Lisa the Legend - Chapter 52 up!!
Chapter 24 - Homeward Bound.
The Nurse Joy at the Ecruteak Pokemon Centre greeted Lisa and Gavin happily, although she seemed to disapprove of them bringing a sulky Wesley and bored but still cheeky Jean into the shop. Many of the baby pokemon in the back had recently hatched from eggs, she told them, and had just got to sleep when they all arrived talking, and then had awakened.
Lisa had been surprised when they entered, and approached the counter, because this Nurse Joy had her scarlet-orange hair grown out quite long, and she was much younger than the usual Nurse Joy – she appeared to be only sixteen or so.
“ I’m filling in for my Mum,” she explained, when Lisa enquired. “ She’s gone to some Island way up north in Kohtu for some sort of research – I think it’s pointless myself,” she added, with a slightly annoyed expression. Lisa smiled when she spotted how similar the Nurse’s situation was to her own when her parents had left for Kanto, to study Omanytes.
“ So – are our Pokemon alright?” Lisa asked, as she felt Jean’s finger poking her in the back impatiently.
“ I think so,” Nurse Joy said, an indistinct trace of doubt in her voice. “ They all seem to have taken a very hard blow, every single one of them seems very injured, but there’s no physical trace of an attack on them at all. Do you have any idea what happened to them?”
“ No, sorry,” muttered Lisa, reminding herself very much of the conversation she had had with Officer James earlier that morning, when most of the answers to his question’s were “ No, sorry, I don’t know” or “ I really don’t remember”.
“ Come and collect them, then,” Joy lead Gavin, Lisa, and Jean down the hallway. Wesley had discovered a TV set, with the Pokemon Battle he had been dying to watch being broadcast live, and Tom and Miki had sat down to watch him, although Lisa suspected they wanted some time ‘alone’.
The corridor was tiled and quite dingy compared to the rest of the centre. As they continued, passing many open doors where small amounts of light seeped in, Joy explained. “ Sorry about the bad lighting. The corridor is the only, um – room – in the centre that doesn’t have a window. Normally we provide the lights with some electric pokemon, but all our Magnemites are still at a Farm west of the city doing some promotional thing. Our electricity supply is only existent due to a couple of volunteers.”
She gestured into a small room, where three Raichu, an Elekid and a Magneton were standing on a conveyor belt, all of them panting. Wires were strapped to them, carrying electric currents to a large generator in the centre of the room. There was another, thinner set of wires attached to them as well – Joy explained that a small percentage of the electricity was fed back to the pokemon to keep them going over long periods of endurance.
Jean looked utterly bored, and looked like she was going to turn back, when Lisa looked closer at the pokemon and squealed. “ Hey – that Elekid, and that Magneton –”
She didn’t need to say anymore, Joy blushed a bright shade of scarlet, and gave a timid but sheepish grin.
“ When I said volunteer, I kinda meant pokemon that stay here overnight to heal.”
Lisa was fuming. “ But they’re injured!” she protested.
“ I assure you they’ll be fine!” cried Joy hastily, seizing Lisa’s hand and dragging her along before any more could be said. “ They’ll be given back to you immediately.”
Jean tapped Lisa’s shoulder, and she whipped around, only to see her young sister poking out her tongue in a very juvenile manner and for no apparent reason. Lisa delivered a quick kick to the shins to shut Jean up.
Finally, Joy turned into an enormous room, so very reminiscent of Lisa’s hospital ward that Lisa couldn’t speak for a moment. There were two long rows of white beds, most of them only about four feet long, and many of them wider than a usual bed, to cater for oversize pokemon. Along one side of the ward were Lisa’s pokemon; Dratini, Quagsire, and Aipom, Gavin’s pokemon; Natu, Staryu, Girafarig (looking very awkward) and Ditto, and finally Kris’ pokemon; Growlithe, Misdreavus and Butterfree. Lisa wondered where Kris was now, and if she would arrive in Ecruteak and be able to retrieve her pokemon.
