Young Writers Society

Damnit.

"Protect."

The shield went up as Hyper Beam hit, but Ninetails was pushed back one inch, then two, then ten...

The turn ended with the fox pokemon on its knees but not on its side. Jasmine ignored the announcement of "It's super effective!" and simply watched her pokemon get back on its feet, HP dangerously low.

"Ninetails, Pain Split."

Alakazam's HP dropped like a stone as the attack averaged their points, making Ninetails able to stand on its feet again. With Alakazam still recovering— he wouldn't.

Of course he would.

"Alakazam, recover!"

HP climbed back up again, leaving the fox at half a hyper beam away from hitting KO.

"Let's hit 'em with Confuse Ray, Ninetails."

"Protect and hit her with another Hyper Beam!"

Champion Miles: 1
Princess Jasmine: 0

When Gengar took the field, Miles began plotting. Alakazam was incapable of matching Gengar's speed, so a quick kill was coming in. Miles set in his order just for the chance it would work.

"Gengar, take him to the grave with Shadow Ball!"

"PRONTO! FUTURE SIGHT!"

Alakazam's eyes burst into red light, generating a psychic lightning that popped around the field, even as his body was consumed in shadows. Gengar did a victory dance around the garnet sparks as the psychic's form vanished into mist.

Champion Miles: 1
Princess Jasmine: 1

"Looks like your all-powerful seer couldn't hold his own! Too bad, Champion."

Miles smirked and turned behind him. "Annie!"

"Yo, champ."

"Lar, larv."

"You're in the Matrix! Red or Blue?!"

"Ooh, that's a toughie. But I'd have to choose Blue."

"Then let's test out some speed. Lucario!"

A blue light burst onto the field as Lucario, a steel blue fighter, combat rolled onto Miles' side. His ears blew in an invisible wind, and the sparks of Alakazam's residual power danced over his body. His red eyes were fixated on Gengar's. The rest of his hazy body could vanish at any time, but as long as Gengar didn't blink...

"Let's see how strong that black magic of yours is against Steel. Lucario!"

"Gengar!"

They shouted at the same time, echoing through the tent: "Dark Pulse!"

The energy shifted in the room. Both Pokemon cupped their hands to their sides, created an orb of dark matter between palms, and released wicked black beams of energy to the center of the arena. The two forces collided, creating a splashzone in the center of the ring where energy popped and crackled, roiled with tension. Neither pokemon relented in their assault, and even Gengar's sly grin had vanished, leaving a viciously gaseous sneer in its place.

Miles counted in his head: the time of dark energy to collapse...three, two, one-

Both Pokemon lept back to the edge of the arena as their evenly-matched energy amassed in a single galaxyesque cloud. It began, slowly, to shrink in on itself, pulling in energy from both bodies. Alakazam's dancing lightning hoisted off the ground, getting sucked into what had then become a black hole, losing size second by second until it was a singularity of dark energy.

Alert: Energy Vortex Unstable. Power Level: 930.

"What?! Over nine hundred?!" Art's eyes were wide and amazed. The singularity pulsed as a heartbeat, bringing silence back to the room.

"Tell me, Jasmine...can you hear the drums?"

Ba-bom

"They're coming for you."

Ba-bom

Jasmine peered down at her console, analyzing the danger of the energy they'd created. That thing nearly has enough power to wipe out both our pokemon... The calculations were true: It would take an energy vortex of 1025 to instantly drain both pokemon of their total health...and it was just a matter of time before that thing ate enough power. Was Miles going for a gambit?

Ba-bom

Jasmine regained her composure, staring beyond the black sphere to Miles and his Lucario, whose body was glowing. He was gathering energy...but for what? Anything dealt would be pulled into the black hole.

Lucario's body shone a sapphire blue, each ounce of his energy focusing into his aura, where his truest power was. Miles considered the field. A fighting move would go straight through Gengar, but the energy of a combat blast could control the black sphere. Miles nodded to himself. This wasn't what he had planned, but it was worth a shot.

"Lucario!"

No, thought Jasmine, not yet!

"Final Gambit!"

Lucario buckled, eyes growing wild as his energy rushed from his body into a golden wind around him. His gaze became a violent blue and his metallic fur shifted into a brilliant gold. Around him was a golden windstorm. He launched from his feet and charged through the air. Gengar braced itself.

"G-Gengar...! Disable him!"

Gengar gathered a sphere of white zen energy and launched it at Lucario, and it landed head-on--but the body vanished. Gengar's wild eyes went wide as the fighter appeared behind him, grasping his body and launching them both into the black hole. It shuddered and pulsed, and, being overwhelmed by energy, collapsed in on itself, bringing the AI clear of the enormous energy readings.

Champion Miles: 2
Princess Jasmine: 2

Jasmine looked at her final pokemon in the lineup, not sure how it would do against a champion's team. It was match point, and now or never.

Miles already made his selection. "Scizor, go!"

Jasmine licked her lips, then grinned. "Chandelure, let's show this poor unfortunate soul what you've got."

Now it was Miles' turn to be shaken up. He paled, eyes widening, and Jasmine just knew he was trying to come up with a strategy that would work against a fire type.

"Chandelure, Fire Blast!"

"Iron Defence!"

