The Trial of Juno Saga [PG-13]

[Neo Emolga]

Chapter 7
Against Odds

Frank was a fat, pig freak, and there was no way I was going to let myself lose to him. I never battled Frank's Pokémon before, but considering the kind of person he was, I didn't expect much out of him. Randy could brag all he wanted to, it wasn’t going to help Frank’s situation. Losing everywhere else in life was habitual for Frank, so this should have been a walk in the park.

“I want this to be a two-on-two match,” Randy told us both. “It should be rather interesting…”

“It most certainly shall!” Frank agreed with a giggle.

I knew exactly who to send out. I already had my fingers on the Poké Balls I was going to use. There would be no chance little Franky would stand a chance against my Weavile and Jolteon. They might not have fought Frank’s Pokémon before, but they’ve annihilated Randy’s time and time again and I figured with Frank, the situation wouldn’t change a bit. I grasped both of their Poké Balls firmly, primed them for action, and tossed them into the field.

And when their Poké Balls hit the ground and opened up, I already got an extremely sickening taste of what Randy could do with his stupid necklace. He made two completely different Pokémon come out. Instead of the yellow, spiky-furred wolf I had been training for years, something stupid make a god-forsaken, flower hula-dancer Bellossom come out instead. And instead of Weavile, the gray and red-feathered weasel Pokémon I usually used to torture people in battle, the Poké Ball opened to reveal a bulb-dressed, green and white Lilligant instead. Not only was he putting me at a disadvantage, but he was mocking me in a nasty way with more flower bullcrap.

“What... the... hell!?” I shouted in disbelief. “What happened to my Jolteon and Weavile!?”

Frank began snorting in humor uncontrollably. Meanwhile, I realized what just happened. I could tell what used to be my Jolteon and Weavile were suddenly shocked and alarmed they weren't their usual selves and were not adjusting very well to it. Suddenly Jolteon didn't have four paws, he had to freaking walk upright on a green and yellow leaf skirt and Weavile now had four tiny yellow feet attached to four bulb-like legs and had freaking leaves for hands instead of claws. And he seriously wasn't thrilled his black and red feather crown was replaced by a massive red flower instead.

“Aww, what cute Pokémon you have, Jake!” Randy smiled casually and mockingly. "They look just like you!"

"That's bullcrap!" Alex shouted in rage. "Give him back his Pokémon, you pathetic cheater!"

I swore, Randy was a freaking maggot. I had never raised a grass-type Pokémon in my life, and now I was going to have to handle two of them while fighting one of my worst enemies. Frank just sat there and laughed.

“Prepare to suffer, flower boy,” Frank giggled as he threw his two Poké Balls. “Go, Moltres and Articuno!”

He had to be kidding...

After Frank proudly launched both of his Poké Balls into the arena and they both struck the ground and opened with a flash of light, there they were. I lay eyes on the legendary birds of fire and ice, just barely able to grasp I was actually seeing this. Moltres was literally a giant fiery-colored bird that was half an inferno while Articuno was a light blue colored bird that glimmered like frozen ice. Its spiked crest looked like ice shards while it had a long, ribbon-like tail following it. I never thought I would ever even see these legendary birds in my lifetime and now Frank was just totting them around like it was nobody's business!

I was ready to just shoot myself, knowing I was probably at the greatest disadvantage of all time and all this would just lead to more humiliation when Frank would just make a massacre of my Pokémon. Frank could slaughter me in no time with this kind of power. All he had to do now was decide how he was going to do it.

I had no idea how I was going to handle this. I already knew grass-type attacks were going to do nothing, so if I didn't try to improvise something decent and quick, this was just going to be a joke.

Recommended Listening: Final Fantasy Versus XIII - Somnus Remix

“Hey, nice choices, Frank!” Randy smiled. “Let the battle begin!”

I knew at the moment the only way I was going to win was to take out them out one by one. I was starting to get a slight idea of one small, yet possible way to at least get my foot in the door on this battle. Still, this was going to be incredibly hard.

“Moltres, protect yourself and Articuno with Light Screen,” Frank commanded. “Articuno, attack that stupid Lilligant with your Ice Beam!”

Just perfect. Moltres took flight, spreading embers and flicks of fire in all directions just moments before focusing his energy to cover both himself and Articuno with a glowing and ethereal bubble shield surrounding them. As if grass attacks against these two couldn't be even more useless, he had to rub in the pain even further.

Articuno soon took flight as well, circling overhead the transformed and disoriented Jolteon and Weavile. I kept eyes on Articuno flying around, but with Weavile barely able to even get used to his new feet to make some kind of evasive action, Articuno opened his beak and launched a wickedly-cold Ice Beam right at him, causing the now helpless Lilligant to fall over like he had already been pulverized with a sledgehammer. I could feel the chill from the freezing blast myself, and I was more than twenty feet away.

“Man, this is going to be a piece of cake!” Frank cheered, thinking he had it in the bag.

“This isn’t over yet, you idiot,” I shouted back at Frank.

And then, an incredibly brilliant idea came to my mind. I had to do it now, or there was no way I was going to win…

Lilligant, or what should have been Weavile, had been badly hit, but he wasn’t about to call it quits right now. And now that Moltres and Articuno were protected by Light Screen, I was going to need to work something around that. At that moment, I had come up with an idea, and I was going to need to take out Moltres first if I wanted it to work right. That, and I was going to need to take both of these blasted birds out of the air, or neither Bellossom or Lilligant would be able to hit them.

“Bellossom, use your Sleep Powder attack!” I declared. "Shoot it up into the air!"

