Arc II: We're IT!

Chapter 16~ Break or Bust 2

Lurid Desert BF6

We could see it. It was in complete clear view through the passageway that we were outside of. It wasn't too far off—just a little bit away, but not too much. It was small, and in a random place in the room, like always.

Of course, the stairs leading to the next floor wasn't the only thing that was in clear view. Wrapped around our guarantee of passage was what could probably be mistaken as a inconvenient line of rocks that blended really well into its environment. But, Water Gun and I fell for that trick already, and we weren't going to fall for it again. Well, technically I'd be a sixth time, but nobody cares about technicalities.

It was a freaking Onix. No, no—let me rephrase that. It was another freaking Onix. There were a bunch of them in this stupid dungeon. Fortunately, we've been able to avoid most of them, like with pretty much every other Pokemon in this place, but this one was literally wrapped around the stairs. A closer look told me that not only was it wrapped around them, but it was sleeping too. I mean, seriously, what the heck? Did it randomly decide to snuggle with a hole in the ground? Freaking dungeon Pokemon make no sense.

A quick glance at Water Gun, who was on the opposite side of the passageway, told me he saw exactly what I did: that there was no way to get to the stairs and avoid the Onix at the same time.

Our tactic here has mostly been staying quiet and tip-toe-like to avoid getting pummeled by the crazy strong—and not to mention typically crazy huge—Pokemon around. We've been able to develop signs and looks to communicate. It wasn't anything big really, in fact I remember Tarsal telling us that it was pretty normal, and good, for a team to develop some kind of signs.

Water Gun and I shared another glance and nodded. In a split second, we both set off running as fast as we could toward the sleeping Onix, our feet against the ground was the only sound echoing in the passageway. We should have been more stealthy, since it seemed like the sound of our running woke up the Onix.

The Onix reared up, its head close to touching the ceiling full of stalagmites, and it roared. It wasn't as loud as it could have been, you could tell, but it was pretty darn loud. The ground shook lightly and I almost lost my balance; which would have been bad because I was in a pretty elegant fighting stance. A quick bugged-eyed look at Water Gun and we both knew which plan we were going for—we did it a couple times already.

The Onix, I guess it was antsy to get rid of us—which I can relate to, I mean we did totally interrupt its sleep—went at both of us. He slowly gained speed and I could see a slight hint of white surround him. Wait, was he going with a Takedown attack? While it would have probably seemed smart to do in blind rage, it was actually pretty stupid. Here we are, two small Pokemon and he's going to try a Takedown while he's still a good distance a way from us? Geez, a Sloth would be able to move out the way before he hits. Of course, we weren't doing that.

Oh no. Instead of dodging, both of us continued to run forwards towards him, maybe a little faster than before. A little bit before the point where he'd probably collide with us, Water Gun unleashed the strongest Water Gun he could, and I jumped into the air. I could see it all happening underneath me during my descent. Water Gun hit the Onix full on with the blast of water, and was probably a critical hit. The Takedown attack he was attempting seemed to have been nullified by it too. But, it didn't look like The Onix took that much damage. He mostly look enraged. Which was kinda bad, considering that this was a dungeon Pokemon. It was kinda amusing to watch though.

I landed from my jump directly on top of the Onix's head. It was in good time too, because the Onix reared up again in rage. Flinging my hand for something to hold, I grasped the horn on it's head for my dear life as it deafening roar which was a whole bunch louder before. Well, I'm pretty sure it was louder at least. I mean, I was on top of its head and all.

Before it came back down to enact revenge on Water Gun, I jumped as hard as I could off of it's head to bring myself close to the ceiling.

"Alright...I've only got one shot at this," I said to myself. It was the first words I said for awhile in this dungeon and, in any other time, I would probably reflect on how unfamiliar my voice sounded...but I was kinda in a rush.

I looked around to find the largest stalactite by me and tried to face its direction in mid-air. It was to the left of me, fortunately, so it wasn't that hard. I reared back one of my arms and pumped a ton of power into it. I kinda had to squint my eyes because of the shiny metallic gleam my claws took. But anyway, I gave the spiky rock the best Metal Claw I've done in a while. It wasn't enough to completely break it off, but it did crack it pretty bad. That was fine though. It was exactly what we wanted.

