The New Normal - 15-14

The New Normal – 15-14 – An Electric Atmosphere

Our dream home planning went well into the evening, and had our stomachs not growled to inform us that we were hungry, I was pretty sure we could have gone on until midnight.

It was a wonderful time. We even released our Pokémon so that they could play around together and check out what was likely going to be their new home as well.

And it made the dinner that we shared together all the more romantic.

Personally, I was overjoyed that we had that discussion yesterday. It made our future together seem all the more real.

But of course, building our future home together wasn’t something we could do anytime soon, and even as a few days’ had passed Cynthia was still trying to scout out how we could buy everything that we wanted, so that was something we would have to return to later.

While this was all happening, Steven had almost finished up with his challenge through the Elite Four, having soundly defeated Glacia. I had watched the battle that took place between them, and without any offense meant, but Glacia was by far his easiest opponent. Her Ice types were just too weak to his powerful Steel type attacks, and Steven always managed to get off a Taunt to deny her the ability to set up the Snow. In my eyes, he struggled far more against Sidney and Phoebe.

With Sidney, Steven had struggled to take down both his Sableye and Cacturne. Sableye had taken him by surprise by being sent out against his Aggron and quickly trapped it with a Mean Look. Aggron was then subjected to the inevitable barrage of status moves that rapidly crippled it and practically took it out of the battle.

Then with Cacturne, the Dark Sandstorm that it utilised had completely blinded Steven from what was going on during the fight. This meant that his Magnezone, which should have been able to utilise its far superior Special Attacks to bombard Cacturne from afar, was less able to do so because of the howling storm of Dark-infused sand that surrounded both of them. Therefore, without being able to receive any instructions from Steven, it ended up losing the fight against Cacturne.

And against Phoebe, he ended up losing his Goodra against one of her Banette. It had trapped Goodra with an Encore, forcing it to fire off a Dragon Pulse right into a prepared Destiny Bond – leading to a double knockout. Not only that, but as if to add insult to injury, Steven got his Aggron trapped in a Mean Look again against Phoebe’s Dusclops. The Ghost type proceeded to slowly but surely take down Aggron with a Will-O-Wisp and a Curse, completely bypassing Aggron’s usual high Defense.

In fact, amongst the three Elite Four members that Steven had fought so far, I felt that Sidney had actually been the one to give him the most trouble. As a result, after the most recent battles, I noticed that the public had started to rearrange the ‘power rankings’ of the Hoenn Elite Four.

Before Steven’s challenge, Sidney was still frequently considered to be the weakest amongst the four. Then it was Phoebe, then Glacia, then Drake as the strongest. However, with their recent performances in mind, Sidney had shot up the rankings so that he was now considered the second strongest, and Phoebe and Glacia were tied for the weakest.

Still, it was now time to see if Drake could be the one to stop his winning streak. His battle was coming up soon, and much like most of the world, I was definitely going to be watching it live. If there was anyone that could throw a wrench into Steven’s plans, it was going to be Drake.

I was informed by Lance that once the Hoenn Elite Four had finished their battles, regardless if Steven won his next battle against Wallace, they would be sent over to Sinnoh as soon as possible so that they could prepare for the upcoming Tournament as well.

Nevertheless, Steven’s progress aside, since the Unovans hadn’t yet arrived in Sinnoh, I still had a bit of free time before the Tournament preparations began in earnest. But with Cynthia occupied with her usual duties, I didn’t exactly know what I wanted to do.

I had planned to hang out with Karen, but then a phone call from Volkner changed those plans. Since I was here now, he asked me to come over to visit him in Sunyshore. Not only to catch up, but because he wanted to show me something.

So that was where I headed. I quickly arrived at the Sunyshore Gym, but rather than heading into his office, I was instead taken to a small underground lab that was built right below the Gym itself.

This was apparently Volkner’s own private laboratory, which he used for testing out the assortment of machineries that he had built himself. To be fair, it wasn’t really a lab, it was more like he had just dug out a chunk out of the cave and just used it as a workshop.

“It’s not as messy as I would have expected it to be.” Were my words when I first stepped inside, “I honestly thought I was going to see way more machinery lying around.”