Chandelure's torches glowed and sent out a torrent of flame towards the bug, engulfing it in a firestorm similar to the one Ninetails had unleashed on Alakazam. Only, this time, the fire had an effect.

Scizor was on one knee but forced itself up, turn ending with the bug swaying on its feet but ready to fight again.

Miles had that same gleam in his eye, when he had a strategy. "Night Slash, Scizor!"

Shouldn't have attacked first, Champion.

"Payback then hit him with another Fire Blast!"

Chandelure took the hit and readied an even brighter light show for Scizor, at an even closer range this time. The fire let loose...

And the fields, whole screen, and every single screen in the battle tent was painted with the face of a Rotom laughing at everybody in the pokefest.

There was not enough profanity in the world to capture Jasmine's mood.

The Electrospectral Analysis of
Art & Science

“Are you going to order something kid?”

Mal slowly looked up to see that he had passed out onto a sweets stand, a grumpy teenager giving him an angry look as he drooled onto the metal side. Trying his best to act natural, Mal straightened himself up and scanned the selection of sweets, his stomach growling like a wild Ursaring; nearly drowning works up an appetite, and they had the ultimate prize for a hungry idiot.

“How much for that perfectly oversized cookie?” Mal asked, pointing at a cookie that, with some creative thinking, he could sleep comfortably on. The lady gave him a fitting oversized price but Mal only nodded and slammed another wad of soaking cash onto the counter, walking away with his gift from the heavens.

With a treat in hand he marched forward, Marty and Chan at his side, scanning the epileptic hell in front of him, smiling like a madman, but sadly he had no box. “So, where do you think those guys are? I mean first on the agenda is that girl, I hope she cared enough to like think I’m dead-that sounds horrible but you know what I mean. But, I feel like I need a full crew, that hipster and his giggling girl friend would be an alright addition, I mean they’re not ideal, but I can work with them.” Marty stared back, unamused by Mal’s rambling, while Chan drooled staring at the cookie. “You’re right, we should just find them and enjoy my cookie. No need to worry, plus I can think of a speech first.”

“Quil!”

“Oh shut up, Marty. I know you hate the whole trope thing, but if you just embraced-” A blast of smoke sent Mal stumbling back, falling down just as a ball of electricity went flying past him. “What in the world-hey that thing took my cookie!” The ball hovered around him for awhile, the giant cookie sandwiched in it’s sparks, an orange grin flashed on his face before darting down the plaza, cookie still sizzling in it’s body.

Mal ran in the general direction, completely lost in the maze of a fair, trying to think of what in the world that thing could be? “Flying electricity, now that was more floating, kinda floaty though...?” Neither Pokemon offered a response, though Chan was hopping with excitement as they ran. “Definitely not a Magnemite...the orange! Rotom!” Mal stopped right there, pulling over his bag and diving in, rummaging through the mostly useless garbage in there, feeling around for what he needed.

“Ah-Ha!” Mal pulled out a, rather bent, pair of old-school 3D glasses, plopping them on. “And my mom said Poke-Mythbusters was a waste of time.” Mal continued to run forward, now nearly magically able to see the Rotom’s electric-spectral trail in the air above him. Not even bothering to avoid people anymore Mal tackled through crowds, seeing the Rotom’s mayhem had not been isolated to his cookie. All around him people were in panic, lights had exploded, music wouldn't shut off, and rides weren't stopping. But Mal couldn't focus on that, the Doctor knew he had to find the Dalek or else nothing else mattered, and so did Mal.

The trail ended at the battle arena at the edge of the carnival, right into one of the many tents set around. Mal didn't bother to stop and think, only do, and tackled straight into the tent the trail landed in, tangling himself in the fabric and crashing into the battle.

“Give me back my cookie you--Jasmine?” Mal smiled as he saw the familiar face, though she was far from it, swearing so profusely no amount of soap could even clean.

Annie watched, stunned, as Jasmine spewed out as many swears as there were calories in a two-layer chocolate cake with a whole can of frosting on top. Plus a cherry.

4,070.5.

Miles stood there a bit stunned, but it was more shell shock. After all, Jasmine's move probably would have been the last. But Annie wouldn't dare admit that in front of him.

Well, not yet!

"Guys, my pokedex isn't functioning properly." Art shook his device.

The laughing rotom still lingered on all the digital screens in the tent. Larvitar dug himself so far into Annie's arm that he actually fell behind her and into the bench head first. Annie peeked at him sitting on his head, but larvitar was covering his eyes. "Lar, lar.. larvitar..."

"Rotom!"

Annie jumped as it cackled.

Then the screens cleared and the lights came up. Everything was as if no rotom had appeared at all. Except the battlefield was reset.

Jasmine pounded the table with her fists.

"This isn't going to turn out so well," Eric said, watching Jasmine's tantrum.

Annie shrugged. "Who knew she was a sore loser." She stood and picked up larvitar. "Miles, on the other hand, will have gotten a slightly bigger head out of this one."

"What makes you say that?" He followed Annie out of the bleachers and down to the bottom. "He clearly would have lost--"

Annie spun on her heel and poked his chest. "Don't. Say that to him." She composed herself before explaining, "He'll call it his good luck and dare her to challenge him for a rematch knowing he's got luck on his side."

