If it's moving in close, then it mustn't have any long range moves. That's where we have the advantage, as well as speed. Amelia thought to herself, upon seeing the Pumpkaboo charge forward. She quickly ran scenario's through her head before deciding on the safest course of action. "Litwick, blind it with Smog then move away." She shouted.

Litwick didn't hesitate, taking in a deep breathe before releasing a massive cloud of poison, making it big enough to cover the giant Pumpkaboo. Once it was up, Litwick moved back while zigzagging, making it's location harder to discern. Once it was far enough away, Amelia gave her next order.
"Hit it with Ember again!"

"Lit...WICK!" The little candle shouted before firing a larger cloud of embers at the smog cloud, and hopefully the enemy Pumpkaboo as well.

With the possible battle against Zubats over, Martin was still looking at Sprout. It was fine the last fight, so why was this asking too much? This was a nagging thought he had to shake himself from, remembering he was talking to this guy from earlier. "Well that could have gone poorly. Nice to run into you again, but I do have to ask why you're in the caves. Trying to get through here and onto the next city? Did you happen to see any suspicious people come through here recently? Oh, I forgot to introduce myself again. I'm Martin, and this is my newest Pokemon, Sprout." Sprout gave a friendly sound, "Saur". Okay, now Martin was feeling betrayed.

"Anyways, me and Dawkin were on our way to find a couple of people down here. Maybe teach them a lesson or two. Okay, maybe also catch a few Pokemon on the way, if the chance shows itself." He stopped to crouch on one knee to look at Sprout from an even height. "We're supposed to be on equal ground, Sprout. Fighting each other won't help either of us. So how about I get you something to eat later and we forget about earlier?" Sprout looked at Martin and didn't turn away. It was a start, had to take what he could get as a sign of an improvement. Considering he actually didn't know the correct route through this maze, he was more than willing to wait for when Dawkin was ready to move on. His shoes weren't in the best shape for trudging through water, but that will be a small sacrifice if it had to happen.

@Joshua Tamashii - Night

Speed-advantage… was something Litwick actually DIDN’T have. The big Pumpkaboo was noticeably faster than the tiny candle Pokémon, and with the opponent moving at full charging-speed while Litwick zig-zagged this difference in velocity became readily apparent and about to have consequences. While the super-sized pumpkin was slower than its tiny counterparts, that was still faster than the average Litwick.

Litwick breathed out its Smog at the opponent, which the Pumpkaboo didn’t even try to dodge but charged straight through. It had clearly taken damage from the smoke, shown by its pained expression, but it hadn’t been poisoned and it hadn’t been deterred. As Litwick was moving away, it quickly caught onto its opponent’s current position and pursued.

“Far enough away” in order to Ember wouldn’t happen, because the Pumpkaboo was about to catch up and impact. Would this cause a change in tactics?

Meanwhile, around them, the Pumpkaboo crowd, including the tiny one, had started cheering onto the battle, unclear which side they were cheering for. A strange little crowd of cheering spooky pumpkins in a spooky wood around this little battle. The stalemate of Laurinda and her Pokémon facing off against the Gourgeists was also still going on, the geists watching on intently, some still singing their ghastly song…

@PlatinumSkink

---

As soon as they stepped foot in the abandoned complex, Claire slowed her pace ever so slightly. You know that thing in video games that happen when you walk into some place and immediately assume you're gonna get ambushed or something? That was pretty much Claire's gut reaction to this place, even if the abandoned buildings had a certain charm to them - if she was perhaps a bit stronger she wouldn't mind taking a picnic here or something. It'd also be hilarious if she had a ghost type to scare the pants off any passerby's, heh~

Soon enough, Claire found herself at the abandoned shrine, and in her usual not paying enough attention to her surroundings fashion, didn't even register the fact that if this was a video game, this was so obviously a boss fight arena. No no, she was too focused on the possible shinies Zigzagoon had. Why yes, Claire is the type to get 100% eaten by a Mimic chest every time.

She brushed past the Chinglings, ignoring Ralia tugging forcefully at her sleeves and walked right into shrine after the Zigzagoon.

"Heh, gotcha!~" She chuckled brightly as she cornered the zigzagoon under the podium. "Alright there, just hand over the shiny stuff and I don't have to have Ralia here flay you alive with her mind." It was mostly a joke, but the Zigzagoon wouldn't know that. Ritz was still holding tightly to Claire's back while Del had taken shelter in her pocket. Ralia had given up trying to get Claire's attention for now, and decided to instead prepare itself for the inevitable act of having to protect her somewhat annoying trainer.

Amelia was more then a little shocked by the Pumpkaboo's speed in comparison to Litwick's. She guess she had greatly underestimated the floating pumpkin and Litwick paid the price with a direct hit that sent it flying back towards Amelia. The little guy slowly got back up, during which time Amelia moved towards him and picked him up.
"Sorry Litwick but I'm going to pull you out now." She said, moving back over to Shuppet and Phantump. Liwick was less then happy at this and let out a cry of protest and waved his little arms around angrily while trying to get out of her's. Amelia let out an amused sigh before gently patting the candle on it's head. "I'm sorry Liwick, but if we keep you in there, you'll just end up losing. It's too fast and powerful for you right now. I know you want to prove yourself to me but you did earlier today against Joshua and his Pichu. So please, just sit out for now... for me?"