“ Sorry if your pokemon are all looking a bit weak still,” Joy smiled. “ When the police brought them in the other day, they were very tired. Some of them still are.”
“ As long as they’re healthy, I’m happy,” said Lisa.
“ Yeah.” Gavin said.
“ Just place your pokeballs here,” Joy instructed, as she surveyed the room. Gavin and Lisa pulled off all their empty pokeballs and put them on a low wooden bench.
Along the opposite side of the ward were a Sandshrew, a very weak-looking Caterpie, and a very strange pokemon Lisa had never seen before. It had large, buggy eyes, a vibrant saffron head, with no ears but a small nozzle that appeared to be a form of sucker. Its body was very odd – it was bright azure, but had glistenings of what looked like snowflakes, constantly appearing and melting, then trickling away and making way for new ones.
The mattress was completely soaked with water.
“ Oh, nooo! Not again!” Joy cried, sprinting over to the bed. Gavin raised an eyebrow, and even Lisa had a hunch that this Nurse wasn’t exactly the most experienced she had met. Jean s******ed behind her hands, but Lisa silenced her, and, slightly reluctantly, jogged across the ward to help Joy.
“ Ugh, Issechu!” yelled Joy, reaching up and pushing the Bug-like creature right off the bed and onto the floor.
“ Bless you,” Gavin said, as the thing landed with a thud, although looked unaffected. Lisa helped Joy wrench the sheets off and pull the mattress onto the ground. Joy began dragging the mattress through a nearby door, then, as an afterthought, flipped it over and replaced it.
“ What IS that?” Gavin asked, from across the room, eyeing the bug as though it was an alien.
“ Issechu,” Joy replied impatiently, heaving the thing back onto the bed. “ Now, Issechu, no more sweating! Just relax, you’ll be free again very soon!”
She turned to Lisa. “ Could you just calm him down for a second while I find some new sheets?”
Lisa wondered if it really needed sheets, but she nodded, and turned awkwardly to the bug like thing, Issechu. Its body was looking very misty, and soon drops of sweat-like water appeared all over it. Lisa reached her hand out and touched it. It was freezing – like ice. She wiped the sweat away, then stroked it’s body. “ Er – it’s OK … good Issechu, you’re doing great.”
Gavin and Jean both burst into fits of snorts as Joy re-entered the room, carrying pale yellow sheets. At the same moment, Issechu’s nozzle vibrated and emitted a loud, buzzing squeak. It then rubbed its large orange head on Lisa’s arm, who flinched back.
“ It likes you,” commented Joy, slapping the sheets down on the nearby trolley.
Gavin and Jean snorted again, and Lisa glared reprovingly at them.
Joy ignored them, and turned back to Issechu. “ Alright, get up buddy, come on!” she urged, pushing his body. Lisa wondered what she was doing, when suddenly she felt a brief gust of air in her face. Two parts of Issechu’s body had broken off into wings, which were glistening in the light from the large window at the far end of the ward. It hovered up, while Joy hurriedly spread out the sheets. Lisa watched numbed, before regaining sense and assisting Joy in completing the task.
Issechu landed, and gave a kind of half-smile, while made it’s eyes look happy and it’s nozzle twist slightly. Gavin looked slightly impressed, but Jean looked nothing less than disgusted by the mere sight of the creature. She sighed and faced outside the door, looking like she wished she hadn’t come.
“ Thanks, Lisa,” Joy sighed, staring oddly at Issechu. Lisa suddenly remembered the Ward was for injured pokemon, and Issechu appeared fine.
“ What’s wrong with Issechu?” Lisa asked, as Joy moved on to check the Sandshrew’s temperature. The shrew looked very weak and it was sweating profusely.