Annie skipped over to Miles with a grand smile. "Hello--"

"Give me back my cookie, you--Jasmine?!"

Before Annie could continue greeting Miles, some crazy dude ran straight into the tent side and fell face-first into the ground, tangled up in the fabric that was once the door. He flailed until the sheet came off his face, and the boy from earlier looked up at them. He grinned. "Why, hello!"

He bounced up to his feet and shook Miles' hand wildly. "I'm the Doctor!"

"I'm... Annie?"

"Nice to meet you, Dani. Very nice to meet you!" The Doctor moved on to the next person, but he babbled over any other introductions, including for people Annie didn't recognize. Eric was a little perturbed when "the Doctor" didn't pay him any sort of attention. "My, my. It is quite a party in here. I once invented the banana daiquiri a couple of centuries early at a party. They had never seen a banana before, can you believe it? Always take a banana to a party, Amy. Bananas are good."

"It's Annie--"

"Jasmine, my old friend, how have you been?!" the Doctor exclaimed, shaking her hand with much more enthusiasm than the others. He leaned in closer and said much more quietly, though still loud enough that everyone heard, "Have you seen anything strange happen here?"

"Yes--"

"Aha! I knew it!" The Doctor threw Jasmine's hand away as he twirled around and paced about the spacious circle the crowd left him in. He pulled out a fake screwdriver and held it up, staring at it curiously. "Ah, yes. Mhm. Yup, just as I thought."

He twirled around dramatically to face Miles, Annie, and the rest of the familiar faces Annie had seen. The Doctor walked smoothly closer, as if for a dramatic camera zoom, and then stopped immediately in front of Miles, nose-to-nose. "The daleks are here."

Miles blinked. "Wait, what--"

"Enough chatting, we've got a festival to save! Come along, Fanny!"

He grabbed Annie's hand and pulled her after him as she said, "Hey! It's Annie, you perv--"

"Wait, what in blazikens are you doing--" Miles chased after them.

"Wait one moment, Miles! We're not through here!" Jasmine ran after him.

Eric and Art looked at each other. "Are you going, too, then?" Eric asked.

There was a slight delay. Then a nod. He leaned closer and hissed, "Did you not see that rotom? It was a rotom!" He ran after the group.

Eric ran his fingers through his beautiful hair. "I suppose it wouldn't hurt to save the day." And he casually walked out of the tent, ignoring the swooning girls left in his wake.

At least, Art said inwardly, I hope it's a Rotom. Rotom was not a common Pokémon by any means, and it would really punch a hole in his nerd cred if he'd just announced they were hunting the wrong Pokémon entirely.

If only the Pokédex app wasn't broken. Again. It was always this way: the slightest bit of interference and connectivity just plummeted. On the off chance he came out on top of this whole tour, that would be the first thing he'd take up with Game Freak, he decided.

You idiot, he realised. That's why you turned to third-party software.
"Siiri," he panted, "please analyse that photo I took of the offending glitch and check for matches against all entries in the Strategy Memo."
He'd found the Strategy Memo, an alternative to the official Pokédex app made by a development team in Arizona, very handy in the past. And today was no exception.

Rotom, the Plasma Pokémon

Rotom's body is composed entirely of plasma. This gives it the ability to take control of various machinery and electronics. Most recorded sightings of this Pokémon describe it as mischievous and a trickster. Some appliances enable Rotom to change its form entirely, which alters its elemental typing and gives it access to different attacks.

"Looks like a mandarin with eyes," Art muttered to Ohm who had just caught up with him. "Now I'm craving fruit juice. That might be from all this running, though."

"This is it!"
The nutter who'd hijacked the group turned and bowed in front of a door. "Through my amazing deductive reasoning, I have amazingly deduced - within reason - that this is where our goal lies."
"Nice, Sherlock," Miles snarked, reading the large Power Plant Through Here sign on the door. "All it needed was a Rotom's Probably This Way You Guys sign to make it especially obvious."

The other fellow rolled his eyes. "The name is Mal, although I'll take your nickname as a compliment. But, if you're so smart, let's see you get in."
Miles smirked and grasped the knob. It didn't budge.
"Locked," he muttered. Mal nudged him out of the way and jammed his screwdriver into the lock. After a few seconds of jiggling, the door clicked and Mal pushed it open. Miles scowled.

"Make way!" called a voice from the back. It was the tall fellow who'd been the last to leave the tent, after Art. He strutted towards the door followed by his Pokémon, a Mareep, and went straight through, following the staircase down.

"This is who, again?" Art muttered to Jasmine as they followed. Jasmine shrugged as the guy turned to Art.
"Zis is Eric, again," he said sternly, narrowing his eyes. "And zis is ze only Trainer here with an Electric Pokémon, zerefore ze most well-equipped to lead ze group through ze treacherous dungeon."
Art coughed and pointed to Ohm. "Funny story."
"Ah, a Magnemite? Forgive me, but zat is so... how do you say? First-gen. But if you are ze confident one, zen perhaps we can make zis interesting. Shall we split into two groups and strive to be ze first to ze offending Pokémon?"

"Of course," he added, turning to the other members of the group and turning on his charm voice, "I should be happy for ze lovely ladies to join me, if zey will."
"I'd be happy to take you up on this," Art said, folding his arms. "And not just because I think it's a good idea to split into groups anyway. But before you guys make your choice, consider this."
He pointed to a map of the power plant that was up on the wall. It was a positive labyrinth of tunnels and machinery.

