Ohey. There was another. Once she had woken up sufficiently – and, more to the point, had heard the other talk – Megan did truly notice another woman nearby. Well, that one seemed like she was, if not a friendly, then at least a neutral. So that was already good to know. “Hey there,” she replied, slightly grinning. Two trainers together could probably deal with anything the wilds had to offer. Well, hopefully at least!

Either way, introductions were best kept court and short. “Don’t worry. I literally just got up. I’m Megan, that’s Arcanine.” Very much to the point. Mostly because she was still looking around, trying to figure out where those tremors had come from. But they seemed a bit more distant now. Maybe whatever caused it was moving away? Possible.

However, just because there was nothing big around the corner, they were not completely safe. Instead of a huge beast, a duo of groundly assailants appeared from the tall grass – a Trapinch that her partner of chance took care of, along with a Sandile from the east. Guess that was hers to handle. “Let’s not set anything ablaze. Extreme Speed!” she ordered her Arcanine, which swiftly thundered at the Sandile. Maybe it wasn’t strictly speaking going to attack them or anything like that. But she was not taking chance at this hour.
And she always, always damaged a ‘Mon before trying to catch it, which was why she followed it up with a Pokeball. “I was woken up by something big and or heavy. Not sure if it was any of those, though.”

Guess that Makuhita had a buddy. Or maybe the ruckus they were causing had called others onto the scene. Hard to tell. But one way or another, she had a sort of buddy here now as well, one who’d warned her. Turning quickly, she nudged Lucario towards the hostile as well. Okay, maybe she was just imagining the hostility here. That thing looked quite stoic and imposing. But being cautious meant giving up the advantage of initiative. And like heck was she going to just let that one attack them!

Instead, she decided to hit it first and hit it hard. “Close Combat right away!” Her order was maybe a bit headstrong, but it looked like a strong Pokemon. If they were starting a useless fight here, she at least wanted to come out swinging and hit as hard as they could. Hopefully, that would be enough. It did seem like the Empoleon was being flung backwards, against a nearby wall. But her Lucario had already caught up on her drift. Instead of letting a dazed opponent be, it sent an Aura Sphere after it on instinct.

Megan, too, followed that up by the only attack she knew, the one called ‘Throw Ball’. She was still husbanding her resources in that regard. But Empoleon looked strong, so she wanted it, one way or another!

---

Tries to capture Empoleon.

She would never understand why a gym was an army base. Yes, she had gotten some public information about what had happened. Heck, she’d done that out of spite. These people had wanted quite a lot of information up front while offering little in return. That kind of stuff reminded her a bit too much of corporate structures, so she’d taken to an internet café and gotten herself all the intel she could easily get.



Nothing much on the gym leader himself though. Of course not. They probably had some NDAs in place so no one gave them a bad review anyway. Which she was totally going to do, if she found a way to.

Arcanine bumped into her side, clearly noticing her internal fuming. She shot him a gaze. He looked back, sternly. And in the end, she gave in, sighing. He was probably right. Positive attitude! There was a trainer here that she had to beat! And she would! Because she didn’t really know what to do if she didn’t.



Wait, that was kind of negative too. Megan stopped briefly, on the first few steps before the entrance. Then, she took a few deep breaths. In through the nose, out through the mouth, just like mom had taught her. Then, she lightly slapped her own cheeks. “you can do this. You are prepared. Just do your best. It will work out somehow.” Her voice was quiet, but steady, for she simply tried to psych herself up. She did have to do that.

And she had to remind herself. “This is supposed to be a passable test. It has to be.” Meg was still rather uneasy about having to register her ‘Mons ahead of time – while her opponent had done nothing like that.



Ugh. She couldn’t get away from negativity, now could she? Well, didn’t matter. She was here now, all shorts, shirt and cap on her head.



…



But where was the entrance?

She looked about. So far, she’d just assumed that someone would be waiting near the entrance to take her credentials and stuff. However, no one came up to her. There was one guy though, but he seemed asleep. So, she had not planned on bugging him. Probably had to, though. “Um, excuse me sir? Is this the way to the gym?”

More like thanks Aboma!

Ah, good. The man had an idea. That was fortunate, since she didn’t have much of an idea in that regard. At least she had trapped these two wild Pokemon in the Fire Spin. Though, she honestly had not exactly expected his Pokemon to outright jump into the ring of fire and knock the Purrzerker out cold.

That was…kind of impressive. However, there was no time to waste. One of the Mightyena was distracting the Magnezone – to the point where it, briefly angered beyond the boiling point – tried to rush it. And thus, it ran into the firespin by itself, before recoiling in a shriek, injured.
Megan decided to both be a bit vindictive and to leave nothing to chance. “Flare Blitz!” she hence instructed her Arcanine. The beast had no issue jumping into the ring as well, a flaming tackle pushing the Magnezone.

Though that also meant sending a ball after that, just in case. “Did you get the bag? Unscorched?!” Waiting for the fire to die down, Megan was still definitely worried about her belongings.

