Chapter 6: Leader


In the house of Joe Peterson.....

Joe woke up staring at the ceiling. Today he would challenge Mark, the new gym leader. Mark, gym leader. The two words just didn't go together. He had known Mark since childhood. Not exactly friends, just...acquaintances would be the right words.

He got up from his bed, threw on a pair of shorts and a tee-shirt. Heading out of his room, he grabbed his belt that held his 3 pokemon.

He jetted out of his house, waived "bye" to his mom, and made his way to the gym. Instead of throwing the doors open in a dramatic manor, he meekly opened the doors and stepped in, closed the door. Since Mark had become leader, he had moved the battles to his special made combat room. The main chamber had just become a hallway, leading to Mark's room.

Joe stepped into the dimly lit chamber. Suddenly, all the lights came on at once blinding him. "Who dares enter the Pewter City gym?" A booming voice echoed throughout the cavernous room. Joe hardly recognized Mark. Being leader had given him a major superiority complex, but wouldn't it do that to anybody?

"Joe Peterson. Remember me?" Joe said in his meek voice. Mark replied flatly, "No. Should I?" "No, I guess not. I would like to battle for the Boulder Badge." "Fine then. We will both use three pokemon. No more than one pokemon at a time will be fighting. If you disobey these rules, it will be an automatic disqualification." "That sounds O.K. I guess...." Joe answered.

Mark stood up, he newly fashioned cape flung over his shoulder in a grand manor. He walked over to where Joe was standing and glared at him, as if he sizing him up, to discover his worth as a trainer. Joe started to back away, as always when he was confronted with someone bigger than he was, which was almost everyone. As a trainer, he lacked an imposing behavior, or stance. He was quite small and quiet, in fact.

Mark walked over to his station, directing Joe over to his area. The automatic loudspeaker came on, and informed the trainer the gym match would start in:
5
4
3
2
1....
BEGIN!

Mark called out his first pokemon: "Onix, let's win another one, right big guy?" The rock snake only roared in response.

Then Joe called out his pokemon: "Mankey, your up!" Instead of throwing the ball, he just set it down and the pig-monkey came out.

Mark: "Onix, Slam that little thing!" Joe called his order to the Mankey, "Climb up to the top of the arena, Mankey. The you should use your Focus Energy!" Mark laughed at Joe's training method. "What do you mean SHOULD use? If you were any good you would COMMAND it to use Focus Energy!" Never the less, Onix missed and Mankey managed to climb up to the top of the arena, and started to glow.

"Onix use your Rock Throw, that'll knock it down!" Before Joe had a chance to give his next attack, Onix crashed into the platform Mankey was on. Mankey fell down and slammed into the floor, KOing it before it even had a chance to get in a hit.

"Gravel, Gravel" It sounded like a hard, rocky kind of laughter. For the first time, Joe noticed the Graveler perched upon a platform above Marks head. It looked like a vulture, only made of stone. Joe reached down to his belt and grabbed his next pokemon. He sighed, knowing this one was a dud. "Slowpoke, try to stay awake this time!" Once again, he set down the ball. A very sleepy-looking pokemon came out. "Poke" it sighed.

"Onix, Return!" Mark called out his next, "Dugtrio, Your Up!" He threw the ball with a flare that only one who knows he is about to win can have. The mole triplets came out. "Dug!" they said in unison, almost as one being.

"Slowpoke, please use Water Gun!" Joe asked the dopey pokemon. Slowpoke seamed to think about it, but by that time Mark had already instructed Dugtrio to use Earthquake. The mole dug deep into the floor of the gym. Suddenly, the floor began to shake. Slowpoke still had it's grin on it's face when it was Ko'd.

"Last pokeball, time for a victory!" Mark said confident that he would not have to give up a Badge. He didn't even wait to see what pokemon Joe was going to put out. He called out Graveler. If he had waited, called back out Onix, or kept Dugtrio out, maybe what happened next might not have happened, because what happened, doomed the world forever............


