true... what else had come with me?

It had seemed like months had passed by when it had all happened in a minute of real time.

The three of us had run into Randy, as well as Jeff and Frank on other school days, but we no longer said or did anything to them. We no longer played the same tricks we used to. And I never did tell Randy that it was really me who was actually Juno. I could have, but it would have gone too far. None of us have ever said anything to anyone. No one but us would ever know all that actually happened.

In essence, it felt like a part of me had completely changed from that day on, as if I took something out of that strange realm Randy had created or if being Juno for that short while had opened my eyes to something new, different, and better.

I wasn't the same bully I used to be, and I never was one again. I felt far more comfort in what I found familiar, my family, my friends, and my Pokémon. There was a piece of me that had been forever changed, and I realized how precious it is to belong to something, and to be a part of it, and to contribute to it as much as you can. I began to see it in everything, as a family, a community, and a brotherhood.

I had arrived home, and my belonging to my family seemed to be more real than ever before. I no longer shouted back at my mother, and I didn't get into fights and arguments with Vicky anymore. I had lost them for some time, but in the end I had gained them back, as well as something new and different that I had realized was there all this time.

They didn't understand what had happened or why I was acting so different, but they never complained and they took a much better liking to the new me.

My own room seemed like something that had been a part of me that had been taken away. I had approached the doorknob, grasped it firmly, and opened the door to reveal the one place where I could be myself and not feel ashamed. I had looked around, seeing my bed, dresser, and my desk, as well as all the other things that were a part of me, and I was glad I could be in my own world now. When I stepped back into it, I saw it was in disarray, and I spent the rest of that afternoon just setting things right and wiping away the bitterness, the chaos, and the anger aside. I wanted home to be something to look forward to, and this whole time, I knew it had to start with me.

But even so, it still felt like I had been away for a long, long time…

Bardothren said:

Well... I suppose the ending of your story (I presume it's the ending anyways) deserves some comment. This shall be a quick review of the last three chapters, mainly encompassing the battle against Randy.

I haven't found any faults with this; your descriptive language in these sections has improved, and you have described the battle very well. You've also done an excellent job giving Jake's pokemon their own voices, Latias in particular, and you've definitely avoided the omnipotent protagonist phenomenon I warned you about. The tension of the battle flowed nicely, peaking whenever Jake was in a bind and ebbing when everything went well. The pacing was also solid, slowing down at the agonizing, tense moments.

I still have questions about the Quista necklace, though, including where it came from, what further powers it possesses, and why was it destroyed. It's the crutch this story leans on, a deus ex machina that you haven't properly accounted for at this point. This plot hole, along with crisper descriptive language in the earlier chapters, are the two improvements to this story I would start with, should you wish to touch up this story.

Click to expand...

This is actually just the ending of Part 1 of 3 for Trial of Juno I and is mainly the core reason for explaining how Juno and Blazewing the Latias come into being. Then there's Trial of Juno II, III, and IV, which each have three parts as well. Needless to say, it goes so much deeper than this.

Thanks for your great feedback, and yes, I have been keeping in mind what you said as I do the touchups to these later chapters by reducing the number of pointless adverbs while trying to capture as much emotion, description, and heart as I can without bogging it down too much. I haven't forgotten about going back to clean up the older material that you pointed out (especially on Victory City's description), but I just want to keep on maintaining a steady rate of keeping up with the story.

The Quista necklace definitely gets more coverage and will be accounted for. You're right, as it currently stands, it's a cheap deus ex machina plot hole if this were to actually be the end of it all. But... I don't want to give away spoilers that will reveal more about it in the material to come.

Only a week had passed since the incident involving the Quista necklace, but it felt far longer than that. I had lost focus on school and class work, but this time it wasn't because of laziness, disinterest, or because of cutting class early. My head was swimming with different thoughts, and the whole time, I felt and thought like I didn't quite belong here.

The experience still lingered in my mind. My whole mentally changed around, and I was no longer the nasty, bullying creep I used to be. There were some students and teachers who thought I was sick or suddenly depressed in my recent change in behaviors and actions, but it wasn't anything like that at all.

And Frank no longer stayed around Randy like he used to. He kept to himself, and we in turn kept our distance from him as well. But I could see in his eyes he wasn't the same he used to be either. He ate less, talked less, and stayed away from people like they were a plague. I never bothered him anymore. I felt signs of sympathy, empathy, and consideration for others that I hadn't felt before.

I simply didn't want to be hated or loathed any longer.

In truth, I resented how much of a jerk I had been, but I figured it was just a part of growing up. Never before had I reflected on my mistakes this way, and I found myself often tired, sighing, and still feeling that ping of guilt.

Jeff was too much involved with sports now, always saying to Randy that he had to get to practice for one of the many sports he had signed up for. I had looked at him for the longest time, and all the while it looked like nothing had ever happened. And then again, maybe it was because he was the one least affected by the whole thing after all. The rest of us… we really weren't the same anymore and never would be again.

I could only wonder what Randy was thinking, and the look on his lost, faraway face during class lectures told me he wasn't bored, but reflecting on what he had done. I only wondered if he longed for what he lost, or if he really had come to terms with it all.

For a week, I had completely avoided Pokémon battling altogether. For some reason I wasn't ready to do it again. I kept telling myself that I would get back into it soon enough. I definitely didn't want to completely retire from it, but there was too much on my mind for the moment. If I were to try, I might just not be able to concentrate the way I needed to.

It wasn't until I had gotten home one afternoon that things took a far more profound turn than I could ever imagine. For once, I hadn't even been thinking of the incident only a week ago, I was just trying to get back on my feet and keep going on with life. For once I was able to grab the time to be by myself.

I had gotten home, grabbed my belt with my Poké Balls, and had headed out to the small, grassy backyard we had in the back of the house. As I stood by the white stone patio besides the outdoor table and chairs we hadn't used in years since dad left, I could sense and feel it was quiet, still, and almost eerie. It had been on my mind for a while now. I just hadn't gathered up the courage to see if my thoughts were truly correct.

It all came down to that fifth Poké Ball...

I had only started with four when I entered Randy's world, and I wasn't sure... and wasn't ready to see if I had truly pulled something out of Randy's imagined dream world into reality. Could it really be possible? Did that wish... that bond... did it really happen?

The whole week, I was in sheer, utter fear, unable and unwilling to find out. But right now, I knew it was time to stop being scared. It was time to face the truth, whether it was true, or whether it was just a coincidence.

That fifth Poké Ball... I remembered it contained a Latias, a powerful Pokémon and cheerful, optimistic friend that kept me hopeful even just thinking about her and that final battle we had before Randy's world collapsed. But, I couldn't help but think of a single, beckoning question…

It was time to stop being scared.

I had grabbed the fifth Poké Ball, closed my eyes, pressed the center button to prime it for release, and grabbed all my faith and courage as I tossed it into the air, where it hit the patio stone and released the Pokémon inside.

What I saw completely defied the laws of logic. There she was, the same Latias I remembered from the final battle in Randy's dream world, made truly living. It denied everything I knew about reality and what could be possible.

After emerging from the Poké Ball, she immediately took a curious and fascinated glance at everything around her, admiring the trees, the house, the skies above, and she even looked at me fondly with the same optimistic and cheerful smile I remembered from before.

"Hey there!" She smiled to me. "That's interesting, so you're trying out a human form now, Juno?"

How... how did she know!? And...

...how was I able to perfectly understand what she was saying!?

I almost felt light-headed as the overwhelming thoughts rushed in. No, that was far too strange. Normally, I should have been totally obvious to how to interpret Pokéspeech. There was something else that had to be going on…

"I..." I struggled to speak, not sure what to even say.

"Oh, the look on your face is priceless!" She chuckled. "Look at that face! Redder... redder... oh, how red can it get!?"

Even with the anxiety, I couldn't help but laugh. She was so funny and cool like that.

"I... I have no clue what's going on," I laughed, flushing with embarrassment. "Really, I don't."

"Juno, I really don't know how you did it, but I owe you a big one!" She smiled to me. "Somehow... you saved my butt when that whole place collapsed. If it weren't for you...!"

She would have been gone. Forever. The very thought of someone as friendly, cheerful, and as optimistic as her vanishing from existence forevermore was hollow, appalling, and depressing. I've never had any kind of friend like her and to have lost her to that would have been pure misery.

"How were... you able to tell I was Juno?" I asked her, wondering what made it so obvious.

"Was?" She asked with a smile. "Your aura and your spirit...it's got Juno the Pikachu all over it! Looks like I wasn't the only thing you pulled out of that place!"

I was feeling very anxious. It obviously didn't bother Latias in the slightest and she thought it was comical, but to me, this was beyond strange and I wasn't sure what it would mean in the end. Was I really still soul-linked with a Pikachu born from Randy's dreams? Even though I was now back in reality in a form that... at least felt like human?

But Latias couldn't have been kidding. After all, she was the same way, and standing right before me as a dream now made real. Made possible... somehow because I wished and connected with her spiritually. And it made me wonder... what kind of effect would soul-linking with a Pikachu born of dreams and imagination have? Never before has such a thing like this ever happened...

I tried my best to just treat all of this like she would. Maybe... this was all just okay.

"That's..." I replied to her, smiling at it a bit. "That does sound a bit crazy, you know? Before I entered that dream world Randy created, you know, I was a perfectly normal human."

"I think I know exactly what happened," Latias replied with a smile, wearing a smug and confident smirk. "You assimilated with Juno the dream Pikachu and you thought it was just going to be temporary, didn't you? You linked a dream Pikachu with your own immortal soul! Oh man, yes.. that's got to be it! Wow, just what are the chances of that happening?"

She was right, such an occurrence like that has probably never happened before. Physically, I felt human, but all those feelings of renewed compassion, empathy, kindness, and determination... did I feel all those positive things because of this merge? Was becoming Juno really having that kind effect on my personality?

...

...It was.

When I did the math and thought out how differently I had changed since the incident, it was true. When it happened, something about it felt beyond even destiny that broke all fibers of realities and possibilities. If what was imagined was able to become real by coming into contact with a soul, what kind of effect would that forever have?

I didn't know how to take it, and it was probably something that could never be undone now. What would this all mean in the end?

"I never actually thought it would be permanent even after Randy's world fell to pieces," I told her, somehow still not regretting the decision for unknown reasons. "It's weird, but something about it feels... right."

"Ah, I can tell you're a little shaken up!" Latias smiled, putting her hand gently on my shoulder as she levitated around. "Trust me, it's a pretty powerful, positive, and pure aura filled with some really great and cool emotions. You may just look human for now, but you've got a spirit of a beloved Pikachu born from dreams and fond imagination! Heck, you got a feel for it yourself, you know how special that is!"

And at the same time, we both had saved each other. Without her, I never, ever would have defeated Randy, and if it hadn't been for me to save her at that last moment with whatever soul wish or bonding I had performed at that last, crucial second to save her spirit and give her life beyond the world of dreams, she would have been gone forever.

If she was happy about this and strongly felt it was something I should be happy about also, I trusted her emotions, even though we had only known each other for a short while. Something about it all just felt right, as it was supposed to happen.

"Well, for now, it's got to be our little secret," I told her sheepishly, knowing walking around with a legendary Pokémon like a Latias was going to draw too much attention, especially from Randy and the others. "If Randy was to find out about all this..."

"Ha, ha, wouldn't that knock him out of his socks!" Latias laughed as she spun around in the air like a comical dance. "But hey, I'm in no rush to surprise him. I can hang out in the ball until you feel the time is right."

"That would probably be best for now," I smiled to her, glad she was willing to agree to this.

I then used her Poké Ball and aimed the recall beam at her, dematerializing her and returning her to the Poké Ball. As I looked at the ball, I kept thinking about so many things. What would being Juno inside mean? What was I to do?

I then thought of something. If I had pulled something from Randy's world, Randy must have had to as well. I had decided I would have to try and talk to him tomorrow. It was going to be hard to approach him as I was sure the incident was as clear as day in his mind as it was in mine. But how would I tell him without revealing the truth? How long could I hide this for?

I headed back inside, and it wasn't long until we had a nice, steak dinner. Mom, Vicky, and myself were together for one of the few times we ate at the table that week. For the past few days, things had seemed better than they did before. There just seemed to be less arguing, less of a rush to get done with dinner, and things felt calm and easy.

And I was beginning to see mom and Vicky were suspecting something...

"Jake, pass the mashed potatoes," Vicky requested as she served herself some mixed vegetables.

"Sure thing," I replied softly, taking the bowl and gently placing it besides her.

And there was total silence after Vicky just dropped her metal serving spoons in disbelief as the spoons rang in the bowl with a clatter. She just blinked at me twice and looked at me with a faraway look in her eyes.

"Wow, what is new with you!?" Vicky asked, very surprised. "I didn't even have to say 'please' with that one! It's like you're somebody else! When did you ever become polite?"

I was anxious. It was true, as the old Jake Kossak, I would have told her to just get them herself and buzz off. They both looked at me like this was completely unusual...

...and they were right.

"I'm... sorry for all those things I did to you," I told her, barely able to speak.

"Did something happen!?" Vicky asked, shocked I was acting so differently. "Did someone at school die or something!?"

If I told her the absolute and honest truth, she would never, ever believe me.

"I... I don't know if I can talk about it..." I told her, still feeling anxious about being put on the spot like that. "I just hope you can accept my apology."

At that moment, she likely thought it had to be something like the death of a student at school. She could never fathom it was something so much deeper than even that.

"Well, I'll try, but this better not be some kind of trick or something," She replied, still doubtful.

And ever since then, I was impulsively nice and polite to her, and she slowly began to show the same respect but with that same look of surprise. Even with my mom, fights over homework, studying, or misbehaving all stopped and melted away like a snowball in summer.

When night had fallen, I sat by my bedside, looking at my hands, and I knew... deep inside, Juno had taken over, just as Latias had mentioned. I wasn't sure whether to be happy or scared about it, but it was strong and it had already influenced all of my day-to-day actions and decisions.