“Well, it was that, but I’ve had to do some cleaning up recently thanks to all the Rotoms hanging about.” Volkner admitted, “Having all sorts of different machineries lying about was fine and all until you’ve got Rotom randomly possessing every little thing – and then it all becomes pure chaos with a very real risk of cranial injury from all the possessed machinery flying about. After learning that particular lesson, I don’t feel the need to learn it again.”

I snorted at that imagery, “Is that what you wanted to show me? Something to do with the Rotom?”

“No, it isn’t.” He said, “Though, now that we’re on the topic – would you like a Rotom? Trust me, I’ve got way too many spares. I can even throw you one of our custom made appliances for it to transform into if that’s what you want.”

I considered it for a moment before shaking my head, “Thanks for the offer, but I’m good. I don’t really need a Rotom in my team. It wouldn’t really fit.” And with my latest additions from Unova, I wasn’t all that eager on getting new team members for the moment.

“Fair enough, just letting you know that the offer’s open.” Volkner nodded easily, “But anyways, let me show you what I’ve more or less stumbled into.”

He led me deeper into his underground lab, until we stepped up to a reinforced door with a warning sign attached to it that said – ‘WARNING: RISK OF ELECTROCUTION’.

“Okay, let me explain how this all happened. I know this probably, no, definitely breaks a few safety regulations. However, I wasn’t keeping an eye on all the Rotom that I have, and so I just let them roam about as I focused on my work.” He explained, “Yet what I failed to realise was that there was actually an empty cavern that had been connected to my workshop that the Rotom had been hanging out in when I wasn’t paying attention – and they ended up creating an electrified field of rocks within due to their constant and lingering presence.”

Okay, he was right. This was most certainly in breach of several safety regulations. But I kept my silence and allowed him to keep going.

“Therefore, when I eventually discovered what they had done, my initial thought was to de-electrify and clean everything up. Yet when I began to do so, all of the Rotom began to stage a protest as they wanted to keep it the way that it was.” He continued, “Ultimately, I conceded to their demands. And since the cavern was pretty much empty of Pokémon anyways, then I thought that there was no harm keeping it as is.”

He moved to open the door, “Though, as it turns out, that cavern wasn’t nearly as empty of Pokémon as I first thought. Apparently, there were several Rock and Ground types living there – just casually exposed to all this electricity for probably over a year now. And uh… let me show you what happened.”

Then he instantly put out a hand to stop me, “Oh, you need to get changed before you go in. Grab that rubber suit and gloves over there so you don’t get electrocuted. And bring a Ground type Pokémon if possible, just in case.”

Nodding along, I got suited up and followed in after him as we descended into the cavern below.

Just like he said, there weren’t many Pokémon around. I spotted one or two Probopass, but I could tell that despite their evolution (that was likely due to the magnetic field here), they were weak and docile – probably because they didn’t have any reason to battle. Besides them, there were also a few Graveler and Rhyhorn.

However, more importantly than that, I spotted something that made my eyes widen. In the corner of the cavern were a few special Geodudes that I most definitely recognised.

These were Alolan-Geodude.

“I see you spotted them.” Volkner noted.

“…Yes, I definitely did.” I replied, “Is this what you wanted to show me? Some kind of Electric variant of Geodude?”

“Yep.” He nodded, “Found them completely by accident. The Gravelers here must have been exposed to too much of this electricity for too long and laid an egg that hatched into one of these Electric variants.”

I whistled, “Lucky break for you then. Though I’m curious as to why you haven’t announced this to the public. You must have discovered this quite some time ago.”

“True. And actually, you aren’t the first person I’ve shown this to.” He revealed, “I’ve already shown this to both Flint and Jasmine; they’ve just promised to not tell anyone, like I hope you will too.”

“Of course.” I nodded easily, “I’ll keep my mouth shut until you make the official announcement. I wouldn’t steal credit for your achievement.”

“Thank you. And as for your other point, I haven’t revealed this to the public yet because I want to show off more than just these Electric Geodudes.” He explained, “I want to see if they can evolve into Graveler and Golem respectively, and if those evolutions will also have their own alternate forms as well. That’s why I’ve caught one already, and am in the process of training it up.”

“They any strong?” I asked, genuinely curious for his opinion.

