There’s a moment, after the shock wears off, where they think they might have a chance. Four on one? Each with at least three Pokemon? Those are good odds. Heck, great odds. With odds like those, they might even win some prizes at the game corner.[break][break]
The punks go for their pokeballs.[break][break]
When another man walks up beside the errant detective, they pause. None of them, Navy included, recognize the guy. He’s another nameless soldier on the battlefield. His voice carries respect. It’s an officer’s voice. That they can all recognize. Beyond that, they’re clueless.[break][break]
The odds are suddenly not in their favor. These punks aren’t dumb in terms of Intelligence Quota. They’re young idiots, but they’ll grow out of their idiocy if life doesn’t cull them first. Their eyes all dart to the men’s belts. Six pokeballs each. Most of Navy’s are housed in ultra balls to boot.[break][break]
Two show they’re a bit smarter than the rest. Like a certain young punk in the opening scene of a movie about Fear and Loathing, they cut and run. Drop their pack, make for the surface. Time to go home and rethink their lives. Navy doesn’t stop them. What the newcomer does is up to him.[break][break]
“Aw come on, man!” One of the remaining two says, slapping his temple with his hand.[break][break]
“More money for us.” The man dressed like the most stereotypical grunt in the world hides his apprehension with a smirk. He’s the first to pull out his pokeball.[break][break]
And what does he throw out?[break][break]
A Raticate. In its defense, it doesn’t look that weak. Perhaps it’s a well-trained specimen. It snarls at the two older men.[break][break]
The other trainer throws out a Glaceon. Not the best pick. Still better than a Raticate.[break][break]
“Look at that, old timer. Their ‘mons don’t even have any synergy.” Scared as Navy is, thrown off his game, shaken by the pull of a primordial sea, he manages to sound cocky. It’s just a part. An act. Trying to scare them straight. Navy unslings a ball with swagger.[break][break]
Roland, his Gallade, spills out of the ball in a flash of red. The knight assumes a ready position, psychic energy forming along his curved hand-blades.[break][break]
“He knows life dew. Throw out whatever ya want, Roland will back you up.” Navy doesn’t care if they hear a hint of his strategy. The more he gets inside their head, the better it’ll be for him and the mysterious newcomer.


[break][break]

+ Laurence Anderson 20 MP

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

“S-Shaddup! We’ll, uh! We’ll get you!” The youth’s eyes betray his uncertainty. The Gardevoir looks well trained. Beautiful. It shines. That Gardevoir is one in ten thousand. Even if the Gallade doesn’t look special, there’s a fierceness in his eyes.[break][break]
Well…[break][break]
Was a fierceness in his eyes.[break][break]
Roland is a warrior. He prides himself on a stoic warrior’s pride. As the bedrock of a team filled to the brim with emotional oddballs, he tries to act as a guiding force for the other Pokemon. A good listener. A foundational warrior.[break][break]
Yet beside this Gardevoir, all Roland can do is blush. Navy notices it first. He sees the same look in Roland’s eyes that he saw in his little brother’s when he had to sit next to a girl he liked on the bus ride to school.[break][break]
It warms his heart.[break][break]
“Show off for your new girlfriend, Roland!” Roland shoots back at him with a look of abject adolescent anger. He huffs and turns just in time to hear the grunt issue a command.[break][break]
“Why don’tcha hyper fang his girl-”[break][break]
The sentence doesn’t finish leaving the grunt’s mouth before Roland teleports behind the rat, a glowing blade of psychic energy gleaming along his blade as he brings it down on his foe with abject ferocity. Navy’s never seen him act like this before.[break][break]
“Uh…” The other meathead is a bit lost. Frankly, he’s in over his head and he knows it now. “Glaceon. Use…I dunno. Ice Beam?”[break][break]
“At least this one knows how to use a TM.” Navy quips.


[break][break]