After getting into bed, my mind raced with many thoughts and considerations, but eventually I was able to find sleep in my dark room. I wasn't sure where this would take me, but maybe it would be better this way. As Juno, I seemed to be bringing calm and sincerity wherever I went, and I noticed it with myself, my family, and with school.

And then it happened like it did with all the other nights.

A transformed in personality human named Jake... and Juno by night. In my own dreams, I was Juno, exactly as before in the last days of Randy's world.

But the dream itself was unsettling.

I felt like I had been thrown on the floor, which felt like cold, hardened metal against my back. I couldn't see anything for a harsh, chilling moment as everything was bathed in black, but then I was able to open my eyes.

All around me was metal, industrial and chaotic with piping, dark steam, and strange, flashing lights that illuminated parts of the area with hellish, flickering glows.

It felt like I was in a normal hallway, only I could barely see anything. I had gotten back up on my feet, now strangely but oddly familiar in their Pikachu size and shape, as if I had been Juno this whole time and never once was a human being. I didn't understand it, but I never thought anything was wrong in my dream trance. In my dream, I accepted being Juno completely and didn't even think twice about it.

Then, a bright, red light had emerged from the end of the hallway, and a silhouette of a dark, tall figure was slowly walking toward me, holding some sort of large, blunt weapon in his hands. I put my tiny hands behind me and slowly crept away on my back in a hopeless retreat, and begging that he wouldn't notice me or I wasn't worth his time to kill anyway.

"Stop... please..." I muttered softly to the cloaked figure. "I mean no harm..."

Pipes mounted on the ceiling were blowing dark steam in front of him, and I had trouble trying to recognize who it was, only to discover it was a complete stranger. Still, I frantically tried to crawl away, but I wasn't getting very far. Then, I had stood up, and began running in the opposite direction, but I was met with a nasty surprise. I had been running in pitch black darkness until I slammed right into a metal wall. I painfully and frantically looked behind me only to see the figure move closer and closer.

He was going to kill me, and for reasons I didn't know why. I had stayed in the darkness, thinking he wouldn't see me, but it seemed like he already knew where I was. He began to approach me, slowly just to keep my anxiety rushing for a longer amount of time. Then, he was standing right above me, and he took his weapon, raised it in the air, and it forcefully came toward me at a feverish pace.

I nearly woke up screaming. I kicked and had thrown off my bed covers, and looked at my hands to make sure I still wasn't Juno. I had sighed in relief when I realized I was still normal, and more importantly, untouched despite the fear. I simply turned and I checked the clock by my bed and it was only four in the morning.

But I didn't dare go back to sleep. And still those feelings of being Juno persisted...

The next morning, I was groggy and sluggish from not getting much sleep, but as school goes, too bad, class will start with or without you. I got dressed and ate a simple breakfast of cereal and milk while mom and Vicky had bacon and eggs, and again. Vicky was still unsure if I was telling the truth yesterday at dinner. Again, that morning, things were peaceful again, and we didn't fight or argue at all.

I could tell from the look in Vicky's eyes that she still was very curious to know what exactly caused such a change in me, and she wasn't liking the fact I was still hiding it. I could tell she was hoping I would have revealed it by now, and I knew there was no way I could do that. But in the meantime, the thoughts were constantly stabbing at my mind, and it was impossible to hide it.

Once I got to school, I barely paid attention in class, now unable to get my mind off of just trying to meet Randy when we were let out. Four long classes of math, history, science, and literature simply went all over my head as my mind was focused on other things. I got called on twice by the teacher and didn't even respond. I knew I couldn't keep this up, or else they would start thinking I was clinically depressed or had learning disabilities.

But when school was done, I knew I needed to get to Randy. Before, I didn't want to have anything to do with him, but yesterday, after letting Latias out of her Pokémon and discovering the cold, hard truth about all this, I needed to know from him as well. As a result, I dashed out the back exit as soon as the bell rang. I couldn't wait another second to get it out.

"Man, aren't you in a hurry…" I heard a familiar voice say right behind me.

I turned around and looked back into the stairway to see Alex with his long, black hair, his black Zenith Death metal band t-shirt, and his blue jeans. He seemed a bit shocked at the mess I had become.

"Dude, you're okay, right?" He asked me, really wondering what was going on.

I gave him that look that said "yeah, it's about what you think it is." He nodded and knew the exact incident I was talking about, but he didn't know anything about Juno or Latias. I wasn't ready to tell him about that either...

"I need to straighten things out with Randy," I told him, finally being the first out of the three of us willing to confront him about the whole incident a week ago. "Something about it still bothers me."

"No kidding, it's been making you act strange," Alex told me, not realizing there was a whole other level to that. "Look, let me come with you. David's off at the after school debate club, but we'll be fine on our own."

I nodded, and then he followed me out the back exit. Things seemed normal for now, and most of the other students leaving for the day didn't suspect anything. I was sure maybe a few of them were a bit surprised we weren't bothering people like we used to, but to them, it wasn't that significant of an issue for them to even think long and hard about.

When we stepped outside, we looked across the busy parking lot and found Randy in the one place where he always hung out after school: on a black, metal bench completely by himself. His frizzy orange hair and his orange shorts were definitely easy to spot. I wasn't sure who or what he was waiting for, but the rumor was he was often here for an hour just waiting for his dad to pick him up.

The two of us approached him, and he looked up at us with hesitation and anxiety in his eyes. I could tell he had noticed we had changed, but it would be the first time we've confronted him about this since the actual incident itself.

"Randy, we need to talk," Alex said firmly to him. "We could really use some answers."

Randy had already known what Alex was talking about, and he didn't look like he wanted to fight about it. Everything had gotten awkwardly silent about all this. Only we knew about the "incident" that happened a week ago, but to us, it was a pretty big deal. He looked a little bit anxiously at Alex, and then just wanted to avoid eye contact.

"Look, let's go some place where no one is going to see or hear us, okay?" Randy asked Alex, already knowing what this was about. "I don't want this to go floating around. I... I already feel terrible about it."

"Fine, Randy," Alex agreed, still keeping it quiet. "How about we talk in one of those dugouts in that old baseball field?"

Only about a half a mile away was an old baseball field that hadn't been used in nearly a decade. After Randy had agreed, we simply walked our way over there, totally out of sight by anyone. Randy walked in anxious manner, seeming like he was very uncomfortable at the moment and might have been thinking we were about to beat him up over what happened. I knew he didn't want to talk about this but if I didn't say anything about it, it would haunt me for months to come.

When we had arrived, we stepped inside one of the concrete dugouts and sat down on the old, wooden bench inside. Meanwhile, Alex sat down on the concrete stairs leading out into the dusty field so that he could face Randy.

"So... what is it that you wanted to know?" Randy asked, looking like he just wanted to get out of there.

"You know what happened last week," Alex told him seriously, not wasting another second. "Randy, you gave us the nightmare of our lives. You had a power trip and we barely got out of there."

"I... I know what I did was wrong," Randy replied sheepishly while squirming in his seat. "I'm sorry. Please, don't hurt me over this. You don't know what it's like to be bad at almost everything."

Well... we did during that whole incident...

"I hope you learned something from that," I told Randy as I looked into his eyes, hoping to reinforce the whole idea of why I really came after him. "Raising Pokémon is something that takes time, there's no quick way about it. To me, it was like your dream world was sending all the wrong messages about how it's really done."

"I know, you're right," Randy flushed, backing up a bit until he had his back up against the concrete wall. "I'm not good at raising Pokémon and it's one of those things I probably should have asked for help with instead of... doing something like that."

"I don't even get how it ended either," Alex continued, wanting to know more. "You clobbered all three of us, constantly win your own tournaments against trainers that I swear would give the Elite Four a run for their money, and it's a Pikachu named Juno that nails you? What the hell, man, it doesn't make sense."

I was silent, and felt incredibly sick at that moment. I already perfectly knew the answer to that one, but I didn't want to say anything at all. Neither of them knew it was me, and I still didn't want to speak up about it.

"I really don't know," Randy muttered, trying to fight off the pressure. "I couldn't understand his commands, he gave his Pokémon and himself strange and powerful attacks, and after he decided to enter the fight himself, he just never seemed to go down despite the serious beating I gave him. I hit him with everything I could, but nothing ever stopped him. I just don't know how Juno was able to do it…"

"No, really, Randy," Alex cornered him, believing there was more than just that. "It was your world, you should have had him butchered in a heartbeat."

Randy looked at Alex for an instant, and then started to look toward the ground by his feet.

"I always wanted a Pikachu," Randy said sadly, totally avoiding any eye contact with either of us. "Juno is the name I would have given him if I ever caught one. And I'll admit, I imagined him to be way more powerful, nice, and selfless than a normal Pikachu would ever be. Juno was a side of me that was a burden that wouldn't go away no matter how hard I tried. It wasn't any surprise he decided to battle me and he was the one who won. It seemed like he was always doing that in some way. I was always losing against him. Could never catch him, could never trade for him, could never get him as a gift. It's... so overwhelming."

Interesting. I never thought of it that way. I was just about to say something when…

"What a lovely story…" I heard a cold voice say sarcastically out of nowhere.

Randy and I had looked up in complete shock, and Alex frantically turned around to see who had snuck up on us. In a feral instinct of paranoia, I suddenly became very defensive. Before us stood a pale-skilled, brown haired man in black cloak, who seemingly just came out of nowhere. He was wearing sandals, and had a very stiff and aggressive look on his face, as if he was ready to fight at any second. He spoke very quickly and aggressively.

"Who the hell are you!?" Alex shouted at the cloaked figure in surprise.

"I want to know who the three of you are, first," The pale-skinned man replied firmly. "I had been tracking that necklace for ages, and once I felt it's power being used, I headed toward the signal as soon as I could. And yet, I come here only to find it has been completely destroyed…"

I don't know how it ended up breaking, but there was something else I really wanted to know. Still, how was he able to track us down, and even get here in the first place? Just where did this guy come from?

"You're Quista, that Kavaskian sorcerer?" I asked the man. "You're the original owner of that necklace!?"

He started snickering, and at that moment, I felt like I had said something extremely stupid.

"So that's who they think I am?" He asked mockingly. "Amazing what lengths people will go to in order to fill in the gaps. My real name is Zander. I'm not Kavaskian either, or whatever that drivel is supposed to mean. Someone had stolen that necklace from me thousands of years ago, and I never got the chance to use it."

"Thousands of years ago...?" Randy recited as he became very tense. "…how could you still be alive…?"

Was this Zander person even human? I really didn't get how any of this was possible, or how someone like him even becomes a sorcerer in the first place. If he really was human, he should have been dead a long time ago, so what was he really?

"I don't care about that right now," Zander replied with a cold stare, looking right back at Randy. "One of you used that necklace, and created your own world from it with all the things you could ever desire and imagine." He then looked furious at the three of us, drawing closer. "That necklace was meant for me! My long search for it has ended with it being hopelessly destroyed, and I want to know who's responsible!"

It was strange to think that as Jake Kossak, I would have gladly fingered Randy. But, as Juno inside, I refused to throw him under the bus like that. In fact, if a fight were to break out, I knew I would be the first one out of my seat to stand before him.

"So who was it!?" Zander shouted angrily.

We were still silent. Randy was quivering, but Alex and I were within a heartbeat of attacking him both at once, ready to summon whatever Pokémon we needed to take him out.

"Hmp," Zander scoffed. "Fine, don't bother, because I already know what happened anyway. You don't think I do?"

I was quiet, figuring this would be a real test of his power.

"You, Randy," Zander spoke harshly, pointing his finger directly at him, "became frustrated at your own failures enough to use it in the first place. You wasted it just to get a taste of what it was like to win all the time at Pokémon battling... wrongfully!"

"Stop it, please…" Randy begged, finding out the hard way this guy already knew the truth about us.

"You couldn't tolerate your companions' endless defeats, so you created your own companions and made yourself a champion," Zander growled at Randy. "Can you possibly fathom how much of a waste you made of that necklace!? You used it as a tool to make up for your own incompetence!"

Randy was shaking his head. He didn't want to believe this was actually happening.

"I couldn't stand losing all the time at Pokémon battling," Randy complained. "I needed something to help me win for once."

"The whole reason why I went through the utter hell of creating it in the first place was so I could use it for what it was really meant for!" Zander shouted angrily.

I wanted to stay quiet, but something inside of me pushed me to speak up.

"You wanted to create impossible things using your imagination and then pull those things into reality," I spoke up, knowing I was the only one that could have known that.

Randy and Alex looked at me strangely while Zander just sneered a grizzly grin.

"Ha, ha, figures you would be the one to know that!" Zander laughed with a dark smile. "And yes, Randy here was so dejected about being defeated in his own dream world that he abandoned and erased everything!"

So that's what happened to Randy's legendaries. Randy gave them all up simply because they didn't win that last fight for him. Meanwhile, Jeff, Alex, David, and Frank didn't look like they managed to pull anything out of Randy's dream world either. It seemed like I was the only one that uncovered this secret unintentionally.

"Endless wealth, power, empires, and grandeur were at your fingertips, and you wasted all of it!" Zander shouted at Randy. "That was all meant for me. Your purpose for using it was meaningless and you gained nothing form it! It took me nearly a lifetime to craft that necklace!"

I sighed, now knowing what the story behind that necklace was. How Zander became a sorcerer was still beyond me, but at least I knew why he made that thing in the first place. Compared to what could have really been created from it, I could see where Zander was furious. And on the flip side, maybe it was a good thing it was gone now so this strange and agitated sorcerer couldn't ever use it for dark reasons.

"You…" Zander spat harshly, now facing me. "You're the only one that discovered it's dark secret. You wanted to free yourself from this maggot's world by defeating him. And the only way to do it was to hide yourself."

Now Randy was looking at me in curiosity. As I gritted my teeth from the realization of this all, I knew Randy was going to find out everything in a matter of moments. I really didn't want it to turn out this way, but I didn't have any choice about it.

