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Amy and Sammy were strong and capable members of their cheer squad. Amy practiced daily with a ferocity and determination that bordered on aggression. Her flashy moves commanded the spotlight while Sammy played a more supportive role. She was always the base of the pyramid, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t take pride in it! Her tenacity was in the finer details, and catching her teammates made her feel needed.
Competition didn’t end at comp cheer, though. What was more competitive than Pokémon battles? There was a clear winner and loser every time. Just like cheer!
“So that’s why we can’t let Angela Collins win next time!” Amy said with a scowl. “Especially with a Frillish. Come on, a Water type? She must have been cheating!”
“It could be that she practices more than you. Technique is an important aspect of battling.” Amy’s mom held her hands steady on the driver’s wheel of the minivan. The twins (mostly Amy) demanded a trip to the beach in exchange for their best behavior. Doubtful.
“And being stronger,” her dad added. “You’ve got a lot of strength in you, Amy. Try to use that.”
“That’s all she does,” Sammy mumbled too quietly for anyone to hear.
Amy grinned. “Thanks, dad!”
This time their mom gripped the steering wheel a little tighter. “I’m sure you’ll have fun zapping Water types for revenge.”
Their dad pretended to be blind to her sarcasm. “Show Angela who’s boss!”
“It’s not just her,” Amy complained. “Any time I beat Leah she gets a new Pokémon so she can win! And Hannah is, like, so jealous of the good trainers that it’s not even funny. Erica caught a Minccino and guess what Hannah caught? A Cinccino! As if sucking up to the team captain makes her a better trainer.”
“It was the other way around,” Sammy pointed out. “Erica caught a Cinccino. Hannah caught a Minccino.”
Amy scoffed. “I’m pretty sure Minccino are the ones with the scarves. M comes later than C in the alphabet.”
“It sounds like Hannah needs to grow a spine,” their mom said dryly before pulling into the parking lot.
Parking was scarce in the Wawanakwa region, and not just because the spots were always full. People used public transit or Pokémon as part of the region’s conservation efforts. The Pokémon League had taken full advantage of this while lobbying for zoning laws that let them set up more facilities. After all, who needed parking when you could ride a Pokémon?
That didn’t suffice for the cheer squad or their family, so Sammy had become an expert at sniffing out parking.
She pointed from the backseat. “That guy’s heading back to his car.”
Her mom lurked as he got in his car. “Good job, sweetie.”
He was taking forever to pull out of the spot, so she honked.
The twins sent out their Pokémon within seconds of hitting the beach. Usually the twins kept them quiet and out of the way inside of Poké Balls. Not today. Most people lounged on one side of the beach to give battlers plenty of room. Sure enough, the twins made a beeline for a wide spot with sand dampened and flattened by the waves.
“Go, Plusle!”
Amy’s Plusle always struck a pose when it showed up to the battlefield, whether that was a cheer meet or the tall grass.
Two years ago, the twins’ parents agreed it was weird that their daughters didn’t have Pokémon like their friends, though they disagreed on which twin needed a Pokémon first. Amy’s dad had consulted reputable breeders and picked out what they claimed was their finest Plusle. They were staples of cheer routines, after all.
“You can do this, Minun!”
Sammy’s Minun chirped happily and chased its own tail, ignoring her pleas to sit still. Sammy’s Minun had been a gift from her mom. Both parents paid lip service to how their daughters might synergize with complementary Pokémon. Neither twin learned anything about reconciling their differences just because they had a plus and minus Pokémon. Besides, Sammy’s mom had caught it in the wild and toughened it up for a month or two before giving it to her daughter. Sammy had no idea, she just assumed it was naturally strong.
Both sisters glared from their battle stations. They waited for the other to make a move. Wait, Amy wondered, why do people do that again? Unable to find a good reason, she called out her attack.
“Plusle! Use Shock Wave!”
The Pokémon sparked and sent a surge of electricity aimed directly for Minun, who looked back at Sammy expectantly. It fidgeted, ready to dodge.
“Light Screen!”
Shock Wave honed in on the target, making it extremely difficult to dodge. Not that this had ever stopped Plusle from trying.
This time Minun got over its delusions of dodging, but it didn’t listen to its trainer. It crackled with electricity and began to charge Plusle. Shock Wave was a direct hit, but Minun barely slowed down. They were at least on a more stable surface than dry sand, but Minun was still unused to this kind of terrain. That wasn’t ideal for a full body move.
Minun crashed into its metaphorical sister and sent bolts of electricity in all directions. Both Pokémon were dazed from the Spark attack, but Minun recovered first.
Sammy racked her brain for ideas. There was an opening to do some damage, which would have been a better idea if Minun had used Light Screen and could afford to be more reckless. Oh wait, that was it!
