The Skitty of Doom

I own nothing but my clothes and mind, and especiialy not Pokemon or (briefly mentioned) Tobuscus.

Please leave comments, positive or negative welcome! Because you'll all review, right? Right?Right?Right?

The gym was lit up with neon lights, flashing and blinking irritatingly. Trainers were arrayed along walls, talking feverishly as I walked in. I pushed through the glass double doors, Houdini floating beside me, bobbing up and down. The trainers immediately stiffened, dropped their conversations and scuttled to corners, faces frozen and arms stiffly held to their sides. I walked up to one, standing about three feet from a wall.

At first glance he did not seem to notice me, until I saw his gaze following my every move from the corner of his eyes. A foot away from him, I stood, pondering. I took one step to the left, and kept my eyes on the trainer, watching for any sign of movement.

"Whatta you doin'? We can take her! Look at her, she's weak. C'mon, leggo and let's fight!" Houdini whined, tugging on my jacket ineffectually. I shook my head and moved behind the trainer, who gritted his teeth but did not make a sound. I walked to wards the next gap between trainers, hoping I would be lucky again when I fell. As I plunged, I saw Houdini, a look of satisfaction on his face as I tumbled to the ground. The second I hit the smooth floor, a tall and barrel-chested man sprang to life, pointing at me as I lay there, groaning.

"Get up and fight! In the mountains when you're set upon by a wild camerupt, are you going to lie on the floor like a wimp! Up I say!"

"Fine, fine," I said as I struggled to my feet, helped by Houdini's psychic abilities. The man sent out a geodude, standing with his arms crossed, mimicking his pokemon's movements.

"Houdini, go, attack. Confusion." I was less focused on the battle and more focused on the concussion I might or might not have had.

The geodude used rock throw, scooping up a fist sized rock with his right arm and chucking it as hard as he could at the psychic. With a flick of his wrist, Houdini sent the rock hurtling off, smashing against a wall, next to a trainer who didn't even flinch.

"Again geodude!" the trainer yelled, thrusting his hand out. I had decided a couple days before that these people had a flair for the dramatic. A bit more than a flair, actually.

The geodude wasted no time this time around, smashing his fist into the ground with a grunt of "dude," sounding somewhat like the kids from my old school.

Houdini sidestepped the rock and attacked, floating at full speed towards the geodude and thrusting his hands out. The ground rippled up, slamming into the geodude and knocking him hard against the wall, leaving a crack and a few loose pebbles.

Houdini looked at his hands, then to me, and finally back to his hands.

"I'm hot today!" he exclaimed, shaking his hands out. "Woo!" I laughed, shook my head and walked on, towards the high pedestal where the brown haired girl rested upon, seated in a wooden chair.

She was about two years older than me, but with a wiry strength. She looked like she could beat me up easily, but that wasn't too hard to do, as many people had demonstrated throughout the years. Her beady eyes were black and as cold as flint. She didn't look at me, stared at the floor and waited, legs crossed and arms knotted tightly on her chest.

"Ahem?" I coughed, shooting a look at the girl.

She glanced up and bounced to her feet, a childish movement that defied her hard attitude.

"Hello. My name is Roxanne, and I am the leader here at the Rustboro Gym. Since you're new, I'm going to give you a rundown of the gym system. First, you challenge each gym, and if you win you will receive a prize and the badge. Each badge will give you either a small boost is attack, defense or speed and will unlock one door to the Pokemon League. Each gym leader specializes in a different type. I specialize in rock types. Each one is strong and sturdy, just like me. Now, let us begin." She took a pokeball from her belt and pressed a button, making it triple in size.

"Woah!" I said, confused. "How'd you do that?"

"Do what?" Roxanne asked, looking equally befuddled.

"Make the ball bigger." I was beginning to feel a bit foolish.

"The button, right here." She showed me and I nodded. "Alright, let's begin. Alfred, will you referee?"

A hiker nodded and unfroze, stepping up to the podium and announcing loudly, "Let the battle between the challenger… uhh, what's your name?"

"Oh, it's Anthony."

"The challenger Anthony and the leader Roxanne, begin!"

"Go, geodude!" she exclaimed, releasing the rock.

"Houdini, get in there," I said, pointing in the general direction of the field. He floated out, hands extended and ready to attack.

"Geodude, rock tomb!" Geodude's eyes glowed blue and suddenly three rocks hurtled down, heading right towards Houdini.

"Houdini, teleport!" The rocks smashed into the ground right where Houdini had been a moment ago. He reappeared behind the geodude.

"Confusion!" I yelled, hoping that the book I had read wouldn't let me down. The psychic force slammed geodude back a few steps, but nothing more.

The geodude responded with a tackle, slamming its shoulder into Houdini and ramming his armored shoulder into the ground. A smear of blood was left on the ground as he got up, and there was more oozing from a cut above his eyebrow.