"You disguised yourself from this maggot by turning yourself into his own, living, childhood desire," Zander snarled with a hint of cynical laughter in his tone. "So you soulbound yourself to become this Pikachu named Juno, and you defeated this maggot with the help of a Latias that you life-bonded with. Do you have any idea what you did to yourself by doing that!?"

"No, I honestly don't," I told him, telling him the truth.

"Unbelievable!" Zander laughed, making it sound like I made a grave mistake by doing that. "I don't know which one of you two I hate more."

I wasn't too concerned with how he thought of me for what I did. In my defense, I didn't know becoming Juno would do that, and I didn't see too many other options when it came to finding a way out of Randy's dream world. Honestly, deep inside, becoming Juno was making me a better person, although still shaken and uncertain of what kind of future this would entail.

"Jake... you were actually Juno!?" Randy asked me in complete shock.

I just looked at him from the corner of my eye, and then looked away, never directly answering that, but he took that as a "yes, but I really don't want to talk about it." In Zander's eyes, we had totally wasted the true potential of what that necklace could have been used for in the hands of someone who knew what they were doing with it.

I also didn't entirely know what it meant to be soulbound, but according to both Latias and Zander, who seemed to know way more about this than I did, I was essentially a dream Pikachu just in a human body now.

In the end, that was really only just the beginning to a whole other undertaking...

Zander had to realize the necklace was gone and he was never getting it back. All the anger and frustration in the world wouldn't put something like that back together, and in a way, I was actually glad about that. A relic like that was too powerful for someone like him to use it for dark intentions. It was good the only thing that walked away from it was a Pikachu and a Latias, both with good hearts and good intentions. In truth, the necklace could have been used for both good and bad.

Still, what was to stop Zander from just making another one? Besides, making our lives a complete misery wasn't going to help him get it back anyway.

"So what is it you want from us?" I asked Zander honestly, shrugging at seeing any real solution to us besides just dropping it and moving on. "It's not like this is going to change anything. Why don't you just make another necklace and be done with it?"

"It took me thousands of years to make that one!" Zander shouted in fury, despising how little I knew about these things. "I would force you to make a replacement, but you wouldn't last long enough and you don't even have a fraction of the power to do it. I will at least make you suffer for it!"

I thought Randy was going to be furious when I told him I was actually Juno. Instead, he had looked at me, and almost began to feel sick.

"I can't believe…" Randy stuttered softly, "…you went through all that trouble to just beat me. You almost killed yourself out there… I'm really sorry, Jake. I… never meant for you… to go that far."

He certainly wouldn't have said that a week ago. It seemed like when we were in Randy's world, all the suffering we encountered wouldn't have been enough. Now, it seemed like he was truly beginning to regret it. It made me wonder... did the necklace corrupt him in a way? Either way, at least we finally got over brutally hating each other…

"That doesn't matter now," Zander muttered in a serious tone. "You've taken something from me that I've spent my whole life making and looking for. And here, after all these years, I find the three of you are the reason why that necklace no longer exists. And for reasons even an imbecile wouldn't understand!"

"Hey, man," Alex told Zander in a strong tone. "It happens. Suck it up, get over it, and stop being a whiner. "

"You fool!" Zander shouted, totally interrupting Alex. "You're no better than the others. I will make you pay for this even though little compares to the kind of frustration you've dealt to me."

From my side, this all sounded like insanity. If all he wanted to do was kill us, wouldn't he have just done it already?

"I don't know what the hell you're even talking about," Alex said straight to Zander's face. "Let's face it, the necklace is gone, pal. It's over with. Maybe you should have made it more durable. Ever think of that, genius?"

"I'll watch you rot for a while before I end your miserable existence," Zander growled at the three of us, gathering dark energy in the form of what looked like a black and violet-colored ball of shadows, surrounding a glyph that was on the palm of his hand. "That's right, you'll have the chance to live for a little while longer before you witness the rise of my own personal apocalypse in a world where you're lost, confused, and hopeless!"

Then, he outstretched his arm, opened his hand, and showed us his bare palm with the glowing glyph. Alex and I tried to tackle him to the ground, but we were frozen, paralyzed helplessly where we sat.

"Da...mn... it..." Alex struggled to speak, trying to fight back with no success. "Just... di..e..."

Seconds later the whole sky went black and the whole baseball field became a sick, crimson red.

I felt nauseous and shaky as everything in front of me swirled like mixing paint and struck me with a force that must have been similar as to getting hit by a car. I wanted to get up and move, but all I could do was just sit there, paralyzed as we were just like puppets to this guy's incantations. Everything slowly became black, and I passed out…


I had awoken, but had not opened my eyes. The air around me was cold, and I could feel a faint breeze coming from above. The floor felt frozen and stiff, and only then did I open my eyes and take a look around me. For a moment, I felt shocked. I knew it wasn't long ago that I had felt this same feeling. but I couldn't recall the exact nature of it..

I then realized it was completely impossible for me to still be back at the old baseball field. The room was completely made of metal, which immediately made me think this was some kind of vault or storage container. Everything around me seemed so giant to me until I realized why that was…

I looked down at my yellow paws and feet and realized had become Juno again, a sight and feeling far too familiar. Despite how strange and foreign it should have felt, it didn't. In fact, it was starting to feel more appropriate than even being human. Again, that word "soulbound" came back to me, and I was really beginning to wonder what kind of impact this was going to have on how I was going to spend the rest of eternity.

As I looked around, I had nearly forgotten how I ended up here in the first place. Instead, I looked over my long, yellow and black tipped ears, my thunderbolt-shaped tail, my posture, and my tiny, yellow hands, all of it made me immediately question if I was to spend the rest of eternity like this. Soulbound. What did that really mean!?

I knew I couldn't run away from it anymore. I took Juno and his amazing powers, angelic demeanor, and compassion out of Randy's dream world, but little did I know this confirmation of acceptance and assimilation would drastically change my destiny forever. I was something that should have ended with a dream, but instead, now I took that highly-adored desire and gave it flesh through my own, willing sacrifice.

I almost wondered... if Coldblood had made me aware this would happen back in Randy's materialized dream world, would I still have done it? Even if it was the only way to end it all?

I had no choice but to say yes to all of it. I was not sure what kind of power had turned me back into this now natural state, but I quickly recalled it was Zander that brought us here...

...wherever this place was.

As I looked up and glanced upon my own surroundings, I realized this was actually a prison cell. Off to my right, the only window to the outside had bars around it, and the only exit was a circular, reinforced steel security vault door. There was no chance of ever getting past that thing. After getting up, getting accustomed to walking and moving as a Pikachu again, I started looking around. I realized I was alone in this cold cell with no one but myself...

...and plenty of thoughts swimming in my head for company.

My curiosity had taken a hold of me as I slowly climbed on top of the single, rickety metal bunk bed and made my way toward the window. When I slowly approached it, I peered through the bars to see what was just outside.

I nearly jumped.

The sky was a horrid mixture of red and gray with passing black storm clouds that were constantly moving and mixing at unnatural, violent speeds. Thunder and lightning were occasionally lighting up dark patches of sky, and I could feel the rumbling from far away. Despite how long I looked at it, it never once stopped. Seeing that nightmare sky definitely cued me in that I had to be somewhere far, far away from home. This... this couldn't have even been the same planet.

Meanwhile, on the ground, it looked like fields upon fields of a wasteland of twisted, dying trees had covered the landscape. In some places, fissures had opened up, seeming to be endless pits waiting to swallow up anything unfortunate enough to fall in and then never release them ever again. But nothing was moving, except for the flashing thunder in the skies above, the swirling of dark clouds, and the swaying of dead trees from a lonesome wind that quickly came and quickly passed. I had to look away.

Immediately, I recalled what Zander told us before this happened, and it was very startling.

"That's right, you'll have the chance to live for a little while longer before you witness the rise of my own personal apocalypse in a world where you're lost, confused, and hopeless!"

Quite frankly, out there, it looked like the apocalypse had already happened. He was right though, I was lost and confused as to where I was, and with Randy and Alex nowhere in sight, I didn't know what had happened to them either.

I put my back up against the metal wall, slid until I sat down, and sighed with my Pikachu ears drooping down alongside my head. Randy's world was a joyful play land compared to this place. Victory City wasn't such a bad place, and I ended it in exchange for this?

Thoughts of escaping this strange jail cell came to mind, but something kept asking me if going outside was any better. From what I saw, it seemed I was probably better off inside within the safety of my own cell than to chance going into a bizarre shadow storm like that along chasms where one slight misstep meant instant death.

As I looked at my tiny, yellow hands again, I tried to wonder why Zander thought it was better for me to be a Pikachu. Did he think the whole thing was amusing and did this to try and make a point? Or was this actually something he didn't actually have control over?

It just seemed there was no place for Jake Kossak in this world, whatever this place was. At first, I believed this was a world Zander created, though that seemed unlikely considering if he could do that already, he wouldn't have taken the loss of his necklace so seriously. My guess was this was just another harsh world that Zander wanted to slowly destroy for whatever reason, and he brought the three of us here to be a part of it.

The more I thought about it, the more I couldn't understand why oh why did I feel like I'd rather be off in Randy's world, despite how incredibly awful it was? I had only been here for a few minutes, and I already wanted to get out of here.

I already knew the cast iron bars blocking the window were too thick and too close together to bypass even with a small-sized Pikachu frame, but even if I could, I didn't think I wanted to be walking alone in that geographical nightmare. Maybe, by some strange hope, this prison was just built in a really horrible spot.

I had approached the vault door, and tried to see if there was any lock whatsoever, but instead, all I saw was the back of the circular vault door with no keyhole or anything. Still, I couldn't pick a lock for the life of me anyway, especially with only my bare hands and nothing to use as picking tools. The only way to get out of here was if someone opened the door from the other side. I had no idea how long it was going to take before that happened, but waiting around for that to happen wasn't going to help anyway.

After looking around, I truly saw no way out at all. I knew I wouldn't get out of this nightmare if I just stayed here and waited to rot away. Someone was going to have to come and at least feed me something, or I would just die of starvation. At least that didn't seem like how Zander wanted us to die. It sounded more like he wanted us to all see and feel whatever fiery and monstrous cataclysm he had in store for this place. Or, maybe it was a slow, painful death.

I decided not to take that to heart and instead, I was determined to at least go down fighting if I had to. Even if it meant having to somehow accept this form and possibly accept I might be having to let this strange world become my home for some time, I had to at least try to survive.

I checked and unfortunately, I didn't have any of my Pokémon with me. Meanwhile, it felt like the prison was designed to withstand Pokémon attacks anyway. I decided to take another approach.

The floor was made up of solid metal panels of an array of grays, browns, and silvers, all secured with extremely heavy bolts. They were nice and tight on the floor, and they weren't going to come up without some sort of heavy construction tools, which of course I didn't have. Plus the bolts were mostly rusted over, which meant they were pretty much stuck in there for good…

I had looked up at the ceiling, now seeing smaller square panels of a deep bluish metal, with smaller bolts on each corner that hadn't been rusted over like the ones on the floor. I had looked up at all of them, and saw out of the corner of my eyes, there was a panel in the corner on the right side of the window, with one of its bolts missing on the right corner next to the wall.

If I were to remove that panel, it might just be a way out of here…

The only problem with removing that panel was it was fifteen feet in the air, and there was nothing for me to even get close to it. I had turned to the bunk bed unit, which would reach high enough for me to remove the panel, but how would I be able to move it? If I were still human, it wouldn't have been a problem, since the metal bunk bed wasn't exactly the sturdiest thing in the room. But as a Pikachu, it might be next to impossible.

Suddenly, to my surprise, the vault door had clicked, and slowly swung open. By the time I had turned around, I had seen a red, clawed hand holding a pewter bowl just suddenly drop the bowl it was holding by the door, and then just like that, it was quickly shut again. Was this how they kept prisoners fed?

Just for curiosity, I had walked over to the bowl, and I could have gagged. It looked and smelled like hot, salty vomit. It was a musty brown and orange color, as if someone threw up and then took a diarrhea dump all over what was there already. I wouldn't have appreciated a nice, warm meal, but I wasn't starving enough to even think about eating that. However, I knew I only had a limited amount of time, and I highly doubted rejecting this... whatever it was, would mean an exchange for something better.

I had grasped one of the metal poles supporting the upper deck and tried to pull as hard as I could. At first, I thought I was making absolutely no progress whatsoever, but I did notice that when I looked down, I made a little bit of progress and moved the bunk bed unit a few inches. After hours of struggling, I must have pulled it five feet away from the metal wall before falling on my hands from exhaustion. I then tried pushing to see if that would change anything. It was a bit better, and I went a few more feet, but it was still at least twenty feet away from the wall, and I needed rest. It felt like pushing a truck in neutral. Not to mention I wouldn't get too far if I tore my paws apart in the process.

After a few hours of rest, I gave it another shot, only to go seven more feet before my hands and feet were aching. I couldn't go on, and I needed to stop for a while or my hands were going to start bleeding. But for now, I needed to get rid of that vomit soup, before they began to assume I was going to try and starve myself.

So, I grabbed the bowl, held my breath after getting a small but appalling whiff of the nausea-inducing soup, walked with it across the room, and dumped the stuff out the window. It was disgustingly lumpy and it smelled even worse as I poured it out. I then promptly took the bowl, put it by the door to make them think I finished off the whole thing, and then headed for the lower bunk of the bed. I didn't care for the fact there weren't any pillows and only one sheet. I was too tired…

I woke up around midnight, still feeling a little disoriented. However, after I came back to my senses and remembered what I was trying to do, I quickly headed back to try and move the bunk bed. I pushed as hard as I could for as long as I could hold out, and soon enough, I finally made it to the other side of the wall. I then climbed my way up to the top bunk, which wasn't any better than the first. I had made my way to the loose panel, and saw there were only three bolts I had to remove since one of them had already fallen out. I had put my hands on the first of the three, and turned it counter-clockwise. This one hadn't been in too tight either, and after about twenty spins, it came out. The other two were a bit harder, but after I tried hard enough, all the bolts came out, and the panel fell from the ceiling and onto the top bunk, revealing a hole in the ceiling.