If Megan subconsciously picked up on the affects her words were having, she didn’t show it at all. Probably because she was still running. Capturing the Ampharos had taken a few moments, but her Arcanine was not going on full speed for her sake, meaning that she could catch up reasonably well before too long. Plus, it wasn’t like Arcanine himself could move beyond the next corner anyway. There was something big and…unusual, really.

Meg just stopped and stared momentarily. She’d never seen a Magnezone before. And she definitely hadn’t seen a Purrzerker riding a Magnezone like a pilot riding an UFO, that much was for sure. And yet, that was what she had in front of her right then.

However, she quickly shook off her confusion, when she saw a third object of interest. No, not another metal Pokemon riding on the Purrzerker’s head. That would have been silly. Rather, she was what the cat was carrying. Her bag. Apparently, they had found the culprit and her escape…vehicle? Either way, they had to catch them!
“Flame Wheel! Keep them from escaping!” she called out to her Arcanine. Then, she would turn to the guy. “Uh, any way you could help getting my bag away from those first? I kind of don’t want to throw fire at them, so nothing gets burnt.

Okay. So maybe this wasn’t the best place to camp. In retrospect, she should have just continued on, towards the next town. But there was this saying about hindsight and how it was so last year. Though her plan to rest and then head over there fully rested was squashed when she got woken up. Not by noise, no. She felt this more than she heard it. A bit of low rumbling, something big. Something she would feel despite her head resting on the still breathing flank of her Arcanine.

However, that would end rather soon. Her Pokemon was considerate enough to wait for her to wake and get her bearings, but he was already answering in a bit of a growl of his own. The moment that she lifted her head from him, Arcanine would get up himself, positioning himself on all four and starting to both listen and sniff in, trying to locate the potential threat.

Meanwhile, Megan sighed, lightly holding her head. Being ripped from the deeper states of sleep was seldom pleasant, and she felt at least a little bit of an headache. Still, this wasn’t exactly a place to lie about sleeping. Not when something big was on the move somewhere nearby.
Sighing once more, she packed up her gear. Soon, the former Pokemart employee found herself on her feet again, backpack on her shoulders and one hand on her partner’s back. “Let’s go and see what this is about. Maybe we can even catch something nice,” she noted, though in part she was really just psyching herself up with that, trying to gain some more courage.

But she had decided to become stronger, to become a leader. This had to happen. Megan headed into the gras, her Arcanine at her side, wary of what might lurk inside.

The Raichu didn’t come back out again. Another successful catch. She should have felt great about that, really, but there was just one tiny little problem with all that: her bag was still not there. Apparently, it had not been the Raichu that had taken it. But who else? She looked about, somewhat frantically, while the odd person from earlier continued to talk. And he sounded a lot like a typical Slateporter: ‘something should be done. But probably not by me’. That sort of thing. She rolled her eyes in response.

“Minor inconvenience? Something just made off with my bag. You know, the one that holds my ID, my money, everything!” Megan was slightly yelling here, but she felt like she did so for a good reason. The contents of that bag were quite important to her. And she still had not found it. Spotting movement from the corner of her eye, she iimediately ordered her Lucario to Aura Sphere a passing Shinx. The little thing all but froze in shock, clearly not expecting that to happen and was caught off-guard by the attack.

A second later, Megan noticed that too. Seeing such an expression on the face of a cute Pokemon did have at least some effect on her, after all. Meg yelped, briefly, before rushing forward to the little one. “Sorry, sorry, didn’t mean to. Uh, just get caught and I will get you to a center in a bit, yes?” Once she had her bag back and could identify herself, at least. Megan would try to more nudge the ball towards the Shinx than properly throw it though, trying to not hurt it any more.

She had not actually considered that her training method might call for more wild monsters to come at them. But, at the same time, she was not completely opposed to that, either. That just meant more training opportunities. Lucario blew a particularly big piece of stone away – and then the stone punched back, a Makuhita coming from the opening. Slightly startled, her own Pokemon did take that hit, being pushed a few feet back.
But it wasn’t exactly one to give up. Within moments, it surged forward again, unleashing an Aura Sphere and knocking the other Pokemon down, just as it had. Briefly, that saw Megan think about throwing a ball at that being, but she ultimately decided against it. A shriek of sorts from the other end of the cave caught her attention instead.

While the Makuhita ran, Meg and her Lucario watched another brief battle unfold. Somehow, there was a bird in this tunnel. That was confusing enough that she could not avert her eyes from it. However, the blonde under attack there was clearly better able to deal with that situation, already cycling through her ‘Mons and, hopefully, bringing down the metallic avian.
“Heh. Not bad,” she noted, smirking like she actually had the right to judge anyone else’s performance as a battler. Still though. It wasn’t bad, now was it? Megan focused on that occurrence, really, while her Lucario kept watch. So far though, it did not seem like that Makuhita was coming back.