EPILOGUE:

In a cave far away from Pewter City, a man named Gyran stared at his ward. It probably the most dangerous ball in the world. It's contents, if released, would destroy the world, or plunge it into a age of enteral darkness........
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Chapter 7: Link

"Venusaur Go!!" Joe actually threw out this ball. The huge plant-lizard took a few steps forward, toward Graveler. "Let's get this thing started, and finished!" Mark said, confident he would win. "Graveler, use Rock Throw!" The huge rock creature flew up in the air and smashed into Venusaur, barely scratching it.

"Venusaur, start charging for a Solar Beam!" Joe had started to take command. "Graveler, get away from that weed!" Graveler started to run into the maze of platforms that made up Mark's gym. All the while, Venusaur continued to charge itself.

Minutes passed, although it seemed like hours. The minutes ticked on both trainers focused on their pokémon. Even though Mark couldn't see Graveler, he could somehow feel it, like it was a part of him, an extra limb, or something like that. He could also sense what Graveler was going to do next, and there was no way at all to stop it.

"Graveler, No!!" The huge rock beast charged up behind Venusaur, and hit it with all it's strength. With absolutely no effect what so ever. The great plant looked like it was about to burst under the power of the charged Solar Beam. So it did the only thing it could.

It let loose with one of the most powerful attacks the world had ever seen.

Directly at Graveler.

Then something happened.

The intense beam hit Graveler at full power, but it didn't seam to hurt it. But Mark, he looked like he was in intense pain. He was thrown up against the wall. He could feel parts of his body burning. His arm broke. He lost sight in his left eye. He lost feeling in the arm that didn't break. His leg broke. He felt ribs break, and some shatter. Finally the wall he was pressed against split in half. The roof started to cave in. The gym was falling apart at the seams.

It was almost as if the Solar Beam had hit him in stead of Graveler.

Finally the intense pain Mark was feeling stopped, and he collapsed.



EPILOGUE:

In a cave, away from the chaos that had broke out at the Pewter City gym, two blind men stared into space, seeing nothing, but at the same time seeing all.

One finally broke the silence that had fallen into the room., "Now we are truly doomed" "Don't jump to conclusions, if he lives, this will be a true test of his worth. To see if he really is the one of prophesy."



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The infamous Halloween Special. This little bugger got me in trouble with several church groups. That sucked, but it's also a good story..
The LFL Halloween Special:
Specter of the Past, Specter of the Future

Darkness.

That's all he saw. Was he dead. No. He could not be.

His name was Mark Dillion and he was in a coma. He had a broken left arm. So was his right leg. As well as about three ribs. He had bad burns all over his body. He was partially paralyzed in his right hand. His left eye had all but gone blind. He had a mild concussion. The only bright spot in all of this was that he had lived.

The cause still had not been found. It was almost as if the solar beam had hit him instead of Graveler....

{Check out LFL Chapter 7 for details...}

Not to say Graveler had come off in perfect condition. It had been knocked unconscious. And since it was not in a pokéball, it was harder to heal.

In the depths of Mark's mind, he began to dream........


He saw... himself. In the gym. Fighting with Graveler. Against a dark shadow, controlling a Venusaur. Finally the shadow had a face. It was Joe Peterson. The one who had done this to him. Suddenly he found himself fighting the Venusaur, getting blasted by the Solar Beam........

Then, the dream changed. He was fighting with a mountain of a man. He was also a shadow. He sent out a dark flying beast. It had two long blades on the end of each arm. The man began to laugh. Graveler was fighting in vain to beat it........

It changed again. He saw Graveler in great pain. It twisted and screamed, like some great power was ripping from the inside out. Then it fell apart. In it's place was a large ball made of rock. It was glowing......

He was fighting a four-armed giant. It was also a shadow. It had glowing red eyes. On the ends of each of it's four arms, a drill appeared. It roared, and smashed Onix. Ripped it in half. Onix stopped moving. It had cracks all over it's body. It's horn was broken off..........

