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Mysterious visit

Staring at his newly aquired Zephyr badge for what seemed like five minutes, Max pulled out a small badge case Fang picked up while he was getting supplies for their travels and set the Zephyr badge into one of the grooves in the case, thus marking his first step into entering the johto league. He'd just barely defeated Falkner of the Violet city gym and even then only because his Larvitar decided to finally listen to his commands. "Well...One badge down and seven more to go...I wonder if I can really do this."

His thoughts were interrupted however as Scavenger, a orange scaled dragon approached him by the side. His scales were orange for most of his body but his chest and stomach had blue plated scales giving him a sort of unique Charizard like appearance. The dragon put a hand on Max's head and gave him a small grin. "I think you're in need of a haircut...I mean it's practically at your shoulders...If you'd like I can give you one myself free of charge."

While Max didn't have any objections to the dragon cutting his hair he did show some discomfort. "Well it's kind of hard to get a haircut when we didn't have a barber shop on the island. Just don't cut it too short...

With a subtle nod, Scav lead Max towards a tree stump that they found while traveling down route 32. He wrapped a small cloth around his neck, letting the cloth end at Max's chest as he began cutting the boy's hair. "You look troubled. I thought you'd be happier that you got your first badge but you don't look it."

"Well, There are 8 badges in total that I'll need to qualify for the championship and Falkner was that first step. He made some good points in the battle even if they were insulting points, I need to get stronger, to be a trainer that my pokemon can depend on and not doubt my strategies." Max looked down, small strands of hair falling over his chest as Scav went to work. "It doesn't help the fact that Falkner was the easiest of the gym leaders for me to tackle, the only reason I won was because of Fang's TM and Larvitar's change of heart."

Both Max, and Scavenger looked forward when they spotted Fang drawing a large circle on the ground, he was doing it with his tails too which was what caught most of their attention as there was a spray of black ink coming from the tips of his tails. While they watched, Scav finished up Max's trim and started messing with his hair a bit as if Max were a little brother, took off the cloth and helped him up. "You forget that it's your strategy that gave you the win though. Unless you gave Sentret the go ahead to use thunderbolt he wouldn't have done so and that doduo would have beaten him. You also have to keep in mind your strategy isn't the only thing to look out for, your opponant could have anything ready to disrupt your plans just like Falkner did when he used whirlwind to call out your Bulbasaur."

Fang let out a small howl, breaking the two of their conversation as Fang approached them both, grabbing Max's hands gently. "Max...I could hear everything you two were talking about and I've been thinking about your situation too. SOOOOOO we're going to have a pokemon battle! If you win I'll give you this." He held out a small badge in the shape of a wolf's head. "It's not an official badge sadly, but it will be proof that you and your pokemon have conqured your limitations."

Startled, Max stared at the badge for a moment as he was pulled toward the ring that Fang had drawn out. "Wait...how can we battle though? You don't have a single pokemon of your own...It's not like you can create them out of thin air...and what do you mean conqure my limitations?"

Fang didn't give Max too much time before he started drawing on the ground again, this time they were the shapes of Bulbasaur, Sentret and Larvitar. "That's right, I didn't tell you about my powers yet have I? Guess I'll show you what I can do. this is how I'll contribute to our team." he gave Max a wink and snapped his fingers, a moment later the drawings came to life, starting to take on a three dimensional shape as they became near duplicates of Max's own party, the main difference being they were in black and white coloring. "Anything I can imagine, I can draw, and anything I can draw I can bring to life!" He let go of Max's hands and walked over to the far side of the circle, his pokemon drawings following the three tailed wolf.

Although he wanted to press Fang further on this little...skill of his, his three tailed companion wasn't going to give much explination as it seemed so he had little choice but to battle him, Fang had led him already to his spot on the arena and he let out Sentret first on the field, Fang did the same with his paint sentret, kind of irritating him but he didn't see much harm in it. "Know what would cheer me up more than this battle? A cheeseburger..." He joked but he smiled. "In any case, Sentret let's start this off with a thunderbolt!"

"Quick attack." That was all Fang said, and in a flash the ink sentret managed to avoid the lightning attack and sped head on at Max's sentret, knocking it off it's feet. "Fury swipes." And with another simple command, the ink pokemon circled behind Max's sentret and gave it a few good swipes with it's paws, Making the furry pokemon wiggle around and roll out of the way, a sort of cute but angry glare replacing it's usually friendly exterior. "Your Sentret seems a bit upset, comeon you battled Falkner much better than this."

biting his finger, Max tried to think his way out of this though that was the problem...even with all of his training and studies, Fang was still ahead of him and it showed. The wolf stood motionless on his side of the battlefield, he didn't waste his breath or motions, saving every bit of himself for the task at hand. "Max? MAX!" The Sentret shouted, jumping infront of him to get his trainers attention "Don't think about it too much!" He balled his tiny paws up in a fist. "We can win this but I need your help!" Sentret turned his back to his opponant again, getting down on all fours. "I'll follow your lead Max!"

There it was again, Max heard the sound of his pokemon. If he wasn't sure about it at Falkner's gym he was now! Somehow he could understand what his pokemon were saying as if they were speaking perfect english. Looking at Sentret's determination he took another deep breath, balling his hands up in a fist as well. "Alright then...Sentret use Foresight! then strike that impersonating ink Sentret with another thunderbolt!"

Sentret's eyes remained fixed on his opponant, sizing him up before nodding. "Max you already tried this before. Okay now quick attack to avoid..." Fang said calmly though that demeanor quickly changed when he found that the thunderbolt managed to strike his sentret clone even as it managed to dodge the attack.

