An Electric Tail (Pikachu Quest)

Welp. That seems pretty unanimous. On to the fight, then! And hopefully this will take less than ten months to write.

Chapter 7 - Our courage will pull us through

Nobody is faster than you. In all the Forest, from deepest grove to highest hill to widest stream, you've never met anything that can match your speed. A few can rival it, perhaps even exceed you on the flat ground of a level playing field. Pigeots have their dives, Ninjask have their darting evasion, and of course trainer-tamed pets are often stronger and faster than any of their wild cousins, suckled on the rewards of submission as they are.

But you know the Forest down to the last branch and stone. You've never been caught while you're in your element. You never will be.

Lightning courses through your legs, and you launch yourself into the clearing in an electric burst of speed.

"Pikaaa!"

"Zu!"

The blobby blue rabbit yelps as your war cry startles her, but you sail past her towards her trainer. She reacts quickly, but only for a Human, and your tail slaps the balls from her belt with casual ease as you pass. They go bouncing and tumbling across the muddy shore ahead of you, and with another burst of motion you intercept them, bolts of electricity arcing from your cheek pads to reduce them to smoking, fizzing junk. A push off one of the rocks on the shoreline, a ricochet off a tree and a controlled skid brings you to a halt on the far side of the Human, with her between you and the Azumarill, and both between you and the pond. Against Rojo, it was a natural barrier that kept his Pokemon away. Against a Water-type it's a weapon to be used against you; something to avoid.

The Human, much to your annoyance, doesn't startle. Her head jerks a little as your crackling form streaks past her and her reflexive hop off the rock fails, but she doesn't jump or cry out. Instead, she raises a hand quickly, finishes her Berry in one bite, swallows, and turns to where you're standing your ground, front paws digging into the ground, back arched, tail raised.

"Ah!" She smiles at you and tilts her hat back. "Hello, Trickster. I'm Cerise, and this is Mallie." The Azumarill waddles up to her side, handing her the badge and frowning at you in a way that reminds you uncomfortably of your mother.

You frown back. This is not how first meetings with Humans are meant to go. Your name isn't meant to be said that cheerfully. If it's not screamed in impotent rage, they're pronouncing it wrong.

"Pika pii!" You dig your claws into the hard soil, your ears flattened back along your skull, and bare your fangs at her and the badge in her hand. "Pikaaa!"

"I'm here because I'm a League Ranger," she continues. "That means I work for the Kanto League and help fix problems where wild pokemon and people aren't getting along. Sometimes by getting the pokemon to stop attacking the people, sometimes by convincing the people to stop provoking the pokemon and sometimes just by sorting out a big misunderstanding between both sides that's causing all the fuss! The trainers of Viridian have been making a lot of complaints about you, Trickster, so the League asked me to step in and help everyone get along."

Uuuuurgh you don't care you don't care you don't care. "Pii pipika chuuu pikachu!" you chitter, lifting one paw to swipe it back towards the edge of the Forest and sparking angrily. "Pika pika chu!"

Cerise nods, still smiling. "I understand you're angry. You don't like humans very much, do you?"

No. You don't. She must read that off your face, because she looks briefly sad, then crouches down.

"I'd ask you to give some of us a chance, but I doubt that would work. Still, Trickster, just because you don't like us is no reason to attack humans like you have been. Is it because you think it's funny? Because you like causing mischief? Those are real people with real feelings you're hurting, and they don't think it's funny at all."

Okay, first of all, pushing stupid Trainers into patches of nettles or covering them with foul-smelling gunk is objectively hilarious, and anyone who says otherwise is lying. Secondly, of course that's not why you attack humans. It's why you attack humans by stealing their food and frying their metal tools and pulling other hilarious pranks, but that's just the how, not the why.

"Kachu ka," you spit at her, wrinkling your nose in contempt. "Chu."

Cerise grimaces. "Spite, then? I can see your scars, and Professor Ketchum told me about the wire trap you were caught in when you were little."

You go very still, tail rising slowly, ears flattening back along your skull from where they'd started to rise. Your claws dig furrows in the dirt. You don't want to talk about this. You don't want her talking about this. She has no right to know about that. None.