The hole that was left was only a foot by foot square. While I might have had an easier time pushing the bunk bed as a human, there was no way I could fit through that hole as one. But now, being a Pikachu made all the difference. I ducked, positioned myself under the hole, and looked up.

It appeared to be some sort of ventilation duct of some sort, which was surprising since I didn't see any vent grates in my cell. I figured keeping the prisoners comfortable was not a strongpoint of this place.

I put my hands on the edge, and hoisted myself into the duct. It was somewhat tight, but I could manage. As a human, forget it, I'd be stuck eating vomit soup until they found some other use for me.

The vent was very dimly lit, so I had to first get adjusted to the darkness, and use the dim light coming from the other vents to see. I slowly crawled my way through the vent, making sure to be as quiet as possible. As I made my way about twenty feet, I had come across a vent leading to another room. When I looked through the vent grill, it looked like a guard's lounge. I took a quick glance around the room and noticed the only ones in the room were an Ampharos and a Skarmory just standing by the table, talking to each other. Oddly enough, the Ampharos was wearing what looked like crudely made combat armor and gear, which was surprising. It definitely seemed military in nature, but who goes through the trouble of making armor for Pokémon?

The room was completely metal as well, and I figured it must have been a break room with several metal chairs of varying sizes and shapes and tables at different heights. That was quite a surprise for me, but then I realized why that was. Furniture and utilities came in different heights for different Pokémon sizes. Regardless, everything was crudely made of metal, and there were two electronic storage containers that I guessed were some kind of vending machines judging by the display windows showcasing what I guessed were some kind of drinks and snacks.

It was nearly empty except for a single Ampharos and a Skarmory. They had laid out several bags on the table containing what looked like military hardware including even what looked like a crudely-made metallic rifle. It actually looked like it was just right for the Ampharos's size, but... since when do Pokémon use firearms?

"So what's the story?" The Skarmory asked the Ampharos, taking a glance at the contents of the bag. "There's a rumor going on that some of those new prisoners aren't actually Silver Rebellion soldiers. Where the hell are they from then? Conda? Crescent Moon?"

"I have no clue, I just process them," the Ampharos shrugged. "We don't keep records on these chumps. Besides, at the rate we've been sacking their cities, it won't matter."

Silver Rebellion? Conda? Crescent Moon? What exactly was that and why would two Pokémon be talking about it?

I listened in, quietly keeping by the grate but still out of sight. Something about all this really didn't add up, and I was really beginning to worry I really was on a whole different world. I've never heard of a Silver Rebellion before and definitely no mention of a place like Conda or Crescent Moon near Kanto. Not to mention it didn't make too much sense for two Pokémon to be so directly involved with something like that. Where the heck was their trainer anyway?

"Did they have anything useful?" The Skarmory asked, looking closely at the bag. "Doesn't seem like you kept much of it."

"No, mostly just useless clothes and broken technology," The Ampharos replied, bringing out the few belongings. "The quartermaster ordered for most of it to be incinerated. He told me that if it doesn't look like anything like Crimson Stars technology, burn it. The last thing he wants is us using enemy technology that would sabotage our operations."

I wasn't sure what he was talking about, or if these guys were in fact affiliated with the Crimson Stars, whoever they were. With the few pieces I had, it seemed like there was definitely some kind of war going on between these two, but I wasn't even sure why. I wasn't sure why Zander would drop me off in the middle of this, but I had no intention of playing along.

"I sure hope we fight again soon," The Skarmory muttered, looking away from the Ampharos. "I thought our rotation was almost up."

"Still got two weeks left," The Ampharos told him, grabbing and looking over the rifle that seemed to be an appropriate size for him. "Don't count down the days, trust me. Besides, the Silver Rebellion doesn't have any real leaders left. The only ones that actually posed any kind of threat are all dead or in jail. Once we attack their capital of Symarix, it isn't even going to matter any more. The rebels are fading."

Who were these rebels, and what were they rebelling for? Regardless, I checked down the vent and this was as far as it would go. The only other choice was to head back the other way, or barge in on these two. I was just about to check down the other side of the vent when I noticed something. After checking out his rifle, the Ampharos went through the rest of the equipment. One of them kind of looked like a crudely-made communication radio, then two hand grenades, a few other strange-looking devices that I couldn't tell what they were for, and a few other belongings that I could only guess what their purpose was.

"So what's all this junk?" The Skarmory asked, glancing at each of the items on the table.

"Most of these are Silver Rebellion weapons we confiscated off of the prisoners..." The Ampharos replied, checking through each item. "If we can identify it, the quartermaster says keep it. If we can't, it gets incinerated."

He then pulled out a strange looking hand-grenade that was painted orange and shaped like an aluminum soda can, covered by a metallic grid-like covering.

"This looks like one of those two Inferno Grenades I've heard about," The Ampharos said, looking over the orange-painted grenade. :As for this..." he continued, picking up a strange, metallic tube-like object, "...pretty sure this is one of those pain-killer devices. And this thing..." he said, picking up a Poké Ball, "...I really don't know. Never saw anything like this before in my life. Makes me wonder if this is a new kind of grenade."

Now that was very, very strange. Almost all Pokémon instinctively knew what Poké Balls were. Any time a human trainer came along to try and catch a Pokémon, most Pokémon were quick to recognize a Poké Ball and fight against being captured in one. Many of them even knew how to destroy them so they wouldn't be caught. But here, we had two Pokémon obviously very in tune with civilization with no clue as to what it was.

There was no doubt about it. This had to be a completely different world...

I looked at the Poké Ball closely, and I recognized it as the one that held Latias in it. I almost gasped, worried about what it was doing in this Ampharos's possenssion. It was strange, but like Latias herself, the Poké Ball that contained her was recovered from Randy's dream world, making it look the same, but I was able to recognize that it was very different from any other Poké Ball.

"Shouldn't it have been destroyed with the rest of the junk?" The Skarmory asked.

"I was just about to get to that," The Ampharos told the metallic bird with a bit of a surprised expression. "It's weird, but this was the only one that wouldn't burn in the incinerator."

My heart sank like a rock when I heard that.

No... they didn't...!

"Odd..." The Skarmory nodded.

Was he seriously telling the truth? Did they stupidly just toss all four of my Pokémon into an incinerator and just mindlessly kill them that way!? I trembled with fear and anger, and I just couldn't hold it in anymore.

"NO!" I shouted and screamed.

They both looked in my direction, suddenly surprised and alarmed. I had no choice now, I leapt and tore my way through the grate, which was easily accomplished just because it was barely fastened in the first place. I then landed on a metal shelf that was right below while the Ampharos and the Skarmory immediately looked up at me.

"Who the hell are you!?" The Ampharos exclaimed, slowly trying to inch toward his rifle.

I wasn't in the mood for a conversation with these two. If they really just tossed Raichu, Ariados, Jolteon, and Weavile into a god-forsaken incinerator and never even gave them a chance to defend themselves, they weren't worth the breath it would take to talk to them.

I angrily charged toward the Ampharos, not caring if he was almost four times bigger than I was. He quickly grabbed the rifle, but his attempt to quickly take aim and fire failed when I slammed right into his chest. Unfortunately, the armor absorbed most of the impact and the recoil did hurt a bit, but it did cause him to stumble and crash into a smaller-sized table behind him.

The Skarmory quickly charged in to help his companion with his blade-like wings fully spread, forcing me to be wary those things might be capable of instantly decapitating someone. I quickly charged a powerful Thunderbolt attack at him, which while it was nothing like what I was capable of unleashing back in Randy's dream world, it definitely did have a lot more electrical power than what an average Pikachu was capable of. Everything in the room was hit hard, including several of the metal tables and the metallic shelf, causing dozens of small metal cans to be sent rolling and rattling in all directions. The Skarmory was hit hard, but after having hit the metallic floor, he got back up on his feet and gave me a deathly glare.

I shielded myself from the barrage of metal cans, and seconds later they had all hit the floor, creating a loud, clanging noise. When it was all over with, Ampharos had turned to me, not looking very happy at all.

"Boy, you are one dead puppy," Ampharos sneered. "Do you really think you can take us down?"

"Yep, simply for the fact your electrical power can't hurt me," I told him, knowing one electric type Pokémon against another was a bit of a stalemate.

"You dumb idiot, what do you think the gun is for!?" The Ampharos laughed, quickly reaching for it again.

Suddenly it all made sense. If that Ampharos really could use that rifle, what would he ever have to worry about fighting other electric type Pokémon? Or heck, with it, he could even stop several ground Pokémon with no trouble at all, making up for his weaknesses easily. It was a grizzly thought to think here, Pokémon showed no fear or hesitation about shooting and killing other Pokémon.

He took aim and fired twice only to just barely miss and hit the metallic wall instead, forcing me to charge with blitz-speed to avoid getting shot. Going for anything that was armored was a bad idea. I quickly charged and leapt up to his head, grabbing onto his back in the process. He tried to shake me off, but he couldn't use his hands while they were still on the gun. In the time he had dropped it again, I had slammed his ears with my fists, causing an immense amount of ringing pain to him. I then attacked another pressure point in his neck, striking his throat painfully.

He threw me off, winded all of a sudden and barely able to breathe. While it would have been ironic for him to be shot by his own gun, the rifle was made for him, and to me, it was too big to handle. Unless I only wanted to shoot his feet, there would be no way I could actually aim and pull the trigger.

The Skarmory charged at me again, spreading his wings and prepared to use their slicing power against me. I didn't have much choice with where to go, so I quickly used one of the metal tables as a shield. I was shocked when his wings sliced through it and cut it completely in half. Not only that, but they cut so far through that my chest had been lightly slashed and was bleeding a bit.

The pain stung, but if I hadn't used the table as a shield, I would have been easily dissected alive...

"Come on and fight me!" The Skarmory taunted. "I swear, you Silver Rebellion worms are nothing!"

"I'm not part of the Silver Rebellion," I told the Skarmory as prepared to strike back.

For a moment, they actually seemed shocked that I wasn't. But nonetheless, it was the truth. I didn't even know who the Silver Rebellion was…

"Really?" The Ampharos asked in surprise, "Then where the hell are you from?"

"Heh, don't bother asking," The Skarmory smiled to his companion. "I swear, these Rebellion idiots have gotten even worse at lying."

I immediately charged up as much electricity as I could and directed it right toward Skarmory, casing my red cheeks to flare with a violent amount of electrical power. He only had a split second to react as he saw the incoming thunder, but it wasn't fast enough…

Skarmory had been struck hard, and he glowed like a white-hot flare from the blast. After a few seconds of intense electrocution, I released my power, and Skarmory stumbled over and fell to the floor, landing on his chest with his thin, metal wings spread out.

But, even as that happened, the Ampharos looked to his fallen companion, and knew Skarmory had the disadvantage and couldn't help it. But taking down an armored Ampharos wasn't going to be as easy…

Everywhere, the room was a mess, with cans laying all over the floor, as well as the three metal chairs that had been knocked over and the two pieces of what as left of the metal table. I had looked over to the shelf unit and saw it was still smoking from my own lightning blast.

Ampharos charged at me in a berserker fury, and lunged toward me, and I jumped into the air to avoid his grasp, sailing right over his body and landed right behind him as he slid through the slick of whatever dark-colored liquid on the floor. Ampharos had realized he had missed me, and after he got up, and turned around, I jumped into the air, turned myself in the air and smacked him right in the face with my sharp, jagged tail, again, going for a part of his body that wasn't armored. Ampharos was sent stumbling backward, trying to grab on to something before he fell on his back.

Ampharos quickly got back up again and gave me a nasty glare. He began to sway his tail back and forward, quickly gathering up a harsh amount of electricity. Then, he released it, and I was surprised when practically the whole room lit up with an intense electrical power. Everything in the room except for the two of us had been struck hard with his electrical power. Behind me, the two vending machines had exploded, and a barrage of what seemed to be soda cans had blasted right out and went rolling onto the floor. The floor was suddenly dripping wet with mixing beverages and what seemed to be some kind of soda. A can that hadn't been destroyed had rolled right next to me, and I thought of an idea.

The Ampharos was trying to get a hold of his rifle, but bending over to pick it up would leave him vulnerable. However, I knew getting shot with that thing would be fatal.

"You Silver Rebellion bastards are all the same," He snarled at me, frustrated his electrical attacks were doing next to nothing to solve his situation. "Can't even fight without cheeky, infantile tactics."

At this point, I stopped caring if he thought I was part of whatever rebel group he was talking about. I was not going to mix myself into this whole war or whatever they had going on here.

Ampharos came rushing toward me, and I quickly grabbed the nearby soda can and shook it as hard as I could, hoping this actually was a carbonated beverage and would do what I thought it would do. I then pointed the mouth of the can at Ampharos and pulled the tab, spraying him with a cloud of amber-colored root beer, blinding him for an instant. I tossed aside the half-filled can and struck Ampharos with the hardest punch I could muster, right between the eyes. Ampharos was sent flying backward, and then violently hit the back wall with his head, which thankfully did most of the damage.

I wasn't sure how much of that commotion was heard by anyone else in this place, but I wasn't about to take chances. I quickly grabbed the Ampharos's belongings and tried to find whatever useful things I could use. I wasn't sure about these Silver Rebellion Inferno grenades, but they were the only weapon I had. I had no clue what the rest of this equipment was about. I found a metallic-gray and white armored uniform, which was definitely not meant for a Pikachu and I figured probably belonged to some unfortunate soldier that was either killed or imprisoned here.

So, it was just two Inferno Grenades, myself, and Latias's Poké Ball, all strapped to an improvised belt made of worn chain links. I was going to have to work with this the best I could.

"Where the hell do you think you're going?" The Ampharos snarled as he crawled on the floor toward me, trying to get back up on his feet. "I'm not done pulling your head off!"