Joy looked up abruptly, upsetting the Sandshrew. She patted him until he was calm, then faced Lisa. “ Issechu is a new pokemon, my Mum found it injured a week or so ago. It’s all better now, but it doesn’t want to go back into the wild. It gets really nervous and upset sometimes – it only shows it by sweating. That’s why you have to calm it down.”
Lisa nodded knowingly, as Issechu kept grinning at her.
“ It needs a good trainer to take care of it now,” said Joy, very indiscreetly. Lisa shuddered, wrinkling her nose up at the sight of Issechu, with it’s pleading buggy eyes.
“ Well I hope it finds a good trainer soon –” Lisa edged away from that part of the ward, walking backwards until she bumped into Gavin. “ Well thanks Joy, I really enjoyed meeting you. Oh, look – a door!”
Lisa sprinted nervously into the hallway, and Jean, despite herself, giggled. Gavin looked warily around.
“ I’ll take Issechu in a pokeball for her, if you want,” he said bravely and mischievously, s******ing to himself, knowing that Lisa would rather lose Aipom than capture Issechu. “ I’m sure that, deep down, she really wants to keep it.” Then he turned to Jean as Joy laughed, and Issechu buzzed happily at the potential of a new trainer. “ C’mon, Jean, help me get all these pokemon back into their pokeballs.”
Nurse Joy smiled as Gavin walked over to Issechu’s bed. “ Just take it for a while to see how it goes, OK? Bring it back in a week for a check-up.”
*
Half an hour later, all six of them were piled into Tom’s very unreliable car. Wes and Jean were sharing a seatbelt, and both looked incredibly annoyed at this, although Wesley much more than Jean – he was missing the conclusion of his TV show. Jean, however, had gained the possession of Kris’ Butterfree, Growlithe and Misdreavus until Kris arrived in Ecruteak, and she was slightly cheerier.
Lisa felt as though she had something to complain about. Issechu sat inside a Friend Ball on her belt. She glared at Gavin while he glanced unknowingly outside the dirty car window, watching pizza shops, shopping arcades, parks and finally suburban houses whoosh past.
“ Home now?” Wesley snapped in a strangled voice, as though he was speaking but at the same time trying not to.
“ Not just yet,” replied Tom, who was promptly answered with assorted groans, and a smirk from Miki. “ First we have to go to my work – I just have to check something with Morty. I left the cokes out of the fridge and I think he said he was letting Haunter and Gastly free today. I wanna make sure they don’t drink them or anything.”
Gavin smirked, and Wes and Jean both now looked murderous. But Lisa felt her heart lift – the last time she had been to Tom’s work, the Main Ecruteak Gym, she had been trying for a Badge. That was before her journey began, before her fateful meeting with Suicune.
Maybe – maybe? Lisa mused things over in her head. Hopefully this time, if the ghosts had succeeded in spilling coke all over the gym, she would be able to ditch Tom and find Morty. The idea seemed very appealing.
“ Isn’t there a new gym or something?” Gavin asked, as Tom swivelled the ancient car down a side street, his idea of a short cut. Tom frowned.
“ Yeah, a new one,” he drawled slowly. “ They only made it a couple of months ago.”
Miki looked infuriated. “ They built it right next to the Dance Studio,” she whined, brushing hair indignantly out of her eyes. “ And now we can’t get five minutes peace without some psycho kids having a stupid battle!! Half the time we get thunderbolts striking out theatre!!”
Gavin blinked, and decided not to pursue the subject. Miki relaxed slightly, her face flushed pink.
The car slowed, and Tom drove over the low kerbing to the car park. Lisa cringed slightly as she viewed the building she had fruitlessly battled at for weeks. Ecruteak Gym.
It was made mainly of stone, which was as grey as the clouds, which haunted its pointed spire, which rose steadily from the ground floor up into the sky. Lisa had often wondered why the tower was constructed, but at the moment her mind was clogged with prospects of winning a battle. This time, she felt she could succeed – she no longer had just Aipom, but now Elekid, Magneton, Dratini, Quagsire, and – Lisa shuddered slightly – Issechu, the nervy, icy bug which appeared to be in love with her.