“Use Swagger! Try to get away from Plusle!”
Minun didn’t need to be told twice. It whacked its tail upwards from underneath Plusle’s nose and took off like a bolt of lightning.
Amy let out an undignified shriek that only threw her already confused Plusle even more off balance. “Samey! You always cheat!”
Sammy glared. “Let’s finish her. Discharge!”
The plan was foolproof. Plusle was too disoriented to dodge or fire off an accurate attack. Plus Amy was too busy yelling to give her Plusle an idea more coherent than “just win!” All Minun had to do was keep its distance and attack from afar.
That was when Minun decided to showboat. It kept using Swagger, ignoring Sammy's commands. After all, it thought its improvisation had gotten them that far.
"Samey if you don't stop your disgusting vermin from making fun of Plusle I'm going to body slam you into next week!"
Plusle’s ear twitched. Body Slam? It knew that move.
Minun's Swagger had diminishing returns. As in it actively worsened the situation. Amy’s Plusle was already as reckless and disoriented as it was gonna get, so this only heightened its berserker rage. Plusle had gone from disorientation to tunnel vision, so with a squeaky battle cry the small red Pokémon charged until its foe was sent flying through the air. It crashed into the umbrella of some innocent beachgoers.
Any trace of anger immediately left Amy's body. "I won! I am an awesome trainer!"
Sammy’s apologies to the random family whose beach day was ruined were only matched by the apology to her Minun.
"Don't feel bad, it was my fault," she assured as she used a potion. Potions invigorated Pokémon to speed up their natural healing factor, but Pokémon battles mostly just depleted energy. Less than 0.005% of Pokémon battles drew blood (Oak et al, 2021) contrary to claims made by some of the Team Plasma members who had taken asylum in Wawanakwa, or their various online truthers. (Amy had met some in kindergarten proselytizing to her classmates on the playground. She bought it until Sammy stuck the middle finger up at them.)
Long story short, Minun was fine, just short on stamina. The potion and some sunbathing would take care of that. If anything its biggest injury was a bruised ego. It pouted and slumped over as Amy aggressively hugged her Plusle. "We are totally gonna kick Angela’s butt when we get back home."
Sammy had enough battling for the day. Well, not really. She had enough losing for the day and didn't want any more. That’s why when Amy suggested some jogging for exercise, Sammy was skeptical.
“It’s not a race, is it?”
“No, it’s exercise. Duh.”
“Okay, but I’ll be pacing myself. You don’t get to brag if you run faster than me.”
Amy rolled her eyes. “Stop projecting your weird inferiority complex on me.”
She smirked. “By the way, the finish line is at the tide pools.”
In an ill advised plan to get there before Sammy, Amy sped off as fast as she could. Sammy rolled her eyes and started calmly jogging at a steady pace. Their coach had fiercely embedded a need to set goals and achieve them, hence the need for a finish line. But it wasn’t like Sammy resented winning bronze.
“Wait, silver,” Sammy said out loud. “Since there’s just two of us.”
She realized she was talking to herself. That happened a lot.
Amy reached the tidepools first, as if her ego needed any more inflating.
“Perfect, now I just have to-” she let out a scream as she slipped. She waved her arms to stabilize herself and looked around.
The tidepools were crystal blue in the craters of their rocky surroundings. The color was pretty in spite of the disgusting slipperiness. Maybe Amy could grind for exp (her brain had trouble telling the Pokémon games from the world she lived in) by zapping the Water types that lived in those pools. It would literally be like skewering Corphish in a barrel! She grinned at the thought of how Angela’s smug face would look after Plusle zapped her Frillish unconscious.
Those thoughts were interrupted by a horribly high pitched cry of pain. A cute pink Pokémon was being gnawed on by something crawling out of one of the tidepools. Amy was seeing Pokémon predation in the wild, and she hated it. The Corsola tried to waddle away, but its assailant had dug in with the spikes on its blue arms. Mareanie usually latched onto a Corsola and either let go when they were done eating, or when another Pokémon drove it off. Some Corsola would even shelter a Pokémon from its predators in exchange for protection against Mareanie. The attacks usually weren’t lethal either way, but Amy had no way of knowing that.
“Hey, idiot!”
The Mareanie glanced in Amy’s direction without letting go. The first thing it saw was a rock hurtling towards its face, the second thing it saw was pain. The third thing it saw was the human who had caused the pain. The purple underparts of its body were technically its stomach, making its face a particularly vulnerable spot. It clung tighter to the Corsola and hissed, a vocalization that only really came in handy on land.
Sammy caught up to Amy, and her irritation at Amy antagonizing the wildlife gave way to sympathy once she saw the Corsola and its bite marks. “Was that Corsola getting eaten?!”