He killed my four Pokémon and almost killed Latias. I figured there was no time like the present. I looked at one of the Inferno Grenades, and found that triggering it involved yanking out a T-shaped metallic bolt. I pulled it out, and then tossed it right next to him and his snarling face. I then rushed out of there, thrashed my way out the scratched and beaten metallic door, and tried to clear as much distance away from the room as possible.

"YOU TWISTED-" The Ampharos screamed loudly before he was cut off.

I turned around to see the break room had instantly turned into an incinerator out of control. Ravaging, consuming fire was even leaking out of the door and into the hallway I was in. I was surprised some kind of alarm hadn't gone off, but then again, I wasn't even sure if this place or even this world had such a thing in existence.

I had no idea where Alex and Randy were being held, and I still needed to find a way out of here. I was still in dismay at the thought these maniacs had killed four of my Pokémon, but I knew if I didn't get out of here, I was probably going to get killed also. Meanwhile, there could be other guards or more of these Crimson Stars soldiers. I doubted anyone would notice I escaped the jail cell considering no one even bothered to look at me in there, but the break room being on fire with the two burnt corpses of a Skarmory and a Ampharos was not going to go unnoticed. Plus I wasn't sure if anyone heard those loud gun shots either.

I then moved my way into the dimly lit hallway. Like the prison cell and the break room itself, the hallways were completely metal, as if this was a submarine. Pipes and wires ran across the ceiling, while metal panels similar to the ones in the cells covered the floor. It was reminding me a lot of that dream, and it was unnerving.

My first objective was to find Alex and Randy, and hopefully get out of here. I headed to the right, knowing I would be heading back in the same direction that my cell was. I had made my way down, knowing if anyone were to come down this hallway, there was no way for me to hide, and I would have no choice but to fight. I had come across another rusty, metal door that had a pull latch for a handle. I jumped, grabbed the metal latch, and kicked back to open the door.

My assumption was correct. I had seen rows upon rows of heavy steel, circular vault doors. The room was much larger than the hallway, but I saw something that made me jump. A Primeape, Beartic, and Seviper had been on patrol, and when I opened the door, they spotted me.

The Beartic was the easiest one to notice, as the giant, white polar bear with his night-black claws and razor-sharp teeth could only be made worse by covering him with black and red plated armor. Even for a Beartic, he was burlier and angrier than usual. He too, was holding a gun, only this one looked like a combat-worn heavy machine gun that looked like it would usually be mounted on a tank.

His Primeape companion was a fuzz-ball pig monkey with brown arms and legs with shackles. He was wearing custom-fit Crimsons Stars armor as well, but his face was scarred and it looked like he had been in several close-combat fights before. He was also holding a dirty sub-machine gun of sorts.

As for the Seviper, he was mostly a scarred black and violet snake with yellow hexagons on his back. He was without armor, although he did have a black and red bracer around his neck.

But in the end, all three of them were filthy. When they saw me, I couldn't help but feel small and overwhelmed at that moment.

"Butt-naked and helpless... well, it looks like we have an escapee," The Primeape laughed, looking at me. "Decision time... strangle him with his own colon or play seconds of life countdown after we rip off his head?"

"Let me handle him, Captain," The Beartic snarled with a wicked smile as he gently put his massive machine gun aside to use his massive fists instead. "The damned janitor never cleaned our bunk this morning, so I'm making sure this one's remains are especially hard to mop up."

I wasn't sure about these Silver Rebellion guys, but I was already beyond sick of these Crimson Stars and their barbaric pleasures. I really didn't need this, and all I wanted was to find Randy and Alex and figure out what we needed to do to get out of here. The Beartic looked me over as he took his sharp-clawed fists and punched them together, illustrating what would happen if I got between then.

The giant, white polar bear with his night-black claws and razor-sharp teeth had growled at me. The Primeape had rubbed his fists together, thinking this was going to be an easy picking.

"Don't stop until he's nothing but goo, Slenx," The Primeape captain grinned in sadistic pleasure. "I want to count the seconds he's still twitching before he dies."

The Beartic named Slenx came stomping toward me, and outstretched his arm. While he was a hulking beast of a Pokémon, he was still held down by his slowness and his heavy armor did nothing to help his finesse and dexterity. I needed to make that something I could use. He threw his clawed fist down powerfully, and I quickly leapt out of the way just a split-second before his claw ripped into the metal floor, nearly ripping his nails off in the process. He charged again, but thankfully, being a light-weight Pikachu made it easy to leap several feet into the air and dodge the shambling giant's attacks. As his hand smashed and clawed nothing but the walls and floor, he was doing more harm to himself than to me. However, if I messed up just one evasive maneuver, it would probably mean getting half the bones in my body smashed to pieces.

"Fight me, you worm!" He shouted, thrashing angrily.

I focused my attention, and began charging electricity. I then sent the massive wave of electricity right at Beartic, and struck him in the chest, knowing his armor would only provide some protection against the electric blast. The giant polar bear Pokémon staggered back, grasping his torso and moaning in pain as forks of electricity coursed around him. Oddly enough, it seemed to hurt him more than the average Thunderbolt. Again, I wondered... was it because I was Juno and not just an ordinary Pikachu? I seriously had to keep practicing at this.

Then, I had crouched down and lowered my head. Slenx wasn't going to move now that he was paralyzed. After he had shook off the pain and began to approach me, I blasted right off the ground and everything around me became a white blaze of electric fury. I slammed right into Beartic's chest once again, sending him staggering backwards. He fell over and the back of his head powerfully struck one of the larger pipes leading up from the floor into the wall. After he had hit the metal floor and landed on his back, he appeared too weak to get back up and the powerful blow to his head had to have resulted in major blunt force trauma.

"Lucky little bastard," The Primeape spat at his fallen comrade before looking at me. "How does a guy like him get so pummeled over by a Pikachu of all things?"

Maybe not just an ordinary Pikachu. I was Juno, after all. A Pikachu born from a kid's dreams and imagination. I figured maybe the signs weren't so obvious on the outside, but I knew I was doing things a normal Pikachu couldn't.

He gave me a glare, and then he looked over to the Seviper waiting impatiently besides him. When the Primeape Captain gave a nod, the Seviper grinned wickedly, licking his lips.

"Yessss…" The Seviper hissed with sadistic glee. "I ssshall make ssshort work of him…"

The black snake with a yellow diamond pattern running along his body slithered his way across the floor, moving with an unpredictable advance. Seviper had one hell of a face, with long fangs and menacing eyes, along with a tail end that looked like a knife.

"You are finisssshed!" The Seviper hissed at me, just before blasting toward me like a bullet.

I couldn't even see Seviper it was so fast. For a moment, it seemed like it just disappeared, and then a split second later, I felt an intense spark of pain suddenly slide down my back. Only then could I see Seviper, only it was too late. I felt so much pain coming from all directions. And then, I started feeling terribly sick and nauseous, and it only got worse every passing moment. I was too weak to continue fighting, and I could barely move.

Maybe it was luck with the Beartic. I still wasn't used to fighting as a Pikachu and I certainly was no soldier like these guys were.

"Get me the chains, I want the little maggot wrapped in them until he chokes," The Primeape captain grunted.

"Yesss." The Seviper began to obey.

I tried to focus, doing my best to ignore the pain that was beating all around my body. After managing to get back on my feet, I looked back at him, letting him know I wasn't about to give up yet. I gave him a dark stare, and then Seviper looked back at me, ready to start fighting again. Yet, despite what had happened, again the Primeape had just snickered and was ready to start again.

"Forget that," He said, shaking off his anger. "Put the maggot back on the ground!"

Seviper had lunged toward me like a bullet, and then I had remembered something. Even with Seviper dashing toward me with its mouth open as it readied its fangs, I concentrated and began to focus. I remembered I managed to pull off this feat back in Randy's world as Juno. It hadn't been that long, I figured I could give it another shot. With some concentration, I grew faster and faster as the rest of the world around me just suddenly slowed down.

Suddenly, Seviper's speed had slowed to crawl, and then I dashed toward him, still rushing at my normal speed. Seviper moved around like it was crawling through tar, so it made it easy for me to get right on its back. I then charged my electricity, and sent the forking thunder and lightning right into the back of Seviper's head, and kept it tearing through him, coursing through all his nerves until I figured he couldn't stand having his brain continuously electrocuted.

Then, everything had returned to normal speed, and I jumped off of the collapsing Seviper, and faced the Primeape, who just stood there in disbelief.

"What the hell...!?" The Primeape asked in shock. "I've never seen a Pikachu pull that off! What kind of damned drugs do they have you on!?"

Drugs. This was definitely nothing like drugs, but I could tell he didn't want to give me credit for anything. Still, it was something far more powerful than any kind of performance enhancers. Without a doubt, Randy definitely had given Juno an arsenal of some pretty powerful attributes and moves. I figured I might as well use everything he gave me and try to learn as much as I could.

He had ignored the fallen body of his comrade, and prepared to attack with his sub-machine gun. I figured all the evisceration and butchery games these three had thought up were no longer being considered.

"To hell with you!" The Primeape shouted. "Eat lead and die, you god-forsaken, drugged-up lab rat!"

He opened fire, and I absolutely had to focus to avoid getting shot. Like before, he slowed down, and I could actually make out every bullet coursing its way toward me. I leapt out of the way, and then I focused my energy. My red cheeks flared up with crackling electricity again, and as he tried to reposition his aim to compensate for my blinding speed, I focused on his head, directing the blazing bolt of thunder to strike him right between the eyes. It hit him hard, and I made sure his brain was so thoroughly damaged by the thunderous attack that it would practically render him in a permanent vegetative state.

He was thrown back and his firearm went sailing out of his hands before he landed on his back, still sizzling from the attack. He lay there, completely still and unable to fight back. Really, a normal Pikachu's Thunderbolt attack wouldn't have hurt a Primeape that badly, but Juno's... definitely seemed to be a heck of a lot more effective.

I had approached his fallen body, and found a cloth bag he had been carrying. Since I couldn't pull it off with him lying on the floor, I opened the flap and looked inside.

Inside was a stockpile of healing items, antidotes, potions, and loads of other stuff. Right now, I had no choice but to use them, or otherwise I was going to collapse because of the harsh poison that Seviper injected into me. They seemed to be a little different from the medicines that I typically gave to my own Pokémon, but they were simple enough to figure out how to use them.

I hated using antidotes on my Pokémon, just because the things look so darn painful. It was a hypodermic with scarlet liquid it, not the most comforting of things to see. All I could do was expose the needle, prick myself with it, and inject the scarlet liquid by pressing down on the plunger. Never once did I ever imagine I was going to have to one day use this on myself. Despite that, I had to hurry, or I wasn't going to make it…

I removed the plastic covering on the needle, tossed it aside, and pricked myself with the sharp needle right in my side. Well, without a doubt, it sure was painful. Next, I put my tiny yellow hand on the release button on the top of the hypodermic, and pressed down. I didn't want to watch as the scarlet liquid left the hypodermic's container and entered into me.

But, amazingly, the sting from the poison was quickly flushed out and gone within only a few seconds. I pulled the hypo's needle out from my side, and tossed it away. After quickly taking a glance at the empty hypodermic, I was not looking forward toward ever doing something like that again.

I had gone back to the bag and looked around for something to heal the cuts with. After digging around for it, I found a medical spray that looked easy and simple enough to use. Mostly similar to the potions back home, but with a differently shaped bottle and a clear liquid. I removed the cap that stopped the potion from accidentally releasing the spray within the bag. I then pointed the nozzle at myself and pressed down on the spray lever, showering myself with tiny, revitalizing droplets. I was amazed how this stuff worked, it healed cuts and bruises within seconds, though there was still some scarring and damage that would take a little longer to fully and naturally heal over time. When it was finished, I felt completely refreshed, almost as if nothing had happened, though there was still some aching. Still, I couldn't always rely on these things. I was definitely going to have to be more careful about it.

For the Primeape's submachine gun, while it was a bigger and definitely oversized, I could actually use it. Trying to figure out how to eject the used magazine to replace it with a fresh one took me a while, and I realized these firearms used a trigger that was a straight rod instead of a curve. Meanwhile, their bullets were also a dark silver color, which was unusual.

Next, I found the Primeape's belt along with the ring of metallic alloy keys he had been carrying. Keys here were also very different, and instead were T-shaped and used an array of metal imprinted bar codes. I almost didn't recognize them as keys until I took a glance at some of the locks on the prison doors and made the connection.

I unloosened his belt, slid the metal key ring along his belt and removed them.

Now I just needed to find Alex and Randy…

I had realized that in order to find Randy and Alex, I was going to have to go through cell by cell, and since I couldn't see into them, I didn't know whose cell I was going to open, and I was a little bit wary thinking about it. There was no telling who or what was going to be behind the door, and the chance of someone lunging for my throat was always a possibility. I was hoping anyone here would be happy I was giving them their freedom, so I couldn't see too much harm coming out of it.

I didn't really know what the Silver Rebellion was or who was in it, but I could already assume this place was loaded with them from all the prison guards I had to take out. I hated these sick-minded Crimson Stars, but for all I knew, the Silver Rebellion could be just as bad.

I had gone over to the first cell along the left wall, all the way at the end. It read, "V17" on a metal plaque by the keyhole, and I had looked at the key ring and found the corresponding key. The whole metal bar-coded key took a little getting used to, but once I figured out how it worked, I put the key in, turned, and slowly opened the heavy metal door.

Inside, the cell was exactly like mine, only by the bedside, I had seen a Cubone, a Chespin, and a Buneary lying against the metal bunk beds. They had been wearing gray and white armored uniforms, although the Cubone was still wearing the skull helmet. The Chespin was sleeping on the bunk bed near the window, but I could tell from his scarred brown face and some of the missing and shredded leaves on his head that he had seen plenty of fighting. Meanwhile, the Buneary was soiled and her brown fur was dirty. Meanwhile, she was wearing a black eye-patch over her left eye.

They looked exhausted, but when they saw me open the door, they looked up.

"Who are you?" The Cubone asked me, suddenly surprised to see the door open for once.

