Cleaning House

It is a fine day for beating random trainers who cross my path. So that's what I start doing. The first hick I come across leads with Aipom, a monkey with a hand on the end of its tail. As I switch to Ninhursag (I need to train her and Inanna) the monkey uses "baton pass" which seems to do nothing but switch to Girafarig, some sort of demonic giraffe. Unsettling, really. The fiend hurts Ninhursag badly with confusion. Leech seed takes its toll, but I know she can't win, so I switch to Khali. The twisted abomination manages to hit my ghost-type with stomp thanks to some sort of move that allows it to, but confuse ray and psybeam bring my opponent down. The hick switches back to Aipom as I bring in Sekhmet. They exchange attacks. Sekhmet wins. He's down to his last pokemon. Good. And it's Psyduck. Water type. Spark should finish this. It does. I return to the Poke Center to heal my weakened team.

I pilot my bicycle over another muddy slope that somehow requires the vehicle. Immediately, I am ambushed by twin girls (with no bicycle of their own to get up here). They use Clefairy and Pikachu. I have Inanna take on the Clefairy while Sekhmet bites Pikachu. But Inanna does paltry damage, so I redirect her to finish Pikachu while Sekhmet uses spark on Clefairy. The Clefairy uses a move called "follow me." This apparently makes both of my pokemon attack her, protecting the Pikachu. Tricky. And Sekhmet is hurt. But I make another attempt. Clefairy goes down. I have Inanna keep attacking with pound while I switch to Ninhursag. Inanna learns softboiled. The twins whine about how even with both of them working together, they could not win. No one ever beats me, so get used to it.

Some other person who got here without a bicycle somehow challenges me. She uses Pichu. Ninhursag cannot get a single attack in against the little devil, because he both paralyzes and confuses her. Finally, she manages to hit him with leech seed. He keeps weakening her with tail whip. I have a bad feeling about this. Pichu uses nasty plot. The trainer is trying to set me up, so that Pichu will be even harder for what I send in once Ninhursag goes down. Stun spore finally works. Now Pichu will hopefully be too slow if he wins against my grass-type. Both pokemon are paralyzed, but Ninhursag, no longer confused, has the upper hand with leech seed and a type advantage. Mega drain finishes Pichu off. My opponent brings in Pikachu. Time to use the big guns. I switch to Khali. One hit with psybeam beats the rat. Then finally it's time for Inanna to take on Happiny. This trainer's Happiny is higher in level than Inanna but I hope that, having evolved, my pokemon is stronger. This Happiny relies on charm to cut my attack, but is also trying to damage me with confusion induced by sweet kiss. Inanna takes that and keeps pounding away. She is not always hitting. The hits she is scoring are doing very little damage. But it doesn't matter: she is winning. But then Happiny's copycat keeps doing more damage than Inanna is doing, and I am forced to tell her to use softboiled before she faints. Happiny copycats that, and the fight practically starts over. This could take a long time. I realize I have one more move with which to attempt to outsmart my opponent. So the next time Inanna is hit with sweet kiss, I have her copycat it. Now I have a way, albeit not very good, to confuse Happiny. We get into a copycat war, with each waiting for the other to break and use a move that the other can copycat. It ends with a sweet kiss, but Inanna's copycat misses. Then I start bringing in refresh, which does nothing but waste time and wear Happiny out. This works quite well. I copycat charm enough times to minimize Happiny's attack. And now that she's out of sweet kisses, she's helpless. Time to start pounding again. This works very well at first and brings Happiny down to the point that she's nearly finished, but then Inanna runs out of PP for pound. Oh. I had not anticipated this. It's boring, but eventually Happiny runs out of moves and takes itself out with struggle.

I find a great ball and nothing else of interest here, so I jump off a ledge and go back to town to heal. I barge into a restaurant or saloon or whatever this place is. The waitress challenges me. She uses Clefairy. A popular choice lately. Also one that goes down with little trouble against Ninhursag's leech seed and cut. After I win, I check the place out. All they serve is "moomoo milk." They make a point of this, actually. Whatever. Two nerds are arguing at a table. I interrupt them to crush them.

Khali destroys Mr. Mime with astonish. Then does the same to a second one. A third. That trainer did not even hurt my pokemon. The other nerd uses Sudowoodo. That name amuses me. Ninhursag almost finishes Soodowoodo, but he hits with flail and takes her out. Poor thing. I was not expecting that. I send in Apsu, who promptly demolishes the fake tree with dragon rage. And up next is...

...Sudowoodo. A lot of variety with these guys. Apsu takes some damage from rock throw, but dragon rage dominates that Sudowoodo too. And the next one. I am cleaning house here. Unfortunately, my display of sheer power is so intimidating that no one else in the milk bar or whatever this place is will face me. One of them mentions something about the pokemon blocking the road to the north, but I do not care. I can still go east. And, once I've healed me team again, I do just that.

Apparently it is raining on this road, despite no signs of rain until I stepped onto it. A "treasure hunter" informs me that his "loot" today will be a victory from me. Whatever. His Bronzor hurts Hanuman pretty badly, but my faithful monkey strikes back with flame wheel. Bronzor gets Hanuman with confuse ray and then hypnosis. This is not working. I switch to Sekhmet. Eat spark, Bronzor. It puts her to sleep too. I use an awakening, then Sekhmet finishes the job. My opponent calls in Shieldon. He tries to set Sekhmet up or something, but she manages to get enough damage in to end the fight before taking an actual attack.

Some nice man gives me a TM. I have Ninhursag cut through a bush, and am immediately ambushed by a trainer claiming that I only thought he was sleeping. Yeah, whatever. Apsu makes quick work of his Meditite. Then the same happens when he sends out Machamp. Like I said, cleaning house. He's not done though. He has one more Meditite. Same result. Apsu is too much for him. My next opponent only has Croagunk. Some sort of battle toad or something. I decide to let Inanna have him. He hits her with something called "revenge" and takes her out. I decide to show this fool what revenge really looks like, and blast the amphibian with Khali's psybeam. It only takes one hit, of course.

The next trainer who challenges me leads with Croagunk. Oh, I learned my lesson. In goes Khali. Down goes Croagunk. He calls in Meditite and I switch to Ninhursag. Stun spore, then leech seed, then mega drain, then cut, cut, cut. I have this loser outclassed. I am just so classy. You don't even know. Anyway, the Machop that follows somehow manages to avoid ever being hit by stun spore. Revenge is hurting Ninhursage too. I switch to Apsu. Let's clean house some more. Apsu promptly destroys the annoying little Machop.

Two "ace trainers" block my path and challenge me to a doubles battle. It's Sekhmet and Apsu vs. Glameow and Monferno. Well, it starts out that way. Glameow goes down immediately to spark and is replaced by Kadabra. Then Apsu's bite ruins that while Sekhmet's spark finishes off the weakened Monferno. Now all that's left is Gyarados. He takes out Sekhmet, but Apsu beats him. With that out of the way, I get out of the rain and enter Veilstone City. And what do I find? The first thing I see are members of Team Galactic. Just to be on the safe side, I avoid them and seek out the Poke Center. I want heavy artillery for this. Articuno, welcome back to the team.