“Yeah! That ugly thing was trying to turn it into a Cursola!”
That wasn’t how Cursola worked. Thousands of years ago, a population of cold water Corsola had the ability to evolve into a larger form. They were wiped out in a meteoric impact before mysteriously reanimating alongside the Dreepy evolution line. You have a better chance of evolving a normal Corsola into whatever Cursola was pre-extinction than to turn it into a Cursola. Everyone knows that.
Sammy called out her Minun, which made Amy remember the fact that she also had a Pokémon. She sent out her Plusle instead of using her fists on that bully Pokémon.
“Light Screen!” ordered Sammy. She didn’t know what kind of moves the Mareanie could use, but this was a wild Pokémon in terrain that suited it. That could be dangerous even if it wasn’t predatory.
“Spark!” Amy ordered as her sister’s Pokémon set up luminous shields. Amy’s Minun charged the Mareanie, knocking it off and knocking the Corsola over on its side. It wiggled trying to get up.
Mareanie took advantage of the proximity and rammed the spikes on its legs into Minun, who wasn’t shielded from the physicality of that attack.
“Discharge!” called out Amy. Minun sent out a web of electricity in all directions, casually hitting Corsola just as much as Mareanie. Mareanie looked furious, retaliating with a spray of mud that hit Minun like a freight train.
“I think it’s poisoned!” Sammy yelled to Amy.
“Obviously the purple thing is a Poison type!” Amy scoffed.
“I meant Plusle!”
Plusle looked really queasy, and not just because of the mud. Its expression looked nauseous and it was wobbling a bit as it got to its feet.
“Mud Shot shouldn’t have hit that hard,” Sammy observed. “It’s like Light Screen didn’t protect it. I think you should keep Plusle away!”
“Don’t need to tell me twice!” Amy was not going to let that ugly thing harm her pet again. “Get away from it and use Discharge!”
The Corsola had just gotten to its feet when it was knocked over by yet another wall of electricity. Plusle was moving much slower, so it wasn’t quite out of the way as Mareanie fired spikes from its body.
“Minun! Help Plusle out!”
Minun ran over to shield Plusle and puffed out its chest. Plusle was kind of like a sister, so the only one who got to beat it up was Minun. Mareanie was almost tempted to cut its losses and crawl away when Minun gnashed its teeth and wagged its tail. That show of defiance drew out Mareanie’s vindictive side, it wasn’t going to let these land dwellers push it out of its feeding grounds.
“I didn’t tell you to use Swagger!” Sammy yelled angrily. “This isn’t a sparring match! You could be in danger!”
“Yeah, maybe you’d win if you listened to Sammy for once!” Amy yelled. She glanced at her sister. “Against, like, a wild Bidoof. Or Hannah. Realistically speaking.”
Sammy glared with an open mouth in both offense and disbelief. “Shut up! This is not your business!”
Amy gestured to Plusle huddling behind Minun. “Isn’t it?”
That was actually kind of a good point.
“You are not Minun’s trainer,” Sammy growled, stepping closer.
“One of us has to be!”
Mareanie didn’t entirely understand the screaming match between the sisters, but it knew an opening for a risky move when it saw one. Mareanie knew saltwater was an extremely good conductor of electricity (yes, that exact fact verbatim) but the enemies were on the defensive and the humans were about to use Mega Punch and Low Kick on each other. It shielded its face/stomach with some of its legs and crawled into one of the tidepools to refill on water. It gathered as much as it could and peeked out to blast Minun in the face.
Sammy stopped arguing. “Minun!”
“Nice going, genius,” Amy snapped.
Minun was pushed backwards, sending Plusle slipping and falling on its face. It looked remarkably weaker thanks to the poison coursing through its body.
“Plusle!” Now Amy was glaring at Mareanie instead of her sister. “Listen, I’m willing to forgive you if you drop the woe is me act and fry this sucker.”
Sammy scoffed. “You forgive me?”
The sarcasm failed to register with Amy. “Presumptuous much? I said I'll consider it once we win.”
Once we win. This was a hypothetical where both sisters shared in their triumph. In spite of her anger, Sammy liked the sound of that.
She glanced at Plusle and Minun blindly firing off attacks while Mareanie slowly scuttled out of the way. Even wild Pokémon battling through instinct would be faring better. They needed direction.
“Amy, I’m gonna create an opening. You’re gonna have to take out Mareanie with electric moves. Does that sound good?”
Amy glared at the blue and purple imp. “Very.”
“Minun, Encore! Keep it distracted!”
“Plusle, get in close!”
Minun directed Mareanie’s attention. Through some Poké mind trick, Mareanie kept firing off Water Pulse after Water Pulse. It was busy enough that Plusle crawled its way over to the urchin.