"Hah! I'll decide what works and what doesn't. In this case all my pal here needed to do was get a good lock on how your ink sentret would avoid his attack and it would be a sure thing! Alright Sentret let's finish this up with a quick attack!" And with that his sentret ran at his opponant with a flashing speed and slammed into it hard, knocking the poor ink pokemon unconcious. A second later Sentret would start to glow and everyone, including the remaining two ink pokemon began to watch with amazement. "No way...Sentret is evolving. he must have pushed himself really hard in this battle..." Max commented, watching as his pokemon's form started changing, it's pudgy round body starting to thin out as his tail and body started merging together, ears pulling back to form pointed ends and growing a pair of cute little whiskers on the sides of his face, Sentret had evolved into a Furret.

Furret looked up at Max, and then the others when he realized they were all looking at him and smiled. "Max...Thank you for pushing me as hard as you did. I promise that I'll work harder. If we work as a team I'm sure we can overcome our limitations." with that, Furret seemed to collapse, his remaining energy spent from the battle. As Max picked up the little guy he gave his trainer a small lick on the cheek before falling asleep in his arms.

A couple of tears flowed down Max's cheeks after the lick. "You evolved bud...I'm proud of you and I'll work harder too because it seems no matter how much we battle, you end up knocked out every time." With that he called Furret into it's ball and sighed, wiping his face of the tears he'd shed. "There's no need for us to continue battling Fang...It won't be easy to get that badge from you, not with the requirements you've set but maybe after we've built up on experience we'll be ready." He gave a slight smile before he, like Furret collapsed on the floor. Both Scavenger and Fang rushed over to Max's aid as soon as he hit the ground, trying to rouse him back to conciousness but nothing seemed to work.

After a little work, Fang and Scav pulled Max over to a softer patch of grass. Bulbasaur looked the most concerned as he laid by Max, a small whimper escaping the pokemon's body as he could do very little for his trainer except offer the comfort of his companionship. soon enough Scav came with a small bucket of water and placed a wet cloth over Max's forehead and gave Bulbasaur a small reassuring pat. "Don't worry little guy, your trainer will be good as new after a little rest. My guess is he got too worked up, He's got to learn to relax or none of that training will do him any good." Bulbasaur didn't take too kindly to the critisism of his trainer however, as he released a small stun spore in Scav's direction paralyzing the poor dragon. "Ack...I was just trying to help..." Before he slumped over, not unconcious but unable to maintain his balance due to the numbness of the stun spore.

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Max found himself floating infront of what looked like a spacious cave, he didn't really understand why he was floating but he started making his way into the cave. "Where am I? Wasn't I in the middle of a battle with Fang? This is too weird..." As he entered the cave everything seemed to light up, and his body started slowly descending to the ground, gravity returning to normal for the trainer. "Uhm...Fang?! Scav?!" He felt the top of his head, Bulbasaur wasn't there with him either.

"You won't find any of them here." Said a deep, grumbling voice from within the depths of the cave. Max would continue to walk down the cave, gulping once he found the source of the voice, it was a large 10 foot Arcanine, laying curled up, one of it's eyes trained on Max.

"Uhm...why not? And where am I sir?" He asked, gulping once more when the Arcanine started shifting it's body to pull itself up.

Walking over to Max, the Arcanine stood to him, snout pressed to Max's own nose as he grumbled his reply. "You're in the depths of your own mind. You sought me out subconciously...You want to be stronger and to protect your pokemon." His breath was hot against Max's face but if the large pokemon took notice of Max's discomfort it didn't seem to care. "Go to the union cave...there you'll find a sealed door near one of the many bodies of water. Find a way to open that door and you'll find me. We'll talk more when you get there." A second later it pressed it's paw on Max's head and threw the poor guy out of the cave.

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Max woke with a start, sitting up quickly, the towel that had been set on his head plopped down ontop of Bulbasaur who looked more than happy that Max was awake. "Was all of that...just a dream?" Max wondered, he could have sworn he could still feel the giant pokemon's breath on his face.

Bulbasaur pulled the towel off of himself and leapt into Max's arms, nuzzling into his trainer with a relieved look on his face. "Max! I'm so happy you're okay!" he cried out, burying his face into Max's chest, vines coming out of his bulb to wrap around Max's waist.

With a laugh, Max held onto Bulbasaur with a big smile. "Of course I'd be okay buddy! I just need a bite to eat that's all." He looked to the side and chuckled when he spotted Scav just laying there.

Fang handed Max a small loaf of bread and the trainer started to nibble on it. "You've been out for a couple of hours. We thought that if you didn't wake up soon we'd have to take you to a hospital. So...are you sure you're feeling alright?"

With a nod, and finishing the bread that had been offered to him he smiled. "I'm feeling fine. We should continue our travels though or our supplies won't exactly last us through the night." He got up and hefted his bag onto his back and smiled. "Let's hurry up, We have to get past the Union cave before we can make it to Azalea town!" With that in mind he started thinking about the dream he just had. Should he tell them about the Arcanine in his dreams or wait until the time came where they'd enter the cave. Either way he wanted to know if it was just a trick his mind played on him or if he'd really called out to such a massive beast.

"You know...I'd love to continue our journey as quick as we can..." Scav's foot twitched a moment later. "But until this paralysis wears off we're not going anywhere!" He roared and started blushing when the rest of the group laughed.

So after waiting for Scavenger's paralysis to wear off they set off for Union cave, and the quest to find the hidden room within it. (Chapter end) (Hope you enjoyed!)