Tom parked the car with a jolt, and leapt out instantly. Miki followed closely, and this automatically decided that everybody was entering the structure. Gavin looked interested slightly, but Wes and Jean remained stubbornly inside the humid car. Tom shrugged as he turned, and locked them in with the remote central locking. They didn’t even flinch.
The inside of the Ecruteak Gym was nicer than Lisa remembered it – she was expecting an entire gym of semi-darkness, wooden panelled floor which was suspended above the basement, and stone walls, hardly visible by the candles which were fixed to brackets in the wall. She expected Morty, the red-haired gym leader, to be standing alone at the far end of the gym. But reality vastly contrasted Lisa’s recollections.
There were countless more candles and torches fixed to the wall this time, making the winding wooden path to Morty’s battlefield quite easy to distinguish from the dark pits around it. Tom explained the gym had been sued in October for poor lighting, when an elderly challenger fell and broke a hip, and they had had to replace the lighting.
As the four of them walked briskly down the path, Lisa noticed there were no gym trainers standing by at regular intervals along the path, waiting to challenge the badge seekers. Tom seemed as puzzled as Lisa was at this, and he sped up. Finally they arrived at the large concrete battlefield, where Morty was nowhere to be seen.
“ What now?” Lisa questioned dully, surveying the room disappointedly. So much for a battle.
“ C’mon, he should be in here,” Tom began, striding across the room quickly and promptly wrenching open a nearby door. When it opened, it was as though Lisa had been deaf forever, and was now hearing things for the first time.
The moment the door was opened, a loud collection of crashes and shouts were heard by all of them. Tom gasped and sprinted through the doors, and Lisa suppressed a giggle as she glimpsed the action inside.
Beyond the door was a small room, the Trainer Lounge. There was a large, slightly rusting fridge in one corner, open, and a table near the other corner. But Lisa didn’t even really notice these – she was taken by the commotion in the centre of the room.
Morty, the young leader, was bent over two pokeballs on the floor, breathing heavily. Around the room, four Haunter and seven Gastly flew wildly around the room. The fridge was hanging open, and Lisa noticed for the first time that the white-tiled floor was covered in a fizzy brown liquid. The rogue ghosts, flying carelessly around the room, had opened over twenty cans of Cola drink, and as Lisa watched a particularly mischievous Haunter held a can to it’s mouth and tipped it up. As ghosts were unable to eat or drink anything physical, the coke slipped straight through it and spattered onto the cringing Morty below.
Tom was sprinting towards Morty, and helped him up, cautious of the slippery floor. Without asking any questions, Tom prepared to throw two pokeballs, but Morty’s strong arm shot out to stop him.
“ Don’t!” he shouted, above the raucous yelling and laughing of the ghosts above. “ Your pokemon are ghosts – they’ll join in!”
Tom obeyed, and lowered his arm down. Miki, who had been standing next to Lisa and Gavin just inside the doorway, suddenly stepped further into the room, and pulled a Pokeball from her hair – her clip was actually a real pokeball.
“ Luni!” she cried instantly, then, while the pokemon appeared in a flash, whispered to Lisa and Gavin. “ Help me out here – use Psychic pokemon if you can –”
Lisa wasn’t sure that she could help, but Gavin’s eyes brightened up at the mention of Psychic. He produced Girafarig, Natu and Staryu in quick succession, and then, as an afterthought, added Ditto to the group.
Morty and Tom were now tottering to the door, wary of the brown mess below and the hyperactive crowd above. Morty looked pleased to see Gavin and Miki stepping up to face the ghosts, and Lisa felt very pathetic, as though everyone else was a pokemon trainer but she was too young. She helped Tom to the doorway rather bitterly, and tried to smile as she assisted Morty, Now the room contained only the Gastly, Haunter and Miki and Gavin.
