 |  |
|
|
Lawrence III, how I cursed that name. If he hadn't been so power-hungry, we wouldn't now be in a hot-air balloon battling against the elements.
There were six of us in the balloon, which belonged to Milly and Michaela's cousin, Adam, and was designed to look like a giant Voltorb. I was helping Adam, a handsome fair-haired youth a few years older than the rest of us, monitor the fuel while the others relaxed as much as possible and tried to enjoy the ride. At times like this, I almost forgot about the Age of Twilight, but it always pricked at a remote corner of my mind.
-----------------------------
"We're almost out of fuel."
Adam's words jolted me back to reality with an unpleasent start. Of course, it was only to be expected since we had spent the last several hours trying to fly in extremely treacherous conditions, but we had hoped we would last the outgoing trip at least.
"Don't you have any spare cannisters?" I asked, grasping at the first idea that came to mind. But Adam shook his head, a solemn expression on his face.
"We emptied the last of them this morning," he informed us. "And this balloon won't stay up without a constant supply of hot air . . ." He trailed off as he tried to think of something that he could use in place of the liquid fuel he usually used.
"What about your Rapidash?" Michaela asked, refering to Adam's magnificent Fire Horse Pokemon which he had raised on his farm ever since he was a little Ponyta colt. I understood her reasoning immediately; a Fire Pokemon could provide an almost limitless source of hot air and we would only have to worry about how long the Pokemon in question could maintain a steady stream of fire.
But Adam shook his head for a second time. "Rapidash is too heavy," he said. "And besides, if a Fire Pokemon has body flames, you know you can't risk getting it wet . . ." He broke off and stared at the rainclouds we could see looming on the horizon.
It was Milly who came up with the solution. Wasting no time, she pulled out her Flareon's Poke Ball and held it above her head.
"Well, if Rapidash can't do it, I know a Pokemon who can!" she announced. "Flareon - I choose you!"
With a burst of light, Flareon emerged from her Poke Ball and sat on her haunches ready to receive Milly's instructions. "Quick, Flareon!" Milly directed, pointing to the inside of the balloon. "Use your Flamethrower to get us airborne!"
"Flare!" Flareon opened her mouth and aimed a steady jet of flame in the direction Milly had indicated. We all cheered as the balloon began to rise once again . . .
--------------------------
"Mount Moon - there it is!"
At the sound of Jodie's shout, we all clamoured round trying to get a good view of the mountain all the clues we'd found had led us to. The only problem was going to be finding a safe place to land because, as far as the eye could see, mountains stretched in every direction.
In the end, we had the decision made for us when what appeared to be a black cloud appeared and headed straight for us . . .
"What's that cloud?" I asked, wondering if it had something to do with the Age of Twilight. In fact, after everything that had happened lately, I was starting to wonder if any would ever surprise me again.
"That's no cloud!" Adam shouted as he watched it encroach on us still further. "It's a flock of ruddy Murkrow!"
-----------------------------
Murkrow - the Darkness Pokemon, combined Dark/Flying Types whose reputation for causing mayhem and ill-fortune went back centuries. It was even said that, at one stage in late medieval times, the people of what would one day become the thriving metropolis of Goldenrod City had ruthlessly hunted down and killed every Murkrow they could find. And now at least a hundred of the birds were flying right towards us.
"Quick!" I yelled as I grabbed Sophie's Poke Ball. "Get us out of the way!"
"That's what I'm TRYING to do!" Adam shouted back. "But those feathered freaks keep on following us!"
Sure enough, just as he spoke, two Murkrow landed on the balloon, making a soft scratching noise with their talons before using their Peck Attacks to puncture two gaping holes in the balloon. Dumbstruck, we could do nothing except watch it begin to deflate.
More Murkrow moved in and began attacking from all sides. It seemed we were sitting targets since neither my friends nor myself had a Pokemon capable of taking on so many Murkrow at once, besides which it was already too crowded with six humans and a Flareon for battling to be a viable option.
"I'll handle them!" Adam called as he produced a Poke Ball from his jeans pocket. "You girls try to figure out a way to hold the balloon together until we can land safely."
With that, he cast the Poke Ball down onto the floor of the basket. "Go - Noctowl!" he called, watching as his Noctowl emerged and perched himself on the side of the basket. We all wondered what was coming next - a Noctowl could use a powerful Hypnosis Attack,but would it be enough against a large flock of Murkrow?
