Glad to see you picking apart my fic some more. good, that's what a reader should do. keep analyzing it, i enjoy your theories and such.

And at last, I offer the next chapter. I've been up all night (it's now 5o am and i haven't slept yet) writing various literature i'm simaltaniously working on at the moment, and i just finished chapter 42. so when it gets around to geing posted, note that i was fatigued and let that explain the odd style.

anyway, here's the next one for you. enjoy.


Chapter 36

The teenagers were a few trees beyond Cauda's room and were taking their time on their nice stroll. The already eventful day seemed to have become cheerier as thoughts of legendary birds filled their heads. While crossing one of the many suspended bridges in Swarm, Tiponi couldn't help but speak up about the book.

"You know how I'm a Moltres? Well, I didn't think it matched me at first, but I was thinking about it. A Moltres is determined. I guess I'm determined, because I have come all this way and fought many battles just to be a Quester. And Medwin is determined, because when we were in the forest and you told him about the new attacks he could learn, he was determined to learn them," Tiponi said.

"He sure was. He almost burned down that tree," said Anata teasingly.

Medwin looked up at his human, interested in the conversation.

"We are alike in ways like that. I never thought about it, but the characteristics of Moltres describe both of us. Neither of us ever give up in a battle," Medwin said.

"And when I had my eye problem, I didn't tell anyone because I didn't want anyone's help. Just like how Medwin, with that little attitude of his, doesn't want help," Tiponi said.

"Hey!" replied Medwin indignantly.

"You both picked up the training pretty quickly," chimed in Anata.

"And I can tell that you two live for battles and winning them. You sure enjoy a challenge," added Ekad.

They reached a tree staircase and proceeded to climb down. The light from the windows danced across the hollow insides of the giant tree with a glowing patchwork effect.

"But there is still the one about a "fiery personality" that doesn't quite fit me," said Tiponi.

"Well," said Ekad, "that can't be by chance. Somehow, you have a fiery personality. I guess we'll just have to wait and see."

Ekad brushed her shoulder gently as he passed her on the stairs to lead the way through the door. Although he had barely touched her, Tiponi suddenly felt very warm, and stomach felt fluttery. She shook off the strange sensation, but the feeling still lay faintly in her gut as she watched Ekad walk in front of her, his brown hair swaying softly while they walked.

Medwin, feeling his human’s emotion, looked up at Tiponi. Her usually pale skin was dusted with rose on her cheeks.

"We're just about there. It won't take to long, I just have to give the bread and coins to Hakui," Ekad said.

The sound of his voice snapped Tiponi out of whatever she had been feeling, and she began to act like her regular self.

"I can pay for the coin part of the fee, you don't need to pay for me," she said.

"It's okay Tiponi, I want to," Ekad replied.

"But remember, I don't like help. I have enough coins, I can pay," Tiponi said, feeling witty yet serious.

"Yes, but I would prefer to be a gentleman and pay for you," Ekad responded.

He had her. Tiponi couldn't resist an old-fashioned gentleman. After all, she was an old-fashioned type of person, just like Medwin was one of the oldest types of pokemon. Tiponi pouted, but she did not say anything.

Upon arrival at Hakui's room, Ekad struck the wooden door three times with his knuckles. Moments later, a voice responded.

"Busy! Leave payments at door. If it's an emergency, you may enter. But I have an emergency now," the voice said with an urgent tone. It sounded like the man's dæmon.

Obediently, Ekad leaned the basket he had been carrying against the door. The basket held the bread and coins, neatly packed. With their business done, Ekad turned and began to head home.

"Wait, do we have to go back to the room just yet?" Tiponi asked.

Ekad stopped walking and turned to Tiponi. "What did you have in mind?" He asked.

"Well, I was kind of hoping we could do some training. It's such a nice day, and I haven't trained in a few days," she said.

Ekad nodded in approval.

"Sounds like a plan. Let’s find a good area," Ekad said.

Excited, the two set out for the nearest field. They passed a few that were already being used, but finally came across one that was on the edge of the woods. Medwin and Tiponi immediately went to their positions, but Ekad and Anata just walked into the middle of the Rec. Much to the outsiders' confusion, the two Swarm residents sat down.

"Come over here, Tiponi. Remember the training I gave you? We have to meditate first before a battle," Ekad said. He closed his eyes.

"Me-dee-tate? I don't remember that," Medwin said, clearly annoyed at the delay.

Ekad opened his eyes.

"I haven't told you that word? Well, it's what we are doing when we practice one of the Four Strengths. You remember, Mental Strength, and we reflect?" Ekad said.

"That's called meditating? I wouldn't have guessed." Tiponi said.

"Well, it's good to do before a battle. It gets you focused and ready for a battle. So sit down and clear your minds and do what I told you in training," Ekad said, kindly.