After I cracked the stalactite I began my descent back to the ground, which was a pretty long distance away from me. Water Gun seemed to be in the middle of a pickle and I could catch the Onix rearing back for what looked like was going to be a devastating Tail Whip. I was half way to the ground by the time the Tail Whip struck home and sent Water Gun flying into a wall. I saw him withdrawing most of his body into his shell before he hit, but it still made me furious at the Onix.

So you know what I did?

I freaking reared back myself. In its blind anger, the Onix must of forgotten about me being up here, so I'm going to give it a rough reminder. I cocked back my fist and it boiled with a red aura. As I collided into the Onix, I brought it down as hard as I could. There was a sickening crunch that resounded off the walls. Heh, it didn't know what hit him. My Brick Break seemed to leave a permanent crack on the horn of its head though. Stupid Onix got what was coming to him. No one bashes one of my friends. Well...I can't really say 'one of my friends' since Water Gun's pretty much the only friend I've got. But still, you get the idea.

Brick Break's a move that I'm glad Dirge, the Medicham, let me put under my arsenal. Yeah, he's the one who taught me the move, being a fighting type and all. You wouldn't believe the amount of times we've had to use it to get rid of a couple of inconveniently place rocks. Dirge definitely knew what he was doing.

So, as it turns out, the Onix didn't completely like the fact that I put a giant crack at the top of his cranium. Either that or his roar of anger was actually a wail of pain. Actually, I like that idea. Yeah, let's go with that one. 'The Onix wailed in pain as it convulsed on the ground and shriveled up in a ball as it de-evolved into the pathetic Weedle it was'.

But seriously, the Onix really did roar out again; and it seemed to finally notice that there was a red lizard on its head. I held on tightly to the horn which I previously cracked as it went wild. And when I say wild I mean it. It was whipping its whole body in every way imaginable just to try to fling me off. He was even slamming his body onto the ground! It was around the time he started to use Dragon Breath to try to get rid of me that I got the wise idea to gradually get off of the Onix by going onto his back and lowering myself onto each of the gigantic stones that made his body.

It was around the time that I made it half way down, by Mew I'm surprised I made it that far, that the Onix noticed me on it's lower body.

It's times like these when I wonder, 'when an Onix sees its body, what does it think?'. Haven't you ever wondered that? I mean, come on their bodies are freaking rocks for Mew's sake! When I look at my hand, I think, 'Ahh, yes. This red thing poking out of my body is part of me.' or 'Man, these are some sick claws...'. I know I cannot be the only one out there who wonders what an Onix would do when it sees it's body—or if it would do anything at all. I mean, would it be like, 'Whoa, that's a pretty nice row of boulders there. Either nature's pretty organized or some guy's got OCD!' or maybe 'Dammit, I can't get my tail to move! Oh wait, that's just a normal rock...'. Just think of how different life would be.

Well, it was these particular thoughts that were going through my mind when the Onix attacked me, and in affect his whole body, with a Crunch attack. I jumped off onto the ground in time of course, but I'm sure you can imagine the Onix looked hilarious biting its own tail like that. It looked pretty painful too though. Then again, giving damage to yourself is pretty much always painful.

The Onix recovered quickly; and the rumbling by one of the rooms walls told me that Water Gun was finally making use of his stupid ass. A quick glance at the ceiling told me that the stalactite was on its way to completely cracking off. All of the extremely loud roaring and wall-crashing was slowly helping. Of course, it's help more if it was doing it faster.

I grit my teeth as I narrowly dodged a sloppy attack from the Onix's tail. I need to stop getting so caught up in my head.

The Onix drilled his tail into the ground and quickly flung it out causing a ton of medium sized rocks to fly at me. Rock Throw. I jumped to the side and, once again, barely managed to get out of the way of the attack. Water Gun, who finally managed to get out of his hole in the wall, ran up to the Onix and fired another one of his Water Gun attacks. He must of been getting tired, cause it was barely even a hit. Only two seconds after Water Gun attacked, the Onix moved out of the way and was only slightly splashed by the water.

The Onix reared up into the air again, the stupid rock beast had a mixed expression of cockiness and anger as it opened its gigantic rocky jaw. I felt my knees chill when I saw a large ball of blue flame form between it's jaws. We had literally no time to move as the Onix spit out a Dragonflame attack big enough to cover both me and Water Gun. I felt a giant pit drop in my stomach as the attack came flying at us, there was no way to dodge it.

