I don’t know how far we have moved but it’s definitely past midnight now. The twins and the two vulpixes are starting to struggle a bit, not use to long nights. Hoot and myself were fine and due to our nocturnal abilities, we were acting as sentries. The night life was surprising and rather loud here. I would have thought it would be quieter, but I could hear insects of all sorts along with various nocturnal pokemon appearing often and their calls being heard through the night.

I wasn’t sure how much further we were going to run aswell. That trainer had a very well trained houndoom at his disposal and it was skilled at tracking by the sounds of it. Only if the moon was duller though. It wasn’t a full moon, being near a half moon as it waned but there was easily still enough light to see along the road. Although if it was a new moon, while I would probably still see fine, the twins wouldn’t see anything unless they used a torch, but then they would be seen from a long distance away.

Why are you doing this for us? I hear the alolan vulpix ask. While the fire type still was walking along, she couldn’t go any further, so she asked me to carry her because she didn’t trust the twins. And I doubt offering to catch them would grant us any favours with them.

Because its wrong to leave someone in a bad situation if its easy to help them out, no matter who you are. I respond to in at least my mind, her completely absurd question. I noticed Jennifer hesitate mid step for a moment but continued on like nothing was different. I guess that might be a story for another time.

What’s the real reason! I hear the other vulpix yell in anger, but I could also sense fear and disbelief in his voice.

You didn’t have to come with us if you didn’t believe we were going to help you. I retort. He seemed to hold back something, but I let it slide. Considering that the one on my back almost broke into tears trying to recall what that monster did to these two.

I looked to the stars as a memory passed through my mind.

I was in my room from my childhood. Considering the poster of spiderman on the wall, I guess this was from my superhero faze when I was about 7. There were two beds in the room, one for me, and one for someone else. I look over to see the young girl I had found and our family adopted hiding in and facing the corner of the room.

“Milly?” I ask and this causes her to freeze up. She suddenly gets up and whips around as a knife drops from her hand and obvious red lines are along her arms.

“Why are you doing this!” She yells at me. I recall her always being distant and quiet, so this startled younger self considerably. “Why did you help me?” She says as she breaks down into tears and falls to her knees. “Why do you give a damn about me? I’m not worth anyone’s attention so why?”

I walk over to her and sit beside her, kicking the knife away from us. “Because everybody deserves kindness.” I respond to her question. I sat down with her as my mum comes in to see what happened. The memory ends as mum hugs us both.

Well at least I fully remember her name now. I don’t know why it was so hard to remember it till now. The forest night sky was foreign to me, but just as beautiful. There were a few small clouds moving over but the sky was otherwise clear.

Through the tranquility of the night, a sharp spear of danger appeared in my mind as I spin to face behind me and shot Dark Pulse into the first sign of movement heading towards us. My attack collided with something and created a smoke cloud, and I heard something hit the ground on the other side.

Go on ahead, I’ll deal with this. I say as I grab the startled vulpix who was still on my back on place her on the ground. Oliver seemed ready to fight, but seeing Jennifer move on ahead, he simply nodded to me and went with her. The two vulpixes surprising went with the twins, despite their clear distrust of people.

“Well then.” I hear as the trainer from before and his houndoom walk through the fading smoke, the houndoom with an obvious mark on its forehead. “Oh, where’s you trainer. Oh, I know, she wanted me to have you. Smart girl.”

I returned his comment with Shadow Ball.

“Houndoom, Flamethrower!” A wave of flames burst forth from the pokemons mouth, engulfing the attack, and blocking line of sight. Perfect

I remove my rings light and create a clone using Puppeteer accompanied with several Double Team copies, all of them with blacked out rings aswell. I then use extreme speed to dart out of sight and decide to pull some strings. Seconds later, the flames subside, leaving only silhouettes of me standing on the road with the light of the moon being the only thing to show they were there.

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“Inferno!” With that command, a blue flame appeared in the dogs’ jaws and it opened them shortly after, releasing a blue blaze towards all the clones. I had all but the Puppeteer copy take the blast and had the last clone move away so it would take the bait.

“Torch the area if you have!” The shit stain of a human being ordered.

Oh no you don’t!

With the pokemon about to start spewing flames everywhere, I bolt in with Extreme Speed from my hiding place in the tree line on the side of the road and activate Iron Tail. I appear above the pokemon and alter the shape of my tail to be a massive hammer. I front flip, bring the massive strike straight down on the unsuspecting pokemon. As the hammer struck the ground, an extraordinarily large dust cloud and shockwave rip out! The soundwave from the impact left my ears ringing for a few seconds.