A great shadow was directly in his face. It was speaking to him. He could not hear what it was saying. He looked down. He was floating. The ground below him was moving. Suddenly, thousands of spheres flew up at him, unleashing great power..........


Unbeknownst to him, his room in the hospital had many visitors. Like Dr. Jones. Like Professor Oak, who had come from Pallet Town to see the boy who had such a mysterious and powerful bond with his pokémon. Like the one Mark blamed for his condition, Joe Peterson.


Then one night, a strange person was seen lurking outside the hospital. He was wearing black all over his body, making him almost invisible in the dark. He pulled out two black hooks from his belt, and twirled them around his wrist. He stuck them into the wall, pulled himself up to Mark's window.

He took out a lock pick set, and easily opened the window. He quietly stepped into the room, and put the hooks back into his belt. In their place, he pulled out two knifes, painted black, so there would be no shine. Each knife was dipped in a strong poison, so it would kill quickly and painful.

He spun them around in his hand, and slowly walked over to the unconscious Mark, preparing to slash at him. "Soon the cursed one will be put to death. The Dark One will be unleashed. This 'Mark' will not be able to stop us and our plan."

Dr. Jones decided to check in on Mark at that moment. He saw the assassin, for that was who the man was. He dove at him and smashed the assassin through the window. "It's one of you isn't it? One of the cultists. I thought we eradicated all of you." "And you must be one of The Thirty. You were all supposed to be dead by now! Heathens! Unbelievers!!" The two men called threats back and forth to each other.

They fought like alley cats for a long time, until the assassin broke free of Jones grip. "The Dark One will not be denied!! We will triumph!!" Professor Oak came running out of the hospital, "One of the cultists? I thought we weeded out those rats a long time go, right after the war." "Apparently not. He's not new. He knew of us, The Thirty." "Hmmmm, yes, although our number now is some where around The Twenty-Five."


The assassin ran off into the woods, and into a cave. This was the base of the cultists. It was very dim, with only candles lighting the whole base.

He approached the throne room of the cultists leader, The Minor Lord Dark. He addressed the assassin directly, "So you failed. He is still alive. He is ALIVE. And you, my top assassin, have failed. Miserably." "But, Minor Lord Dark, there were two of The Thirty there.... one stopped me. I..I had to leave behind my sacred daggers."

"The daggers. You left them. Two of the only remaining ones left, and you lost them. You fool! Death Upon You! You shall not live through the night." He seamed to think, "The Gauntlet. None have ever survived it, and you shall not. The Dark One is displeased with your work. So you shall die. Take him away." Two cultists dragged the screaming assassin away. "Elite 2, now you are my top assassin. Do not fail me." He smiled at the new top assassin. "The time of The Dark One is at hand."
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Chapter 8

"Clear!"

Zap..Boom!

"Clear!"

Zap..Boom!

Mark was dying. His condition had worsened in the past few days. His heart was giving out. He was not expected to live through the night. He was in operating room of the hospital he was staying at.

Dr. Jones and Professor Oak were in the observation deck, overseeing the whole thing.

"Theirs a chance he won't live." Jones broke the silence the had fallen between the two men. "I'd say that it's almost diffenent, but then again I've been know to be wrong before." answered Oak. "Like that time, way back when? The war? With the Blastoise?" "Don't ever mention 'Blastoise' again...I really don't want to go through that again....." Oak replied.

"Gasp! Cough..uhhh where am I....?" Mark had finally woke up. He still looked bad though. "M-m-m-my eye? I can't see-e-e-e......" He was referring to his left eye. He was going to be permently blind in it. "My-y-y arm-m-m-m??" He was having trouble speaking. Or breathing for that matter. His arm was slightly paralyzed. He couldn't feel his fingers.

Dr. Jones and Professor Oak ran down the stairs to the operating room. "You lived! The spirit must be in you!" Jones called. "Are you all right?" Oak asked Mark. "Yeah, just a little....woozy...?" He answered, unsure of anything at the moment.