Oh Mew, did it burn! The attack was over in a flash but I felt completely awful afterward. It was the first major damage I've taken in awhile, so I knew I'd be okay, but glancing at Water Gun—who's type advantage made him become the main attacker since we've been in this stupid dungeon—I saw he was straining to even stand. Damnit. We've got to end this, fast. Otherwise we'll be completely screwed. At the corner of my eye, I saw Water Gun looking at me as I ran off towards the Onix, who was too busy relishing his attack to notice me coming at him from his side.

While being here in the dungeon, we've gotten to know Onix bodies pretty well. We knew which part of their body hurt the most when they smashed against us, and which part of their body could fling at us the fastest in a Fail attack. As Tarsal always said, pain is education. You're probably wondering where I'm going to go with this crap. Well, I've learned something. It's pretty interesting, really. Onix have exactly two main weak points and they're both exactly on the opposite places on their bodies. Their horn, and their tail.

So, there I was, right in front of the smallest part of the Onix's body—which was resting helplessly on the ground—and you know what I do?

I cock back my fist, and give that tiny rock the hardest full on Brick Break I've ever pulled off. The loud 'CRACK' resounded around me and I could tell just by the sound of it that it was a critical hit. Perhaps it was too hard 'cause I saw a good portion of the rock flying away.

The Onix was pissed beyond words—well, either that or it was filled with uncontrollable blind pain. It threw its head towards me and let out a gigantic roar. And I don't mean one of those 'how dare you wake me' roars that it's been throwing around. I mean an actual legit 'Roar' attack. It was so strong that it threw me back until I hit the wall behind me, which was pretty impressive cause the wall was a pretty long ways away.

I was fine with it though. It was exactly what I wanted. I looked up towards the stalactite that I cracked earlier and grinned. That roar was probably strong enough to reach and vibrate the ceiling. Sure enough, that giant spike was finally breaking off the last strings of its base—and the Onix was right on its landing pad.

The stalactite fell sliently towards the Onix, who was completely oblivious to his incoming doom. Something glinted inside of the falling rock and it caught my eye. Heh, looks like there's some metal inside of it too. The more damage the better. It was so perfect I could cry.

The moment it crashed into the Onix was a moment any Pokemon would salute to. The relief that the battle was finally over was wonderful. "Take that you Weedle wannabe!" Yeah, I knew the thing was probably dead and couldn't hear me, but I needed to get that off my chest. The Onix was crumbled on the ground underneath a pile of rocks and that piece of metal I saw. It should be disappearing soon like the defeated Pokemon here normally do.

"I don't know about you, but I'm glad that's over." I walked back to Water Gun, who was sprawled out on the ground, taking a breather. We bumped fists and I sat down next to him.

"Yeah." He was still breathing hard, so he took a deep pause in between words. "Sorry I wasn't much help...I was really getting worn out there, Red. I don't know If I can continue any longer with this..."

"Meh, don't worry about it! I've still got enough energy to go at it, if anymore Onx try to stop us, they'd better watch out for my killer Brick Break! Next time I'll do a ton more than crack a horn!"

"I'm sure." He grinned tiredly at me. Suddenly the pile of rocks in front of us began rumbling. It continued to shake until the Onix was completely uncovered by the broken pieces of the stalactite. I realized then, that it wasn't the pile of rocks that was causing the shaking, but the Onix.

"What the—!" I heard Water Gun shout behind me.

I don't know what was causing the Onix to shake, but I didn't like it. I looked at Water Gun, and he gave me a confused expressing back. Then, the Onix started glowing. I realized what was happening to late to stop it, which I'm pretty sure I couldn't even if I did have the time. The Onix was evolving. The glowing only lasted for a few seconds and then subsided. The Onix's new from stood there, and looked at us menacingly with its gigantic head—and I mean gigantic. If the Onix had a big head before, then this thing's head was huge. Also, instead of it's earthy grey, it was a sharp sliver, like the piece of metal I saw in the falling stalactite.

I have no Idea what caused the damn thing's evolution, but there was no way I was letting it have anything remotely close to live. I'm taking the thing down. I seemed like the evolved Onix had the same idea, as it prepared an attack that caused the whole room to shake. I knew what it was right off the bat, after all, I pretty much almost died by it once before by that Sandshrew in our first dungeon. Rock Tomb.

"Red Fire, wait!" Before I could go running off in a mad attack again, Water Gun reached out and grabbed my wrist.