"Thunderpunch!" I yelled, and Houdini, the referee, Roxanne and even the geodude looked at me weirdly, but I knew what I had read.

"Fine, but if we lose, it's on your hands," Houdini said, staring at me.

His hand crackled with energy and he rushed forward as I watched on bated breath. This thing had to work it. It had to.

The geodude's face was frozen in a rictus of surprise and it tried to turn away, but Houdini caught it and smashed his full in the face. The rock type's head snapped back but nothing happened. Houdini's attack was turned back on his and he fell to the ground, twitching and with static running off his body. The book was wrong.

"Focus punch!" Roxanne yelled, and her geodude's fist began glowing white and it rushed towards the stunned Houdini. The geodude drove its fist into Houdini's chest, and he coughed, blood spurting from his mouth.

A flag went down and the referee said, "The battle is over. Roxanne is the winner."

Suddenly, from behind, a crunch was heard and a white light erupted in front of my eyes.

When I woke up, my head hurt like crazy, bloodstains were on the ground and another pink haired nurse was leaning over me, a weird pink thing peeking out from behind her shoulder.

"Hello sir, is everything alright?" She asked in a high, quavering voice.

"Uhhh," I groaned, rubbing my head and struggling to get to my feet. I knew I was going to have a concussion.

"Sir, we healed your pokemon, and we tried to wake you up, but it was quite, ahem, difficult."

"Okay, okay. First, what happened? Second, who are you? Did you follow me here from the last center?"

"Well, to the first question, once you lost, the, ah, trainers in the gym did their little welcome prank. Every time a new challenger loses, they take advantage of their being stunned and knock them out and bring them to the pokemon center. It's tradition. Secondly, I'm Nurse Joy, part of the family. We all look the same, but we have somewhat different attitudes. So, anyway, here's your abra. If I may suggest something, you might want to catch a new pokemon. I heard that there are some tailow on route 116. Have a nice day." And with that, she slammed the door and I was alone.

I got to my feet and released Houdini, watching him stretch and moan, saying, "That was a nice nap. But seriously, let's go now. I'm bored and I wanna kill something."

"Well, I heard route 116 has some nice pokemon there, we could head over there and then…"

I was interrupted when I saw a man running full tilt down the street, pushing men and women alike out of his way as he barreled down. He tripped over his own feet once and went sprawling in front of us, cursing. He looked up at me, to Houdini and then back at me. He was dressed in a green tweed jacket and slacks, all soiled and dirty from his fall. In his right hand he clutched a pokeball, done up in blue and red, and in his other hand, a sheaf of tightly held paper.

He jumped up and walked up to me, forcing Houdini and me to back away. I had seen his sort back home, and I had learned the hard way that it was better to stay away.

"Hey, you. Take this, and don't say anything about it. Keep your head down. You didn't see me, got it?"

I said nothing, shocked. The man got even closer, and grabbed a fistful of my shirt, crumpling it up and rolling around his fist as he almost lifted me off of my feet. "You hear?" His breath smelled like alcohol and licorice.

I nodded, and he ran off again, stumbling as he went. Only then did I realize that I was holding his strange red and blue pokeball and I had gotten myself embroiled in what was most likely crime. After all my mom had told me about watching out for crime in the big city, now that I was in a new world, it was different. If only Mom was here. Hands in my pocket, hiding the forbidden ball, I headed off.

The road was hard packed dirt, lined with rugged stones and men bumping into each other as they walked back and forth, trading shifts. They wore construction hats and tool belts, with white undershirts dark with sweat.

The grass was full of trainers, bustling about and swatting flies from their arms as they searched the tall, sweeping grass for any signs of movement. I walked in, and rustled around for a bit, not really knowing what to do. Then I made as much noise as I could, shuffling my feet together and even blowing into one of the pieces of grass to make a long, shrill shriek.

Of course, as soon as I did that, a cat leapt out of the grass and landed at my feet, mewling cutely. It was pink and cream, with big purple eyes that stared up at mine with a gaze that would've put my sister into fits of giggles and cute, fuzzy happiness.

With a hiss, the cute fuzzy wuzzy suddenly jumped on my neck and clawed, gouging deep into my shoulders and back. Houdini yelled and used confusion, blasting it back a few feet as I looked at the blood running into my green shirt. I turned back to the battle.

"Houdini, Fire punch!" I yelled, watching his fist explode in flame and slam into the cat's side, throwing it to one side, and singing its fur.

The pink cat struggled to its feet and launched a barrage of attacks, swiping with breathtaking speed, making Houdini swing from side to side, ducking and weaving to avoid the razor sharp claws.