"It's all well and good to send any Electric Pokémon in, since they'll all have some way of reading and sensing the surrounding energy," Art said. "But wild Mareep live out on the plains. Magnemite, on the other hand, are the ones who inhabit abandoned power plants, not to mention some that are still in use. Meanwhile, this place is a maze, we're here to hunt ghosts, and I've clocked at least five hundred hours on Pac-Man. So who would you say has the home field advantage here?"

Miles
Power Center

“In some parts of the world, you know,” mentioned Eric, “Grimer guano is used as quite a strong moisturizer and facial creme.”

Miles rolled his eyes in the near-dark, lit only by Patrat’s flash. The walls were murky, the floor was murky, and with every step, Miles could hear his shoes squishing either a bug or a snail. Pulling on his shirt tail, faithfully, was Annie. She whispered in his ear, “I don’t see why we had to come with Eric.”

“We couldn’t leave him by himself,” Miles retorted, “besides...I don’t want to be near that Jasmine girl until she forgets about our battle.”

Eric stopped walking, peering at something on the wall. A swarm of Joltik scattered, but Miles caught a blurry pic.

Joltik, The Attaching Pokemon

Joltik have the ability to drain energy from household outlets, as well as living beings. Since it cannot generate its own energy, it attaches itself to a larger Pokemon and feeds off their static electricity.

“Egggggh, why’d it have to be bugs?”

Miles kept staring at his phone while Eric brushed the slime off the wall with a squeejee he’d found earlier. There was a screen with small bits of static humming in rows. “Claude,” he announced, “permit me a thunder wave, class two?”

Mareep shook her tail back and forth before tapping it against the outlet in the wall, bringing the screen to life with a faint giggling sound. It began glowing...first blue, then red, yellow, and orange. Eyes popped out of the screen, and an enormous jaw swung out, encasing Eric’s entire head. His body jerked with fear as Rotom’s night shade chilled his blood.

“Juice! Hypnotize the prankster before Eric faints on us…” Patrat rolled from Miles’ head and onto the floor, eyes flashing deep purple. The Rotom’s jaw loosened and waved back and forth before phasing out of reality and back into the screen where it yawned, shook its head, and flew away with sparks trailing after him.

“I become very aware that the people around me find me odd, slightly unsettling, but I must move on. There is a little Dalek to fight, a cookie to save, I have to press on. There will be time to think about these slights later, time for that and more. I could get some better glasses, maybe a cup of tea...British Things.”

“What are you doing?” Art asks.

“What am I doing he asks? It’s hard to know, in a world of greys and beige moralities you can never really know. Heroes and Villains, that’s all perspective, but I can’t be weighed down by that, I have to push forward and hope again all else that I am the hero.”Mal tries his best to look dramatic and deep as he stared at the Muk stained pipes above him, the smell made him sick.

“Is uh...Is he okay?” Art asked Jasmine, who just shrugged in response.

“Your guess is as good as mine,” she said, not even bothering to give Mal a confused look.

“Am I okay though? Are any of okay? As I look into this young child eyes I think, will he be okay? I hope so, and if my cookie survived I will be sure he gets a bite.” Mal looked down at the group, solemnly, and shook his head. Unable to muster a fake tear he looked up. “What are you looking at me like that for?”

Art stared some more, he seemed to slightly scared, while Jasmine just kept moving forward. “Was I monologuing again? I am so sorry.”

“I don’t know what that was,” Art replied, slowly turning back away, though keeping a side eye on Mal.

“I couldn’t be sure either--Oh sorry, I gotta stop doing that.”

They spent the rest of the walk in silence, only the occasional whistle from Mal, to break up the sound of their squishing footsteps. They kept going, on and on, with no end insight, the Magnemite swirling his light around in boredom, until they finally came to two doors.

“Which way?” Art marched over to the doors, trying to read the grimey, rusted signs on each of them. The one on the left was some sort of “Employes Only” office written in big blue letters, while the right was a “High Danger” sign, in bright, now pink, red.

Mal ran over to the red door, leaning against it and pulling his coat up higher. “Art, if you don’t take this door you’ll regret it. Maybe not today, maybe not the next day, maybe not at all, but there is a chance that someday you might.” Mal sighed and looked away. “Embrace the truth of it, or live in ignorance.”

"All right, all right," Art muttered. "Further down the rabbit hole, or whatever."
He pushed the red door open, took a breath and stepped through. The moment he was on the other side, alarms went off in his head.

But also, alarms went off in real life. All down the corridors. And before Mal or Jasmine could follow Art, a cage-like door came down to separate them, locking Art in the hallway he'd just entered.

"Hands up who saw that coming a mile away," he said matter-of-factly, turning back to his allies. He and Mal raised their hands simultaneously, leaving Jasmine to continue looking shocked at the sudden noise that had surrounded them. "Ok. You guys go through the other door. Just in case Rotom tries to escape through there."

They nodded and pushed the Employees Only door open. Art turned to the light shining at the end of the hallway and, steeling himself, began striding towards it. Ohm hovered protectively behind him, occasionally glancing back behind itself.