Good question. I wasn't even sure myself anymore.

"I'm nobody, let's just bail out of here," I told him, knowing there wasn't too much time to do this. "We don't have a whole lot of time."

I figured I was going to need some help getting out of here anyway.

In an excited ecstasy, they had gotten up, and scrambled to the door. The Chespin and the Buneary had run out the door and prepared to keep a lookout, but the Cubone had stopped in the doorway, and looked at me curiously for a moment. I could see past the skull he was wearing to look directly into his black eye.

"That's funny, I don't recognize you from the Silver Rebellion…" The Cubone told me, looking me over strangely. "Did they rip off your uniform? Wouldn't be the first time they've done that."

"No, I'm not from the Silver Rebellion," I told him with a casual but polite smile, hoping to avoid being caught up in this war.

"Heh, well, you should be!" The Cubone replied in a somewhat amused tone. "Leading the charge on breaking open a Crimson Stars military prison? That takes guts!"

I admired his support, but I was no soldier. I had been nearly shot, pummeled, bitten, and shredded to death and had it not been for Juno's special powers, I would have been long-dead.

I had turned around, headed to the next cell, and found the key that corresponded with the door. I was really hoping I wasn't making a serious mistake by doing this, but so far, the few Silver Rebels that I had met didn't seem to be so bad. I put the key in the keyhole, and turned it clockwise until it stopped. After I heard the release pulled in, I opened the cold, metal door. Again, it was the same setup as before, only now I found a Meinshao and a Marill inside the cell, both looking like they've been in there for way too long. The white and purple weasel-like Pokémon looked like he had seen far too much fighting and the scars on his body proved it. Meanwhile, the round-shaped, aquatic mouse looked terribly malnourished and in dismay.

"Am I seeing things?" The Meinshao asked, looking at me, "You're not one of them, are you?"

"Nope," I told them quickly. "Come on, let's go before someone catches us."

They both dashed for the door with sudden, lifted spirits, and after the cell was empty, we then shut the door. I quickly moved to the third cell from the wall, and found the key I needed. Now, I felt like I needed to move faster and faster.

"There might be more coming," The Cubone warned me, urging me to go faster. "We don't have a whole lot of time."

"I'm trying..." I told him, feeling the urgency as well. "Not used to dealing with keys like these."

Once I unlocked the door, I handed the keys to the Cubone to take care of the rest.

Inside was a solitary Pachirisu, sitting on the bed with his eyes staring at the floor, his ears drooping downward, and his giant, fluffy tail laying by his side. I was surprised for a moment. His white and cyan-colored fur was relatively clean unlike the others. He didn't seem to be in such bad shape like the others had been, like he had just gotten here. That, and unlike the Silver Rebellion soldiers, this electric squirrel wasn't wearing armor either. I walked over to him, and he still looked down, not willing to face me, even though he had been aware of my presence.

"I don't know who you are, but I don't belong here," The Pachirishu said to me, just trying to push me away so he could be by himself. "I don't know why they did this to me or why I'm here."

"That's why I'm taking you out of here." I replied, trying to comfort him.

"You don't understand, this isn't the real me," He said sadly, shaking his head in disbelief as he looked away. "I'm…"

I couldn't understand what he was trying to say. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe he had been here way too long…

"I'm…" He stuttered, trying to continue, but finding it really hard to, "not… actually… a Pachirisu…"

Was this what I thought it was?

"Is that... you, Randy?" I asked.

He then immediately looked up, and I instantly knew my hunch was right. Instantly, he recognized me as Juno the Pikachu, but I didn't understand... why would Zander have Randy get turned into a Pachirisu?

"No... way..." He muttered.

"Seems it... happened to me also," I told him, still trying to wrap my head around this strange situation we were in. "Something really is weird. I... don't think there are any humans here."

"Jake..." Randy muttered, looking oddly at me. "You... you look really awesome as Juno. But... do you know where we are?"

"It's a military prison of some sort," I told him, not knowing much about the situation either. "I had to fight off some armored Pokémon with guns from some group called the Crimsons Stars."

He just seemed overwhelmed by it all, and I could tell that as he got up from his bed and tried to move around, he was definitely not used to walking as a Pachirisu. I knew the others would think it might have been either injury or weakness, but they didn't know what was really going on here. Still, if Zander turned Randy into a Pachirisu, I was quite sure he had probably turned Alex into a Pokémon as well, wherever he was.

Randy had looked at me, unable to believe. He then shook his head, unable to understand. But then, he looked at me closer and seemed to recognize me much more easily.

Just then, Cubone had poked his head out from behind the door and peered in.

"Hey, what's taking you so long in there!?" He shouted out. "We've got to get out of here as soon as possible!"

"Come on," I told Randy, knowing we could sort this out later. "We'll figure this all out once we're some place safe."

Randy just hopped off the metal bunk bed and landed on his feet. I then began to head out of the room, and he began to follow me.

I then continued to unlock door by door, releasing what seemed to be practically a small army of Pokémon. I hadn't been faced with resistance for quite a few minutes now, but even if someone had come to stop us, they wouldn't stand much of a chance with all this united effort. Almost all of them were obviously Silver Rebellion soldiers judging from the silver-gray and white armored uniforms they were wearing.

"Come on!" Cubone shouted, "I know where the exit is!"

I tried to look among the crowd for a Pokémon that might be Alex, but there was no way of telling. There were at least three dozen other Pokémon and while most of them were wearing armor, I didn't get an opportunity the unarmored ones if they were Alex.

"Is there anyone named Alex here!?" Randy asked the whole group.

They looked at him strangely, and then at each other. It definitely looked like they had never heard that name before.

"Where is he?" He asked me, knowing we didn't find him in any of the cells. "None of these guys look like they know him.

"We have to go find him…" I told Randy, heading in the opposite direction that the rest of the Pokémon were heading.

"Where do you think you're going!?" The Cubone asked me in shock, seeing I was running in the other direction. "The way out is the other way!"

I had stopped and turned back for a moment. I had noticed Randy was following me.

"There's someone I know that should still be here!" I shouted back. "We need to go find him!"

"There can't be…" He shouted back. "I've unlocked all the other cells in the whole prison. He would have to be held somewhere else…"

That didn't make sense. If Alex wasn't here, then where was he? I was just about to turn around and follow Cubone when Randy had got my attention, lightly tapping me on the back with his white paw.

"Do you know where are they hiding my Pokémon?" Randy asked me, looking up.

I felt sick at that moment and had to back against the wall to avoid fainting as I felt so light-headed from stress and despair. I had no clue how I was going to explain this with the little amount of time we had. I tried to look into his eyes, but I couldn't, and the best I could do to share this horrible news was just look down at my own two yellow feet.

"Randy, they..." I told him, taking a hard breath as I was struggling with the words, "...they threw all of our human stuff into an incinerator. Pokédexes, medicine, PokéNavs, and... and the Poké Balls..."

"No... no... nooo, why would they do that!?" Randy suddenly cried, sobbing into my shoulder. "No, please, those were my Pokémon! Didn't they know there were living Pokémon inside them!?"

"I don't think they would have cared even if they did..." I replied to him, pulling my paw on his back to try and comfort him.

It was brutal to see him so emotionally wrecked, and I felt like such a horrible person for all the times I heartlessly beat up his Pokémon and insulted them. I shut my eyes and despite Juno's power, there was nothing I could do to bring them back and take back all the horrible things I did to them.

"I... I don't get it..." Randy sobbed with tears in his Pachirisu eyes. "Why them...? Why did it have to be them...!?"

I felt the same burn in my heart as he did. Even beyond the battles, I grew up with Raichu, Ariados, Jolteon, and Weavile, and to know they were dead and I never got the chance to say goodbye...

"I just want to wake up already..." Randy cried with tears burning in his eyes. "I hate this dream. I hate everything about it."

I could only wish it was one, though. But the pain was far too real for it to be one.

"Let's go, we need to hurry!" The Cubone shouted to the two of us from down the hall. "We don't have much longer. Once they initiate the lockdown of the whole prison, there will be no way out of here!"

"We gotta go," I told Randy, knowing there was nothing we could do about it. "I'm sorry, Randy, I... lost all my Pokémon save for one."

"Save for one?" He asked.

"For some reason, they couldn't incinerate the Poké Ball that held Latias," I told him, showing him the one Poké Ball I had left. "I think it's because... they're made from your dreams."

Randy was a bit shocked, unable to understand it completely, but it surprised him also.

"This is all so... weird," Randy replied, still unable to believe this was all really happening.

"We'll try to figure it all out later," I told him, knowing we were still in dangerous territory here. "Right now, we've got to go follow that Cubone. I don't know about these Silver Rebellion soldiers, but I'm sure if they wanted to kill us, they would have done it already."

He nodded, and got up on his own two white furry feet. He was slowly getting the hang of traveling as a Pachirisu, which I could imagine wasn't easy for him considering he spent the last decade and a half as a human.

Already, everyone else but Cubone had already left the building, and we quickly rushed to follow him. Just past the second metal door of the jail room, there was a metal exit leading out. Randy and I quickly made our way outside. I could only hope Alex wasn't still in there, and I was willing to take the Cubone's word for it, but if that wasn't the case, we would never be able to get to him now…

Outside, I got a full view of just how ravaged and torn apart this strange and foreign alien world was. As Randy and I looked upon the fields, the black ruins of a massive city had lied before us with the dark thunder still raging on overhead. The land was charred black in various places, and the fragments of tall buildings lay around us like twisted, jagged thorns. All that was left was a field of twisted, empty shells. Above it all was the fiery colored sky with its occasional flashes of thunder endlessly clashing in the air, the same nightmare I had seen from my cell window…

I was wondering what caused all this, and I was just about to ask the Cubone about it before stopping myself. I then figured it might be a good idea to not so quickly reveal Randy and I were former humans by showing ignorance. For all we knew, this could be new, or it could be something these Pokémon have always had to deal with.

And then, the Marill had emerged from the group, mounted upon a fierce-looking Pidgeot. I had no idea where he had gotten that massive bird from, but he was now equipped with all kinds of riding gear and armor. He looked down upon Cubone. He seemed a bit distressed…

"Sir, we had better leave before the Wind Strikers arrive…" The Marill warned him with anxiety. "Your mount is awaiting, and most of the others have already mounted up and are ready to leave. But there's not much time."

"Wind Strikers…?" Randy asked, feeling a bit worried.

"I guess you two really aren't from around here," The Cubone told him. "They're aerial sentinels who ride Skarmories. They're fast, lethal, and they simply enjoy killing. Their weapons are also highly advanced."

So, I figured that Ampharos in the break room had to be a Wind Striker. His Skarmory was certainly no joke and neither was that massive rifle he was using.

It wasn't long until the rest of the released prisoners had come forward, all of them mounted on Pidgeots that were equipped with riding gear and armor. From what I could tell, these Crimson Stars guys had locked up their mounts in another area of the prison. A Pidgeot without a rider had come forward to the Cubone, and it seemed like Cubone had known this particular Pidgeot before. I figured the other Silver Rebellion captives had found out where they had been keeping their riding mounts and managed to release them. Soon enough, the Cubone jumped up upon the Pidgeot's back, and strapped himself in with the riding saddle that was on the giant bird's back, now ready to ride.

At that moment, Randy and I just looked at each other, and we were both thinking the same thing. Randy and I then looked back at the Cubone and his other riders, and the question of whether these Pidgeot mounts could support two riders came up, but judging from the saddles and the gear they were wearing, it seemed like an obvious answer. There was no way we were getting on those things, and I didn't feel like holding onto one of their backs for dear life.

"Uhhh…" Randy said to the Cubone in hesitation, "We don't have a Pidgeot…"

"You don't?" Cubone asked in some surprise. "No flying mount at all? How did you end up in the same prison as us Storm Riders?"

Randy seemed a bit embarrassed, and I couldn't blame him since I was pretty much in the same situation as he was in. I didn't know what a Storm Rider was either, and these Pokémon had a way about them that made you feel a little stupid for asking.

"Well, like I said earlier, we're not part of the Silver Rebellion," I told him, trying to put it casually. "Hence... the lack of a Pidgeot mount."

"What are the Storm Riders anyway?" Randy asked, looking at Cubone in curiosity.

"That's who we are." Cubone responded, putting a fist to his chest in a proud salute. "We're the aerial forces of the Silver Rebellion, and we use Pidgeots as a means of transportation and as a means of attack."

I had to admit, it was pretty impressive what these Storm Riders managed to create. An aerial attack force of two Pokémon working together.

"Wow, that's... awesome…" Randy said in awe, just looking at all the Pidgeot riders. "But... are you sure we can't get a ride? I have no idea how we're going to get out of here otherwise..."

"I've got it covered," I assured him.

I didn't have a Pidgeot, but I certainly still had Latias. I unstrapped Latias's Poké Ball from my waist, and pressed the primer button, enlarging the Poké Ball a bit to be prepared for release. A few of the Storm Riders looked curiously at what I was doing, probably having never seen a Poké Ball in action before. Regardless, I took the Poké Ball and I tossed it onto the ground. Sure enough, there was a flash, and the white light had formed into Latias.

Once the light had become her and she had looked around at the scorched earth, it was clear she had no idea where she was again.

"Holy cow, someone please change the channel," She blinked twice at the ravaged world she saw before her. "Okay, who ordered apocalypse and forgot the fries?"

She then turned and looked at me to realize... I was Juno the Pikachu again. I figured this was probably looking pretty weird to her right now, but I figured I could fill her in on the details later. Still, I couldn't blame her for feeling so confused at that moment…

"Uh huh, okay," She nodded cynically. "Yep, something's weird again."

And then, suddenly, all of the Storm Riders were looking at Latias and I. Every single one of them and even their Pidgeot mounts had just completely stopped and just stared at the two of us, some of them just gaping at the sight with a few gasps here and there. They just looked at Latias and me blankly for a few moments, and said nothing. I had looked back at them, and had absolutely no idea why they were looking at me that way. For a moment, I thought it was because Latias was a pretty rare and legendary Pokémon, but their mesmerized reaction magnified to something even well beyond that.

