What The?!?

[Lee]

"Hm. So I got the Sandshrew and a Zangoose...Wonder what the other one is?"

Zach was walking along the route, having decided to take the fifth route. As much as because Jasmine the Sandshrew, the nickname having been decided on by both of them, was beginning to annoy with her many questions as the fact that she had a habit of running off, and he was afraid she'd end up running into something that was upset, she had been put into her pokeball.

Zach decided this was as good a time to figure out what his Group 2 pokemon was as any other. If he had only known, the poor pokemon probably wouldn't have ever seen daylight.

In a few short seconds later, there was a scream that echoed across the route, a cloud of dust where Zach had been, and a very confused looking Shuppet. Her confusion turned into worry as she spotted her trainer high-tailing it, and she chased after him.

< Wait up! Are you okay? Is something the matter? You'll hurt yourself if you don't slow down! >

[Nyaa-Neko]

((YES! You portray that Shuppet SO PERFECTLY! ^_^ And you chose Route 5 as your first route. The Group 3 routes/places are my favorite. *gives Lee a cookie*))

Almost as soon as she warned him against it, Zach ran into a rather strange-looking tree. The tree, however, was not a tree, and was slightly put-out.

"<Excuse me?>" He grumbled, shifting his small, rocky "branches." "<Can't you leave me in peace to pretend to be a tree?>"

[Lee]

((Whee. Cookie. XD))

Zach stumbled backwards, rubbing his head and temporarily forgetting about the Shuppet in a case of a second-long amnesia. Which gave her enough time to catch up to him.

< Oh dear, you've hurt yourself! Here let me take a look...I told you not to run.... > She attempted to move his hand, but this only caused him to shriek and hide behind the Sudwoodoo, apparantly forgetting that the 'tree' was a wild pokemon.

< Oh no, don't do that... >

[Nyaa-Neko]

The Sudowoodo rustled his "branches," rather annoyed. However, he did not actually MOVE, since tress just don't DO that.

"<Young man, I would greatly appreciate it if you let go of me,>" he ordered in a huffy tone.

[Lee]

It was probably a good thing the Sudwoodo didn't move, since Zach wasn't letting go. The Shuppet couldn't help but wonder how long it would put up with that, and that only made her worry more for Zach.

< Please listen to him, dear. Let go, and be a good boy...You're all dirty now. > Indeed, Zach had dirt smudged against his face, though how it got there would never be clear.

He was still speechless though.

[Nyaa-Neko]

"<That's it,>" the Sudowoodo growled, shaking Zach off. "<If I battle you, will you go away?>" He asked in a gruff, annoyed tone.

Even though trees didn't battle...he could deal with ONE battle just so he could go back to being a tree!

[Lee]

< Oh no! I can't allow it! It just wouldn't be right, you battling him! >

While the Shuppet was fretting over that, and attempting to distract the Sudowoodo, Zach seemed to have remembered that the Shuppet /had/ come from a particular place.

A pokeball.

Therefore, it could go back in it.

So, while still hiding behind the tree/rock/pokemon/thing, although he'd ended up on the ground after being shaken off, he regained the pokeball and the Shuppet disapeared in a flash of light, in the midst of a sentence. It was also then that Zach realized what the Sudowoodo had said.

Now, Zach had never seen a pokemon like it before, but he didn't think it was quite so scary. Maybe because it acted so much like a tree, albeit a talking one. And Zach wasn't afraid of anything, although he was still shaking, and speechless, from the whole Shuppet thing.

"B...B...Battle?" Finding his voice again, he blinked. Had he annoyed the talking tree somehow? "...O-Okay."

Assuming that, since this was route five, he was supposed to use his group three pokemon, he grabbed the pokeball containing his Zangoose, and in short order the Shiny pokemon was staring at his opponent.

< Well, it's about time. There's no scenery in that forsaken device, you know. And I did all of the puzzles I had... >

[Nyaa-Neko]

The Sudowoodo growled, seeing that the time for battle had come. He raised his arms/branches, and the ground started to rumble.

He raised his arms towards the moutain, and several large boulders dislodged themselves, and began to roll down the moutainside towards Zangoose in a ferocious Rock Slide.

((OOC: Ack...bad post. ))

[Lee]

((Nah.))

Zach, unfortuantly, was in the midst of the range for the Rock Slide. The only thing that saved him was his own talent for self-preservation, and his good running speed. He did, however, momentarily forget that his Zangoose was in the midst of the Rock Slide, and not in such a good position to run from it.

< Hey! What about me? > While he enjoyed the scenery very much, something about giant boulders rolling down a mountain towards you could dampen your enthusiasm. He managed to avoid many in the front, and the last few, but in the middle of the two there were simply too many boulders to avoid. So he ended up being hit. Alot.

"Oh...Uh..." Checking his pokedex, and wishing he had opened the grey device earlier, he quickly scanned over his pokemon's moves, and then snapped it shut and called out, "Try a Crush Claw!"

[Nyaa-Neko]

The Sudowoodo grunted as the air was knocked out of him. "<Stupid Crush Claw,>" he coughed, rubbing his stomach/trunk. "<Well, here's another attack!>" This time,, since the Zangoose was in close range, the feaux-tree spun around with a Low Kick, aiming to knock the Zangoose off his feet.

[Lee]

The Zangoose was knocked off his feet, and he was severely winded, and even harmed, by the attack. But he wasn't out for the count yet, and he struggled back to his feet, stepping away from the rock/tree.

"Ouch. Use Fury Cutter!" This, at least, was a move Zach was familar with, from his Beedrill back home. So he knew that while it might not be very good at the beginning, so long as Zangoose could manage to keep hitting, it would eventually be strong enough to do some damage.

If he didn't miss.

