Chasing After A Legend

Nothing But Dust

"Human talking"

'Human thinking'

"Talking in a Flashback/Memory"

"Pokémon talking"

---

"Plu...!"

Vileplume slammed into the ground next to a downed Ariados with a heavy THUMP. The living flower attempted to get back on its feet but was soon overcome with exhaustion and promptly fell back.

"Nice." Gary smirked behind his Skarmory, who had a small trail of smoke on its beak after landing a critical hit with Drill Peck. "Two down, one to go. Ready to cry for mommy?"

Annie growled softly in response, her still-standing Espeon mimicking her.

"If not," Brock followed up. "Crobat, Air Cutter!"

Crobat retracted its wings, prepared to unleash a sharp blade of wind from them – not noticing the smirk on Annie's face.

"Espeon, Confuse Ray."

"Espe..." Espeon's eyes, along with the jewel on its forehead, glowed bright blue while it emitted an invisible beam of psychic energy at Crobat's head. The effect was almost immediate – Crobat roared in confusion as it dizzily shifted its target to Bill and Daisy, who were attempting to sneak away during the chaos, and unintentionally fired an Air Cutter at them. The duo yelped in surprise and pain as they dived to the ground to narrowly avoid the slice of wind, which made a decent cut on a tree behind them.

"Crobat!" Brock cried out. "Snap out of it!"

"And for extra insurance..." Annie brushed a stray hair aside. "Psybeam on the mean ol' bat."

The glow in Espeon's eyes turned from blue to red as a peculiar trail of circles shot forward and engulfed Crobat before it even had the chance to even try to recover. When the Psybeam finally faded away, Brock's Pokémon was motionless on the ground, clearly knocked out.

"S-shoot!" Brock exclaimed. "Crobat, retur-" Before he could finish, Annie darted forward with surprising speed and grabbed his wrist, forcing him to drop the Poké Ball.

"Tsk, tsk." Annie shook her head disapprovingly. "Naughty boy. We wouldn't want to spoil the fun so soon, now would we?" He tightened her grip on Brock, causing him to groan in pain.

"Of all the times for a beautiful woman to hold my hand," Brock grit out, "it has to be the one trying to kill me..."

"Oh, stop. You're going to make me blush." Annie cooed as she twisted tighter on Brock's wrist, forcing him to get on one knee.

"Darn it!" Brock growled and, with his free hand, pulled out another Poké Ball from his belt. "Alright, go- ACK!" He was taken by surprise when a string of web encased and trapped his hand along with the ball. Brock grunted as he turned his head to get a look at where the String Shot came from.

"Riagh...!" Ariados quietly hissed, who apparently just barely stayed conscious and was snapping its fangs at Brock.

"Ah, for the love of- SKARMORY!" Gary commanded. "Take that Ariados down for good with Wing Attack!"

"Skraa!" Skarmory's wings shone as it dashed past Ariados and forced it to finally fall, its legs sprawled on the ground in its unconscious state. But Annie's giggles were a far cry from what Gary thought her reaction would be.

"Think fast~!" she sang. "Shadow Ball!"

"Esp-EON!" Espeon leaped into the air and flicked 2 spheres of dark, ghastly energy from its twin tails at Skarmory.