The room at the end of the corridor contained a large generator. Art could see it was only one of many, and that it (along with the others, presumably) was connected to a user console. The screen, Art expected, would normally be showing the generator's output and any problems it was experiencing. Now, Rotom's face danced around the screen.

"There you are," Art said. "So what's the big idea?"
He was employing some of the language used by the tough characters in almost every television show he'd ever seen. But even as he said it, he heard his voice come out and knew exactly how intimidating he didn't at all sound. Rotom began to giggle.

"All right, forget it. Just get out of that thing and stop terrorising everyone. And ruining their battles," Art added. Rotom poked its digital tongue out and, Art observed on the charts behind Rotom, began increasing the generator's output. It was getting dangerously high.
"Don't!" Art shouted. "Are you trying to ruin PokéFest entirely? Do you want to put people in danger?" Rotom hesitated.

Before either of them could make another move, a loud, familiar voice filled the room with a "BING BANG BOOM!" and the face of Professor Cox pushed its way onto the screen next to Rotom.
"I did not expect to see you here, Art!" Digital!Cox exclaimed. "You can probably help me. Check out this bad boy!"

He held up a Poké Ball, which burst open to reveal... a duck?
"A duck?" Art said, echoing his own thoughts. He scanned it with his PokéGear and quickly bookmarked the entry to view later:

Porygon2, the Virtual Pokémon

Porygon2 is the evolved form of Porygon. Like its predecessor, Porygon2 was engineered by a group of programmers in Japan during the development of a new form of artificial intelligence. During testing, Porygon2 exhibited behaviours that were not programmed, indicating that it was capable of adapting and learning on its own. In November of 1999 the development team presented Porygon2 to the Pokémon Federation, who recorded Porygon2 as an official Pokémon and allowed the release of the Up-Grade disc that would update Porygon. Plans for a spacecraft captained by Porygon2 were scrapped when engineers were unable to give the Pokémon the ability to fly unassisted.

"We got this," Digital!Cox assured Art, "we got this. Porygon2's blocking up the network to prevent Rotom getting out, right?"
"Gotcha," Art said. "So I need to defeat Rotom. But once it recovers, it'll just run off and cause trouble elsewhere, right?"
Digital!Cox nodded.
"Then I'd better capture it. Research indicates that an unruly wild Pokémon can become disciplined while under the -"
"Yeah, listen. I don't wanna rush you, but you might wanna pay attention here."

Rotom, having figured out it couldn't escape through the electronics, had begun revolving around Art, gradually gaining speed until, at first, it became a solid blur. Then, quite suddenly, multiple Rotom began appearing around him.
"Double Team!" Internet!Cox called out. "You need to figure out which is the real one! And do it quickly, it looks like it's gearing up an Ominous Wi-"

Cox's voice was cut off by the roaring of a purple hurricane that seemed to be confined to the Rotom sphere that Art was now at the centre of. Art grabbed for his bandana before realising it was no longer on his head, and that his hair was still spikier than an anime character's. Bandana's probably halfway down Murtle's gullet by now, he thought, followed by oh, that's right. I might die if I don't focus.

"Ohm!" he called. "Do you think you can direct a Thunder Wave that'll hit this whole sphere?"
Ohm clicked frantically.
"Don't worry about hitting me!" Art thought back to the Lick he'd endured from Murtle. "Apparently I've got a pretty high tolerance to Pokémon-induced paralysis!"
Ohm hesitated, then buzzed loudly and shone a bright yellow as it let off a weak but wide-ranged electrical shock. The effect was instantaneous: Rotom's images became fuzzy and blurry, exposing the real one which was also moving much more slowly now.

Art had been stunned by the Thunder Wave as well, but he concentrated all his strength to his right arm, pulling a refurbished Great Ball from his pocket. With one mighty heave he hurled the Ball directly at the only sharply-defined Rotom he could see. He didn't even notice Mal and Jasmine bursting into the room.
"I think Rotom lost control of the -" said Jasmine, stopping short as she witnessed what appeared to be at least twenty Rotom simultaneously being absorbed by Art's Great Ball. The Ball clicked shut and twitched, emitting a red light.

Art held his breath as he watched it roll back and forth: it even jumped into the air at one point. Rotom was putting up one heck of a fight in there. But finally, the Ball lay still, its light flashing a bright yellow before shutting off.
"YEAH SON," cheered Digital!Cox.
"Bravo!" whooped Mal, applauding. "I'd say you're the best trainer in the room if I was standing outside in the hallway. But still, spectacular!"
"Not bad," Jasmine said with a smirk. "Now let's go find the others. That hipster owes me a rematch."
Murtle popped into existence in front of Art, reached into her mouth and pulled out Art's old faithful bandana, which she plopped back onto his head, dripping with saliva.
"Thank you," Art said, wincing. "Ok, let's get out of auuuughhhh," he added as he moved one foot towards the door with great difficulty: the paralysis was lasting longer than he'd expected. On the console screen, a lightbulb flashed over Digital!Cox's head.