Litwick continued to struggle as Amelia spoke but at that last part he stopped. Realizing his trainer was just looking out for his interest and wasn't simply pulling him out for a lack of trust, he would sit back and watch for now. Seeing this, Amelia smiled before looking at her other two partners. She was more then a little reluctant to let Phantump in due to her opponent being a possible old friend. Who knew how well the Phantump and Pumpakboo's got along. So that left her with one option.
"Shuppet, you're in." She said, turning to the little puppet pokemon. Shuppet in turn looked at Amelia in shock before giving a resolute nod and floating forward and facing the giant Pumpkaboo, a determined look on it's face. Amelia in turn watched, determined not to screw up again.

@Rune_Alchemist

Amusingly enough, although wary of ambushes in the complex she discarded this upon her arrival at the shrine, where there actually was a danger of this. She hurried after the Zigzagoon, intending on claiming the shinies it carried and arrived on the other side of the podium to corner it…

Only to find there was a perfectly round Zigzagoon-sized hole on the other side of the little pedestal podium which obviously the Zigzagoon had been heading for the entire time. Now inside the tiny shrine right by the podium with the mirror on top of it and only one way out. Yeah, that way…

‘Greedy… Terrible… Sadistic…’ A voice whispered, barely audible from above the shrine. ‘I’ve felt guilty for this in the past, but this time…’

The sound of two feet hitting the ground could be heard from right outside, along with the sound of three Pokéballs cracking open simultaneously. If Claire turned around now, she’d come face-to-face with another red-head. Except, this one had an angry frown, wore a pretty telling ninja/martial arts uniform and was bent into a position right alongside her Pokémon as if waging for a battle.

And her Pokémon was a small blue frog with one hand on the floor which also was frowning determinately forward at her, a humanoid baby-like creature in a yoga-pose floating a foot over the ground and a weasel in the same battle-stance as its trainer.



‘BUBBLE! MEDITATE! CONFUSION!’ She shouted out while pointing forward. Didn’t seem like she had any intention of explaining herself or giving her target a chance to speak. If any of them had not been interrupted somehow before, the girl launched a preemptive attack.

The Froakie immediately blew forward a mountain of bubbles, spreading out all over in front of him in a direction to hit all in front of him. As Bubble now is a move that hits all adjacent opponents, it was pretty much in position to blow the whole contents of the shrine full of bubbles and hit all inside.

Meanwhile, the Mienfoo took a quick step backwards and clasped its (paws?) together while standing straight, closing its eyes for quick meditation, which would raise its attack. While it did that, the Meditite smirked in mid-air as it focused its hands forward in preparation. It was going to use Confusion on the first Pokémon (or person) to move in to counter their attack, in a strategy that was clearly practiced. It hadn’t used Confusion yet, but was clearly primed to do so, clear to anyone who could see her… which could be hard given the wall of slightly damaging bubbles the Froakie spouted at them.

The aggressor trainer stood, eyes focused behind her Pokémon, in a stance of her own as if prepared to make a move. For now, she was inspecting how Claire and her Pokémon reacted to this attack of hers, which clearly weren’t exactly following the rules of a common Pokémon confrontation.

Now, how did Claire and Co react?

__________________________

@Joshua Tamashii - Night

When the Pumpkaboo came into contact with Litwick it opened its mouth and cried out loudly. in the way of sound plus impact did damage in the move called Astonish. As a Ghost-type move, it was highly effective against other ghosts, and with a bit of strength combined with level the impact turned out to be highly damaging for Litwick as he flew back. Although he wasn’t out, Astonish isn’t that powerful a move, it couldn’t be said if he’d be able to handle another similar move or not.

It could be said that Phantump knew who this Pumpkaboo was. He was a bit self-absorbed due to his size, and was known to have bossed around the younger crowd of Pumpkaboos because of this. Phantump herself had probably not interacted too much with him herself, but she knew who he was. The Pumpkaboos typically avoided the areas where she usually roamed on account of how protective the Trevenants usually were of her.

‘Pum, pumpkaboo!’ The Pumpkaboo chuckled and taunted his foes, Amelia switching out his opponent bolstering his confidence despite the Ember and Smog having done considerable damage to him. With his next opponent decided, the Pumpkaboo locked its eyes on Shuppet and the two holes in the pumpkin glowed as it prepared. When Shuppet had come forth near enough for the Pumpkaboo to be satisfied he once again charged forth.

Confident in a repeat-feat, the huge Pumpkaboo was just charging Shuppet head-on for another Astonish. Amelia and Shuppet now knew roughly what she could expect. How would they react?

@Eklispe@Pikmin Eye@Pyromaniacwolf

Dawkin moved out through the wet way, which was the way he had previously taken. He was probably followed by Martin, and then maybe Lucian if he wanted to follow Houndour’s track unless someone stopped for any reason, which is possible. This quickly led to wading through water in a tunnel with no dry corners at all. This continued for a good minute or two, with Zubats overhead threatening to maybe fly down onto the travellers. There was a random rock sticking out of the water, which Dawkin could probably remember being the one Wooper had been standing on. In any case, moving on… … … …

There are red things swimming about in the water. Red and white, and threateningly pointy.





… In any case. As long as none of you attempt kicking the actually pretty dangerously large fishes in the water, you should all be pretty safe although the Goldeens could be kind of intimidating. If none engaged them in a fight for any reason, You’d quickly find your way to the next split, where there’s a way to the left and a way to the right. Left continues the river, while right goes up on the ground.