"Water Gun, it's using Rock Tomb! Waiting is dying!"

"I know, I know! But look! See how its all shiny and metal-ish?"

"Are you serious right now? Really? We are about to die if we don't attack and all you can do is talk about how shiny it is?" Isn't that my part, anyway?

"No! It's probably a steel-type!" He said excitedly. "That mean's—"

"I already gotcha. Let's do our worst." Back in Ivy Town, Tarsal ran us down with all of the different Pokemon Types and their weaknesses. And when I say 'ran us down' I mean he drilled us. Constantly. It was all about knowing your enemy and stuff. Anyway, steel-types are pretty unfortunate when they run into us. Having a team with a Charmander and a Squirtle, both of our types are super effective against them. Considering how this evolved Onix is already super injured, taking him down again will be a piece of cake. And I like cake.

Water Gun and I ran up to the Onix evolution together and blasted our strongest fire and water type attacks at it. Which were Ember and WaterGun. The attacks hit just in time, as pieces of rocks were already falling from the ceiling and up-heaving from the ground. I could see the evolved Onix wincing at the strain of pain.

There was a giant 'thud' as the thing fainted and fell on the ground. The Rock Tomb attack stopped and all the rocks that were up-heaving crashed back into the ground. We did. We were just in time.

I grinned at Water Gun, who was smirking broadly at me. I gave him a high five and we headed over to the stairs. There was no way we were waiting around for anymore Pokemon to come up and evolve while attacking us again.

Water Gun stumbled while walking and I'm pretty sure if I wasn't there to catch him he would've fallen straight out on the ground. It was when I was helping him up and let him wrap his arm across my neck in support that I realized just how fatigued Water Gun was. Damn idiot.

We wordlessly walked up the stairs to the next floor of this stupid dungeon. According to the mission letter, only twenty three more floors of this crap until we reached the Rescue Floor. You know, I actually didn't care whether or not we did make it through all of this. I'm sure it sounds strange—but its true. No, I don't have some kind of death wish or anything. I just know whatever happens to Water Gun and I, we'll be able tackle it together. Our bond of friendship has really strengthened, and I guess I take comfort that even if we do go down, nothing will be able to break it. For my first best friend, Water Gun is pretty great.

Crap. I'm getting all sentimental again, aren't I?

Author's Notes:

When does one give up on something they do? That's a question that I've thunk about for a pretty good while. Really, It didn't seem like there was anytime when it seemed entirely appropriate. Especially in the case of WaterBlaze. But then I kinda realized something: I had started WaterBlaze because it was fun. And you know what? It isn't fun anymore.

I'm really sorry to all of you. I mean, I started this fic, and took years just to get to—what chapter is this? 19? Not only that, but I had said not too long ago that I was still continuing WaterBlaze despite the long hiatus. I wonder how many people I've disappointed in stopping the story.

But, above all I'm sorry for WaterBlaze. It might sound weird, but I am. I had planned so much for this story, that I can't even put it all here. WaterBlaze was going to get four more members, there was going to be a civil war, Red Fire was going to come close to death so many freaking times—and was actually going to die for real and still live. We were going to go in depth in Red Fire's background and other main character backgrounds, and there was going to be TONS of character development. There was going to be prophecies, legionaries, and plot twists; and I outlined it all and everything (well, most of it). WaterBlaze was literally going to be epic.

And I think that's where I went wrong. I basically set myself up for failure buy starting something so big and so long that it would eventually not be fun anymore. A writer enjoys doing their work, which is why they write in the first place. But somehow along the line, I stopped enjoying it. Perhaps I'm intimidated by the prospect of tackling something so big as WaterBlaze's future.

You know, I cannot cringe harder with the way I ended this chapter (and by affect the whole story)? The last paragraph—discounting the last sentence—doesn't do WaterBlaze's once possible future any justice. But I'm forcing myself to leave it that way—which is extremely open ended—because I know if I did do anything, I'd end up killing off Red Fire and Water Gun (which was the ending I was initially going to write).

I'm not taking WaterBlaze down, though. I'm actually leaving it up here and marking it as complete; mostly as a lesson for me to remember. Also, for those of you following me, I think I'm only going to write one-shots for a while—discounting one fic I'm writing now. I want to refine my skills as a writer, and 20,000 worded one chapter stories seem like the way to do it.

Once again, I'm sorry reader.

~Claw/Odd