Miki stood next to Gavin, Luni, her umbreon, baring it’s teeth before her.
“ Night Shade!” she bellowed, as Gavin shouted out commands to his team.
“ Psychics – Psybeam. Ditto – you transform!” he yelled quickly, almost feeling like he was in an unorganised battle.
Natu perched itself onto Girafarig’s head, so that it was high enough to reach the crazy ghosts. Staryu stood at the ready, before, without any hesitation, all three blasted beams of mauve light at a few particular ghosts. Three Gastly were struck down, falling like rubber balls to the floor, then abruptly falling right through the floor, and disappearing.
Luni had shot out a ray of blackness from her mouth, which began very thin but gradually expanded through the air, enveloping two Haunter and a further Gastly. Miki grinned, as she yelled to Luni to complete the fight with a powerful Bite.
Ditto had successfully transformed into a Haunter and was now having a wild battle, Gavin shouting out attacks that he could only guess at. The true Haunter was retaliating with lavender spheres which sparked with ebony energy – a petite version of Shadow Ball. Ditto had floated upwards and was relentlessly spitting out poisonous purple acid at Haunter, which would have been effective if Haunter had have been solid.
The Ditto/Haunter battle was suddenly ended when a powerful Psybeam from Natu intervened and KO’ed Haunter, dropping it quickly to the ground. Ditto grinned, squeaked, and with a bright flash transformed into it’s blobby self.
*
Five minutes later, Miki, Gavin and Lisa were perched wearily at the wooden table in the corner of the Trainer’s Lounge, half-heartedly watching Tom plop an ancient mop into a bucket of murky brown water, and begin washing the floor.
“ Ask him, go on,” urged Gavin, while Miki and Morty were deep in a contempted conversation about the New Gym, and Lisa was nervously fiddling with her pokegear-necklace.
“ I dunno, it’d be rude to interrupt –” Lisa excused pathetically.
On cue, both Miki and Morty ran out of conversation matter. Gavin smirked.
“ He might not feel like battling – he probably has better things to do here anyway.”
Morty sighed angrily as Tom’s mopping continued. “ This is soooo boring, Tom, waiting for you, I’ve got nothing to do except wait to inspect it – don’t want you messing things up. I’d rather be battling.”
Tom frowned, and Gavin nudged Lisa. Somehow she found the courage.
“ Excuse me, Morty?” she asked very timidly, as though Morty was an intimidating man in a suit and she was a three year old girl with a lollipop hanging from her mouth.
“ What?” grunted Morty.
“ Um, would you mind battling me? For a badge. I mean, you’re here anyway, so I though maybe it would be OK…”
Morty originally looked as though he was about to double his teeth’s size and bite Lisa’s head off, but he stopped with an open mouth, as Gavin had so-often done, and changed his mind. “ Well … I suppose I could. But it’ll have to be a one-on-one match, OK? I’m not letting Haunter and Gast-”
But Lisa was no longer listening. Her heart had leapt. A one-on-one battle – she would have to pick just one pokemon to fight Morty’s ghost pokemon – she presumed a Gengar or Misdreavus.
The upcoming battle had an effect of everyone. Tom looked very annoyed, as Lisa followed his boss to the main gym room, and Morty left with a comment of “ This’d better be finished when I get back.” Gavin grinned as though Christmas had come early, and Miki looked pleased with Lisa for some reason or other. Lisa could imagine Wes and Jean’s reactions – “ Can’t we go HOME yet??”
A moment later, Lisa had a pokeball clenched firmly in her hand, facing Morty fifty metres away, where he stood holding a great Ball. Gavin and Miki clustered in the doorway, Miki torn between the interest of a battle and comforting Tom before he became outraged at Morty’s treatment of him.