Dawkin would remember that he had fled up on the ground and onwards towards another split, which went in three ways. One to a bright place with turned out to be an underground lake with a hole to the sky above, Then there had been an additional wet path with Surskits on it and a path that went into a rocky area with movements within. Well, if he wanted to go further there.

Then there was the river that continued left, that Dawkin had ignored last time. If Lucian was there with Houndour, Houndour would be able to tell that the scent he was following was the most fresh following the river. In fact, there were some kind of sounds coming from that direction. There was light splashing, and there was… maybe distant voices? It was their choice what to do next from here.

Amelia's expression, for the first time, grew cold. No one, made fun of her pokemon, her partners and friends. She was now angry with this stuck up pumpkin and she was going to make sure it learned this. When it began charging, no doubt for another Astonish, Amelia watched carefully and waited until it was close enough before issuing her orders.
"Shuppet, Screech!" She shouted. Shuppet responded by letting out a loud wail, the sound waves visible as they traveled through the air and, hopefully, would stop the Astonish in it's tracks due to one sound being canceled out by another, possibly louder sound. If this managed to knock the Phantump off balance, she would issue the following command: "Shuppet, Knock Off!"

Shuppet would move close and proceed to attack the Phantump and probably knock off an item if it was holding one.

@PlatinumSkink

---

"Geh!" Upon seeing the hole in the back of the podium just large enough for a zigzagoon to fit through, Claire comically flinched backwards. Well that was disappointing! Outsmarted by a simple zigzagoon, she was! That was...well, kinda funny to be honest. If it had been anyone else but her, she'd have laughed at their silliness. Being on the receiving end herself though? Yea, she could do without that, heh. The redhead didn't get long to ponder it, though.

As soon as the two feet outside hit the ground, Ralia struggled out of Claire's arms, landing on the floor with surprising grace and immediately using Double Team.

"R-ralia?" Claire, was obviously surprised. She hadn't noticed the other girl at all - and when she did, she knew this was the moment, that she fucked up. At least Ralia was on top of things. "O-oh heeeey. Uh, nice weather we're having, huh? The cloudiness is really, um...edgy, heh." Well, when Claire was nervous at least it was easy to tell. She talked more than usual. She didn't really know what the other girl was saying about 'Greed' 'Sadistic' and 'Terrible', she was clearly being attacked here and she didn't have much time to think about it.

It was about this time the other redhead told her pokemon to attack. Confusion, Meditate, and Bubble. The bubble attack spread across the entire shrine, threatening to hit all of them, and Claire only had a few moments to react. Ralia and her clones were doing her best to dodge them, but the tiny pokemon wasn't the most acrobatic.

"Ritz! Del! Come on you guys, we're not gonna give up just from a little ambush!" Alright, first things first...this shrine was wayyy to small to fight in. It'd give them a major, major advantage, especially considering the Bubble attack from the froakie. She'd have to look for an opening - or make one, and she had a pretty nifty idea to help with that.

Weedle wasn't the fastest of pokemon, but it could slow down other pokemon with stringshot. If it could do it out of the other pokemon's reach, then it'd mean they'd be easily dealt with. She reached into her pocket, where Del was peeking out of it, wearing an expression that pretty much read 'NOPE, F THIS, I'M OUT', and she could feel Ritz trembling on her back. The poor thing was definitely scared, wasn't it? She pulled Del out, setting him on her head, earning a few surprised cries from the pokemon.

"Ritz, come on boy." She quietly spoke. "We got this, alright? Just need a little luck and we can pull this off. Now, grab Del and avoid those bubbles! Del, hit 'em with Stringshot as much as you can!" At least upon hearing Claire's orders, the small ladybug pokemon flapped its wings, pulling itself off of Claire's back and reaching up and grabbing Del from off of her head. Del, protested only a tiny bit before letting itself be picked up by the larger pokemon.

There still wasn't much room to maneuver around not be hit, but hopefully with a little luck they could make an opening with this.

"Ralia, keep using Double Team and see if you can use an occasional Growl, but focus on dodging and drawing their attention!" They needed them to be weak as they could possibly be. It likely wouldn't work so well on Froakie, but that Mienfoo needed to have its attack lowered back ASAP.

As long as Meditite didn't get a confusion off on Del, then this could be easily dealt with. If she could slow them down and maybe get a few confused with supersonic from Ritz, then she could likely at least get out of here easily enough and fight outside where she had much more room to maneuver. If she and her pokemon could wait for the right moments to attack then this could be dealt with easily, yeah? No? Maybe?

....now where was Lure? She could easily handle two fighting types, couldn't she? Ugh, the damn bug-type was going to give her no end of problems, wasn't she?

---

The pokemon in question was fluttering outside the shrine, completely ignoring her trainer. The small bee pokemon had pretty much figured this was the way this was going to go, and had no desire to be a part of some foolishly foolish fools shenanigans. Instead, it was enjoying a rather breezy, calm, day outside of the shrine, munching on some of the honey it previously found.

This was her honey, and no one else's.

So delicious~

The little bee looked like it was enjoying itself at least.

---

Actions:
Ralia preemptively uses a Double Team
Ritz flies around with Del in his arms, and attempts to avoid the bubbles.
Del attempts to slow the opponents with aerial string-shot moves.
Ralia Keeps using Double Team, using her clones to distract the opponents pokemon and using Growl occasionally if she gets an opening.