“Well, they do have this special ability where they turn all their Normal attacks into Electric attacks.” Ah, that must be the Galvanize ability, “Though other than their new Electric typing, which replaces their Ground typing, I don’t really see too many differences for now. Perhaps if and when they evolve into a Graveler and Golem it’ll be different. Still, I’m more than happy to add a new Rock/Electric type to my team – especially since it’s the first Pokémon with that kind of Type combination.”

Due to the inherent dangers about staying in an electrocuted zone, and since there was nothing else for Volkner to show me, we stepped out of the area and back into the safety of his lab, where we continued our conversation from there.

“So anyways, you feeling excited about the Tournament coming up?” He asked me, “You have anyone in particular you want to have as a partner?”

“Ideally I’d prefer to be partnered up with someone from Unova, since I’d love to be able to get to know them better and form a deeper connection.” I replied, “And if I was allowed to choose… then I’d want to be partnered with Gym Leader Iris. She was the first Gym Leader I spoke to when I was in Unova.”

“Makes sense.” He nodded, “But unless you’re able to whisper your desired partner into our Champion’s ear, I doubt they’d pair someone like you with the 8th Gym Leader of Unova. Especially not a Dragon specialist like her.”

“That’s true.” I agreed, “So I’m not holding out hope for it. What about you?”

“Obviously I’d want to be paired with Jasmine.” He remarked, “Although I doubt they’d allow us to have the same partners as last time. Otherwise… I’d want someone from Hoenn, since I haven’t really had the opportunity to get to know them too well.”

“Speaking of Hoenn… I’m sure you watched how Steven dominated his battle against Glacia.” He said, “I wonder if we’re going to be seeing a new Champion for them soon.”

=================

(Steven’s POV)

After a long slew of battles, he had finally reached his penultimate opponent and the last of the Hoenn Elite Four – the Dragon master himself, Drake.

Fortunately, though many speculated that he was foolish to agree to the accelerated challenge schedule, he found it easier to not have to wait so long between battles. His Pokémon were already ready to go, having previously prepared extensively for the battles against the Elite Four, and he saw no reason to delay things when they were already pumped up and roaring for battle.

The first three Elite Four members had been far from pushovers, but they all fell to the raw might of his Pokémon. Neither Sidney nor Phoebe’s teams focused on using pure strength to overwhelm their opponents, choosing to instead make use of status moves to wear down and cripple opponents overtime. Unfortunately for them, his training with Bruno meant that his Pokémon had inherited much of his friend’s martial discipline, giving them a significant amount of mental resistance to moves like Taunt and Confuse Ray – both moves that Sidney and Phoebe relied on heavily to execute their strategies.

And while Glacia was different, that didn’t make her tougher. Rather, her Ice types failed to withstand the stalwart might of his Steel types, and after he denied her any opportunity to set up the Snow, they crumbled before his relentless assault.

Plus, thanks to all the training that he did with Bruno, his Pokémon hit hard.

However, even before he had fought against Sidney, he had always known that Drake was going to be his toughest opponent outside of Wallace.

Unlike the others, he fully believed that Drake was his peer in strength. The man’s team was easily worthy of a Champion, and he was well aware that only Drake’s lack of political ambitions stopped him from challenging Wallace for the title outright.

That was why, during his preparations, he had spent the most time planning out his battle against Drake.

And with all of that preparation, he had no reason to feel nervous as he stepped into the arena. Even though he was about to face Drake’s full might, he knew he was ready for it.

Besides, this battle was merely the hors d’oeuvres for the battle against Wallace.

If he wasn’t able to defeat Drake, then he would stand no chance against the Champion.

He kept those thoughts in mind as he stepped up into the arena, taking his position opposite of the final Elite Four member. His face remained completely stoic, which was in heavy contrast to Drake, who was sporting an excited and battle-hungry grin on his face.

“You don’t know how long it’s been since I’ve had a proper challenge like this.” Drake said before the battle began, “I saw how you decimated my colleagues – the strength that your team possesses to do so. I was fucking bursting with excitement to test out that power for myself. So don’t you dare try to hold anything back for a ‘surprise’ against Wallace. If you are to be our Champion, I want to see everything you have.”