Right at that moment, down a few floors, Graveler had woken up itself. It looked around at the dark room it had been placed in. There was nothing else in the room, save for a few brooms, and other clutter. It growled, something was not right here. Mark was not here. Graveler did not want to be here. There was a window here. Graveler ran at full speed and crashed through it, showering everyone nearby with shards of glass.

It continued rampaging through the hospital, flying up many floors, to the operating room. Just as it got there, they were moving Mark out of the room, since he could not walk. "Graveler!" Mark cried, perking up, "How'er you doin' big guy?!" "Gravel Er Gravel Graveler Gravel Er!!" It explained in it's own language.

Then Mark realized something, "Where are Dugtrio and Onix?" Dr. Jones looked worried, "Um, well, I'll tell you later. We need to get you checked on. You might be able to leave!" Oak said "I might have something that can deal that," He grabbed a pokéball at his waist, and smiled, "Go Mr. Roboto!" He threw the ball, a flash of light come out.

A silver cylinder formed. It had two arms sticking out from the front of it's body. It looked like it had flashlights for eyes. At the bottom of the cylinder were four wheels. It started to speak, "Domo Aregato, Mr. Roboto, Domo." Then it beeped twice, "Domo" It then repeated the phrase again. Mark and Dr. Jones only managed to stare at the thing. "What the heck is that??!" Dr. Jones asked as the strange pokémon came closer to him. He started to back away.

"It was sent to me by a friend of mine. He's managed to build an entire new species of pokémon. He calls them the 'metal' type. He has several others, although I haven't seen them. This one has been trained to act as a doctor, or nurse, as well as battle. My friend says that these will someday replace Chanseys as nurse pokémon."

Mr. Roboto came closer to Mark. It popped out a scanner and ran it over Marks body. It then printed out a report and gave it to Professor Oak. "Hmmmmm. Looks OK to me...." Oak said and handed it to a nearby doctor. He gave Mark premission to leave.

Mark was wheeled out of the hospital, and into another day, nary, another life, in Pewter City.

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Chapter 9


"What??!" Mark screamed at the man. "If I wasn't confined to a wheelchair, and had full access of my arms, and sight in my left eye, you'd be dead!"

"Don't blame me. It's the League's decision. Don't shoot the messenger, for crying out loud!" the man answered. He was a representative for the Pokéleague. He had just told Mark his training license would be revoked. He could no longer train, nor own, pokémon. Dugtrio and Onix were going to be turned over to the League for care and handling. He would be able to keep Graveler, because of the strange bond between them, and the fact that Mark had never officially caught it.

"They just think that a crippled trainer wouldn't be able to control his pokémon. It would be too dangerous. If you have any arguments, take it up with the League." Mark again screamed at the man, " I AM NOT CRIPPLED, YOU COMPLETE DUNCE!!!! I am perfectly safe! My pokémon will be returned to me, that I swear!"

"Mark calm down!" That was Dr. Jones. He had been taking care of Mark since, the incident, as that was what they were calling it. His mom had become incredibly sick since it. She was worse than ever. Many experts had come to Pewter to see "The Boy With The Amazing Link!" as the Pokémon Times were calling him, and had ended up staying to help his mom.

They didn't expect her to live out the week.

Dr. Jones wheeled Mark around and pushed him back inside the pokémart, where Jones lived as well as worked. Him pushed him into a back room, and up against the wall.

"Dr. Jones, you have to let me go and get Dugtrio and Onix! They were my first. I loved them like family. And now the League has taken them away from me. And me away from them. We need each other." Mark started to cry.

At that moment, three figures entered the back room, Graveler, Professor Oak, and Mr. Roboto. Graveler walked over to Mark and sat against the wall, sighing "Gravel" as he slid. Oak tried to console Mark. "It'll be OK. We'll find some way to get them back. Even if we have to hire the whole of Team Rocket to do it." Oak smiled a smile that Jones had seen him do many times over.