"Confusion!" The blue aura rippled and thrust out, driving the pokemon back and throwing it to the ground. One more time it got up, and this time raised his head, and began to mew softly, the melodious notes wafting to Houdini slowly and seductively. Houdini's eyes widened and he backed away, flailing his arms but the voice seemed to wrap him up and he drifted slowly to the ground, snoring. The pokemon seemed to grin and attacked, slashing and clawing while all the time hissing and shrieking with pleasure and fury. The claws seemed to be a blur, speeding and connecting, clawing furrows in Houdini's skin until he was covering in blood and welts.

I couldn't take it any more, and raised the ball, returning him. With no pokemon to attack the cat turned its attention on me, hissing and spitting with a maniacal look in its eye.

A couple younger trainers screamed or ran, yelling, "Someone stop that skitty!"

But I was different.

I screamed and ran, wind-milling my arms until the skitty caught up to me, leapt and somehow knocked me down, despite being a fraction of my size. It sunk its teeth into my shoulder and ripped at my clothes. I decided that if I was going to die, I might as well bring out Houdini.

My groping fingers closed around the pokeball and I threw it up, and heard it explode. Next there was only a rush that sounded much like water, a squeal, a click, a cheer and a scream.

When I woke up, I was bandaged, and holding three pokeballs. Next to me was a ten year old trainer who had brought me to the center and healed my pokemon. He had also promised to fill me in on what had happened.

"So, what did happen, Rob?" I asked the trainer, who was at least a half a foot shorter than me, but had six balls n his belt and a full case of badges.

"Well, after you threw out your surskit-"

I cut him off there and asked, astonished, "What?"

The boy looked confused and rubbed his feet against the ground, making holes in the ground with his heels. "What do you mean? You did mean to take out your surskit, right?"

"Well, no. I actually didn't know, I, ah, had a surskit."

"How could you not know you had a rare pokemon like that?"

I thought back to the man running and handing me a pokeball, and thought no more of it. I was not going to get involved. "I was just kidding, I knew I had one, but what was the third?"

Well, after your surskit defeated the skitty, I took the liberty of capturing it for you. Sorry," he said sheepishly, looking at his feet.

"No, no it's okay, it's just that, the skitty, didn't seem to, um, like me very much."

"Well, yeah, but that's why you train. Make it like you a lot, and it can be strong. Anyway, I gotta go, the Elite Four are calling," he said, finding his confidence and grinning like a maniac.

He raised a pokeball and a huge, towering pokemon came out. With a word, it took to the sky, Rob on it, and soon they were out of sight.

I let out Houdini and asked, "Are you okay buddy? You got beat pretty bad."

"Beat, when was I beaten? I won, don't you remember? I did not lose to the skitty, okay?"

I nodded and spoke no more of it. It would be pretty humiliating to be beaten by a small cat. Oh, wait, it had clawed me to pieces. I suddenly got the urge to crush the pokeball to splinters, but I repressed it. I might have some uses for it before I let it go.

I took out another pokeball and looked at it. Red and blue, and a mystery. I tapped the center, closed my eyes until I heard it open, and then opened my eyes, slowly.

A small blue bug was sitting in front of me, spindly legs crossed underneath its body. It looked much like a skeeter bug, which flitted across the water back home, leaving trails of wake in its path.

I asked Houdini, "hey, um, what does it know? Like moves. And can it, um talk?"

"Well, yes, but not to you, not yet. She says she knows.. um, Water gun and quick attack. Hey, that could-"

"Really help in the gym, I know. That's exactly what I was thinking. Alright, Surskit, let's see what you can do! Water gun!"

The surskit barely moved, only sat there, looking at me quietly.

"Um, hey, Water gun? Now? Chop chop?"

"She says that she has a name, thank you very much."

I sighed and asked, running a hand down my face, "What, what is it?"

"Her name is Unda, and she would like you to address her as such," Houdini was mimicking her voice comically, a high and pompous voice.

Unda obviously thought so as well, so she drenched him with a water gun, knocking him backwards and leaving him sputtering and coughing. I grinned and nodded.

If a crazed floating physic, a pompous bug and a demonic cat was happiness, then I was as happy as a…

Before you all kill me, let me explain my absence. I̶̶b̶l̶a̶m̶e̶̶t̶h̶e̶̶i̶n̶t̶e̶r̶w̶e̶b̶s̶!̶ It was NaNoWriMo and school, with a two handed blow that sent me reeling and knocked out. Luckily, I had Alphinia and her story, "Enigmas: All That Glitters" to keep me able to fight back and destroy the impediments (taken directly from my ninth grade vocabulary book.) So, tell me. How many of you participated in NaNoWriMo, and how far did you get? Also, whom would you like to see in the next chapter? Leave your answer in the review sections. Feel free to PM me for ideas or comments. Review, now! Peace off! Boop!