C060 - Meeting Team Rocket members

For the first time ever, Pete was riding on Arcanine while running through the forest. Last day when he accompanied the adventure group, nothing happened. They found a few berries, Servine dug up yet another Leaf Stone, the three Farfetch'd beat up a bunch of Heracross. But what he feared would happen hadn't happened until just a few moments ago.

Nobody in the group could run as fast as Arcanine. So, deep in the forest, he got on her back, and they ran toward the explosion with his pokemon following behind.

They arrived to see two very haggard trainers surrounded by Koffings, Weezings, and Venomoths. Their pokemon were a Raticate, a Cacturne, two Arbok, three Houndoom, and two Mightyena. It looked like one of them also used to have a Voltorb, but the explosion seemed to have been it using Self-Destruct if Pete judged that right.

'Team Rocket! I don't get why they still wouldn't get rid of the very obvious jersey with the giant red R on it if they are on the run. But these are way too many powerful pokemon for them to be regular riff-raff. I'll need to handle this well... do I call it in and risk exposing myself and my farm to TR, or do I get rid of them? Who am I kidding... I'm not ready to take a life on purpose,' Pete thought with gritted teeth.

Pete took out his tablet now that the two TR members hadn't noticed him yet and... well, he didn't have Lance's or Clair's number or a direct line to a trustworthy police officer like... any Officer Jenny. So he did the next best thing and called Elm.

Pete filmed the two people, described the situation as best he could, and sent his current location. Elm advised him to be careful and told him he forwarded it all to Lance, who was still in the area, apparently.

As he watched the fight below, he wondered for a short moment why these pokemon were attacking the villains with everything they had until Pete looked around and found a dozen berry trees completely devoid of berries, even unripe ones. This was likely part of the wild pokemon's feeding grounds, and the Team Rocket dude and dudette were too greedy. They even damaged the trees from what Pete could see.

It was mostly the Houndooms that were dealing with the enemies with three powerful Flamethrowers, keeping them at bay. Cacturne was Ingrain'ed and kept shooting the bug move Pin Missile at the enemies while the two Arbok tried their best to spit Acid at the nimble enemies. They barely hit anything, though.

It also didn't help that both Cacturne and the Arboks were working with a huge typing disadvantage. That and the rest of the pokemon apparently didn't know any ranged attacks.

When yet another Weezing fell to the Flamethrower attack from a Houndoom, making it so roughly two-thirds of the attacking forces fainted or died, the poison pokemon of the forest left in defeat.

"Don't just lie down! We have to find shelter!" The male Team Rocket shouted toward his clearly exhausted Houndoom as it buckled down, panting. With an unsatisfied growl, it stood back up, and the pokemon and trainers began walking in his direction. But only after the Arboks, Raticate, and the Mightyenas fought over the corpses and hungrily devoured them.

"Arcanine, you get the Cacturne, don't allow it to set up by using Fire Spin, and be wary of its close ranged attacks. If it's well versed in dark moves, you better make use of your typing advantage and speed. Farfetch'd... I'd love to send you versus the Arboks, but I'm sure you'd like the 3vs3 more, so you take the Houndoom. They are exhausted, but don't be caught off guard. They'll always have enough power to give you a point-blank Ember or Fire Fang, so keep your weapons away from their maws. Nidoking, you take the two Arboks," Pete ordered quietly.

"Servine, show me your progress by taking on the Raticate and Duosion, I'd like you to hide from those two in case they would ever be able to flee prison or get the information out. I don't need a rare shiny pokemon like you on their radar. Assist with Heal Pulse when needed and use Celebi's move Future Sight whenever you see fit. Might be good training to use it away from line of sight. Miltank... as much as I don't want them to know about you too for the same reason as Duosion, I'd like for you to fight the Mightyenas. Team up with Vibrava. Try your best to not cause paralysis. Because when they overcome it, they will get much quicker thanks to their Quick Feet ability," Pete finished the strategy off and retreated. Duosion hid in the tree above him, ready to teleport him away at a moments notice.

"Hey, kid! What's with the scary lineup over there! We're not gonna hurt you. We could use some food, and then we're out of your hair. I promise," the woman shouted.

"Sadly for you, I know that you guys are Team Rocket, and I know what a cancer Team Rocket is," Pete scoffed.

"Cancer!? What do you know of our noble goal!?" The man shouted angrily.

"Is it so bad to want to replace the corrupt league?" The woman indignantly retorted.

"Oh yeah? Very noble of you to abduct children and enslave pokemon to further your goals," Pete spat back.

"We're giving those orphans purpose! Don't let the league lie to y-"

The lady's next lie was cut short by both Arboks spitting Venom Drench at Pete as they had slithered forward when nobody was paying attention.

However, that was when Duosion showed off a new psychic move she had comprehended after combining Safeguard with psychic energies: Magic Coat. The Venom Drench was reflected back and flew toward the Mightyenas instead, who had followed the Arboks as stealthily as possible.