@Joshua Tamashii - Night

The Pumpkaboo charged forth, confident in its victory, its tiny mouth grinning as it filled itself to shout out at Shuppet for another decisive blow. Seeing how Shuppet wasn’t moving to avoid it, it assumed its victory to be inevitable. And then… Amelia gave her command. Pumpkaboo hadn’t noticed the change in expression.

The super-sized pumpkin opened its mouth to shout as it came in to make impact, but instead it found itself screamed in the face. Screech, a move that amplified the shout of a Pokémon to be earsplitting, was far louder than his little Astonish shout. Shuppets scream was loud enough to cause the whole crowd of watching Pumpkaboos to recoil, even Laurinda and the Gourgeists over there might have twitched a bit, but her opponent took the scream right by the source before it had started to exponentially decrease.

‘KABOO!’ The giant Pumpkaboo recoiled in pain, hardly gifted with anything which it could use to block the sound, and without the sound Astonish was no longer a Ghost-type move and the forward momentum of the pumpkin simply carried it through Shuppet. It quickly tried to spin around to face its opponent once again, but its ears were ringing and defense sharply decreased, it wasn’t able to regain its bearing fast enough before-

Kapof! Shuppet hit into the weakened Pumpkaboo with a super-effective Knock-Off, sending something flying. The pumpkin recoiled, tiny eyes and mouth wide.

‘Kaaaaaaaaa…’ And the big thing fell, making a sound as it impacted the ground and rolled onto its back, staring up into the sky. The battle was over.




Meanwhile, because Pumpkaboo had ran through Shuppet, this placed it between Amelia and her Pokémon, meaning the item that was knocked-off likely came flying towards her in a gentle arc, pretty much perfect for her to catch it.



So, with that, Amelia was victorious. Realizing what had happened, the Pumpkaboos gave a little varied cheer depending on the individual, many looked like they’d cheer regardless of who’d won, really. The tiny pumpkin which had originally come forward to her before the bigger one interrupted came forth and looked at his big brother from the side a little…

‘Pumpka.’ Which pretty much translated to “Thanks for looking out for me”. He then turned and smiled up at Amelia.

‘Pumpkaboo?’ “So, can I come?”



… And to update on the surrounding situation, there’s still Laurinda standing prepared to battle with her Trevenant and Chandelure glaring at a host of four Gourgeists, and a couple more floating about in the background, the Gourgeists looking mostly amused and maybe playful, though Laurinda had warned that they had a tendency to become aggressive. Phantump could probably affirm that, the Gourgeists of Wilted Woods had a tendency to “playfully” attack travellers within, and be pretty merciless while doing so. Though, they mostly appeared to just be observing an amusing situation involving their young, now.

__________________________

@Rune_Alchemist

Ralia got off her Double Team without a hitch, doubling up numerous times… but the bubbles were too many to dodge by replicating as they hit pretty much all the duplications anyways. However, as the attack had been spread out, it didn’t do a lot of damage and Bubble was a low-powered move to begin with, but it was an advantage that Froakie had obtained for his team. It wasn’t so annoying so that Ralia couldn’t get off a Growl, however, collectively decreasing the attack of the enemy team. Meditite and Froakie didn’t look particularly bothered, but Mienfoo gave an annoyed stare and then closed its eyes again to Meditate once more.

Ritz picked up Del and carried him, trying to avoid the bubbles. While one or two hit, it only caused superficial damage to the ladybug and Del was protected. However, the moment the two of them emerged from the bubbles out of the shrine, the floating humanoid thrust its hands at them.

‘Meditite!’ And so, with little time to prepare Ritz was hit by Confusion, taking a mental punch from the meditation Pokémon. While perhaps reeling from the hit, Ritz would be able to stay airborne and avoid becoming confused himself with not all that much damage. He has pretty decent special defense. In return, Del started shooting out its strings of web at the opponents. Both Froakie and Mienfoo blinked from their respective actions, shooting bubbles and meditating, and successfully dodged the strings at the cost of stopping what they were doing, Mienfoo unsuccessful with regaining its attack. Meditite, though, couldn’t dodge and settled for protecting its face with its arms, still smirking behind it as it got webbed where it was floating.

‘Froakie! Keep the Ralts forced down, more bubbles! Meditite, Mienfoo, take down the bugs! Confusion, Pound!’ Their trainer commanded, pointing in the directions of the varying targets as she did.

Mienfoo unhappily discarded its attempts at meditation, but instead utilized its speed to chase after Ritz while dodging Del’s webs. It was noticeably faster than Ritz, aiming for a time to jump and Pound. It was slowed down by having to dodge the shots, maybe enough to keep it at bay, but then there was Meditite, who while webbed only needed its mind to use Confusion, and it was smirking and aiming.

Froakie had noticed which Ralia had been hit by bubbles previously, and utilizing considerable speed it jumped closer and sprayed out more tightly focused bubbles in her direction. If she replicated again, he’d spread out his bubbles more to aim for all of them. The intention was not necessarily to take her out, more to ensure she was too busy to help out otherwise.

Around them multiple Chinglings escaped noticing that a battle was breaking out, and they were apparently not interested in participating.

---

So, Lure was floating around, enjoying her honey…

‘Zig?’ … There sat a Zigzagoon beneath her. It had put down its golden ball on the ground, and then looked up at her, slightly licking its mouth. It had been attracted by the smell of honey, because Zigzagoons have pretty good smell. It wanted some, staring intently at her. It looked extremely unintelligent right about now, a small animal that wanted some of that from the bee.

