You ever have one of those moments where you see a rare pokemon, but you have nothing to catch it with? Yeah……I saw a Stantler as I was passing through the last patch of grass before Ecruteak and had zippo to throw at it. Oh well, it's not like I don't have one on my other games, but there's something about letting a rare pokemon go that's frustrating. :/
Anyway, I healed my pokemon at the pokecenter, walked outside and enjoyed the sights. I've always loved Ecruteak City; I'm glad that Gamefreak managed to update the city and keep the same feel I always liked about it. Ecruteak always seems to be the epicenter of Johto: middle of the map, 4th badge out of 8, and the two towers where Ho-oh and, once upon a time, Lugia come to roost.
After reminiscing, I went to the Ecruteak Dance Theater in search of HM03. I was also hoping to battle the Kimono girls and their Eevees, but I forgot that the story is a little different from the originals and that scene doesn't happen until later. Instead, I arrived to see a Team Rocket grunt harassing one of the Kimono girls (and making a regular fool out of himself on stage). I took him down, and the old man rewarded me with the Surf HM (finally). Of course, Morty is the only thing between me and surfing, so I needed to go look for him in the Burned Tower. Of course, this is the site of another battle with my rival, but he was even less of a challenge this time around now that heracross had gained several levels. I met with Eusine, went down to release Raikou, Entei, and Suicune into the wild, and headed on to Ecruteak Gym.
Now that my Charmeleon, Zieg, had fallen a few levels behind, I decided it would be fair to use him against the gym. In the stretch between the entrance to Morty, Zieg gained about 5 levels, due to the experience bonus for being traded. After all the trainers were down, I left, healed up, and came back to face Morty himself! It wasn't hard, but I had to keep in mind that pokemon above lv 30 won't obey me, and Zieg was pushing lv 29 before the start of the battle. I let my heracross deal with the haunters and let Zieg handle Gengar. Upon Morty's defeat, I was rewarded with the Shadow Ball TM and the Fog Badge!