Cerise continues blithely on, though. "If you're holding a grudge over that, you should know that Professor Ketchum went to Gym Leader Oak about it as soon as he found out. You must have noticed how quickly the traps vanished. Oak was furious to find poaching going on so close to his city; he came down on the poachers like a Legendary. The people you're causing trouble for haven't done anything wrong; they had nothing to do with what happened to you."

Only the fact that she's at least trying to understand you prevents you from Shocking her on the spot. It's more than any Human has done before. But she's still missing the point. Of course you know your victims aren't the ones who hurt you. You got your revenge for that ages ago. You're not attacking them because you're as stupid as the Humans who think all Pokemon of a breed are alike; you're attacking them because the Forest is Pokemon territory, and they are trespassing. They have no right to come into this place; your home, and swagger around like it belongs to them, like they can claim its fruits and take its children and stick their stupid metal things all over it the way they flatten grasslands to build their box-like caves.

They think they can own land just by saying it's theirs and that the Pokemon living there don't get a say. But you do get a say. You get the only say that matters. Because you can keep them out, and when you can't keep them out, you can make them scared. And yes, it is fun to torment them, and yes, you do hold a bit of a grudge for the wire traps that they have, in fact, started putting out again. But those aren't why you started, and they're not why you continue. You continue because the Humans won't let it go, trying over and over and over to capture you because they can't accept that the Forest isn't theirs. You're not even the one driving the conflict at this point! You'd be content to stop if they just stayed away; freeing you to find ways of balancing the Forest to account for their absence. They're the ones who keep coming after you!

This Cerise Human is just the latest in a long and annoying line. You've given her a lot of leeway so far, but if she implies one more time that your campaign to kick the Humans out of your Forest is built on petty reasons or that you're a pup throwing a tantrum, you're going to show her just how deliberate you can be.

"Zuzu zuma," her Azumarill speaks up quietly, tugging on her dress. "Zuma zuma rilla."

"Pika!" Yes. Exactly. So she should pick up her useless Shocked-dead Pokeballs, give you the badge back and leave. Or just leave. You're annoyed enough at this point to let her keep the stupid thing, even if it'll make stupid Rojo think he's won something. You just want her to go away so you can go find some Figy Berries and enjoy the spiciness.

Cerise looks down at Mallie, then up at you, and then sighs and stands back up again.

"Alright, alright," she says, sounding a lot less obnoxiously friendly, which is at least some improvement. Her next words wipe out that small positive, though. "I can see this isn't an argument I'm going to win with words. So if you won't listen to reason, I'll just have to be firm about it. You're going to stop bothering people who are only here to use the forest and who don't mean any harm. No more traps, no more ambushes. No more mischief."

Beside her, Mallie nods sternly, wearing an expression you've only ever seen directed at you from your Ma: the I'm Disappointed In You mama face.

This stupid waddling water-bunny is trying to admonish you while the Human she's sold out to is laying down an ultimatum to stop fighting back against the Humans who are keeping this war going.

You see red.

This is a step too far.

Your fragile temper snaps.

Your tail comes up, lightning flashes.

And Mallie, impossibly, parries.

Not perfectly. Your speed still gives you an advantage, and your first, rash, sloppy Shock connects with a crack that echoes across the clearing. But Mallie takes it, enduring the brief electrocution with only a brief grimace, and then pulls a veil of water from the pond to surround herself, cerulean-blue light forming rings around it that soothe the burns away.

Your second Shock is precise, focused and strong enough to knock her out in a single strike. It hits the water, a blue ring dips to intercept it, and the lightning...

... bends.

Like a stone skipping off the surface of a river, your Thunder Shock skitters off the Aqua Ring, arcing away to ground itself on a tree. Mallie folds her arms, waiting patiently, and lets you try again to the same result. You step back uncertainly, ears twitching, eyes wide. This... this isn't normal. You've seen Aqua Ring from the freshwater Goldeens in the river. It's a healing move. It can't do that. No Water-type should be able to do that.

Unless, like Grandpa, they'd deliberately gone out and found a way to counter their own Type disadvantage. Trained and practiced until they could exploit their vulnerability and use the very traits that made it a weakness to turn the tables.