The girl and Charmander sat down and closed their eyes, and began to remember the lesson more clearly.

Tiponi first noticed how warm the sun felt. Her sense of sight was cut off, which somehow made the sun seem warmer. Remembering the lesson, Tiponi cleared her mind. With her eyes still closed, she reached out for Medwin's paws. Once she had the familiar scaly digits clasped in her grasp, she tried to think of only her dæmon's mind. Somehow, she could tell that her dæmon was doing the same thing. They continued to pool their minds together until they felt like truly one being. The girl almost felt like her dæmon was inside of her and part of her, instead of a separate being. She concentrated on this feeling, and gradually she felt completely mentally aware of the Charmander. With this feeling filling her mind, Tiponi sensed that she could read her dæmon's mind.

Now that she was one with her dæmon, she was ready to reflect on memories. But before she could think of one, a memory came floating into her mind. Medwin had though of it, and in their state, he was able to share the thought. He was reminiscing about a childhood event. Once the memory was over, Tiponi thought of her different emotions while in battle. Back and forth, the two sent their emotion during battle and how to understand and read them. Fear. Anger. Frustration. Thoughtfulness. Joy. Triumph. Excitement. Pain. Stubbornness. Defeat. Victory. They then moved on to battle tactics they had come up with. They poured these thought together until they felt fully mentally strong and ready for the battle.

At the same time, the two opened their eyes. Ekad sat in front of them, looking at the two intently.

"I swear I saw the sun move in the sky while you were meditating," he joked.

"Good work, though. I see it's really helping. But now, onto the battle," Anata said anxiously.

Both teams reported to their respected positions on the field and prepared for battle. Tiponi felt mentally awake, and completely confident that she could beat Ekad.

"Ready, set, go!" yelled Ekad.

This field had no tree for Anta to climb, so she immediately skittered off to one side, where there was a patch of thicker grass. She stopped there, knowing her green and black exoskeleton helped camouflage her.

Still in a reflective mode from meditation, Tiponi thought of their last gym battle, where their opponent hid in tall grass, and what they had done to prevent that. She opened her mouth to tell Medwin to burn the grass, but as she did the Charmander gave a barely noticeable nod, then opened his mouth and spat a series of small fireballs to burn away the grass. Tiponi smiled, confident that Medwin would be able to attack Anata easily when she had to flee from the burning plants.

“Intim!” Ekad suddenly yelled. Both Medwin and Tiponi were startled when Anata leaped at her opponent, her hind end raised to display the face pattern on her back. For one frightening moment, it appeared to be an actual scowling face, intimidating Medwin into taking a step backward. Anata seized her chance and shot a stream of sticky string at Medwin as she landed on the ground.

“Flutter!” Tiponi called urgently, still shaken by the previous attack, which she realized was probably Scary Face. Medwin belatedly leaped away from the oncoming String Shot, but his foot still was caught in them, and he crashed clumsily to the ground. Tiponi felt the pain as Medwin’s side hit the ground, as well as…his annoyance?

But I only feel his emotions when we’re meditating, Tiponi thought, slightly confused.

Aaarg, not this stuff again, she heard Medwin think to himself. How can I get out of it quickly?

Tiponi saw that Anata had started charging forward, one claw raised to strike.

There would be time later to wonder how she could hear Medwin’s thoughts. “Spin,” she instructed mentally and verbally, trying to let her thoughts carry the image of Medwin’s tail flame slamming into Anata and burning the spider’s thread away. Medwin obediently spun around on his entangled foot, swinging his tail at his attacker. His large, white winter flame was easily big enough to char the thread and still score a nasty hit on Anata. She flinched back from the pain, but bravely stuck one clawed leg in Medwin’s side as the tail passed. Still spinning, he was unable to dodge, and his momentum caused Anata’s claw to open a gash in his side. She completed the Fury Swipes with a few more strikes of her claws, then scrambled painfully away from Medwin and his dangerous flame.

“Now, Stand and Fright!” Tiponi shouted. Medwin grinned, eager to try this particular tactic. He planted his feet firmly, stood tall and glared down at his opponent, unleashing his own Scary Face. He flared his tail flame slightly, which cast a long shadow at Anata and made him appear larger. He let out a low Growl and flashed a feral grin to add to the effect. Anata was rooted to the ground, almost quivering at the sight of the menacing figure in front of her. The Flamethrower caught Anta and Ekad completely by surprise.

Anta tried desperately to scramble away from the gout of flame, but did not a chance of moving fast enough after being frozen in fear. The grass around Anata was instantly seared to crispy black dust as the spider was enveloped in the stream of brilliant orange fire. The torrent continued for several long moments, during which the defending pokemon was completely obscured from view. Then Medwin stopped to catch his breath, and make sure his opponent was OK. He didn’t want to hurt her too badly.

As the smoke cleared, Anata could be seen; she was frantically rolling across the ground to prevent her skin from catching on fire.