"...And he will come at your most dire time of need…" Cubone had softly murmured, still blankly staring at me in a strange way, "He will arrive upon a bird as red as blood, and as white as lightning…"

I looked at him strangely, suddenly realizing he was reciting something from somewhere he must have read. Even Latias was looking at him strangely, having no idea who this strange Cubone was. It was… quite eerie to see him so hasty for a moment to get out of here, and then be totally mesmerized into this kind of behavior.

"Were you... saying something?" Randy asked Cubone, wondering what he was exactly talking about.

"When the skies turn into fire and the land is burnt into ash, he will come. We have waited too long for this day to arrive…" Cubone stated in a firm tone, "The restless masses, the battles, the nightmares… When the night seems endless and all hope has faded, he will come, and he will go by the name of Juno…"

Now he was freaking me out. How the heck did he know my name? And why was everyone staring at me? He sounded like he was reciting something like he had read countless times. I thought we needed to get out of here before the Wind Strikers came. Why was everyone just waiting around?

"How did... you know my name?" I asked him, knowing there was no way he could have just guessed that.

"Could someone be so kind to tell us where we are?" Latias asked, looking around curiously. "And most importantly, the quickest way out!?"

"I will show you, Blazewing," Cubone said to Latias, seemingly proud to be in her presence. "We must make haste."

Blazewing? He knew Latias's name before even I did?

"No way!" She exclaimed with shock. "If that was a lucky guess, forget this place, we're hitting the roulette wheels!"

Wow, I just didn't get it. Still, before I could even say anything, Cubone had just looked forward, patted the side of his Pidgeot, and she spread her wings, and took flight into the sky. Soon after, the rest of the Storm Riders had lifted off the ground, and just left us along.

"Come on Randy, let's go." I told him, pulling him by the hand and making my way onto Latias's back.

"How did he know your names?" Randy asked me, looking at Cubone and his Pidgeot strangely.

Hell if I knew. I was asking the same question myself. Soon after, Latias jumped off the ground and we flew swiftly through the air, looking upon the charred remains of the city below. The fissures consuming the city were deep. It was pretty easy to see there was no way to cross this land without flying over it. Still, I had a big question that really needed answering.

"Blazewing, huh?" I suddenly asked her. "That's a pretty cool name."

"You bet!" She told me with a smug smile. "How the Cubone dude managed to know that... wow, no clue on that one. Heck, I didn't even get around to telling you yet! I wonder... does he somehow know I came Randy's dream world, or that I resembled his optimism too?"

"I haven't got the foggiest idea..." I told her, looking up at the sky in wonder.

As Randy and I held on tight to Blazewing's wings, we had flown over miles and miles of ruined desert land, cracked and charred with canyons of endless pits lying everywhere. This was the most treacherous land I have ever seen in my life, worst than the driest desert and the coldest of snowy wastelands. It was impossible to even walk on foot, never mind the distance.

As I looked ahead, I saw the fifty Storm Riders, with each of their Pidgeots beating their wings in the hot air. Above us, the crimson sky flared above us with its swirling, dark clouds. I had then suddenly realized the thunder never once hit the ground. I had no idea where I was, and at this moment, I had no idea what the Storm Riders of the Silver Rebellion wanted me to do. Half of me was wondering if following them was even a good idea, but considering how the Crimson Stars showed no compassion to anyone, even those unaffiliated with the Silver Rebellion, we had to have some kind of guide in this strange world we were in now.

"Juno, I tell ya... this vacation you booked... it sucks," Blazewing nudged me with her wing with a teasing, mischievous smile.

"Well, you get what you pay for," I sighed to her with a tired smile before I just had to shake my head in disbelief at all this.

As we continued to fly on, I saw the ground below us was slowly beginning to change from bottomless canyons to an arid desert, but it was still a wasteland. The endless fissures were less plentiful, and the land could actually be walked on now.

And then, far in the distance, I saw what looked like a massive, metallic metropolis just on the horizon. As we got closer and closer to it, it was absolutely the most gigantic city I've ever seen. The circular, spire, and square-shaped buildings towered hundreds and hundreds of stories tall and seemed to shine and gleam in the light of the red sun. I could easily tell metal must have been much more in abundance here considering they were willing to build many structures out of it as opposed to stone or concrete.

As we drew closer to the outskirts, I could see the streets were much wider than most cities on Earth, yet the number of motor vehicles was drastically low in comparison. Plus they didn't look anything like the ones on Earth, being made of very large mechanical parts with no real concern for exterior aesthetics. All of them looked like they were unpainted with a bare, metallic chassis, and were just manufactured for transportation purpose only rather than appearance.

I had seen the city was well fortified and heavily militarized with a fifty foot wall made of metal surrounding the city and with large, metal cannons mounted on the walls. As we got closer, I saw each of the buildings were also made of black, silver, or dark blue metal, yet I had no idea how they were able to make all of this by themselves, especially under these harsh conditions. Towards the center was one massive and towering building, shaped like a spire, made of a reflective silver-colored metal.

I could look in any direction and just couldn't believe all of this was actually real…

And yet, everywhere we looked, there were only Pokémon. Somehow, in this world, they built an entire civilization and culture, and now the three of us were sitting right in the middle of it. Here, they lived together, worked together, played together, and essentially replaced humans as the civilized society, bringing forward their own technology and innovation. I had seen marketplaces, courtyards, streets, and even Pokémon children playing some kind of street game that involved one large rubber ball and two smaller ones. A few of them wore a few basic articles of clothing, while it was really the soldiers and guards that were fully dressed in uniform and armor.

I think spellbound was the only fitting word I could come up with to describe how I felt about discovering such a place like this existed.

We had headed toward the center of the city, to an open area just near the giant spire. As we flew downward, I caught sight of what seemed to be a large military base with many bunkers and training grounds. All I did was just follow the Cubone, since he seemed to know the most about this place. I knew I had to be extremely careful about what I said here. I wasn't sure about making the Silver Rebellion my friends, but I sure didn't want to make them my enemy.

Once we arrived at the central spire building, I looked up and saw the spire tower extend high into the red-hued sky like a stairway to the fiery heavens. I couldn't even tell where the tower ended it was so high up. Shortly after, I had gotten off Blazewing, and Randy had followed me, still getting used to his tiny Pachirisu feet and oversized, spiked squirrel tail. We stood on that warm, metal ground and looked up. He too, seemed amazed at the sight.

Meanwhile, as I was taking this in and looking around, I noticed that the whole city seemed to be designed for those small and large alike. As I looked around me, I couldn't imagine how something so giant could have been built by Pokémon alone. It seemed like it could have taken forever to construct…

"What… is this place...?" Randy asked in amazement, looking at all the giant buildings around him.

"Symarix," The Cubone had told Randy. "And I don't believe I have introduced myself. My name is Sever. And I'd like to welcome you to our city."

"Well, thanks," Randy replied sheepishly, still looking curiously at everything with his eyes.

Sever could tell from the look on our faces that we were definitely lost and had no idea what we were doing here. In a way, he seemed happy to answer our questions, but at the same time, he looked at us strangely, seeming a bit surprised we didn't know this already.

"So... uh, this Symarix..." Randy continued, getting fidgety with his little paws as he looked at Sever with an embarrassed expression on his docile Pachirisu face, "...I don't mean to sound... dumb or weird, but... I don't even think I'm... familiar with this world..."

Sever looked at him very strangely as his eyes narrowed in on him from behind his skull helmet, unable to understand his behavior. Honestly, I had to admire Randy's bravery for asking these kinds of questions. Admitting we were travelers from a whole other world was a very hard and not-so-believable thing to admit in front of these militarized strangers.

"Wouldn't be the first time the Crimson Stars drugged a prisoner with Downsmoke and amnesia was the result of it," Sever muttered with a sigh, shaking his skull-covered head before looking at the Pachirisu like he had a lot of work to do. "I guess they've been upping the dose lately."

I nodded, know it would be unwise to tell him the outlandish truth. If he thought a drug was responsible for it, it might just be better for him to go with that theory.

"This is Kivistal you're on, buddy," Sever informed Randy, talking to him like he was trying to jog his memory. "Not sure where you're from, but Crimson Stars are vicious to everyone who still has a working conscience in their soul. Say... what's your name, anyway?"

"It's... Randy," he replied, feeling confused.

And then, Sever blinked twice, almost thinking that was absurd.

"That... what kind of name is that?" Sever asked, looking bewildered before he assumed Randy gave him a fake name to protect himself. "Listen, I know it might be hard for you to trust us because you only just met the Silver Rebellion, but you can at least give us your real name."

Randy looked at me for help, really not sure what to do in this case. Between myself, Blazewing, and Sever here, it did seem like the Pokémon of this world weren't accustomed to human names either.

"His name is Blitz," I told Sever, figuring he might as well get a new name just like me if he was getting stuck with a new body to live in. "He's a little on edge with all that's been going on, so don't mind him if he's not so quick to trust others."

"Thank you," Sever told me before turning to 'Blitz the Pachirisu' again. "See? It's not so bad. Really, I don't know how long they've kept you wired to Downsmoke, but you're better off with us than out there on your own."

"Blitz" nodded, although I could tell from the look in his eyes, he still felt totally lost when it came to all this. It also seemed like that oversized squirrel tail was a hard thing for him to get used to.

"So, why do they call this the Silver Rebellion?" Blitz asked. "You're rebelling against the Crimson Stars because... you used to be a part of them?"

"Unfortunately, it's true," Sever nodded. "Things in Crimsonland were looking bleak to begin with before the Silver Rebellion started six years ago, but the whole thing with spilling blood for their new god called Zander to escape the coming apocalypse that only started up recently is a clear sign we made the right choice."

Zander, hmm? I was beginning to wonder if he was walking around with a Pokémon form on in this strange world of Kivistal like Randy and I were just to fit in.

"Oh, not him again..." Blitz muttered, looking at Sever with a faraway look in his eyes.

"That's right," Sever nodded, not even realizing we've run into him already as he was only thinking he was making progress curing Randy of his 'amnesia,' "The Crimsons Stars think he's saving them from an apocalypse, but we know he's a rotten liar and he's responsible for all this!"

"Where... is he now...?" Blitz asked with anxiety, wondering where he might be hiding.

"Now that we don't know, my friend," Sever replied, looking up to the sky as he was really wishing he did. "Heck, we're not even sure what he looks like. We were never really friends with Crimsonland to the north, but ever since we starting hearing his name while getting attacked by Crimson Stars zealots, we're seeing more and more of the world falling apart. We're not sure if he's a powerful dictator or some kind of demigod for all we know."

I nodded, trying to get in on this conversation to at least sound and act like I knew what I was doing. For some reason, the Silver Rebellion was treating Blazewing and I like we were VIPs and I still had no idea why.

"And that's not the least of it," Sever continued, figuring he might as well share this piece of information. "Rumor has it that some of his followers believe this is the end of days for Kivistal, and Zander wants to save them by taking them to a new world to live on. He just hasn't found it yet, but they trust in his otherworldly power. They think all this is just some untimely Armageddon."

"There's no way that could be right," I told him as I shook my head in disbelief, figuring I knew Zander enough not to be the generous and life-saving type of person that would be out to save Pokémon. "Skies like that? That's not a natural occurrence."

"Well, tell that to the Crimson Stars, Juno," Sever told me. "Somehow this false god 'Zander' has the people of Crimsonland believing if they fetch enough blood and cause enough death for Zander, he'll be able to use that sacrifice to work some kind of dark ritual to bring them to a new world."

"Oh yeah, I'm sure a portal created by blood, guts, and good ol' fashioned death has just GOT to be the gateway to the good life!" Blazewing replied, nearly laughing. "Let me guess, did he talk them into buying a timeshare in there as well?"

Sever looked at Blazewing curiously, almost chuckling a bit before getting back to business.

In the meantime, not knowing what happened to Alex was a problem. Just where was he, and was he even still human? I knew the later was probably no considering what had become of Randy, and how I needed to keep thinking of him as "Blitz" to avoid any suspicion. It pretty much seemed like no one here was human, which was definitely an odd occurrence. In the meantime, I questioned myself with the thought of exactly how long we were going to end up staying here…

"We need to talk to Emperor Jamac," Sever told the three of us, knowing he felt this was more of a pressing issue than Randy's 'amnesia.' "I'm quite sure he will want to know of your arrival."

"Where does he usually stay?" I asked Sever, blinking twice in wonder as I was looking at him in the eye.

Sever had turned to face the tallest, towering building in Symarix, and then he pointed with his bone to the area all the way on the top. I had looked up, and saw the top of that one, giant tower was strongly built and extremely well-defended. At first, I thought it would be suicide to be so high up in a tower that would not be easy to escape from, but then again, when I saw the Storm Rider patrols flying overhead, the huge number of sentry turrets, and the reinforced armor plating the tower used, it was a death wish to try and sent aerial forces up there to attack it.

Meanwhile, it seemed like such a long way up…

"He has surveillance over the entire city," Sever told me and I imagined it had to be quite a view up there. "Come, the sooner we see him, the better."

"Right behind you," I told him, walking alongside Randy the fidgety Pachirisu and Blazewing the witty Latias.

After a small march through the city, it seemed like just about everything used metal, even the streets. As I looked around and glanced at the shiny metal buildings, I could only guess metal and iron ore were in such a massive abundance that they made entire cities out of it easily. Meanwhile, the vehicles that passed around through the streets were like tanks, being about ten feet tall and completely armored. It made me wonder if they served another purpose than just transportation…

"Thanks for saving my butt back there," 'Blitz' the Pachirisu told me as we were just out of earshot of Sever. "I dunno, I kind of like 'Blitz' as a name."

"Well, good, because I think you're stuck with it," I told him with a mischievous smirk. "A decent Pachirisu deserves a decent name."

