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Faylinn had, in her short time in the cave, let the darkness and general quiet that pervaded it lead her to believe that she was alone in the cave. Or at least this section of it. So, when she shouted at the top of her lungs for assistance she had expected the echoes to be her only for a short while. All of this to say that when someone asked her not to yell like that they got the opposite of their request. Startled not only that another person was nearby, but that one was essentially right behind her, she screamed again. This time louder, and with the shrill pitch of someone genuinely frightened.[break][break]

"Ahhhhhhhh fu -- frick, frack, ahh!" her arms wrapped tight around her upper body and she found herself on her tip toes; face white from the shock and heart pounding so hard in her chest she could feel it in both her crossed arms. When the scream devolved into weak curses and exclamations she deflated, first bending at the hips before letting herself move all the way to a sitting position on the ground, knees straight up and her face buried between them. [break][break]

The bits of warning the stranger had offered about pokemon were lost in all the noise she'd made, and she was too out of breath to try and ask about what he'd been trying to say. Instead she just sat there on the ground, arms hugging her legs as she tried to remember how to breath. At the end of the day his words would have gone unheeded even if she'd understood them. No pokemon frightened her when she had Lunk around, at least none that she could imagine being here. [break][break]

"Oh my god, you scared me. . ." she mumbled from her place on the ground, words muffled by her posture, "Oh man!" she yelled again in an attempt to shout the last of her anxiety out of her system; staring at what she assumed, somewhere in the pitch black darkness, was the cave's roof. Then she looked over her shoulder and up at where she thought the stranger would be. Assumed. Thought. Words of circumstance as she realized that in her fright she'd thrown her phone to the ground and at the very least broken the part of it she'd been using as a flash light.[break][break]

"Do you know if we're near the entr -- AH!" she started to speak in what was almost an even tone and volume when she felt something grip her leg. Strong fingers, rough, hard. She responded the only way she could think of and ripped Lunk's Pokeball from her hip before throwing it in the direction of whatever had grabbed her. The flash that accompanied his release illuminated the Onix for a moment, and then a moment later the light of an Iron Tail illuminated him again. He swatted whatever was holding Faylinn deeper into the cave and she scrambled to her feet in the hopes of avoiding being grabbed again.[break][break]

"Ahh that was really scary!" this time she laughed in loo of screaming. If her adrenaline wasn't pumping before it definitely was now, and with a battle under way she was sure it wouldn't stop any time soon. Rumbling in the dark alerted her to something approaching again, the thing that grabbed her? It came rolling fast, and when it drew close it was illuminated again by Lunk's tail. A Roll Out connected, earning a short howl from the Onix before he responded with another Iron Tail, punting it into the darkness again. This time to stay, as no more noises issued from where it landed.[break][break]

"Uh, hey uh, hey! Dude? Are you okay?" she shouted for her new companion before getting on her hands and knees, "I uh, need to find my phone real quick but we just got attacked by a pokemon so . . . uh. If you need help we can offer that!" she continued to speak as she swept her hands over the cave floor. The rough scraping of the stone gave way for a moment to a sharp sting. After hissing through her teeth she more gingerly searched the area around the sting and found its likely source. Her phone, which when shifted made a sound like crushed potato chips.[break][break]

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715 WORDS FOR Leon Harte

[attr="class","Vgentemptitle"]A Wild Pokemon Has Appeared

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[attr="class","Vgentemptitle"]A Wild Pokemon Has Appeared

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Ruined phone in hand, Faylinn made the short walk towards her new companion -- led by the shine of his flashlight. Her posture was somewhat timid; her usual energy being tempered by embarrassment from her earlier display. Usually she wouldn't have been so jumpy, but she was so nervous thinking she'd gotten lost, and the dark was so disarming, and she couldn't shake the feeling that she'd looked less than amazing screaming on the cave floor. It made what would have already been an awkward meeting all the more so.[break][break]

"Uh yeah, okay." she responded to his dismissal of help in nervous, drawn out words. When he mentioned marking of the trail Faylinn looked behind him where he shined the light. She felt even more silly now. Why didn't she think to do that? It would have been such an obvious safety measure! Instead she'd gotten caught up in her excitement and dashed into the dark with nothing but her phone. It was just one embarrassment after another it seemed. Self-consciousness had her stuck in her thoughts when the rumbling started, so well stuck that she didn't even notice until it grew close enough for the man standing across from her to see the source. [break][break]

She turned at the sound of his cursing, and suddenly found herself smiling. How nostalgic! How exciting! Seeing the wild Onix lit up, towering above her with its head craned down to stare at them -- it reminded her of years ago in Granite Cave . . . It seemed to remind Lunk too. The way he started shifting restlessly at her side pulled her out of her funk in mere moments. Her fingers flexed and her breath hitched up into her chest, earlier it had been out of fear but in this moment it was just the pure rush of a good thrill. [break][break]