I dash out of the dust cloud while the trainer calls for his pokemon, demanding it to use various attacks, but either the dust was so incredibly dense I couldn’t see through or that pokemon is dead. I could see the trees around the impact zone had leaves and branches ripped off. The shockwave probably reached the twins.

The twins! I immediately spin around and look down the road. The fight only lasted 30 seconds which wouldn’t have given them a lot of time to get away, even at a full sprint! I see them just standing there, probably only 70 or so meters away.

“Houndoom! I swear to Arceus I will use you for hunting practise if you don’t get up right now!” I hear the man yell. But with that, it suddenly made sense. He used the two vulpixes as targets for his houndoom to hunt. That is honestly messed up. Using children for sport just because you didn’t want them.

With this, my rage spiked, and I saw red. I charged Dark Pulse and held it for a few seconds before unleashing it in a horizontal line across the road through the dust. I heard and obvious scream of pain before I dashed in through the thinning dust cloud. I burst out the other side and pounced on the man who was lying on the ground. My paw on his chest drew a hushed grunt of pain as I stared into his eyes.

“Well then little fella, take your best shot!”

Gladly! I yell as I activate Iron Claw, raising my paw that’s on his chest as it glows in a silver light. His arm reaches up and hits my neck as I felt something grip around it. I instantly jump back and land on all fours before pain wracks my body before swiftly stopping, leaving me panting.

“Useful little toy these are.” The man says as he sits up. “Anti-move collors or so hard to find though.” He says with a maniacal grin. “One press of a button and a pokemon will bend to your will. And if they try to fight back with any sort of move, they are punished for it. Checkmate bitch.” He raises his hand, showing a small silver remote with three buttons on it before clicking one of them. My vision blurs and ears buzz as pain travels through my body.

“I would bet you would be worth something on the black market.” He adds as my senses return to normal. I go to dash at him with Extreme Speed only to be wracked with pain. Once it subsides, I realise my body collapsed and I struggle to get up.

Not again fucker! I yell as I stand up and activate Puppeteer, creating a clone behind the ignorant bastard. I hold still as I move the clone quietly closer as I needed to get the remote cause people seem way to durable to just outright kill.

“Good, you’re learning. Now then.” He says with a maniacal smile. “Kneel.” I do as he says, just as my clone is in range and I hear someone running towards me from behind. “Now then, stand still.”

I hear him start walking towards me and making it difficult for the clone to land a clean shot on the remote, but I wasn’t about to let him near me. With that, my copy activated Extreme Speed, dashing in instantaneously and rammed his hand. Unsure if he dropped the remote or not, so I made my move, I leap forward with Take Down. My body was coated in white light as I collided headfirst into the trainer, the move denotating, launching us both. Everything spun and then everything became hazy as my back met something and I kept sliding. I stood up inside of the dust cloud and I can make out a human figure running through the dust. I quickly chase after it and as I appear out the other side, I see Jennifer worriedly looking about.

Hey. I say, drawing her attention. She quickly sees me and moves to my side and notices the collar.

“What is that thing Shade?” She worriedly asks as she tries to remove it. I notice about 30 meters down the road the guy laying on the ground unmoving. I really hope I just didn’t kill someone. But it doesn’t seem he is getting up anytime soon. I look around and I can see several collapsed trees on each side of the road and ripped branches and eaves flung around. I really did cause a lot of destruction. I also notice, shining in the moon light, the remote!

Jen, try that. I say pointing towards to the remote. While I slowly move towards it, Jennifer just bolts over to it and picks it up. My body is suddenly wracked with pain and quickly ends.

“Shade!” She yells, almost in tears at the quick realisation of what she just did.

I’m okay. I say with a headache. Just try one of the other buttons. She quickly tries the next one which seemingly did nothing while the last one caused the collar to unclip and fall to the ground. She quickly ran over to me and hugged me before running over to the other guy and crouching down on his side and then coming back.

“Come on, we better not be here when he wakes.” She says as she heads back the way we were originally heading. The dust had settled, and I saw that despite the force I had hit the houndoom with, it seemingly was just unconscious. Granted there might be some internal injuries, but I’m honestly surprised it isn’t a mashed mess. Just how resilient is a pokemons body?

That also makes me think. First up, how strong am I relatively to everything else. I mean, other than the galvantula and when I was trapped in the pokecenter, I haven’t had an equal one on one fight. One where we could both hit each other on equal footing and take the same amount each.

Second, how strong was that galvantula to survive the absolute beating it received. It also hit like a semi-truck and I’m not to sure what counts as strong and what doesn’t. I mean, I did cause quite a bit of damage but how does that compare to someone stronger or weaker than me?

I just decided to push those thoughts aside as we continue our journey. I just really hope this encounter doesn’t bite us in the arse.