Ekad smiled, pleased with his opponents’ clever tactic. The two certainly had gotten stronger. But he still had a few tricks of his own. “Fein! Pin!” he called.

Instantly Anata was on her feet again and circling around Medwin, though at a bit of a distance. Her eyes glowed black, then a stream of darkness shot from them. Medwin successfully leaped away from that first Night Shade, but when Anata released a few more rapid-fire bolts of blackness, he was hard pressed to avoid them. Eventually one hit, enveloping his eyes and temporarily blinding him.

Tiponi recalled how horrifying it felt to be completely robbed of sight. Medwin had never known that, especially because even in the blackest night he had always had his tail flame to see by. Somehow in their semi-connected state, the two experiences were shared, and they both began to panic.

Anata did not notice that her opponent was preoccupied. She was carrying out part two of the strategy; spraying a large web over Medwin, thereby pinning him to the ground. She further anchored him by depositing two large sticky gobs on his feet, then wrapped on long thread around his muzzle for good measure. Then she stood back and fired volley after volley of Poison Stings at him.

Meanwhile, Medwin’s vision had not cleared yet. Although Tiponi could see, her shared panic was keeping her from fully understanding what was going on in front of her.

I gotta calm down. Gotta calm down, Tiponi thought nervously to herself. I can’t let this distract me, we have to keep fighting. I can see Medwin in front of me; he’s being attacked. I got to…I don’t want to be blind again!

Tiponi? Medwin’s voice broke in her thoughts, sounding worried as well as shaken. What’s going on? Not sure what he meant, she stayed silent a moment, taking deep, slow breaths as she fought down panic.

Ekad finally noticed that something was wrong, and called, “Stop a minute, Anata. Tiponi, is something wrong?”

His voice shook her out of her thoughts, and she looked up at him. Then noticed the state her demon was in, and finally felt the numerous pinpricks of the Poison Stings.

“Oh, er…yeah, we’ll be fine now…” she replied awkwardly. At the same time, she silently told Mediwn, You have a lot of webbing on you, flare your tail flame to burn some off. Medwin immediately forced the pale flame to blaze up as much as he could, causing it to grow over his head. His back was free of threads in moments, and at Tiponi’s command of, Now swing it low to clear your feet, he dropped it low to the ground so the flame licked at his ankles, freeing his feet.

“Now Spin again!” Tiponi called, letting her mind carry the image of Medwin’s flame wrapping around him and removing the remaining webbing, freeing his arms and muzzle. He promptly spun on the spot, revolving several times as he was bathed in the flames.

Anata, having seen him free his feet, had resumed her volley of Poison Stings, but since they were incinerated in the revolving flames, she quickly stopped and scurried away, circling her foe and staying low to the ground. She crept closer to attack as soon as possible, but was surprised when the spinning flames grew into a fiery tornado around him. She didn’t have time to escape when it expanded wide enough to encompass her. Medwin, his sight beginning to return, stared in surprise as the flames almost took on a life of their own and shifted until Anata was in their center.

Tiponi and Ekad were similarly surprised. Tiponi gaped, just as shocked as her dæmon, as Ekad exclaimed, “Is that a Fire Spin? I think that’s the first time you’ve done that, right?” Tiponi and Medwin nodded simultaneously, and Ekad smiled at them. “Well done!” he cried as the whirling flames petered out, leaving behind an arachnid who looked much worse for the wear.

Shocked as they were, Tiponi worked fast to press their advantage. Now Flamethrower, that ought to end this! she mentally told Medwin. Or she tried to, anyway. Medwin gave no sign that he’d heard, and instead clutched his stomach as he watched his opponent try to figure out which legs were too burnt to stand on. As he did, Tiponi felt the wave of nausea that meant Medwin had been poisoned.

Better end this fast, she thought to herself. Flamethrower! she tried to mentally call as loud as she could, finding it odd to be yelling without a voice.

Medwin jumped, looked back at her with a what’d you do that for? kind of look, then breathed a stream of flames at Anata. Surprisingly, she was still able to stumble out of the way, trying to avoid walking on a few of her legs. Trying to ignore the dizzying feeling of nausea, Tiponi noted which legs seemed to be worst burnt.

“Charge!” she called, and Medwin sprung forward to deliver a Slash. “Left,” she added, indicating that he should attack the more injured left side. Anata barely leaped out of the way of the first swipe, then landed on an injured leg and stumbled from the pain. Medwin was on her in a second, scoring two quick hits on her injured legs. She finally crumpled to the ground, followed by Ekad.

Tiponi ran over to where the defeated Ekad lay on the ground. Although she felt bad about hurting her friend, she was ecstatic that she had won the battle. Not to long ago, he had beaten her terribly. But now, the student had bested the master. She knew that she was finally ready to take on Muata.