Martin was all too right about having to go through water. His shoes were indeed not ready for this. Damp, dark cave and the feeling of not being alone. They were large fish, orange and white. Martin pulled out his Pokedex to scan the Pokemon. It was a Goldeen, which was a water type. He had a grass type, and could probably catch this. His current team was really weak to fire, and this should fix that problem.

"Hey Dawkin, which way was it from here? If you don't mind, I kind of want one of these Goldeens. Never hurts to catch a few Pokemon along the way, right? What do you think, Sprout?" Sprout was enjoying the swim through the water, his tiny feet paddling along the surface. He wasn't paying much attention to anyone. Martin had a smile on his face, amused by seeing such a sight. "Sprout, are you having fun?" Sprout finally snapped out of it, looking around before getting back to dry land. He looked back at Martin again, trying to look like he wasn't caring. Martin wanted to tease Sprout, but that would get him back a few steps and let it slide.

"Now let's see, a Grass type move should end this in maybe two hits, and I got plenty of Pokeballs. Yeah, should be quick and easy. Alright Sprout, use Leech Seed to slowly drain it's health. Then use Vine whip and we'll see if that's enough to start trying to catch it." Sprout looked for the closest Goldeen and fired small seeds at it. Martin was having a silent moment in his head, Sprout did what he told it to do! Finally, progress. He hoped this was going to be quick, as he still had things to do. If there was any other good Pokemon, they would have to wait. This was greedy, but he did need something that was strong against Fire types, just in case.

Amelia had been expecting things to go worse and couldn't help but feel a bit of relief when her plan went off without a hitch and visibly relaxed and let out a sigh of relief upon seeing that the battle was over, only to get out a slightly surprised cry when something hit her in the forehead. Phantump moved quickly and caught the item, holding up the Miracle Seed to her owner with a triumphant grin on her face. Amelia laughed and took the seed, pocketing it as Shuppet approached her. She reached out and gave the Puppet Pokémon a pat on the head.
"You did a good job Shuppet. You too Litwick. We couldn't have done this without both of you." She said.

"Lit." Litwick said, sounding a bit disheartened.

"Shu!" Shuppet said, a bit of pride in it's voice.

Knowing she would have to address Litwick's blow to it's ego later, Amelia turned towards the tiny Pumpkaboo when it approached and knelt down closer to it's height, pulling out a pokeball and enlarging it before holding it out to the little guy.
"Welcome to the team. I hope we have a lot of fun together." She said. The little pumpkin gave her a smile before hitting the pokeball, the device opening up and hitting the Pumpkaboo with a red beam of light, bringing him inside. It shook three times before stopping and clicking. Satisfied, Amelia stood up and put all her Pokémon in their pokeballs before approaching Laurinda. "I'm sorry for the delay. I'll return to the safer parts of the forest now."

Assuming there were no more reasons to delay, Amelia would follow Laurinda to the safest parts of the forest before saying her good-byes and thanking the veteran trainer for her help. She also said good-bye to Chandelure and Trevanent as well. Once she was in the safer parts of the forest, she looked for a relatively secluded area to set up camp. Once she found one, she set about pitching her tent and generally setting up camp. She let out her pokemon to help her out and before long, they had all had something to eat and were ready for bed. As she returned her partners to their pokeballs for the night, she kept Litwick out for a little one on one time.
"Litwick... are you okay?" She asked, picking up the little guy and holding him close. When he didn't respond, she took that as a 'no' and just continued. "I know you must have been shocked, with me pulling you out. But, I didn't want you getting too hurt by that Pumpkaboo. Besides, you're not going to be able to take down every opponent we go against. We'll come across a lot of powerful trainers and Pokémon and we won't be able to beat all of them. It's not that I don't believe in you. I have complete faith in your abilities. You've already proven how strong you are. But just be ready to suffer some losses as well. Do you trust me?"

"... Lit." Litwick said, sounding a bit happier then earlier.

Seeing this as progress, Amelia went to bed, keeping Litwick in her arms and holding the little Candle Pokémon close. It was late in the morning when she finally woke up and set about getting ready for the day. Once she was done, she set out and returned to Route 2 and thought about her next action. Though she disliked this, she knew she would need to train her partners to keep them strong enough to protect her. Not only that, some battling might help Litiwick regain it's confidence. Nodding to herself, she went about training against the wild Pokémon, having Pumpkaboo do the most battling since it was her weakest. Her main goal was to get all her partners on Litwicks level and keep them equal at least on that account.

@PlatinumSkink

---

Things were definitely not going to be going her way it seemed. Not that she expected getting out of an ambush like this to be easy, but she wasn't going to be going down without a fight at least. As long as Ritz could keep a confusion from hitting Del, then they could stay in the fight. Still, being completely defensive wasn't going to get her anywhere. She needed to make a few offensive moves here - which is why she was glad she did a bit of training.

"Alright! Ritz, hit 'em with a supersonic if you can! Try not to get hit by that Mienfoo's attacks!" From what she knew, Ledyba didn't have a large amount of physical defense. "Del, if it gets close enough hit it with a Poison sting!" As for Ralia, she was having to deal with a Froakie. Claire frowned, there wasn't much she could do to have much of an advantage over the water type. At least she didn't have to worry about a buffed Mienfoo now though. "Ralia, switch from grown to confusion and take down that Froakie!"