The Zangoose (Who had made a note to point out to Zach that his name was Rapheal, and that he didn't like being referred to as The Zangoose, even in sub-concious thought), lept foward with a cut aimed towards the Sudowoodo's face. Or what should be it's face.

[Nyaa-Neko]

The rock-type shrieked as the (weak) cut almost got his eyes. He flailed, and kind of used a sort of Struggle-Tackle-thing that wasn't actually an attack.

Well, when you usually pretend to be a tree...you don't do a lot of battling! He wasnt bad at battles...he was just...a little rusty, that was all.

[Lee]

Because it wasn't actually an attack, Rapheal had an easier time of avoiding most of it, since the Sudowoodo wasn't actually aiming anything. Sure, he got clobbered on the head once, and knocked over backwards, but he'd been through worse.

Or had he? He couldn't remember.

"Fury Cutter again!"

Fury Cutter? What was that? Curiously, Rapheal scratched his aching head and stared at Zach for a moment, watching as the boy made hilarious gestures. Then he realized that Zach was miming the attack, and actually remembered what it was.

Maybe he had some sort of small amnesia? Shrugging, he dove in again for a (slightly weaker, though hardly enough to matter) Fury Cutter, avoiding the face this time. He didn't like getting clobbered on the head.

[Nyaa-Neko]

Once again, the Sudowoodo was knocked back, and he groaned in pain. This time, however, he was able to manage a Low Kick, aiming for Raphael's shins.

This was why he rather liked being a tree, and not battling.

[Lee]

If he hadn't been hit on the head, Rapheal might have remembered his previous experience with the attack and done a better job of avoiding it. As it was, he ended up being kicked backwards once more.

"This isn't working..." Zach knew he needed to keep the Zangoose away from the Sudowoodo's range, but none of the pokemon's attacks allowed him to stay away. "Back away and use Sword Dance!"

Rapheal willingly 'retreated', following through with the rather intimidating attack. Even if it didn't hurt Sudowoodo. Although he swore to himself that his next attack was going to hurt.

[Nyaa-Neko]

The Sudowoodo, seeing his "chance," lept forward for another Low Kick. "<I think I'm starting to get the hang of this,>" he muttered to himself as he swiped his left leg backwards toward's Raphael's furry shins. "<Maybe I'll practice a few more before going back to pretending to be a tree,>" he mused.

[Lee]

Zach was beginning to realize just how bad it was when a pokemon continually used low kick. In fact, it was even worse when you were fighting with a Zangoose. And he was beginning to believe that he wasn't going to win this fight, but he was going to try anyways. He could always run backwards off the route and try a Group 1 route.

Never was going to make it to Group 2 routes, unless his Sandshrew got strong enough.

Still. He'd try for a little bit longer.

"Try using Crush Claw again!" Dodging was practically impossible, but Rapheal managed to get out of the worse of it. He still ended up rolling head over heels.

But he was up and attacking again. < This...Isn't going to go on much longer. >

[Nyaa-Neko]

Luckily for Raphael, the Sudowoodo was knocked backwards into a small tree, which then toppled over. It began a domino effect, which knocked over more random objects (including a sleeping Nidoking, among other things). They all fell on him...and he was promptly knocked out.

So much for being a tree.

Suddenly, a strange man in all black ran by Zach, dropping a note in his hands before disappearing as quickly as he came. The note read, "congratulations on winning your first battle. Your Zangoose gains 1 level, and is now a level 46 Zangoose, since the Sudowoodo was level 45."

((I'm not in a good posting mood tonight. All my posts are like blehhhh. >_< ))

[Lee]

Zach stood blinking, in a complete state of not-realizing-what-has-just-happened-ness. Rapheal was as well. After all, how often was it that you won a battle because your opponent disapeared beneath a mass of randomly assorted objects in a domino-effect?

Of course the man in black snapped him out of it, and for a moment he almost looked as if he was going to scream, much as he did when Akriso the Shuppet made an appearance. He managed not to, and looked at the piece of paper.

"Oh. You're level forty-six, Za-"

"Rapheal. Not Zangoose. Rapheal."

"Uh...Okay. You're level forty-six, Rapheal."

Rapheal yawned, rubbing his head, and muttering about an aching back at the same time. "That's good. Ya gonna catch him. He's tough-Rock type. Plus, it'd be nice to have an ally who didn't get his breath knocked out with a simple low kick."

Zach muttered something along the lines of 'not a simple low kick', and absently pulled a pokeball from the lumpy brown package dumped precariously in his open backpack, considered for a moment, then threw the pokeball with the skill of someone who has thrown a pokeball before.

Zach, after all, wasn't a clueless newbie. Maybe to the system, but catching pokemon was still the same.

[Nyaa-Neko]

The ball completely missed the Sudowoodo, since it was buried under all the random objects. However, it didn't break on impact (a miracle!) and rolled inside and out of sight.

There was a strange poof of white glow for a second, then nothing.

All was still...

Until some unidentified bird Pokemon swooped over Zach, and dropped a stick. The stick had some papyrus wrapped around it, and on it, in lovely loopy handwriting (that was immensely hard to read), it said: "Congratulations. By some miracle, your Pokeball found its way through the pile of stuff to the Sudowoodo, and hit it. You now have a Sudowoodo with these stats:

Sudowoodo
Level: 45
Group: 3
Gender: Male
Nickname: whatever
Ability: Rock Head: receives no recoil damage
Attacks: Low Kick, Rock Slide, Block, Faint Attack
Personality: The stereotypical Sudowoodo, he likes to pretend to be a tree. Nothing would make him more happy than pretending to be a tree all day. Although he is beginning to like traveling and battling, he still gets rather angry with anyone who attempts to stop him in his tree-mimicking endeavors."

On the back, however, the note read: "Good luck getting the Pokeball out of all that rubble, kid."