"Lunk --" the orders that were set to practically spill from her lips were stoppered by the stranger. She hadn't even noticed the Sandshrew atop the Onix's head until he pointed it out; it was a good thing they hadn't jumped right into battle then. The type advantage the mouse pokemon had could have quickly turned the tide while they tunneled in on the larger pokemon it rode in on, "Yeah sure, leave it to us!" The nerves from her voice were gone. In their place was an electric tone, she was all but jumping in place with anticipation.[break][break]

Watching the other pair at work helped calm her down a little. Having focused on screaming and pushing back the Geodude that had grabbed her from the shadows, Faylinn had missed the first display of their skills. The Eevee was deceptively fast, and the use of attacks to gap close rather than truly cause injury was an interesting one. They knocked the wild Sandshrew from its perch faster than she'd expected, and all of a sudden it was time for her and Lunk to hold up their side of the bargain.[break][break]

"First thing's first, let's restrict that reach of his!" Faylinn wasn't always the best at strategy. She and Lunk had been together for a few years and in that time his size had made up for most tactical disadvantages they faced. Here that wasn't the case. The wild Onix was no more than a foot shorter than Lunk give or take, and while it seemed to nurse a fairly docile nature she was sure it was more than capable of putting up a decent fight. That said; if there was any pokemon Faylinn knew how to counter it was the one she traveled and battled with.[break][break]

Lunk's greatest strength in many of their battles was his ability to dominate space with his size. He could surround most smaller pokemon, limiting their playing space, and even moderately sized pokemon had to struggle against the reach of his tail. So that would be what they shut down first. With the fluid movements of a seasoned fighter Lunk worked his way to the inside of the wild Onix. In an instant he wound his body around its middle and through a tight Bind not only restricted his ability to move but was able to tug upward and force the other rock snake to the ground.[break][break]

The wild Onix's response was swift. As Lunk bore down with more force and their bodies began to creak and scrape against each other the wild Onix began to take on a solid sheen. Harden, an attempt to reduce (if not negate) the damage Lunk's crushing power could bring. It was a good countermeasure, but it didn't do anything to stop its restricted range of motion. With part of its body bound, its head and upper body grounded, and its tail hanging oddly in the air its offense and defense outside of the defense-boosting move were lacking.[break][break]

"Beat it down! Give it a few Iron Tails, make it focus on defense instead of wiggling free!" Faylinn shouted over the sounds of their mountainous bodies crashing against each other. Lunk was quick to act on the command. His tail began to glow before snaking its way towards the wild Onix's mid section. There it began to chip away at its hardened flesh with repeated Iron Tails, which met more and more resistance as the wild Onix struggled to maintain its Hardened state. It was a futile effort. Each Harden took energy and focus to maintain, meanwhile the Iron Tails hit hard enough to batter down any added defenses as they went up. It was a game of stamina and Lunk had the sure advantage.[break][break]

It wasn't pretty, but the victory came undisputed in just a few moments. A sound like the earth splitting wide echoed in the cave. The spot on the wild Onix that Lunk had been beating away at finally cracked, no amount of hardening could hold out forever, and the trauma of the injury left it laying limp on the cave floor. Lunk released it from Bind, his breathing heavy and his face showing the signs of exhaustion such a merciless offense caused. Still his eyes glowed, and when he looked at Faylinn her face was broken into a wide smile. How cool! How absolutely awesome![break][break]

"Good job!" two words, shouted with all the electric energy that seemed to pour off of her. [break][break]

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1050 WORDS FOR Leon Harte

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Both Lunk and Faylinn struggled to calm down after a good battle and it showed. Faylinn's weight shifted back and forth as Lunk drew closer, his own body rattling as he shimmied about despite his apparent fatigue. His head lowered until his eyes and Faylinn's were on the same level, and once they were within reach Faylinn set about rubbing his nose and face (not caring about the way his rough skin turned her palms red with irritation). They'd been up against so many small fries lately, it had been awhile since she'd got to see him show off like that![break][break]

"You're so good! Way to go!" He huffed happily at the praise, blowing air in her face and tousling her hair with each one. They both continued to quietly vibrate with energy as they separated, Lunk rising back into an upright position and Faylinn doing her best not to fidget too much as the blond man returned from his own battle in the shadows. His praise made it hard though, the compliment on the battle and Lunk both filling her with enough pride to get her fit to burst.[break][break]

"He is, isn't he?" she blew air through her nose before reciprocating the man's feelings. Incredible. Beautiful. Looking up at Lunk she thought those were words she'd apply to him too. Maybe not beautiful, but the feeling behind it, the admiration. She'd put it into a word like . . . cool! Or stunning! Words she used when she saw him up close for the first time. When the stranger asked about it she looked up at Lunk, happy to see he'd had the same idea and was looking down at her.[break][break]