---

Lure glanced down towards the Zigzagoon, two of its small eyes eyeing it carefully. Huh, that was the item its trainer wanted. Must be valuable. Would make her pretty angry if she, the great and powerful Lure, queen of all Bees everywhere got her sweet wings all over it. The Zigzagoon didn't look too smart either....should be easy enough to trick it into giving it to her, yes! Hehehe, she could have honey whenever she wanted, but whatever this top of the line item was would make for a fair trade.

"Bee." The Combee fluttered a bit closer to the ground with its Honey. "Combee." "Trade ya for that shiny thing...."

---

Ralia switches from using growl to confusion on the froakie.
Ritz attempts to use supersonic on Meditite
Del still tries to slow them down, but if Mienfoo gets close enough to land a shot will attempt poking it with a stinger.

Lure makes an offer the zigzagoon definitely should not accept. _{though even if he doesn't, he's gonna have a bad time}

@Pikmin Eye

Deciding to capture a Goldeen, there were quite a few to choose from, but one of them was picked. Sprout shot out his Leech Seed at the unsuspecting fish, and despite it being underwater it was shallow enough that the seeds came down far enough to hit it. The Goldeen jerked to, making a splash as the seeds taking root onto the goldfish Pokémon started leeching its health and sending it back to Sprout. Annoyed at this, the Goldeen turned and glared at Sprout, clearly taking offense. It started swimming at Sprout, quite clearly intending on delivering an attack…



__________________________

@Eklispe

Funny thing, Wooper could probably guide the way through this cavern. She’s lived here most of her life up until now, after all. If it occurred to her to do it, that is, which she might not be bright enough to realize.

In any case. Back at the divide. To the left was the continuation of the river. The Goldeens had come from there, so with all likelihood they had ordinarily been living inside wherever this was and had for some reason travelled over. This, accompanied by the fact that Dawkin definitely could hear voices further in, but couldn’t distinguish the sources or what they were saying. They were further in. The tunnel made some kind of S-shape, curving first left and then right after a bit, making looking inside the wet tunnel by leaning a difficult venture.

And, of course, he knew the other way. He’d run through it before. It went up on dry land again, and then led on until it came to a three-way split. One way down to the lake he had been, one shallow wet road with Surskits dancing over it and one way into a darker cavern with moving things inside awaited there. But, yes. If he was waiting for Martin by this split, then here he’d be standing.

__________________________

@Joshua Tamashii

Though the deadlock was still going on, Laurinda nodded to Amelia about her being done and then backed away from the crowd of Gourgeists before the two of them could be on their way. They passed Delphox, who was still looking after the injured Pokémon. She gave them a bored look, Laurinda returned the greeting, and they could move on. Trevenant and Chandelure helped them through Deep Infested Woods using the same tactics as before to avoid them getting Dustox poisoned, then they navigated the thick vegetation of the True Infested Woods to avoid traps and other such things, before finally coming back to the Outer Infested Woods and the lightshow that was going on above by Volbeats being guided by Illumise.

When it was time to part, Laurinda turned to look at Amelia with a soft expression.

‘You’ve shown me something interesting. I’ve never seen the ghosts of Wilted Woods react quite like that. Then again, I’ve never seen someone act like you in Wilted Woods, either. Just perhaps, you’re…’ She then went silent, inspecting Amelia somewhat. ‘… Good luck on your journey. If you’re after more ghosts, I would recommend the Old Tombs, as well as Route 16 and above, east of here. Route 16 is perilous to the normal traveller, but you… you should do fine. If on the other hand you’re after Gyms, I would suggest you start the journey with the Highhill Town’s Gym. The Gym Leader there is more forgiving than others to new trainers.’ And with that she had given a bunch of tips that Amelia hadn’t actually asked for. She could cover her ears if she didn’t wish to hear it.

‘I wish you luck on your journey, young one. … I’m going to go to sleep in the Wilted Woods, now. Good night.’ Laurinda said to her, before turning and walking back into the woods. Trevenant and Chandelure were both happy to say their good-byes too, the Chandelure cheerful and the Trevenant expressing his confidence in that she’ll do fine in Pokémon. Then, Amelia was free to pitch her tent and go to sleep, letting the night pass over to a new day.

So, onto Route 2 to train.




Connected areas:
Pureplain City. It’s a bit there, but you could get back without complication.
Infested Woods. Close, you can get there without complication.
Wet Caverns. It’s a bit more, but you can likely get there without complication.



When training in Route 2, Amelia got to see the most common of the Pokémon on Route 2. There were the average Pidgeys, whom not yet knew any flying-type moves and would therefore be exceedingly easy to train on for Amelia’s ghost-types. There were also Sentrets, who can’t do anything to the ghosts. Also, Weedles, whose Poison Stings were slightly dangerous to the new grass-ghosts of the party. Other than those, the most common creatures of Route 2 are Surskits and Lotads. Surskits aren’t that bad, their one damaging move, Bubble, is resisted by the grass-ghosts, but they had to beware the Lotads. They knew Astonish, making them super-effective against the ghosts. Spooky.















So, Amelia started training. As long as she kept to Pidgeys, Sentrets and Surskits, things should go relatively fine. To note is though that Pumpkaboo’s Astonish wouldn’t work against Pidgey or Sentret due to Ghost / Normal type interactions, so he might need to stick with Surskits, unless he was going to confuse them to defeat them with Confuse Ray alone. He might need to be healed once or twice, but otherwise, the ghosts in Amelia’s party wouldn’t have trouble. With Knock-Off, Shuppet would have no problems and Phantump has Tackle. Tiny Pumpkaboo would have trouble to begin with, but after being healed once or twice he could handle his own.