“Spark!”
Plusle surged with electricity and tackled Mareanie. It was electrocuted and pinned, but it wouldn’t last for long.
“Now!” Both twins called out.
“Shock Wave!”
“Discharge!”
The twins shielded their eyes as the tide pools shone with electricity. Loud cries could be heard all around. When the twins opened their eyes, Mareanie was unconscious.
“Yes!”
Amy and Sammy grinned and high fived. Their eyes widened. High fiving? They hadn’t done that since they were kids. Since before they moved for high school, before they joined the cheer squad, before Amy went on the offensive and Sammy spent every day reacting to what should have been her sister.
Sammy chuckled. “I guess we do make a good team.”
“Sure,” Amy said. What little tact she had told her not to ruin the moment. Wait. There was no one else around, it didn’t matter if she looked weak.
Why would she want to ruin the moment?
Then a Wingull collided with her head.
“What-?! You little-”
Amy realized it was unconscious. In fact, some more bird Pokémon fell out of the sky. Sammy glanced inside one of the tidepools and found an assortment of fainted Staryu and Binacle. Amy stepped over a fainted Wimpod and gagged.
“We should go,” Sammy suggested innocently.
“Wait,” Amy turned to see the Corsola knocked over on its side yet again. It was unconscious, but it was cute in almost a pathetic kind of way. Amy usually only had contempt for pathetic things but Plusle could carry her team while Corsola decorated it. Erica graduated next year, Amy needed a bigger team if she was going to be the next team captain.
She took out a Poké Ball. “You’re coming with me.”
She tossed it at Corsola. The Poké Ball opened up and returned a nearly-fainted Plusle back to its ball.
Sammy stared in bewilderment as Amy pretended that wasn’t a mistake and tossed a different (empty) ball at Corsola. It shook once, then twice, then clicked.
“Woohoo!”
Sammy decided against bringing up Amy’s catching skills. “I guess when life gives you Iapapa Berries, make lemonade.”
“Ew, too sour.” Amy picked up the Poké Ball with her new Corsola and grinned. “Wanna race back?”
Sammy laughed. “You know what? Sure.”
Amy laughed and took off across the beach. Sammy turned to Minun, who looked a lot less smug than she expected. Weird, didn’t Minun just win?
Oh.
“Sorry about chewing you out earlier,” Sammy apologized.
Minun didn’t seem to buy it. Those words had been pretty genuine, and they weren’t exactly wrong. This seemed to dawn on Sammy.
“Hmm. Actually, I think I need you to trust me from now on. Please listen to me, okay?”
Minun nodded. Sammy let out a relieved sigh.
“Let’s get you rested.”
She returned Minun to its ball. So why didn’t that feel like the end of it?
Sammy glanced over at Mareanie, who was unflatteringly squished underneath its splayed out legs. Sure that Corsola needed rescuing, but Mareanie needed to eat like any other Pokémon. Speaking of which, Sammy noticed a curious and hungry Buizel peeking out from the ocean. It saw a human girl and a tasty meal, so as soon as the human was gone…
A Starmie that lacked Buizel’s reservations crawled out of the water. It could just blast the human with a psychic attack and eat the yummy sea urchin Pokémon. Sammy nervously reached into her pocket and took out a Poké Ball she kept in case of emergencies, like a shiny or something. She tapped it against Mareanie and walked back to her family.
“I didn’t plan for a visit to the Pokémon Center,” the twin’s mom said with a barely concealed edge to her voice.
“Samey was the one who caught that ugly murderer!” Amy complained.
So much for teamwork. “I couldn’t just release Mareanie with so many predators nearby!”
“Of course you have a problem with poetic justice.”
Their father sighed and shook his head. “Girls,” he said in a voice he thought conveyed wisdom, “I think this will be an opportunity for you two to get along. If you can raise two natural enemies side by side, maybe you two can settle your differences. And if you can’t, well, that’s one less mouth to feed!”
The twin’s mom glared at him. “I sure wonder why your standup career failed.”
“Love ya too, hon.”
Amy and Sammy noticed that they didn’t technically reject the idea of keeping the new Pokémon. With their parents’ anger directed at each other, the twins got in the backseat of the car. Their parents joined them and sat in silence as their father drove them to the Pokémon Center.
“I thought we made a good team,” Sammy whispered angrily.
“We do,” said Amy. “You know how Coach doesn’t care about arguments?”
Sammy raised an eyebrow.
“She makes us figure it out ourselves,” Amy continued. “Mom isn’t as smart as Coach, but she likes it when problems go away as fast as possible.”
Sammy tilted her head in confusion. Since when did Amy have theory of mind?
“Which is, like, a mood.” Amy added. “So let’s just drop it and move on.”
That was fine with Sammy.