"We've been working together for uh . . ." she had to think for a second, time always felt weird to her, "five years!" the mental math was a bit slower than it should have been but it got done. Five years ago in Granite Cave, that was right! Her family had always caught their first pokemon there. Most walked out with a Makuhita, or sometimes an Aron, but she'd really hunted and after a whole day of searching she'd found him. An Onix! Her ace![break][break]

"When we started we weren't all that good, but now we're strong as they come! Right, Lunk?" it was hard using a rock type on Dewford. Granite Cave had so many fighting and iron types, they were at a constant disadvantage. But with his size and the right tricks they learned to lock out opponents. Typing didn't matter if they were taken out before they got a chance to throw a good punch.[break][break]

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435 WORDS FOR Leon Harte

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Faylinn couldn't help but smile wider as the praise continued. They were amazing! They'd only get more amazing, too! As they got more experience they'd only get stronger, and the stronger they got the more great things they'd do. Originally she'd hoped those great things would be what every kid dreamed of. A run in the Hoenn League, a flashy title, maybe even status as a Gym Leader! Now though, she thought she was almost a bit happy she'd come to Johto. It let her meet new people and it led her to the makeshift family she'd made. It allowed her to find Team Virus who welcomed her with open arms; not that she could exactly mention that bit here.[break][break]

"Yeah, he was!" she'd gotten a bit caught in her thoughts there for a minute, but she popped back into the conversation after the stranger's question. "Back at home we'd go to the local cave to find our first pokemon, I hunted all day to find something special -- and I did!" the last three words were punctuated by another look up at Lunk, who this time wasn't quite in sync with her thoughts and continued absentmindedly staring at the cave walls. The waving of the light at their feet pulled her gaze back into a conversational range and she followed at the man's heels as he and his Eevee led the way back to the entrance.[break][break]

"Uh, hmm," while adept at talking about herself and the things that excited her, carrying a conversation past that point was always an awkward venture for Faylinn, "What about you? Mmm, your Eevee's really fast! That has to be something that took a while to work on, right?" If words could grasp that's what Faylinn's were doing. She took a little bit of the previous conversation and tried to smash it together with thoughts she'd had from earlier. The result was a genuine question that came out in not-quite even pieces. The energy in her voice dipped a bit, but she did her best to keep the intensity there despite social anxiety settling in again.[break][break]

"I mean, figuring out how to best use Lunk took forever and even then we can't do flashy stuff," the tempo of her speech went from stilted to almost too fluid as she tried to compensate for nerves with speed, "you guys took care of that Sandshrew like, woo! It was so fast I almost wasn't ready to follow up ya know?" [break][break]

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413 WORDS FOR Leon Harte

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The disbelief from her temporary travelling companion, for a moment, bred intense anxiety in Faylinn. Was her compliment strange? Was he one of those types that didn't like praise? Had she overstepped some boundary, was there some kind of thing about the Eevee's speed that made it a difficult topic? All at once she was a bit of a fidgeting mess; her hands sat behind her back, left grasping the wrist of her right arm and the fingers of her right hand wriggling tirelessly in an attempt to keep all the nervous energy in a place unseen. Despite their efforts her face tightened notably, though somehow managed to maintain a stressed but friendly grin.[break][break]

It felt like she dangled for an eternity in the ensuing moment before the conversation picked back up. The man's relative laxity when he carried on speaking did wonders for her own lack thereof. As the man continued to speak, though, energy soon returned in new ways. Thirteen years!? The words read like fiction in her mind if only due to the scale such a time frame held for her. The five years she'd spent with Lunk were already a third of the time she'd been alive, to imagine having a pokemon for thirteen years! She didn't even have memory that far back. [break][break]

A part of her expected the number to be followed by an explanation of some great amount of practice. Years of work to hone a specific battle style founded on speed! Instead it was quickly followed by quite the opposite. Looking at the Eevee now, or rather in the battle prior, Faylinn never would have guessed it was little more than a novice. Though hearing that the blond was no stranger to a battle did help to make sense of the situation. An experienced trainer with a spirited pokemon, how cool![break][break]

"Wow . . ." her overflowing thoughts spilled out in a whispered word, "You figured it out so fast . . ." Is that what experience meant? The ability to just pick up and go, even when what you're picking up is so far removed from what you're used to? Faylinn's thoughts again drifted to Lunk. It had taken them nearly a year to figure out how to fight well together, and several more to try and get to the bottom of doing it efficiently -- even then they still struggled against unfamiliar pokemon or setups! There really was a lot of ground to cover before she could do something like mastering a totally different style. . . Her thoughts wandered to the Starly from Route 31 (still unconscious in a pokeball at her side) and how much more active its style was.[break][break]

"Oh, uh!" she snapped back to the conversation towards the end of the man's thanks, "Yeah, no problem! Uhm, I mean, you said all that stuff about Lunk so it's, I uh. It's only fair, right! Credit where credit's due!" [break][break]

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482 WORDS FOR Leon Harte