In his youth, Grandpa found a way to use the magnetic fields his electricity produced to hurt even Ground-types who his lightning couldn't touch. You understand the basic idea - you've always been able to sense the pull of north and south through the tug on your sparks. But you've never been able to figure out the trick yourself.

Mallie, it seems, has worked out how to use water's conductivity to bend your bolts away from her.

And that's... that's not something you think you can counter off the top of your head.

B-but! Even if your lightning doesn't work, you're not defenceless! If you can't Shock her into submission, you'll just batter her unconscious instead! Pride drives you forward; pride, and also fear. Because you don't have a choice now. Not with an ultimatum like that, and not with a Pokemon that can parry your Shocks. If you don't prove your strength immediately, this Human and her rabbit will hunt you just like Wenge did.

You charge your legs with lightning and leap forward, aiming to tackle Mallie in her soft round belly where your skull will be cushioned in the exchange but she'll be winded and badly bruised. But she's already moving, not as fast as you but almost precognitive in how she predicts your move, sending the veil of water forward in a spinning torrent and summoning more from the pond to replenish it with. You try to change direction, but now your speed works against you; on the flat ground without any branches to ricochet off, you lack the traction you need for such hairpin turns or sudden decelerations.

You plunge headfirst into the whirlpool Mallie put in your path and the world becomes a blurry, distorted jumble of spinning and tumbling and trees streaking past going round and round and round and round...

A brief moment of contact with the ground is enough for you to push off your hind paw and burst out of the water-trap, bouncing across the ground. But as you stagger up onto all fours again, you lurch sideways, barely keeping your balance. The world is still spinning. Your head hurts and your stomach is tumbling over and over, making it an effort not to spew half-digested Berry all over the ground. You try to focus on the approaching blue-and-white shapes, but there are three of them and they keep drifting sideways through each other. Something about the way they lean down over your and hum is soothing, and you feel yourself calming. The panicked need to prove your dominance recedes enough for you think clearly again, or as clearly as you can through the wooziness.

Then a pair of surprisingly powerful arms latch onto the scruff of your neck, hoisting you up into a rough embrace that pins your limbs and tail, and you remember yourself. You're in a fight. This stupid waddling bunny just out-moved you. And now she's trying to charm and aggressively cuddle you into submission?

Well you'll show her. All over your body, your fur stands on end as static electricity builds on your skin, and there's no guiding this charge away with water. Mallie yelps as the volts flow through her where she's grabbed you, and you're unceremoniously dropped to the ground as she staggers away.

You just about make it back onto your feet for the second time and are halfway through electrifying your fur for another static-charged tackle when the stupid water surges up again and engulfs you. Engulfs you, and sends you right back to spinning, screaming, flailing motion.

This time, she doesn't let you out. She somehow adjusts the water so that the core of it stops going round and round so fast, leaving you floating in a liquid prison with whirling water all around you, dizzy and sodden and bruised and furious.

And the Human, Cerise. She hasn't said anything throughout the whole exchange. No orders to Mallie, no guiding her through the fight like most Trainers have to because their Pokemon are too stupid to know how to fight on their own. She's just watching you. Quietly. With her feelings written all over her face.

---

Cerise is watching you. What can you see in her expression?
[ ] Concern. If she's so upset about how you're getting hurt, why hasn't she called her rabbit off yet?
[ ] Confusion. Does she really not understand why you're fighting back against being caught and tamed?
[ ] Conciliation. Even as she's winning by force, she's trying to find a way to talk you over to her side; why?

This serves only to strengthen your opinions about Humans. They're...
[ ] Snobs. They think that just because they're big and strong and clever that they deserve to be in charge. They treat Pokemon like they're lesser things who can't take care of themselves and need to be ordered around.
[ ] Liars. They say one thing and do another, pretend to be nice to you then attack you or hunt you when you're asleep, claim to care about wildlife in the Forest while setting traps and spying-things. They can't be trusted.
[ ] Bullies. They throw their weight around and use force to get their way. For all their claims, when they see something they want they take it, and they attack things they don't like until they stop or go away.

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Okay, sorry about the wait, I've pretty much worked out the "what am I doing with this story" issues that were blocking me for the past couple of chapters and am back on form. Expect shorter delays on future chapters.