That started off the fight as Arcanine angrily shot a Fire Spin to the Cacturne, who had already started to use Ingrain. The fight didn't last long after that when Arcanine did something Pete didn't think was possible.

She wrapped herself in fire energies for the fire move Flame Wheel, but then she charged forward with speeds that screamed 'Extreme Speed', effectively empowering the two moves by combining them. Was his Arcanine a genius after all?

The three Houndooms didn't last long, either. The Farfetch'd used fluid movements to get closer, which Pete then realised was the buff move Swords Dance, and then all three of them let lose the move Air Cutter by swinging their leeks from a distance. It caught the Houndooms offguard because they expected melee combat.

After another Swords Dance where the Houndooms failed to close the distance and three Air Cutter later, the Houndoom were lying on the ground in their own blood.

'Wait, isn't Swords Dance a buff move for attack and both Air Cutter and eventually Air Slash are special attacks? Why bother using Sword Dance then? I'll have to discuss this with the Farfetch'd later. Maybe I'm missing something... They have tails, can they learn Tail Glow, the bug move that raises special attack by two stages? Maybe that's an alternative,' Pete inwardly mused as he watched. In any case, the Farfetch'd all looked super cool doing it.

Nidoking was aided by an angry Duosion who used Future Sight twice and took out a decent chunk of the two snake pokemon's flesh with the psychic mines she had laid down. After that, Nidoking used Fire Fang on one of the Arboks, biting its head with fire type energy and followed up with the ground move Earth Power to blow up the second one.

Not only was the ground move super effective versus Arbok's poison typing, that Arbok was already exhausted and hurt by a super effective psychic move, so the snake pokemon was actually blasted apart.

With another dark type Crunch, the second Arbok died, and Nidoking was already starting to eat it to increase the potency of his own poison.

The two Team Rocket members were looking on in horror at the last two battles, but it was already a certainty that they would lose.

The two Mightyenas had barely dodged the reflected Venom Drench, but then they were hit by the Rollout of a shiny Miltank. Vibrava was already flying forward and shot one of them with Dragonbreath, doing exactly what Pete told it not to do: paralyze the Mightyena for a short moment.

When Miltank returned with Rollout and hit both of them, Vibrava's next move, Supersonic, a normal move that would confuse an enemy, did not hit either of the two enemies.

Miltank returned once more with Rollout, but this time, she only hit one of the Mightyenas. The other one got over the paralysis and Quick Feet increased its speed and apparently its evasiveness, too.

As Vibrava realised her mistake, she grew angry. Not at the enemy or Pete, of course, but at herself for using a move that has a chance to paralyze right after Pete gave her the crucial tip. Using Agility to increase her own speed, Vibrava flew over to the faster Mightyena and countered its Bite with Steel Wing, a move it comprehended after spending two weeks with Klink.

The steel type move made it so that the wings Mightyena bit down on were too hard to inflict the full damage with an increase in defense. She would rather get hit than have her mistake cause damage to her teammates. A dragon's pride was hard to shake.

After Mightyena let go, Vibrava once more flapped her wings to use Supersonic, though in much closer range and succeeded in disorienting the Mightyena. She followed it up with another Steel Wing, though this time hitting the opposing pokemon right in the head instead of lowering the damage by getting it countered.

The other Mightyena wasn't doing any better. Miltank hit it squarely with a last second agile turn during Rollout and disabled its hind leg. The cow pokemon stopped the Rollout with that hit and used two super effective fighting type Rock Smashes she had learned from Nidoking to end the fight after that.

That left only one enemy pokemon standing: Raticate who was fighting Servine. The fight was over, that much was sure, but Raticate still wouldn't give up.

At the very start of the fight, Servine countered Hyper Fang by shooting Gunk Shot in the enemy pokemon's mouth and blocked the incoming Fang with a Leaf Blade so it wouldn't take damage.

After jumping back, Servine shot Leech Seed at the Raticate, who tried to desperately spit out the poison type move and avoid getting poisoned. The move hit, and Raticate was poisoned regardless as well as seeded.

From there, Servine simply had to stall, but Raticate seemed tenacious. Pete was glad that his grass pokemon seemed to recognize the situation and use Agility to dodge or Leaf Blade to block instead of going for a wound-for-wound attack.

It slipped his mind that Raticate had the ability Guts, increasing its attack when inflicted with a status effect.

After another successful dodge, Servine hit Raticate in the back with a Vine Whip and followed it up with Wrap. Now, Raticate had to waste time trying to bite through the vines holding it in place, which it didn't accomplish before Servine ended the fight a critical hit from Leaf Blade.

"Starting a fight by trying to poison the trainer. I see now. Your organization is totally misjudged."

Pete looked at the two Team Rocket who had a resigned but hateful expression on their faces.