And with that, they were aligned… … …

Buuuuuuuuut…

At some time while she was training her Phantump, a trainer passed by. He raised an eyebrow seeing that it was a different than regular color, and then kept walking. He battled another trainer down the road, and then after battling he told this little story of the shiny Phantump he saw training earlier. Unfortunately, the trainer he battled was a little boy. He excitedly called all of his friends, and…

Amelia was training her Phantump, when suddenly she might realize that she was being watched. By a considerable amount of youngsters and bug-catchers or other young trainers who came to get a glimpse of the shiny Phantump, after someone had successfully pointed them in the right direction.

‘Shiny Phantump. I wonder where she got it?’ One asked.
‘Probably from somewhere far from here. There are no ghost-types this close to Pureplain City.’ Said someone who clearly would be stunned to hear Amelia caught a Shuppet in that very city.
‘But, what if she DID catch it around here?’
‘No way. Where would she have gotten it? In the woods?’
‘Uuuuh… Maybe?’
‘But there’s just bugs in the woods.’ Said by a bug-catcher.
‘But, um. Why don’t we just ask her?’
‘But, eh, uh, _{she kinda scares me…’}

Sooo, she has an amazed audience of about six kids. Some others might walk by and wonder what they were looking at. Of course, simply up to Amelia how she might behave with this sudden attention.

__________________________

@Rune_Alchemist

Meditite, bound down by the String Shot, was in no position to attempt dodging the incoming Supersonic when Ritz turned and fired its super-focused wave of sound at it.

‘Medi.’ Making a little small sound that probably was a curse in Poké-language, the Meditite decided that they’d trade blows, and struck forth with another Confusion. It hit its mark, and Ritz took another blow to his mind. He did not get confused, though he took some more damage. Meditite, though, took the Supersonic straight on and waved a little in mid-air, having some balancing issues on account of becoming Confused.

However, the Mienfoo caught up as well, and the time when Ritz turned to Supersonic the Meditite was the perfect moment according to itself. It jumped, focused, claws and hand ready, and went in for a Pound at Ritz. In return, Del stuck out its needle and countered.

Mienfoo was quick enough that he’d be able to hit Ritz, but Del’s sting hit and caused the Mienfoo to jerk back, softening the blow. Mienfoo fell back to the ground, feeling at the place it was stung and then looked up angrily. Not poisoned, though that hurt. It was definitely intending on trying that again. Ritz had taken a blow from the Pound but it wasn’t as threatening as it could have been.

Meanwhile, Ralia and Froakie faced off. Ralia managed to fairly easily hit Froakie with a Confusion, sending the blue frog reeling a little, but it was back on with a frown and sprayed more bubbles that made duplication seem a bit pointless. They didn’t do much damage, but. Using his high attentiveness, the Froakie determined which Ralia was real again using the bubbles, and then charged her with a hand ready to Pound. The Froakie made the decision to do this on its own without its trainer’s command.

‘Don’t give up! Keep at it! Pound, Confusion! Watch for the stinger next time! Take down the Ledyba, and the Weedle will be a easy prey!’ The trainer commanded, primarily to Mienfoo and Meditite, and the Mienfoo charged once more. The Meditite swung a bit unsteadily on account of being confused, but still attempted to aim another Confusion, if it would be successful or not was impossible to tell right now.

---

At the offer, the Zigzagoon blinked a little at Lure and then looked at the golden ball.

‘Zigza. Zig. Zigzagoon…’ “Tainer told me to look after it. It is bait. I can’t trade it…” The Zigzagoon said looking a little disappointed, because it really wanted that honey. However, it quickly brightened up and looked happily at Lure.

‘Zig, zigzagoon!’ “But, I’ll let you hold it for a bit if you let me have some honey!” So the Zigzagoon offered with a cheery look like it had solved all the problems in the world.

Amelia was smart about her training. She quickly took the Lotads off her list, as Astonish would do too much damage too quickly to her still fragile teammates. She took stock of the wild pokemon and quickly selected which pokemon was the best one for her partner's to go against. Phantump and Pumpkaboo were assigned Surskits, since Bubble would do little damage to them and they could trade back harder. Shuppet was sent against the normal type Pokémon since it was immune to their attacks but they weren't immune to knock off. She was cautious with Weedles, since they could poison her pokemon and she didn't want that. She was careful with her battling and pacing, visiting the pokemon center in Pureplain a few times but this didn't bother her.

After she defeated her final opponent to reach her goal, she smiled as she let out her partner's to congratulate them. As she was doing so, she spotted a group of about three other children watching her and she smiled as she approached them.
"Hello there. Can I help you with anything?" She asked kindly. Her pokemon stayed near her, all four of them watching the children as well, Litwick sitting on her head, Shuppet held in her arms, and Phantump and Pumpkaboo floating above each of her shoulders.

The plan went off exactly as planned. The Surprise Leech Seed was executed perfectly, and the Vine Whip connected faster than the Goldeen could even try to attack. Unfortunately, it was too powerful, the Pokemon out of the water and fainted. Martin gave a quiet groan, okay, too much power. That was a good lesson to learn from this. There were still more Goldeen in the water, shake it off. "Nice one Sprout, but you might need to hit lighter next time. Pick out another Goldeen and try using Tackle instead, then I'll toss the Pokeball." Sprout was proud of showing off that he could handle the enemy, and quickly looked for another one to aim at. He took a single step backwards before diving into the water straight at another Goldeen, his small body splashing into the water. It looked more like a cannonball due to the shape, but grace wasn't needed here.