Lisa scanned over her already-decided choice in her mind – it was probably her best bet. Aipom she wanted to rest still, tucked safely in his pokeball. She was hoping never to have to use Issechu until the week was up. And Magneton and Elekid were quite inexperienced. Quagsire and Dratini were the only competitors, so she chose …
“ Quagsire!” Lisa yelled, throwing the ball swiftly onto the wooden floor, where it made a clicking sound and in a vibrant flash released it’s captive – a plump, shiny, pale blue fish-like creature. Morty didn’t sneer, as some would have, instead he obediently threw out his Great Ball, and revealed his battler. His fighter was tall and wide, black except for a tint of violet on the edges. He had stubby black arms and even stubbier black legs. The creature had wide, mischievous eyes, which bordered on downright evil, and his upturned mouth looked like a nasty grin, as though the pokemon had just killed somebody and was pleased about it.
“ Gengar!” Morty yelled, beginning the fight. “ Begin with Shadow Ball, then Hypnosis.”
“ Quagsire – Aurora Beam, then Double Team!” Lisa cried, completely prepared, launching into her first real battle for weeks.
Quagsire subtly nodded to Lisa, and began rapidly forming a globe of rainbow light in its mouth. Gengar seemed to be mimicking it, only it was creating a black, shadowy orb within its clumsy-looking hands. Quagsire then shot a thick jet of light from the orb directly at Gengar’s head area, but the dark ghost was prepared for the strike – it fired off the ball of Shadows, which barrelled at Quagsire. Both attacks whipped past each other in mid air, but neither hit, both to Lisa’s dismay and delight. Quagsire flattened itself to the ground, while the Shadow Ball swished above it, while Gengar leapt up, displaying it’s agility, and the beam shot past and sliced through the cement wall on the far side of the indoor battlefield.
The multiple candles on the walls quivered and flickered on impact, and the ones near the area where the beam and ball hit were instantly extinguished. Much of the gym was affected by this, and the Pokemon and trainers were plunged into thick semi-darkness. Lisa breathed heavily – round two.
Gengar’s eyes glowed an acid-like crimson, and Quagsire looked like it was about to faint. But then it recalled it’s orders, and pulled it’s gaze away from it’s enemy’s, keeping its eyes low and squinting – not to block out Gengar’s gaze but to create over a dozen mirror images of itself, which formed a ring. Quagsire then magically switched itself with another of its ‘clones’ while Morty cried orders again.
“ Gengar, intensify the Hypnosis!”
The real Quagsire looked up for orders, and the images followed suit. Lisa wasn’t sure what to do to combat Hypnosis – Gengar’s hypnosis was widespread, and she suddenly realised the Double Team was pointless.
The sleep waves coming from Gengar were rolling out now, visible even in the dull light. They rolled out continuously from the Gengar’s eyes, slightly illuminating the match. They rolled relentlessly over the Quagsires, and they all dropped instantly to the ground, eleven of them diminishing on impact. Lisa’s Quagsire was now lying on the floor, very vulnerable.
“ Wake up!” cried Lisa, instinctively.
“ Now, Dream Eater!” yelled Morty in a confident voice. Lisa shuddered, and Gengar’s mouth opened wide, and countless drops of lilac energy spiralled out from it, spinning in ever-growing circles towards Quagsire, who snoozed ignorantly on. When the circle had grown large enough, the tiny spherical drops tore into Quagsire, each one taking more and more energy and life away from it, chipping viciously at it’s health.
It looked like the end of the match already – Quagsire’s nerves were twitching and flinching with each drops impact, but Gengar’s ambush didn’t end, it just kept on coming. And just when Lisa was preparing to sacrifice her attempt at the badge to protect Quagsire, there was a sudden, unexpected blast of whiteness from Quagsire – Gengar and Lisa were both thrust backwards abruptly.
Lisa nervously turned her eyes back to the place where Quagsire was sleeping – only suddenly he was awake. White light filled his being, and Lisa heard Miki mutter “ No way…” and Gavin swear quietly to himself.
Quagsire was evolving.
Originally Posted by mr_pikachu
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