Steven returned a silent nod in reply, waiting patiently for the announcer to start the battle. After his usual speech, he did so.

“TRAINERS, ARE YOU READY?!? THE FINAL 6V6 BATTLE BEGINS IN THREE!...TWO!...ONE!...FIGHT!”

“Come out, Mawile!”

“Fight, Flygon!”

He knew that Drake was the type of trainer to send out his stronger Pokémon first in order to gain an advantage and snatch the momentum for himself. Therefore, he had guessed correctly that Drake would send out his Flygon first to try to capitalise on Flygon’s Ground type advantage over his Steel types.

And that made him ripe for a nasty surprise.

Drake started off the fight with a powerful Earthquake, but his Mawile predicted this and launched itself into the air. However, instead of attacking, Mawile instead began to set up with a Stockpile and Swords Dance, buffing up its Attack, Special Defense, and Defense all at the same time.

Flygon immediately punished this with a scorching Fire Blast, detonating a huge ball of flame right on top of Mawile. Yet his Mawile held strong and set up with another Stockpile to continue buffing up both of its defenses.

“Outrage, Flygon! Put it down with a Fire Punch!”

Of course, in his usual aggressive fashion, Drake decided that there would be no more setting up. His Flygon exploded forth with incredible power, searing the air around it as it slammed a Fire Punch into Mawile.

Had this been before he met Bruno, his Mawile would have likely collapsed right then and there, unable to withstand the sheer power of a Fire Punch from an Outrage-boosted Flygon. But, thanks to all the training that they had done, things were now different. His Mawile had been trained and drilled to resist against attacks of such calibre.

And so, Mawile held the line.

Its face was one of pained determination as its tiny fists grabbed onto Flygon’s, locking the Ground type in place before Mawile viciously slammed their heads together with an Iron Head. With all of its Attack boosts, Mawile was actually able to inflict a small flinch onto Flygon even through the Outrage, causing Drake’s Pokémon to stagger backwards for a brief moment.

Which gave Mawile all the time it needed to pounce onto it with an Ice Fang into Play Rough combo.

The combined assault from two different supereffective types actually managed to break through Flygon’s Outrage, dealing considerable damage and causing it to be inflicted with a bout of confusion as it stumbled around disorientated.

With Flygon completely vulnerable like this, it should have been the perfect opportunity for Mawile to follow up with another hard hitting blow. Yet the Steel type did not do so.

Instead of going for the finishing blow, Steven surprised everyone with his next move.

“Baton Pass, Mawile.”

Drake’s eyes snapped open with a look of emerging horror, “I retire my Flygon.”

The crowd was as shocked as Drake was at seeing the man instantly retiring his Flygon from the fight. Drake was famously known as a trainer that would fight to the end. Retreating like this was very unlike him.

Yet, it was the right decision. Because as soon as his own Mawile was recalled, it had passed its buffs over to the Pokémon he knew would bring him victory in this fight.

“Metagross! DESTROY!”

“Salamence, earn me victory!”

Had this been either Sidney or Phoebe, a Baton Pass trick like this wouldn’t work out so well, due to the litany of status moves that they frequently made use of that could cripple a buffed up Pokémon. However, for all the strength that he had, he knew that Drake was not a trainer that made use of status moves often, if at all. As befits a Dragon trainer, he was the type of trainer that would try to match strength for strength. A man who sought out a honest and pure fight.

Which was why he knew how to exploit it. Drake was going to get the ‘honest’ fight he wanted, but against his incredibly buffed up Metagross – his prized starter and, even without the buffs, the most powerful Pokémon on his team.

And Steven had studied Salamence extensively before this fight. He knew exactly how strong it was. So he knew that with all these buffs, his Metagross would surpass it.

“Salamence, Outrage! Go all out!”

“As planned, Metagross!”

To his credit, Drake made the right decision going all out from the start. His opponent recognised that sending any of his other Pokémon against a buffed up Metagross would be like nothing more than sending out fodder. The only chance he had now to reverse his position was to go all-out from the start and bring down Metagross before it could buff itself up further.

Unfortunately, he would find that it was already too late.

Salamence shot forwards like a missile, but Metagross had already set up a Reflect and Light Screen, while its remaining two heads were in the process of setting up a Iron Defense and parrying with a Ice Punch.