He nodded with a confident smile. As we continued walking through the city, somehow, for reasons I couldn't fathom why, my presence beside Blazewing was enough to stop traffic, and turn the heads of Pokémon just walking down the streets. I just kept looking forward, but out of the corner of my eye, they just stared at me and began talking among themselves. Nonetheless, we just kept walking… though I tried to listen in a bit on their conversations. However, there was only so much my long, black-tipped ears were able to tell me.

It was going to be hard to get used to a city made up of nothing but Pokémon when I had gotten so used to cities composed of people. It almost seemed like… everything had been flipped upside down. I wasn't even sure why Zander brought us here anyway. My only guess was he was hoping we would either slowly die from his power, or surrender and be forced to worship him as some false deity. As for why Blitz and I were turned into Pokémon, I wasn't sure. If he kept us as humans, I figured Zander would need to explain it to the Crimson Stars, and that might tear a hole in his plan.

After a long walk, we had finally arrived at the massive tower, but it actually didn't look so tall when we were right next to it. I was guessing it was just my perspective. Sever hadn't waited one moment before we approached the entrance, made of glass windows and sliding glass doors encased in dark metallic frames. To my surprise, the doors were electronic, and slid open with proximity detection. As we stepped inside, I had no idea what I was just about to face…

Immediately, we had entered the massive lobby of this giant tower, which was also completely metal with many metallic doors leading to other rooms, except for two very large metal doors on the opposite side of the room. Throughout the red carpeted room, there were various statues and busts made of metal on the walls, on pedestals, as well as one in the center of the room. I had looked at the ones off to the sides, which appeared to be Pokémon that once ruled this city, dressed in these prestigious uniforms while in a proud, standing upright position. There was a Slowking, a Swampert, a Garchomp, and many others, and again, not one depiction of a human in sight. Then, my eyes had caught sight of the one statue in the center just as I was passing by it...

...and it nearly shocked the life out of me…

"What the…?" Blitz asked as he looked up at the bronze statue.

It was statue larger than life, made of shiny bronze with a polished wooden mount. But it wasn't that which had shocked me. It was a statue of a fully geared-up Pikachu with a determined and steadfast look in his eyes, riding a fearless Latias that looked brave and willing to head right into wicked combat. The statue did a fantastic job of capturing the wind that was blowing past his ears and through his fur as the Latias seemed to be heading forward at a thunderous pace. Both of them looked so lifelike that I wouldn't have been surprised if they just flew off the wooden mount and started flying around the room. Meanwhile, on a small plaque that was nailed onto the wooden mount, it read:

Juno and Blazewing, protectors of the righteous Silver Rebellion. May their paths one day cross ours.

My jaw nearly dropped off my face and I suddenly wasn't sure whether I wanted to cheer, scream, or panic. Blazewing gasped as her eyes went totally wide and Blitz couldn't believe it either, covering his mouth with his tiny Pachirisu paws while rendered totally speechless.

"You have got to be kidding me...!" Blazewing gasped, not sure whether to be thrilled or freaked out of her mind. "Do I... really look that epic!? Oh man, who made this thing!? Let me know and I'm treating them to dinner for the rest of the month!"

"Just... just... how!?" I exclaimed, having no idea this was even possible. "It's amazing..."

The Silver Rebellion believed we were already heroes, and we barely even knew them! They made the two of us look more important than even their own rulers! I didn't understand any of it whatsoever, and I was beginning to sweat, thinking they were expecting me, just an ordinary guy thrown into a ridiculous series of circumstances, and Blazewing, who I hadn't even known only a month ago, to be capable of impossible valor and triumph. Did these guys... did they... did they really expect me and her to fix all of problems!? They made us look like the toughest soldiers ever when in reality we've never even been through boot camp!

"As you can see, we have been waiting for your arrival for some time," Sever told the three of us as we just stared at the statue. "We need to press on, however."

And then he continued moving on, just beckoning for us to follow him. After snapping to our senses we had to keep moving, despite how much that statue wanted our eyes to be totally affixed to it. We headed toward two massive doors without handles, but I couldn't help but take once last glance at the statue. I was really worried now. Were they really expecting Blazewing and I to become soldiers? I was anxious about the thought of having to plunge into lethal warfare and I really doubted I was ready for it...

Then, I just faced forward, and I realized what the doors were. It was a giant elevator, probably the only way to the top. I had turned to Sever as he put in a security access code on a keypad on the wall. Suddenly, the elevator roared to life, and the two giant, steel doors slowly opened. I just shrugged and walked into the elevator like there was nothing to it.

The elevator floor was carpeted by an ornamental rug, and the walls were actually paintings, all scenes depicting Storm Riders flying through the fiery sky in combat with the Wind Strikers, a dark counterpart of the Storm Riders where the riders were each mounted on a Skarmory rather than a Pidgeot. In the paintings, the Wind Strikers were losing quite miserably. Not one Storm Rider was seen dying, and there were some who were wounded but in a charismatic way.

"We will soon be meeting Emperor Jamac," Sever said as Blitz and Blazewing entered the elevator and the heavy metal doors closed behind them. "No doubt he will be most pleased to see you have finally arrived."

Again, I felt that anxious, butterflies in my stomach feeling as I thought over what this Emperor Jamac was going to expect Blazewing and I to do. Was he really expecting us to become a hero Storm Rider or something? The one time I fought Randy's Pokémon and the incident that happened at the jail were my only instances of me really getting into a fight. But I've never actually led someone else into combat. And I hated to say it, but when these guys realized how little Blazewing and I actually knew about the Silver Rebellion, it was going to look awfully sad and embarrassing.

As the elevator continued to ascend higher and higher, all I could do was wait and wonder why we were seen as such saviors to the Silver Rebellion. I knew I had rescued one of their Storm Rider regiments, but really, I think they were all expecting a little too much out of us. Despite all that was going on, I was still just looking for a way to get home, and I mean the real home, where my real family was. It was never really my intention to get involved with war in the first place…

And then, we had reached the top floor, and the elevator stopped. The metal doors had slowly opened to reveal another long, carpeted hallway with many wooden doors, and then at the end of the hallway, there were two very fancy and ordinate-carved doors with golden trim. At the end of the hall, two guards were stationed there, a fully armored Braixen with a tough attitude holding a heavy machine gun and stout and steadfast Cinccino in full Silver Rebellion riot gear held a smaller-sized submachine gun.

As Sever had continued walking, right toward the two fancy doors at the end of the hallway, all we could do was just follow him, and then, he had arrived at the doors. The fiery colored bipedal fox and the fluffy chinchilla Pokémon looked at Blazewing and I, and it looked like both of them were suddenly lost in a dream.

"Sever... are you...?" The Braixen asked, her breath nearly stolen away.

"It is really...?" The Cinccino gasped.

"They're the ones," Sever proudly acknowledged, bowing his skull-covered head in reverence. "Fifty Storm Riders saved from Black Bay Prison. First mission success without even a formal assignment. They are the ones."

At that moment, both the Braixen and the Cinccino saluted us, placing their closed fists over their hearts before closing their eyes and bowing their heads down. Once they returned their hands to their sides did they open their eyes and look up again.

I didn't know what came over me, but the salute looked really easy to learn, and out of respect, I performed it before the two of them as well, clenching my paw over my heart, bowing before them before closing my eyes. I then put my hand back at my side and looked up at the two of them, and they both were in a bit a surprise, but were respectful about it.

Sever pulled down on the metal levers, and pushed open both doors at the same time.

When the doors had opened, we were greeted with amazement. There was a giant throne room opened before us, with the floor made of white marble with a red carpet leading from the door to the mounted thrones. The walls and ceiling were made of white stone and golden chandeliers were suspended from the ceiling. On the two side of the red carpet, there were masses of soldiers waiting. On the throne, a regal Excadrill sat down, while a battle-hardened Vigoroth in a highly decorated military uniform and a seemingly shady Zangoose stood by his side, wearing a gray and white formal-looking uniform. Sever continued on, and we just followed him.

It had looked like we suddenly walked in on some kind of military ceremony of sorts, but Sever felt this was important enough to interrupt it. As we passed by the various ranks of uniformed Pokémon soldiers in Jamac's council, they saluted me with the same fist over heart salute. Despite their reverence for me, I still felt like I was going to be the biggest disappointment ever when they saw me in action. I was definitely not the soldier they thought I was! And heck, I felt embarrassed to be butt-naked in front of all these formally dressed and uniformed Pokémon!

However, from the looks of things, I had the feeling that if I was going to even have the slightest chance of getting out of here, it was likely going to have to be done by working with these guys and stop Zander, if that was at all possible. As I got closer and closer to regally dressed Excadrill, I saw he had a very stern and serious look on his white face while the serrated blade above his head and the blades he had for hands looked like they could brutally eviscerate just about any Pokémon in a heartbeat. I knew I would need to treat Jamac with ultimate respect. Being branded as a traitor or an outcast would only make things far worse, especially if these guys had such extremely high expectations for me. With Blitz and Blazewing at my side, I finally arrived at Jamac's throne, and I kneeled down, and Randy did the same, trying to show Jamac respect in the only way we knew how. I bent down my head, looking down toward the floor. I knew we were already deep into this and even though I wasn't entirely sure about the Silver Rebellion being friends and allies, I knew I had already gone far beyond the threshold at this point. Better I get on their good side now than make a lousy first impression.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the High Silver Rebellion Military Command and the Silver Rebellion Royal Council," Sever proudly spoke before everyone in the lavishly-decorated throne room, "I present to you, Blazewing the Latias and Juno the Gold Rider."

There were murmurs among the uniformed soldiers while a few of the others were taken back in shock. Meanwhile, I just kept my head bowed. I was nervous as all hell, but yet, somehow my will and spirit kept me from trembling.

"I seriously hope you have some proof they're the ones," The Zangoose spoke to him in a dubious tone.

"Ask any of the fifty Storm Riders Juno saved from Black Bay prison just a few hours ago," Sever replied, nodding.

And that got them really talking. Blazewing and I just exchanged quick but slightly worried glances, knowing we were seriously in deep with all this.

"Yeah..." Blazewing whispered to me, knowing exactly what I was thinking also. "Sure hope you've been working on those push-ups."

I slightly nodded with a bit of unease as I was a little bit afraid of what this was about to turn into. I really, really didn't feel ready to be admitted as a soldier.

Jamac the Excadrill then motioned with his claw for the audience to be silenced. While the red-eyed, white and red-jagged furred Zangoose still seemed a bit doubtful, Emperor Jamac looked at us, and I could tell from the look in his eyes that he definitely believed we were the ones.

"You have come at last, Juno," Jamac the Excadrill smiled strongly. "I can't tell you how long we've waited for your arrival. This Zangoose is the chancellor Sinis, the Vigoroth is High General Kamax, and I am Jamac, the ruling Emperor of the Silver Rebellion. It is an honor to finally meet you."

No way...

"No," I told him quickly, trying to get on this guy's good side and show a good first impression. "That honor is mine. I want to thank you for accepting me into your ranks and welcoming me into your amazing city. I've been treated with kindness, respect, and honor ever since I first stepped into Symarix, and I greatly appreciate it."

Sinis the Zangoose crossed his arms with his long, black claws sticking out, and looked down upon me. For some reason, it seemed like he really didn't believe I was the one, or there was something wrong with me. Even so, I still didn't understand... how did they anticipate my arrival? What told them I would be coming and that I was supposed to be some incredible hero or something? I was beginning to think this Zangoose could be right. Who was I kidding, I was no soldier.

"We have been fighting the Crimson Stars for a long, long time," Jamac told me in a firm tone. "They have massacred endless amounts of our finest soldiers and they've ruined many of our great cities. The Divine Prophecy states that you would one day come to our aid and help us turn the tide of this war."

Divine Prophecy!? Now I was really getting worried. How could anyone foresee we would be coming? And what made them think we were...

...special...?

I almost gasped at that moment. Someone knew... someone here knew Blazewing and I were born from dreams and imagined with supernatural power. They knew our names and they knew what we were capable of. When I became Juno... and when I connected and saved Blazewing... they felt that signal within space and time and knew something powerful had been pulled out of a dream in the form of a blessed in power Pikachu and Latias. And somehow... they knew we would end up here. Juno's charisma... his capabilities... his genuine selflessness... someone could see that.

My heart was racing out of control.

"And so I have come," I told him almost impulsively just to say something without succumbing to sheer fright and panic.

And then, Sinis just turned away, not looking very pleased. I didn't know it was about him, but he still felt there was something wrong about this whole picture. Only then did he suddenly have the courage to speak up about all this.

"We are in grave times, but I strongly urge the Council not to solely rely on a mere prediction to win this war," Sinis warned the others, pacing about the throne room. "It will not replace proper military tact, strategy, and preparation. The Crimsons Stars would be laughing if they saw we were resorting to this."

Even though I kept my head bowed down, he was right in a way. It was pessimistic, but it was also a realistic way of looking at things. That, and maybe he could tell I was definitely not a properly trained soldier.

"And who's the tiny Pachirisu?" Sinis asked, glaring down at Blitz. "Does the prophecy mention this as well?"

"He's my companion." I told him, really not seeing why that would be a problem.

"Enough, Sinis," Jamac said firmly. "Tell me, what is your name?"

And now, all eyes were on Blitz. Surprisingly, he seemed even more brave now than I did! Just outside the tower, he was a sheepish mess who looked like he just wanted to bury himself in his own giant squirrel tail, but now, he really didn't seem all that afraid.

"My name is Blitz…" He said proudly, bowing before Jamac, "...happy to be of service."

I wasn't sure if he was relaxed because it wasn't him they were expecting to become a master soldier, or if he just felt really attached to the new name I gave him. In either case, if he was still worried, he was certainly doing a fantastic job hiding it. Either that, or for him, the pressure of the situation was simply like jumping into a cold swimming pool: shocking and chilling at first, but after a while, it was easy and comfortable to relax once he got used to it.

In either case, I sighed, and figured he probably had the right idea. We were definitely going to be expected to be here for a while, so I knew if they expected me to be a soldier, I was going to need to get prepared to be one.