It was always bad news.

"Ohhhh, No. You're up to something, aren't you Oak?" Professor Oak only smiled. "You're not REALLY going to hire Team Rocket, are you Professor Oak?" Mark asked Oak innocently. Oak was still smiling. Dr. Jones looked like he was going to faint. "Oh my Sweet Lord. We're going to go through it again, aren't we Oak?" "Oh, Hell Yeah." Oak replied, using the strongest language he had ever used.

Dr. Jones just rolled his eyes and proceeded to faint. Mark had adopted Oak's grin, even through his tears.

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EPILOGUE:

Far away, on Cinnabar Island, the scientists had returned to the mansion. The came after the wreckage that Mewtwo had rained down upon them. They return to finish a project they had started long ago. They returned, they're creative instincts inspired, by a fifteen year old boy named Mark. He had instablished a mysterious link with his Graveler. He had been able to control it even though he had never caught it. Controlled it better than most trainer controlled their caught pokémon. This project would be even more powerful than the Mewtwo, for they would be able to control this one. Control. It was all about Control.........

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This has often been called the best LFL chapter. I'm not arguing....

Chapter 10: Joe's Side

His fault. It was all his fault.

He should have never came to the gym.

Joe Peterson was walking through the wreckage of what was previously the Pewter City Gym. He had been walking through it every day since the accident. The accident he had caused. He had been to see Mark while he was in hospital, many times in fact. Mark was unconscious, of course.

His fault. It was all his fault. He could never change that.

The other day, Mark had come home. He was hurt so bad, he couldn't walk, or move his arms. The day after he had come home, a man from the Pokéleague had arrived. He told Mark that he could never be a trainer. Nor could he keep his pokémon.

That was his fault too. All his fault.

He could just hear the townspeople talking about him. "Look here comes Joe, the guy who ruined Marks life. Forever. It was his fault the gym was all but destroyed. He doesn't deserve to live. It should have been him instead of Mark. Keep the trainer with worth. Break the useless one." That what they say. He could hear them now.

He had grown to hate people. They would talk about him. The Pokémon Times had come to interview him. They wanted a story from "The Boy Who Gave Pokémon a Bad Name Forever" as that was what they had called him. He had ran and hid in the former Gym. They never found him.

He wanted to die. He really wanted to die. The world would be a better place for it. He kept telling himself that. But he could never bring himself to do it. Just another example of his stupidity, and meekness.

Spineless. That what he was. He hated him self for it.

He looked around the ruins. He saw what was left of Graveler's perch. His fault. All his fault.

"Stop all this moping" His mom had told him, "it wasn't your fault."

His mom was right. It was time to stop moping around.

It was time to make amends.

He went over to the pokémart where Mark was staying. He swallowed. This was it. Could he really face Mark? He stepped inside. Dr. Jones was standing by the desk. Graveler was standing in the way of the door to the back, blocking it. It saw Joe and began to growl. He knew this was the person who had hurt Mark. This was a Bad person. He would not see Mark.

Standing by Dr. Jones was a strange looking thing. It looked like a robot, but had a certain pokémon "feel" to it. It saw Joe and it's flashlight eyes turned bright red. It too know Joe was to blame, even though it had never seen him.

Dr. Jones just stared at him, glared at him. He knew about the whole incident. Every time Joe had come to the hospital, Jones had never spoken to him. He hadn't even acknowledged that he was there.

Professor Oak was looking through a rack of pokémon magazines. He finally noticed that Joe had entered the store. He just gave Joe the look an animal activist would give a cow going to slaughter, sad, yet very pathetic. He knew Mark would rip him apart when he got his hands on him. If he could ever move his hands again.

Finally Dr. Jones gave the order for Graveler to move, letting Joe get into the back.

He got one look at Mark, in his wheelchair, turned around, and ran out the door. He just couldn't face Mark right now.

His fault. It was all his fault.