Bellossom then immediately sprayed the air above with a cloud of pink-colored Sleep Powder so both of Frank’s flying Pokémon would get a nice whiff of it. I could at least thank the last shred of luck I had that Jolteon managed to figure out how to use a Bellossom's attacks. The cloud just barely managed to reach the circling Moltres and Articuno, but it seemed to be enough. Moments later, both of them were sent spiraling down toward the ground.

Frank’s face changed from excited to panicky the moment both Moltres and Articuno landed on the gray battlefield fast asleep, taking a bit of a blow upon hitting the ground after tumbling out of the sky. I knew it wasn’t going to last forever, so I had to act quickly and make decent use of this while they were on the floor and weren't flying.

“Lilligant, Giga Impact attack on Moltres, now!” I shouted.

And a moment later, Lilligant looked to Moltres and then furiously charged and rammed right into him with a blazing slam that definitely looked painful. Thankfully, Weavile seemed to be getting the hang of this moronic transformation. This time, Moltres’s type-alignments and Light Screen weren’t going to help him, and he was sent flying head over talons twice before falling over again, still comatose from the powder. Compared to David's battle with Caska, maybe I was making some actual progress here and had a chance to pull this off.

“Come on you fools, wake up!” Frank shouted. “We don’t have time for this!”

I needed to have Moltres taken out, and now. Articuno alone would still be a problem, but at least I'd take one bird out of the equation. I wasn’t going to wait any longer. Lilligant needed a moment to take a breath after running a Giga Impact like that, but once he was back in action, I wasn't going to show this swine any mercy.

“Bellossom, use your Hyper Beam on Moltres, Lilligant, use Sunny Day,” I commanded the both of them.

Suddenly, the night sky that was above us quickly faded, and almost a second later, it looked like it was in the middle of the afternoon. The bright sun had returned, and its light poured into the stadium brighter than ever. Meanwhile, Bellossom focused his attention on Moltres, and with a dark smile that looked even a little badass for a little flower dancer, he began to prep a devastating torrent of blazing energy. Seconds later, a massive blast beam was fired straight from Bellossom's tiny hands, and it hit Moltres like a freaking semi truck. When the massive, glowing beam had made contact, it exploded violently sending bolts and flicks of blazing energy in all directions. Moltres was sent flying out of control once again, rolling over a few times like he had been hit by a rocket.

But to my dismay, he still hadn't fainted even after all that. I couldn't believe it! After all that and a Giga Impact, that blasted bird was still in action?

“Sunny Day?” Frank laughed. “Boy, aren't you an idiot! What, do you want Moltres to roast your precious flower Pokémon even faster now!?”

True, Sunny Day was going to make Moltres’s fire attacks even more powerful, but that wasn’t going to help Frank with Moltres still snoozing. There was still a chance and there was seriously no room to make a single mistake. However, despite the fact Moltres was still sleeping, Articuno had woken up. Frank wanted to make sure he wasn’t going to screw up with this opportunity at his fingertips.

“Articuno, Aerial Ace attack on Lilligant!” Frank commanded and pointed at his target with a smile on his face. "Heh, heh, try to peck the flower off!"

And Articuno didn’t even need to blink before taking flight again at ludicrous mach speeds before blasting at Lilligant like a tank shell. I heard a very nasty slashing sound, and only a second later, Articuno had returned to the skies, preparing to strike from above again.

I winced when I saw Lilligant fall over and slam on the ground, completely out cold. Just when I thought I might pull something off here...

"Oh, oh, isn't that too bad!" Frank laughed and snorted as I reluctantly used the Poké Ball to fire the return beam to recall the Lilligant back to the Poké Ball. "Poor bouquet boy lost one of his battle flowers!"

As much as I wanted to ram a live hand grenade down his throat, I decided at least not to give him the satisfaction he was hoping for by screaming at him again. Just like David's battle with Caska, this was obviously rigged and I felt like I was just wasting time here proving absolutely nothing.

Meanwhile, my poor Jolteon was still horrified at being stuck in a Bellossom's body. He was seriously doing a good job considering the transformation he had to deal with, but at that moment, I realized he was helpless, trying to recover from the exhausting Hyper Beam attack he launched at Frank's Moltres. Meanwhile, Articuno was above, hunting him down like a freaking predator drone.

Moltres soon woke up again, and I could tell it seemed like despite however many hits Articuno and Moltres took, they just seemed to shake off the pain and damage like they were only acting that it hurt them before. Moltres got up like pain was nothing to him and only just made him more energized to retaliate.

"Ha, ha!" Frank giggled. "Totally helpless! Articuno, blast him with Hurricane, and Moltres, make a pot roast out of him with Overheat!"

Holy... crap.

It was a massacre. Articuno nearly shredded the poor Bellossom to ribbons with the ripping winds of the Hurricane attack that blasted through almost the entire stadium, and even that alone probably would have been more than enough to finish him off. Heck, even I had to stand back while the winds ripped their way through every damn flower petal on my own body. And then came the fiery, destructive force of Moltres's Overheat, made even worse because of the Sunny Day effect. Moltres surrounded himself with savage flames and turned into a living fireball, which then rocketed toward the already exhausted and disoriented Bellossom like a tank shell. When the brutal impact happened and more flames were thrown in all directions, I could feel the heat and fire from where I was standing. I couldn't even imagine how badly that must have hurt.

The very last bit of energy Bellossom had was incinerated in a heartbeat with the serious overkill of the Overheat attack. I was seriously concerned Jolteon would die as a Bellossom, which was a fate no Pokémon deserved, but thankfully, even after being cooked alive, at least he didn't croak because of it.

As I had easily suspected, there wasn't a single bit of will to fight left in him. He fell helplessly to the ground as a burnt, ravaged wreck in a body he barely had control over, and I had no choice but to return him and admit defeat to Frank, of all gloating idiots to lose to.

But then again, the game was clearly rigged. I at least had that excuse...