Therefore, with all those buffs surging through its metallic frame, Metagross hardly even moved as Salamence violently slammed into it with a full-powered, Outrage-boosted Fire Punch and Earthquake combo. A move that was powerful enough to bring down all but the strongest of Pokémon, and even for the latter they would still have to respect it, was shrugged off just like that. And they were supereffective too.

Steven couldn’t help but grin when he saw the frown on Drake’s face. Yes, that was the reaction he wanted to see when opponents faced off against his Metagross. His starter may not initially have the raw strength that other Champion’s starters would have, not when compared to the likes of Emperor and Tyrant. But with its four different minds working together simultaneously, it was able to rapidly buff itself up to be able to match or even surpass those titans of battle.

Furthermore, with Metagross’ Clear Body ability, outside of moves like Haze, you couldn’t even reduce those stats after they had been buffed. And now you were faced off against an unstoppable monster of a Pokémon, ready to wreck through your entire team.

Which was exactly what was happening to Drake right now.

For all of his Salamence’s vaunted strength, even with the Outrage boost it was being repeatedly pummelled into the ground by his Metagross. Oh, it was fighting back as good as it got, and he knew that Drake’s Salamence was one of those Pokémon’s where their body would break before their spirit.

But that was perfectly fine by him. In this incredibly violent and vicious brawl that their two starters were entangled in, he remained supremely confident that his Metagross would be the one to come out on top.

Steel fists smashed into draconic claws as Ice Punches and Dragon Claws collided against each other. Heads were smashed and bashed together. Torrents of scorching flames were unleashed and held back by a Psychic in equal measure. Enormous Earthquakes and shards of large rocks shredded and devastated the battlefield.

Steel clashed against Dragon as both Pokémon sought victory, no matter the cost.

Yet in the end, just as he predicted, the boots granted by the Baton Pass had given his Metagross an overwhelming advantage against Salamence – and the Dragon’s body broke against the incredible might of his starter.

So even as the Dragon’s spirit still yearned, nay, demanded for battle, its body refused to obey – beaten and battered by the relentless and brutal assault from his Metagross. In fairness, his Metagross had not come out of the fight unscathed, and its once pristine metal form was now marred by a litany of scrapes, dents, and scorch marks.

Had it been an equal fight to begin with, he was pretty sure that Salamence would have come out on top. But sadly for Drake, he didn’t fight fair. He had stacked the deck to ensure that he would win.

So, seeing his starter and most powerful Pokémon go down, Drake let out a bitter laugh, “So that’s how it’s going to end. One mistake, and this fight is already over.”

Steven remained silent, letting Drake continue with a shake of his head, “I suppose I was too eager for a good battle, I forgot all about how cunning an Ekans like you could be. Heh, but maybe someone with your brains would make for a good Champion.”

Steven still said nothing, completely unbothered by the backhanded insult from Drake. Because Drake wasn’t wrong – Bruno had said as much about him. And as long as he still had Bruno’s trust despite his occasional duplicity, then that was all that mattered.

“...But I won’t go down without a fight.” A grin broke out on Drake’s face, his hand reaching for another Pokéball, “Come on then. Show us all just why you deserve to fight our Champion! Show us the strength of a man ready to lead a region!”

That’s right. Drake was never someone to give up; he would fight to the bitter end.

So it was only right that he saw it through.

A.N. I had always wanted to bring the Alolan-Geodude line into the story, and I felt that Volkner was probably the best person to discover it. I felt it was only fitting that since Jasmine (his girlfriend) accidentally discovered A-Diglett, it’d be poetic for him to discover A-Geodude in a similar fashion.

Also, I wanted to shine the spotlight on Steven’s Champion challenge for a moment. I know I skipped over several of his battles against the other Elite Four, but against Drake, I felt that skipping over his fight entirely would be a disservice. Therefore, I decided to highlight the one, battle-defining moment of the fight, where Steven outplays Drake with a well-timed Baton Pass. This is highlighting another facet of Steven’s character – and what makes him differ from the other Champions in Lance and Cynthia. Steven actually fights more like Karen or Sidney does, not necessarily in terms of moves, but in terms of mindset. Hope you enjoyed!