"Hey, bro! I can activate the service elevator from here!" he exclaimed. "Look to your right, next to the door you came in from." Sure enough, a pair of silver doors slid open to receive the group.
"Siiri," Art said, "tell Miles mission cough complete."
"Sending message to Miles. Message. Mission cognac complete. Sent."
Art didn't even bother to clarify as he stepped into the lift. The doors shut and the group felt themselves ascending.
"This is the elevator song..." Digital!Cox sang, "and I will sing it all day long..."

If only Murtle's lick could reach across that screen and shut him up.

Jasmine skipped out of the elevator as soon as the door opened, ghosts floating behind her and keeping an eye out for anything in particular.

"So..." Art said. "Guess we have to find everyone else?"

Mal adjusted his jacket. "Yes, we really should. Allons-y, everyone!"

They both started wandering semi aimlessly, a mistake in and of itself considering Art, causing Jasmine to shake her head. "Boys?" They both stopped dead, causing her to smile. "We do have a tracker."

She flicked out Roy's pokeball. "Want to find a Patrat, boy?"

The Growlithe wagged his tail and gave a quiet bark. "Go track one that smells like hipster coffee."

Roy gave another quiet bark before putting his nose to the ground and sniffing down the way that Jasmine figured Miles, Annie and Eric had gone. Mal's stomach grumbled, which got him to clutch it and say, "Where's my COOKIE?! that Rotom stole it!"

Art glanced at him. "I'll buy you a cookie when we get out of here."

She skipped until she was facing them, having led the group before. "Will I get anything for losing thanks to that thing?"

"You're really a sore loser, aren't you?" Ten said.

She just grinned, only to freeze upon hearing the unmistakable scream of Arial when she'd found fear to feed off of. Her laughter went through the halls and was promptly followed by shouts of "Get that Pokemon!"

What had that ghost gotten itself into now?

Misdreavus came flying around the corner, still giggling madly, and a few security guards white like a litwik. As soon as they saw the group of three, they froze and shoved a finger at them. "You there! Stop!"

"I say good sir," Mal said, jumping forward. "You really should reconsider. We here are simply trying to relocate our friends after this chap stopped a Rotom from taking over your system, and once we've found them we really will—"

He didn't get to finish that sentence because of a particularly girly scream coming from down the hall. Either Eric or Annie. Jasmine couldn't exactly be sure which. Roy barked from somewhere ahead of them before running back to alert his mistress something was going on.

Mal paused, pointing a finger up into the air. "Now if you'll excuse us, we have our friends to take care of! Allons-y!"

Eric
Power Plant
Angleterre

Eric's experiences of England had not been pleasant thus far, but this was by far the worst.

"Muk?" The Pokémon sitting on top of him clasped its hands and looked at him inquisitively. "Muuuuuuuk!"

Eric screamed. Very loudly. He jumped up, but the Muk was stuck to his chest. Eric had to grab it with both hands and throw it away from himself. His hands, his chest and his scarf were all covered with... Muk.

"Ah, merde."

"No, Mom, I want to-" Miles opened his eyes. "WAIT WHAT NO I DON'T WANT A-"

"Muuuuuuuuuk."

Miles had to go through a similar procedure as Eric, which in turn woke up Annie.

"A MUK!"

"MUK," the Muk agreed.

Simultaneously, Miles and Eric rushed towards he and pulled it off her.

"Muk," said Muk, reaching towards her.

"No!" Miles and Eric simultaneously shouted. Then they said, "Are you okay?"

"What's happening? Is anybody hurt? I heard screaming although, well, that could just be a fox- earth fox, I mean, not a fox from Pandora 16, although those are some pretty fascinating creatures. Ate all my cookies once, welllll, most of my cookies, and then there was that Judoon- speaking of, where is my cookie?"

Eric rubbed his head. "Claude?"

"Reeeep," said Claude feebly and Eric ran to his Pokémon's side. The Mareep's coat was still bristling with static and Eric knew it was not a good idea to touch him. He grabbed a Pokéball to take the Mareep in, but a Muk blocked him.

"Muk?"

"No. You do not fit in my team. Move."

"Muk..." The Muk said sadly, sloping off into the corner. Eric took Claude into the ball.

"We heard screaming..." said Jasmine.

"That was him." Simultaneous again.

"Well what happened?" Jasmine put her hands on her hips in a way that probably usually got boys to listen to her. Miles was certainly listening, with his mouth hanging open. Eric was not impressed. All French girls did that.

"There was an incident, and my scarf was ruined," Eric said, inspecting his scarf. "And this is Gucci. Claude and Isabelle have matching collars. Without it, we are not a team as we should be. We must get to a dry cleaners' tout suite."

There was a lot of staring at Eric dumbfoundedly. He wasn't sure why, but was thankful when it stopped. Because somebody else had screamed. And the scream had been followed by, "I THINK I JUST CAUGHT A MUK!"

Miles
Power Center

“That sounded like Annie.” Miles gathered his breath. “Wait. Annie?!” He jerked to the left, back to the right, forward, back, all directions looking for the One Thing he was responsible for. “Annie?!” Out of the corner, she emerged, blonde hair dyed oily black by Muk’s Muk. She had tears in her eyes that Miles knew were about to burst open. “N-no, no no no--”

“IT’S IN MY POKEBA-AH-AH-AH-ALLLLLL.” She tackled Miles in a grabby, teary hug and bawled. The oil in her hair got all over his jacket, making him grimace. He couldn’t support her tiny weight, and in seconds of shaking and sputtering, they both hit the floor, the world’s smallest dogpile on Miles.

