Chapter 2

'...' for thoughts

"..." for speech

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While the three older people were having fun and the three younglings were preparing themselves, three other people entered the 'concertroom'. Cook's parents, his older brother, all three having pokeballs with them, and his 2 years younger sister Lou, who pesters her brother nearly every day, so that she can join the band as guitarist. Her Idol is Roxie so she really hoped her brother and Roxie get together.

Roughly 5 minutes later Jasper, Roxie and Cook went onto the stage to begin their performance and even though the performance of the three was definetly not perfect, it wasn't bad either and everyone, whether on or in front of the stage, human or pokemon, enjoyed the evening.

After the concert Jasper, Roxie and Cook got a big applaus and praise from everyone present and then all helped cleaning up the hall so that everyone could go home earlier.

After saying goodbye to his friends and their family Jasper and his parents slowly walked along the sidewalk home and enjoyed Virbank City at night, with it's neon-lights and a totally diffrent atmosphere. Roselia was already sleeping in Gina's arms and Electabuzz was kicking away stones that were lying on the sidewalk, but it was stopped by Joshua shortly after, because one of the kicked stones hit his butt.

But the near idyllic moment was broken when the group of 5 were near the Virbank Complex and saw a tongue of flame rising into the air, followed by screams of multiple pokemon and loud battle sounds. Roselia woke up with a startled cry and went into a battle ready stance.

"Stay here Jasper, your mom and me will go and see if somebody there needs out help, let's go Gina, Electabuzz" Joshua shouted and ran into the Complex along with Electabuzz, his wife and her pokemon.

But Jasper had other plans, he had never seen an actual fight between wild Pokémon and even trainer fights he only saw a few times on TV and the one time they saw a fight in the gym in his father's hometown, Nimbasa City . And the few times he saw his parents' Pokemon fight was in their movies, but he knows their every move is scripted in advance, so it doesn't count as a real fight to him. Being a generally very inquisitive and curious boy, and especially when it comes to Pokémon and Pokémon battles, he rushes to follow his parents to see what they will do. But he followed at a little distance lest he get caught by his parents or worse, get caught in the fight.

When Jasper got near the spot where he saw the tongue of flame, he could already see what all the fuss was about.

A group of 6 Krabbys and 2 Kinglers surrounded a visibly aged and exhausted Magmar and a trembling Magby trying to hide behind the much larger Magmar.

Right then one of the Kinglers started gatherung water energy on it's truly giant claw and wanted to finish off the battle by hitting the Magmar with a mighty attack, that Jasper quickly identified as a crabhammer. Meanwhile Magmar got ready for a last stand to defend the Magby behind it. The Magby is probably it's grandkid, going by the visible aging marks the Magmar showed.

Magmar gathered energy in it's mouth and let loose a desperate flamethrower, trying to stop Kinglers Crabhammer, but it just wasn't enough and the Kingler easily weathered the flamethrower and moved in front of Magmar by walking sideways, rising up it's big claw that had finished gathering energy by then.

Just when it looked like all hope was lost for the two fire pokemons two commands rang through the air. "Electabuzz, Thunderbolt on the attacking Kingler!"

"Roselia, use Magical Leaf on all the Krabbys and the other Kingler!" Jaspers parents shouted in sync, without coordinating beforehand, showing their great teamwork even though they have never gone on a pokemon journey or did the gym circuit, so technically being just hobby trainers.

The Thunderbolt snaked through the air incredibly fast and hit the attacking Kingler with near pinpoint precision. Clearly doing a lot of damage due to it's strength and being super effective on the water pokemon.

The Magical Leafs arrived shortly after, avoiding the Magmar and Magby and raining down on on the second Kingler and the Krabbys, which took a lot of damage from this also super effective attack.

The Krabbys and second Kingler gave up their encircelment and fled into the nearby Ocean, the attacking Kingler though showed why it was this group's leader and powered through Electabuzz's Thunderbolt with sheer tenacity and willpower and hit the Magmar with it's weakend, but still quite strong Crabhammer. The Crabhammer knocked down the Magmar, but Kingler didn't try to attack another time and limped away, still being quite fast, submerging shortly after throwing Joshua's Electabuzz a resentful look.

Joshua and Gina, together with Electabuzz and Roselia hurried to help the Magmar, though the pokemons remained cautious of the Magmar, just in case it sees them as aggressors.

Just as Joshua reached out to help up the Magmar a shout rang through the air.

"Don't touch that Magmar, dad!"

Whirling around Gina and Joshua saw Jasper running to them, his expression a weird mix excitement and worry.

"You were so awesome there mom, dad and you too Electabuzz and Roselia." Jasper, seeing Joshua quit his attempt of touching Magmar, stopped worrying and shouted in fascination.

But his excitement came to a stop abruptly, because he could see the storm clouds metaphorically brewing above his mother's head. "Jasper Acacia, we clearly told you to wait for us outside the Virbank Complex! What do you think you are doing here, you could have gotten hurt!" His Mother all but screamed, clearly worried about him."

But Joshua interrupted his wife's rant. "Even though I am totally on your side honey, but now is not the time for this. We will continue this later, we have to help this Magmar and Magby first. Why did you stop me from helping the Magmar just now Jasper, it clearly needs our help right now."

Even though she was not satisfied with the situation, Gina still knew what had priority in this situation. "Answer your father's question first, but this isn't over, mister!"

Jasper quickly nodded to his mother, glad she stopped shouting at him, at least for the moment, and answered his father. "If you had touched the Magmar, you would have lost your hand! A fit Magmar's body temperature is more than 1200 °C and even if this Magmar is old and exhausted, it's temperature is still at least 900 °C, this one is just keeping it inside of its body, so you didn't notice. Multiple Magmars were documented beeing able to do this."

Upon hearing this, Jasper's parents had a horrified expression on their faces, realizing just how close to losing his hand, arm or even life Joshua really was. "Thank Arceus you stopped me from touching Magmar, son. You really are our little Professor".

Which made Jasper really proud of himself.

But then Gina thought about something and decided to just ask her son. "But why then didn't Magmar use its heat in the battle, it would have helped it alot."

"Because it would have harmed Magby more than the Krabbys and Kingler. Magby ist clearly a newborn and it being so near Magmar the whole fight over, the heat would have hurt it the most." Answered Jasper without even thinking about it, his parents looked visibly impressed by the fast answer.

Just then the Magmar opend its eyes and tried to rise up, but it failed and fell onto the ground again. It was clear that the Magmar was dying and the pokemon center was too far away. Even if Jasper's parents caught the Magmar, it wouldn't make it. The Magmar had realized it too and looked at its grandkid Magby, visibly saddend, but then it turned its gaze to Jasper's family and back to Magby. It then raised its hand and pushed Magby into our direction.

Magby, realizing its family member was dying, started to cry, but Magmar didn't look at Magby, only at Jasper and his family, a silent plea in its eyes and while Joshua and Gina were hesitating, Jasper had already decided that that Magby would be his first pokemon. "Can we please keep the Magby mom, dad? It cannot survive on its own and Magby can become my official first pokemon when I get my youngster-license next year. It can stay with us as a pet-pokemon till then and I can already bond with him and do some light training, pretty please!"

Joshua and Gina looked at their son,the crying Magby and the dying Magmar and then nodded to each other. Joshua then said to the Magmar soothingly. "Don't worry, we will take good care of Magby and it will become our Son's first pokemon in the future, you habe our word for that."

Visibly relieved Magmar closed its eyes for the last time.

And that was how Professor Acacia and his mightiest pokemon, Magmortar, met for the first time.

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1537 words