---

passes

Phew. Caught it before it exploded. That was a clear win in her book. Could have been better, but at least they all got out of this unscathed. She could never understand how the people of this city could live with such dangerous ‘Mons stalking the street. Well, potentially dangerous. She didn’t know if that one would have hurt anyone without provocation. But she took no chances with Gravelers.

Either way, Megan breathed out a little sigh. Then, her attention is turned towards her back, where apparently a Pichu had tried to get to her while she was distracted. But that guy had intervened, hadn’t he? “Got all my things?” Meg blinked at him, lightly confused. It didn’t register to her at first why he’d ask something like this of all things. They could have exploded, but he asked for things? That was just….
…
Wait, where was her bag? Megan blinked, looking left and right. Then she spotted something fast running away from them into an alleyway. “Get it!” she called for her Lucario, who dashed into the street ahead of her. Meg would run after him, forced to leave that man behind if he did not join the hunt. There was a crashing sound of sorts in front of her, after Lucario rounded a corner. Slightly apprehensive, Megan slowed down just a bit at that, taking the same corner more slowly, cautiously.

Once there, she would see Lucario, having punched a Raichu in the face. Meg couldn’t make out anything else, but she threw her Pokeball at it anyway, hoping to stop it from escaping, if it was not knocked out yet.

Some people saw treasures in the stone, beauty even. Once upon a time, she probably had, too. But these days? These days Megan saw this whole cave as an opportunity. There were wild Pokemon here, of course. But there were also boulders. And her Lucario needed training. So, she, was killing two birds with one stone. Or more smashing two stones with one fist. Well, her Pokemon was, but she felt quite smart coming up with that one. So, it would stay.

And so, her Pokemon would continue punching one particularly big boulder, which was apparently blocking the path in this area. She figured that a Pokemon with Strength could move it but a) she didn’t have one with that move and b) she didn’t need to. As long as they could train like this, it didn’t really matter if the boulder was removed or not.
After all, she had not come here for the beauty of things. Instead, the lass in shorts, shirt and jacket would watch her ‘Mon punch the boulder repeatedly, her own arms crossed. The only sounds coming from her direction, reverberating through the cave, were sounds of those punches and the impatient tapping of her feet. Though she was not quite sure why she’d do that to begin with. As if she was waiting for something, without really knowing what that was.

She was startled by the little sound the door made when opening. She got miffed when she caught the tail-end of a consumer complaint. Her features hardened quickly when that happened. That guy better not have given the poor employee grief just because they did not have in stock what he wanted! Megan met his approach with harsher eyes than she might have wanted, at least at first.

Her Lucario picked up on that, too – but it soon shifted attention to another noise. That one was not a higher-pitched half jingle, so Meg didn’t initially notice it, but rather the low, rumbling grumbling of a Graveler. Being a good boy, he would nudge Megan, briefly distracting her from her little stare-on with the stranger.
Turning to the side, she would be a bit jumpy again – but in a very different manner. In a little maneuver the two of them had trained, Megan would swiftly take position behind her Pokemon, giving him a clean line of fire towards the passing Pokemon. The Graveller, at least at first, did not seem very interested in them. But it, too, could feel the sudden tension in the air. And tension in the air led to thunderstorms, which were connected to lightning bolts and…..anyway, it discharged a….Discharge at Lucario, who deftly dodged. “Aura Sphere it!” Megan would call out. In her usual manner, she immediately went for a rather aggressive course of action. But that was how she’d been taught to fight – confident and straightforward.

Maybe a bit overconfident, since the moment she saw the sphere connect, she threw a Pokeball at the newcomer, simply hoping that it had taken enough damage. She probably had to. If she remembered correctly, those things could explode or something. Best to settle this quickly.

Phew. It….certainly had been a while since she’d last been here, hadn’t it? Felt like a lifetime ago that she’d last walked these streets. They looked….nicer than back then, really. But Megan did not feel good about that at all. Probably because at the back of her mind, she knew that a lot of that simply because the city had been fixed in the aftermath of a so-called war. Still a scary word. She’d heard of it, naturally, but by the time that she had fully internalized what that meant, it had been over already.

One of the reasons as to why she had not yet come here. Or, in another way, it was why she came now. That news and the realization that so much was going on outside had finally gotten her to get off her butt and moving towards a goal. So, naturally, this town would be one of the first stops for the young woman. She had her Lucario out though. Just in case. Even without any wars and the like, the lower district was not necessarily the safest of places. Especially not for a girl on her own, wearing a tightly filled backpack that indicated her being a traveller, and wearing a rather eccentric sort of shawl that probably made her look like a bit of a weirdo. Did not take a Rocket to try and think she was easy pickings.

Plus, there were wild Pokemon. Just around the current corner, she’d met a Magneton so long ago. And, without any Pokemon of her own back then, running had been her only recourse. But now, now she was back and ready if any of them tried anything! Yes, this was new Megan, a stalwart warrioress that would one day make it to –
Ding-ding
The sound of a nearby Pokemarket door opening caught Meg slightly off guard and she whirled to face and hiss at it. That horrible, horrible sound. If she never heard it again ever, it would be much too soon.