The Australian poked Eric in the side with his shoulder, holding his left arm with his right. “Why is she crying?”

“Iunno. She’s American. Must be pregnant.”

Her crying stopped, paused for just a second, and she leaped to her feet, eyes furiously burning. “I AM NOT PREGNANT YOU SUNUVA--”

“Annie!”

She stopped, pursing her lips and putting a finger to her mouth. She closed her eyes and sniffled. “There. Is a Muk. In my Pokeball.” She pinched the bridge of her nose and screamed, causing Zubat to pftb pftb pftb down by their heads.

“They’re down this way!”

“Ah, yes! We’re being chased!” Mal beamed at the remaining five, but then cocked his head at Miles, who was on his knees, recovering. “Why were you all passed out on the floor? Doesn’t seem like something Americans would do on a floor, though I suppose there isn’t much an American won’t do on the floor…”

“Rotom used Reflect when my Patrat tried to hypnotize him...hit everything staring at the screen.” Miles climbed to his feet and pulled off his jacket, tossing it into the running water on the other side of the railing.

“So he knows reflect, too...what a mon!” The Australian --

“What’s your name?”

“Art.”

-- Art took out a Pokeball and released Rotom into the air. The little orange ball giggled and winked at Miles, who shuddered. “You caught him?!” He grinned. “Amazing! This is just what we needed. Give me a second with him!” Miles took out his phone and pulled up a WIKIHOW page, plugging his phone into Rotom’s forehead.

“Oooom,” noted Rotom as he absorbed the data. When he was finished, he nodded at Miles. Flashlights broke through the near-darkness and Rotom danced ahead down the hall, looking back at Miles, then at Art.

“Tell him to use Electroweb.”

“Electroweb?”

Miles nodded quickly. “I taught it to him! It’ll keep the cops out long enough for us to escape!”

“Right,” Art nodded. “Citrus!”

“Citrus?” in chorus.

“It’s his name!”

“Oh.” In chorus.

“Use Electroweb!”

Rotom opened his mouth and made his lips into a small O. With a deep breath, he let out a string of electricity that shot out like a spider’s silk, drawing a very large Rotom face in a barrier blocking the hallway. Everyone awed in approval.

“Let’s go!”

Annie
Power Plant

"Wait, someone let the muk out for me--"

Miles grabbed her wrist and ran with the rest of the group. Annie whimpered, her other hand flailing behind her, perhaps in hopes of the rushing wind blowing off the gunk in her fingers or in a clueless flailing manner in which every nerve in her body was panicking about a muk in her trunk pokeball.

Blurry eyes had a hard time paying attention to where they were going, so it was probably a good thing Miles was dragging her along.

Then she panicked and stopped in her tracks. Miles flung backward at her sudden halt. "WHAT?!"

"WHERE'S MY BABY?"

"YOU WERE NEVER PREGNANT."

"WHERE'S LARVITAR?!" Annie shrieked. She spun around in circles, wailing. "WHERE'S MY LARVITAR--"

"WAY AHEAD OF YOU." Miles shoved a finger forward before pulling her, yet again, to chase after the group. Annie squinted through her tears to see little Juice, with those wild eyes, helping larvitar keep up with everyone.

"Larvitar!" Annie suddenly got a hold of herself and ran alongside Miles until they even picked up pace. She scooped up her larvitar as soon as they got close enough, Juice hopping onto Miles' extended arm.

After much hustlin' and bustlin', the gang finally made their way outside the power plant. Everyone stopped running, completely out of breath, and Miles managed to say, "Everyone... just act... natural."

"Never stop running, I always say!" Mal exclaimed, waving his screwdriver around.

"I have been saying zis for years, but no one evah listens."

"I HAVE A MUK IN MY POKEBALL."

Annie wailed, doing the GETITOFFGETITOFF dance.

Miles walked up and took the pokeball out of her bag. "Only you could accidentally catch a muk."

"I was going to put larvitar in his pokeball," Annie squeaked, "but the muk was... the muk was all..." She started tearing up again as she flung her arms out in the catch-me-I-love-you-let's-play imitation that muk did before getting caught.

"Let's get back to the festival before the police catch up," Miles muttered, tossing the pokeball up and down in his hand. "And remember, act nor--oh, never mind," he finally said as he saw Art oogling over his rotom with a magnifying glass he mysteriously now owns.

Miles
The River Song Hotel

“Don’t you think it’s a little weird that we made so many friends in just a day?” Miles took a sip of his coffee and leaned against the back wall of the elevator. Inside, it was just he and Annie, and the hum of soft jazz music faded just within earshot so as not to disrupt vital conversations that never took place in elevators. The floor and ceiling of the elevator were black, and the walls had murals of Pokemon on them, each a different type. For this particular elevator, Vaporeon, Umbreon, and Sylveon made very innocent faces, their tails curled around their necks like scarves. Miles was impressed that the photographer had managed to get all three into the same pose while making it look natural.

“Maybe,” murmured Annie. She was feeding Larvitar the last of a bag of gummy worms she’d bought before leaving the carnival. “But I don’t like to question new friends! You can only imagine how rare friendships like these must be…” The elevator stopped on their floor, and Miles trudged wearily into the hallway. For courtesy, he pulled Patrat into his pokeball and stowed the ball in his bag.