Dawkin already was continuing on, and Martin had a bit of time. Should be simple enough to catch one if the last one went down so quickly. While he did have the thought that maybe they were weak, it was also possible that it was just because of using a powerful hit. He lightly tossed the Pokeball he still hasn't had a chance to use in the air. If his best foot forward was too much, then he'll have to make do with a little less power.

@Joshua Tamashii

Knock-Off-ing Sentrets would occasionally provide Amelia and Shuppet with a bonus.



Other than that, the training went well. Now for the kid-sitation.

A few of the kids (that said, they’re around 9-11, so same age/slightly younger than Amelia), looked a bit frightened when Amelia approached with the ghosts out and staring. A youngster was eventually pushed forward as spokesman, blinking a bit at Amelia and the ghosts. He was maybe a year younger than Amelia.



‘Ah, um.’ Not quite as confident as in the image. He was visibly under pressure, all his friends staring from behind him.

‘I, uh, guess we were wondering where you got your ghosts. I-I mean, you’re training on Route 2, meaning you likely started from Pureplain City. If it was just one I’d have supposed you got it as your starter. But you have… at least four… and one Shiny…’ He scratched his cheek a little uncertain while looking at the ghosts, though his gaze did linger on Phantump, who was a bit special, before looking back to Amelia.

__________________________

@Pikmin Eye

Sprout turned to a new opponent, another Goldeen swimming by the sides though it had noted what you just did to another of its kind. Somewhat noticeable, after all, especially if you’re practically identical to the one that was just attacked. As Sprout dived at it, the Goldeen spun to face him, but was unable to make any movements to dodge the attack before Sprout knocked into it and the Goldeen spun away.

The Goldeen, hungry to counter, suddenly jumped out of the water. It jumped, splashing water around, rotating in mid-air to come falling down onto Sprout horn-first. It had clearly been able to handle the Tackle without major damage, though it was clearly damaged. But, it never made it down, because Martin’s Pokéball hit it in mid-air and the Pokéball harmlessly fell down into the water just in front of Sprout.

The Pokéball started shaking, once, twice…

@PlatinumSkink

---

Claire frowned. This wasn't going badly per say, but it wasn't going all that well either. So...sorta okay-ish? At this rate though she wasn't really going to be doing all that well. Ugh, damn it! Okay Claire, keep your cool. She just needed to think of a way to break the status quo here, so to speak. There had to be something she could do, but her pokemon's movesets were rather limited and she couldn't really do any impressive combos or have them work together moreso then they were already doing, could she?

...if Del had evolved she could have him use harden and have Ritz use him as a spiky shield, heh!

Strategy for later though.

Well, maybe they should try something a bit risky, then? Meditite was tied down thanks to not trying to avoid the string shot all that well. It with its psychic moves was the most dangerous thing here at the moment. If she could possibly throw off its balance more and help interrupt that confusion attack....

Welp, here went nothing!

"Ritz, Tackle that Meditite and drop Del right on top of him!" With luck, Mienfoo would be caught off by their sudden battle plan change to react in time. Mienfoo was faster, but with Del still spewing string shot at him they could pull it off, definitely! If Del could get close to the Meditite and get a few good poison stings in, then maybe with its confused status and a little luck this would work! Then it'd just be Froakie and Mienfoo, and as soon as Froakie went down, Mienfoo would be a piece of cake if Ralia could keep up.

Speaking of that frog and her adorable pokemon, The Froakie had decided to charge using pound after using bubble. The good news was, that the growls should have seriously weakened the Froakies physical attack, even at least a little.

Heh. He wasn't too bright, was he? Still, tanking a hit from Froakie would be a bad idea if she could help it. Maybe...

"Alright, Ralia!" A small smirk formed on Claire's face as she started to give Ralia another command. "Split once and hit 'em with a confusion!" Just a little something to throw Froakie off last second and maybe give Ralia time to get off a confusion without getting hit herself.

The rest of the clones, seeing themselves be oddly useless for now started cheering for either side. Of course, they were merely waiting for a moment to mess the froakie up, even a little.

---

Oh this delicious, precious, little innocent little Zigzagoon. Lure almost felt sorry for it, but the feeling quickly passed. A Queen couldn't feel bad about the things she took from her subjects - willing or unwilling, nope!

"Bee. Comcombee." "Here, then..." Combee lowered herself to the ground, intent on trading the honey for whatever that 'bait' was for now.

Assuming the exchange went off without a hitch, Lure would immediately fly upwards out of Zigzagoons attack range. Wordlessly, she flapped her wings as strong as she could and created a powerful gust, hopefully hurting the poor zigzagoon more than enough to send the silly pokemon running, before zipping off and waiting above the small shrine for her trainer to be soundly defeated.

Rubbing this in the humans face would be ever so delightful!

---

Lure bribes the Zigzagoon and takes his shiny, blasts him with a gust before skedaddling.
Ritz attempts to tackle Meditite, and drop Del right on top of him with his stinger poised to land right on him.
Ralia attempts to make a single clone more as Froakie attempts to use pound to throw off whichever one he was targeting, before trying to get off a confusion.