+ 30 seconds to Laurence Anderson

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

It’s a beam clash that would put special effects in movies to shame. Coalesced ice and pure psychic might. Navy and Roland are both transfixed – for different reasons, of course. Roland only snaps out of it when the Raticate snarls and tries to bite him. This specimen is not, unfortunately, in the top percentage of his kind. Roland attacks him in close combat. The rat is sent sprawling.[break][break]
Just in time to witness the end of the beam clash. The Glaceon, too, isn’t well trained. Navy privately wonders if the Pokemon wasn’t stolen or freshly evolved. It’s a farce. He covers his lips to stifle a laugh.[break][break]
The Tauros are huffing. Looking agitated. Whoever handed these beasts off to them trained them well. Were it not for the mysterious hero beside him, Navy would get an idea or two about snagging one of those Tauros. They’d just end up going to the League, anyway…[break][break]
“Why you…!” The grunt grunts. He takes a step forward. A precarious step that brings him too close to one of the Tauros. His proximity seems to be the last straw. The bull loudly screams and kicks out. It shatters his waist and one of the pokeballs at his waist.[break][break]
Out comes a Crobat, looking angry for having its nap disturbed. In the midst of all the confusion, it surveys the situation and decides it’s going to make things worse. As the Tauros snap free and charge the League trainers, ahead of them is a confuse ray aimed for them as well.[break][break]
“Looks like we might just break a sweat!” Navy says, understanding that maintaining the appearance of control is important. One grunt’s all but given up, judging by the fact that his first instinct is now to tend to his Glaceon. The other is rolling on the ground in pain by the carts he was so desperate to defend.[break][break]
Roland teleports in front of one Tauros, the one going for the Gardevoir, and clashes with the bull. His psychic blade locks with its horns as he digs his feet in.[break][break]
“Lookin’ chivalrous, bud.” Navy gives him a thumbs up.[break][break]


[break][break]

+ 40 MP Laurence Anderson

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

“You heard the guy, Roland!” Navy shouts out to Gallade. “Stop bein’ a hero. I wanna see what this guy can do.” Roland’s reluctant to teleport out, what with the rampaging bull in front of him, but he gives in eventually. What choice does he have? The Gardevoir’s one of his kind, he has some idea of the tricks she can pull.[break][break]
After all, he’d faced the choice, once upon a time, of becoming like her or walking a different path. He chose this form for himself, courtesy of a stone.[break][break]
Placing his faith in the blue-tinted Gardevoir, he teleports to his master’s side. Stands guard like a sentinel beside the taller trainer.[break][break]
And across the field, to the single grunt’s credit, he sure isn’t backing down. His buddy picked up his Glaceon, turned tail, and ran. Even abject idiots, under sufficient pressure, can extol common sense. Now there’s just one.[break][break]
He seems oblivious to the effects of the terrain rolling in across their impromptu battlefield as the Tauros rage.[break][break]
“My payday!” He cries.[break][break]
“Geez, does Rocket give out employee of the month awards? ‘Cause this guy deserves one.”

[break][break]

+ 50 MP Laurence Anderson

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

The dumb kid in the Rocket uniform that’s left comes to grips with reality. He has a Golbat and several Tauros that have now been beaten by a clever use of terrain. They are caught in the blast and sent flying. Most of them, not trained for proper battling, are knocked out. Pokemon are tougher than humans, but it takes special training to endure the kind of punishment that a Gardevoir can doll out.[break][break]
He's outgunned. Outmanned. Outnumbered. Outplanned.[break][break]
He can either make his stand and lose or retreat. Frankly, it’s the most generous offer he’s liable to get today. Gritting his teeth, swallowing his pride, he cries out to the Golbat while trying to fight through the pain of being kicked. He turns on his heels and kicks a hasty retreat. His Golbat shrieks and chases after him.[break][break]
“…man.” Navy chuckles. “You fought good, old timer. …wanna go see what this was all for?” He asks while walking to the cart.[break][break]
Roland follows, trying very, very hard to come across as stoic and cool. Looking forward. His eyes gazing at the cart with a warrior’s enigmatic gaze.[break][break]
Oblivious in a juvenile way to the fact that his evolutionary line are empaths. Anything that cared to could sense how he felt.


[break][break]

+ 60 MP

[attr="class","pokeclass"]

“Nah man, knock yourself out.” Navy shrugs as he jumps into the back of the cart. “Not like it’s gonna be our lungs that kill either of us.” He speaks with dry acceptance about the inevitability of his fate. He looks through the cargo.[break][break]
It’s disappointingly normal. Practical, even. Food, since they were smart enough to realize that this was going to be one long day. Navy finds no shame in snagging a pair of MREs and some water for himself. It’s been almost a day since he had something to eat. The plan was to stop at a nice restaurant he knew in the nearby town, but life got in the way.[break][break]
There’s linen. Radio equipment. Everything’s normal until…[break][break]
“The hell is this?” Navy pulls up a pillow the size of a human. A person he doesn’t recognize is looking up at him in a provocative pose. “…someone almost died for this damn thing.” He chuckles.[break][break]
Guess a bit of levity’s in order.


[break][break]

+ 70 MP

[attr="class","pokeclass"]