In their room, Miles made a beeline for the bathroom, closed the door, and, staring at the wall, stood over the toilet. If I’d wanted friends, he thought, I would’ve made them in America. He sighed and thought of everything from Annie’s perspective as the sound of water hitting more water caught his earshot. If she’d wanted friends, she could’ve done much better than me. Why choose a lonely dog while there are millions of cats craving attention just outside? It was ultimately a question of who’d sought whom out. And as much as he wanted to remember, Miles just couldn’t bring to mind how he’d met Annie.

Their room was split cleanly into two distinct parts. Miles’ side: the messy clutter covered with games and clothes, cameras and photographs, books from the 1800s -- even a textbook for senior-module Calculus with his scrawl written all through it. On closer thought, he decided that bringing it had been a heavy mistake. Then there was Annie’s side: spotless and organized with clothes arranged in ROYGBIV fashion hanging from a mobile rack, a cell phone charger plugged in beside their lamp, and a book on Pokemon nurseries that her mother’d given her before they left home. Miles sat down cross-legged on his bed and filmed through the photographs he’d collected.

Miles had this particular habit - one that he’d never thought to share with anyone else; instead of collecting his own photographs in a scrapbook, he collected photographs taken by other people, discarded after they were deemed unfit for a collection of their own. But Miles, he saw things in a much different light. The things that were worth the least, he imagined, would, in some way, be worth the most.

“I think finding the boat will be the hard part,” called Annie from the bathroom. Miles could smell her straightening her hair from his bed. The Muk residue came through strong and true, so Miles lit a candle and turned out the lights. The dim orange glow lit his side of the room, mostly. He leaned back against his headboard and shut his eyes, imagining the sights they would find on their journey. Warsaw, Prague, Rome...the thoughts made him warm inside, like he’d found a new emotion somewhere on the road. He imagined running with his Torchic through the French plains, exploring caves with Patrat, flying home to Long Island with his notebook full of journal entries. There would be his new emotion, somewhere out there.

Miles opened his eyes, and Annie appeared at the foot of his bed, blurry and golden-haired, her eyes on her phone. He could smell her shampoo, her perfume. He’d been asleep. “Have…” His words were slurred together by fatigue, but his eyes couldn’t leave Annie. His responsibility. “Have some faith, Ans.” His eyes closed again, and he could hear his own breathing, but nothing else.


“C’mon, you.”

“Mnnnm.”

“Geddup!”

Eyes open. Five a.m. and change. It was time to pack. Miles slumped out of bed and peered into the closet-door mirror where he could see Annie back at the bathroom sink, swallowing a pill. It wasn’t his business. He released Juice and Megaman and began packing his things into a single bag -- it was no easy chore. After a long while, he and Annie were on the streets in the cold pre-dawn morning, walking towards the London outskirts.

“It’d be easier,” Miles said, “if we could hitch a ride.”

They both looked around them. Plenty of cars, plenty of trucks. Even a helicopter or two. But nothing moving slowly enough to pick them up. Annie pushed Miles aside and wagged her finger. “You have to understand what the boys will stop for!” She looked both ways on the highway and stuck her leg out onto the road, pulling her jeans up to reveal her ankle. The very next truck--blue, 1980, Ford--stopped with squealing breaks. They both crawled into the back and huddled together to keep warm.

I think it’s safe to say that I rocked the festival today.

Several near death experiences, an opportunity to regenerate, beat a bad mon, ran from the cops, and had a giant cookie. I mean, like, the near death stuff wasn’t fun, but it was FUN afterwards, aside from the whole almost dying, the pain and the possible trauma to come later. But how many people can honestly say they jumped into a dangerously fast river to regenerate? Very few! Mostly because no one would want to do that, but I count it as a win.

I must say that it went much, much, much better than my last attempt at this, I think it was the people. Malcolm is no fool, I knows I’m not some cool dude, but they didn’t find me annoying enough to give me a fake number or run off, so I must have done something right. Or Maybe something so wrong, so wrong they think I NEED them. Last guys only ditched me and when I found them ran away, I mean I get it, I can’t always find a hint, but they could at least have tried, ya know? Even if they don’t like me, these guys were nice...

Well, either way at least they’re nice enough to pity me, which is better than most people I suppose. Chan is super happy that she got to make some friends too, Marty is too but he’s trying to play it cool, little pyromaniac thinks he’s so cool. *Note- Pyromaniac who thinks he’s cool, possible joke?

A bit disappointed I didn’t get to do the main event of the festival, I really wanted to get some early points in for this thing, but there are always more to come. We’re going to try and find a boat tomorrow, I already have everything picked out too, I figured I needed something naval based, nothing too outrageous though, I gotta be classy. So I’m going as an olde timey Pirate with a stuffed wingull on his shoulder, Chan has an eye patch.

Good day. 4.5/5 would live again, though without the drowning bit.






P.S- Marty tried to cook a bag of popcorn on my back while I was writing this, the Hotel had a fire alarm go off. Don’t tell anyone.


P.P.S- Artstalian’s Rotom will pay for my cookie.

P.P.P.S- I want a unicorn made of fire and death.