"Quick, Noctowl!" Adam ordered. "Use Hypnosis to knock out as many Murkrow as you can!"
"Owl!" Noctowl hooted and fised his gaze on the nearest Murkrow. Gradually, the smaller bird's eyes seemed to grow heavy and it wasn't long before it began to drop out of the sky. It seemed such a foolproof plan, putting the Murkrow to sleep, that, as Justine (in her Butterfree form), Xatu and Ledian flew round patching up the holes with a supply of glue which Adam carried for emergencies, I wondered why we hadn't thought of doing it in the first place.
----------------------------------
But, no matter how hard Noctowl fought, he was hopelessly outnumbered by the Murkrow and there was no way he could keep using Hypnosis indefinitely. Seeing him struggling to stay airborne as three Murkrow circled around looking for an opening, Michaela seemed to snap. With the air of one who had realised she had remained inactive long enough, she morphed into her Raichu form and leapt onto Noctowl's back the second he came near enough.
Sparks sizzled in Michaela's cheeks as she powered up - seconds later, the built-up energy in her body exploded as a powerful Thunder Attack and sent the Murkrow flying off, squawking loudly as they went.
But the attack seemed to take a lot out of Michaela and she changed back into her human form almost instantly. Watching her grip on Noctowl's feathers falter, I gre concerned.
"Michaela's in trouble" I informed Adam, wondering as I spoke what else fate had in store for us.
--------------------------------
Wasting no time, Adam used a length of rope he had stashed in the basket to reel Michaela in and recalled Noctowl. Next, he directed the balloon to the first flat patch of land we could find, a narrow ledge barely large enough for the six of us to move around.
But we seemed to have no choice. The attack on the Murkrow had taken a lot out of Michaela and she would need at least a day to recover, possibly longer since we were stranded miles from the nearest Pokemon Centre and I was willing to bet that no-one had ever treated a human for exhaustion sustained through using Electric Type Attacks before.
"I don't think she'll be morphing again for a while," Adam said as he laid Michaela down on the ground.
"But she will be all right, won't she?" asked Milly with a slight quaver in her voice. With a pang of empathy, I understood what she must be feeling as she watched her sister lying unconscious on the ground - I had been through it with Sarah when she, not yet four years old at the time, had fell out of an upstairs window and had to be rushed to hospital. Sisters could be trying at times, but neither Milly nor I would ever wish anything on the ones we had.
"I think so," Adam replied as he set up his little picnoc stove and began to boil a kettle of water. "That sort of thing often happens when Electric Pokemon use too much juice - but, since she's not actually a Pokemon . . ."
He tailed off, leaving us to work out the implications for ourselves. Obviously, since Michaela hadn't been born a Pichu - the first stage in the Raichu evolution - her body wasn't used to conducting electricity. And, without any previous experience of human/Pokemon shapeshifting to fall back on, there was no way of knowing how long it would take Michaela to recover from this.
"Hey," I whispered as I knelt beside her. "That was a real brave thing you did, taking on all those Murkrow alone . . ."
Maybe it was my imagination or a trick of the light, but I swear I saw Michaela grin at me for a fraction of a second.
------------------------------
Since it looked as though we were stuck on the ledge until Michaela recovered and we could make more permanent repairs to Adam's balloon, we used the time to go over what we already knew about the Age of Twilight and try to fit the pieces of the jigsaw together.
Psyrene had sent us to locate the Orb of Twilight in the belief that it would lead us to the Po-psydron and the rest of her kind, a mission which had quickly led us to the Legendary Birds who dwelt in the Orange Islands and, in particular, to Lugia whose heir we needed to find so that we could be led to the Orb. The only trouble was that it had been weeks since the Lugia we met in the Orange Islands had passed away and, from what Moltres had told us at the time, a Legendary Egg should have emerged by now.
It seemed we were at another dead end. Without Lugia, we couldn't find the Orb of Twilight and, without the Orb of Twilight, no new Lugia would emerge. Besides, how could we look for a Legendary Egg when none of us had the faintest idea what to look for - as far as we knew, Lugia's was the onyl death of a Legendary Bird in living memory and even Justine's dad had no idea what their Eggs looked like.
And every second that passed was a second lost in our quest to save the world from the Age of Twilight.
| |
bravenet.com