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The guy who was supposed to be reiterating the plan to the grunts was about as charismatic as a potato, so Tate pulled him down from the rock he was stood on and took his place. "Listen up, grunts. I'm gonna blow the wall in a minute. When I do, you get in there and grab as many pokémon as you can. Catching them in pokéballs will take too long, so you've all been given rifles that will fire nets. Aim and shoot. The net wraps around the pokémon, and then you can reel it in.
We'll wheel the cages in and leave them next to this wall, so when you've got a catch, dump the pokémon in a cage, then get back in there for more. Understood?"
The grunts all nodded.
"This is the safari zone. You get me? I'm talking big time caterpie crushers. You bring me a wimpy pokémon, I slap your face off. I want evolved pokémon, tough pokémon, hardcore pokémon. Understood?"
The grunts all nodded again. They were idiots--they probably didn't have a clue what he meant. They'd bring back rattatas and sandshrews knowing them. But Tate had had enough of talking. He lifted a control switchboard in his right hand, then twisted the big red dial on it with his left.
Boom!
The stone wall behind him was blown up in a massive explosion. Dirt and dust were thrown everywhere and the grunts all flinched, ducked and squeaked with fear. None of them moved. Tate was sick to the back teeth of them. "Move it dweebs!"
The grunts all jumped up and ran through the hole in the wall and onto the grounds of the safari zone, wailing and screaming to inspire fear in any nearby trainers. As the last of the grunts disappeared into the tall grass, Tate's radio cracked.
"Number one, are you mobile?"
"Yes, number two," Tate groaned. "Stay in position. I'm going for the dratini."
With a familiar flash of red, Tate's Skarmory appeared from its pokéball. The man jumped up onto its back and a moment later it took off, over the wall and straight toward the secluded lake in the depths of the safari zone. That's where the warden would be, playing with his secret friend Dratini.
Score.




Sebastian threw some food into the lake and watched as his dratini friend came to the surface. Its face lit up as it saw him through the water, then it rushed up and with a splash leaped into the air. "Droooo~"
"Hello there, Dratini," Sebastian said, as the pokémon landed back in the water. "I hope you are well today."
"Drooo~" Dratini replied. It swam around in a circle, then performed another leap, much to Sebastian's delight.
"Ohoho, you're getting good at those. I think you deserve a treat for that. What would you say to a pecha berry?" Sebastian asked.
Dratini seemed excited to get a taste. "Drooo!~"
"Excellent," Sebastian said. He crouched down and put his hand out over the lake, with some pecha berries in his palm. "Here you are. Take as much as you like."
"Thanks muchly. I think I will," Tate said.
Sebastian jumped up, shocked. "Who are you? How did you find us here?"
"Who do you think I am, old man?" Tate snickered. Then he pointed at the Dratini. "Skarmory, grab that dragon!"
"Ska!" Skarmory screeched. She swooped up into the air, then dived down and clawed at Dratini, plucking it out of the water and then flying back to Tate, who'd already begun to run.
"Hey! You can't do that!" Sebastian cried.
Tate jumped up onto Skarmory's back, and together they flew up into the sky.
"Dratini, use shock wave!" Sebastian shouted. Tate and Skarmory were already heading back to the cages, to get the dratini locked up, when it let out a blast of electricity. Skarmory let out a pained crow, then plummeted toward the ground, a mile from the cages.

As Tate picked himself up and returned his Skarmory, Sebastian was already on his radio to the front desk. "Alert! Alert! There are pokémon poachers on the grounds! Make an announcement; we need all able bodied trainers to assist us in stopping them! Use of pokémon must be allowed. We simply have to stop them. They're poaching our pokémon!"

Raide was not having very much luck in the Safari Zone. So far she hadn’t managed to catch anything before it ran away from her and she hadn’t even thrown a single Pokeball. ‘Ugh,’ Raide thought as another Pokemon ran in the opposite direction, ‘Either I’m naturally Pokemon repellant or I’m more suspicious looking than I thought. Maybe the army low-crawl isn’t helping me.’ Raide got to her feet and brushed the dirt off of her shirt. She considered why she was having such bad luck, but was distracted by a massive explosion somewhere.

A small cloud of dust was easily visible through a few of the trees around her, and Raide was really beginning to become nervous until she heard the announcement that there were poachers on the grounds. That was when she became extremely nervous and concerned. These Pokemon weren’t trained to fight as far as she knew, and poacher’s weren’t above dirty tactics, were they?

Turning around, Raide considered what to do, but she knew that she had already made her decision. She was an able bodied trainer in the loosest sense of the idea, but she might be able to stop them. 'Well, it’s possible now that they’re allowing the use of Pokemon,’ Raide thought to herself as she ran through the thinning trees until she heard a thump followed by a pained sounding squeak. Her jaw dropped like a Magikarp’s when she saw that the person had kicked the Pokemon. She thought that they were here to poach the Pokemon, not to beat them up for fun.

She wasn’t quite fast enough to catch the poacher, but she could try to get her attention without getting run over. “H-Hey!” Raide shouted at the retreating back, and picked up one of her safari balls. Then she threw it at her, not really trying to hit her (though the poacher would deserve it), but merely tried to get her attention.

‘Oops,’ Raide thought as she covered her mouth with both hands and watched the Safari Ball actually hit the lady. She hadn’t really meant to do that, but at least she hadn’t nailed her in the head or anything, which would be unnecessary even if she had kicked that poor, stubborn Nidoran like a kickball. The poacher turned around to look at her, and for the first time Raide noticed the bold letter on the front of the shirt. ‘Uh oh. Team Rocket’s behind this?’ For a moment, Raide considered turning around and finding a less serious looking grunt to stop, but decided that the competent ones were most likely to do the most damage.

She tapped her foot and bit her lip. Reaching for a Pokeball with slightly shaking hands, Raide tried to think of something to say, but couldn’t come up with anything that wouldn’t sound horribly cheesy and embarrassing. It would have reminded her too much of someone else. Instead, she simply thought, ‘Isn’t it obvious I just threw that at you?’ and tilted her head to one side as she thought about calling her out on that. She decided against it and tossed Cyndaquil’s Pokeball into the clearing with a flick of her wrist. “Try to stop her, Cyndaquil,” Raide said quietly because she knew that the Pokemon was always up for a fight.

“Cynda!” He replied.

Talora stopped walking as she watched the girl send out a pokémon. Urgh this is the last thing I need.
She thought to herself. I haven't even caught a thing yet. Secretly she was worried she wouldn't win this battle, she was just a rookie grunt and all Talora could do was hope this timid trainer was as weak as she looked.

Not about to let her concerns become obvious to her challenger. Talora yelled. "You'll regret this!" She pulled the pokéball she nearly pulled out before and threw it towards the trainer vengefully. "Go! Houndour!" Talora growled.

The pokémon appeared out of the pokéball before it even got near the girl trainer and faced off the Cyndaquil with a threatening howl.

Talora breathed a silent sigh of relief when the Cyndaquil's tackle landed and Houndour shook it off as if it were a minor inconvenience. Maybe she really could win this, maybe she was a better trainer than she thought she was. Maybe the victory would have her honoured as a superior team rocket member, ah yes, she could see it now, her own cushy office with a sea view.

Talora brought her self back to the present and confidently ordered her Houndour to attack. "Use crunch Houndour!" Talora called swinging her arm out to point at the tiny fire type. Houndour ran forward quickly scooping Cyndaquil up in its mouth and crunching down with it's jaws before spitting the pokémon back out onto the floor. Talora managed to catch what would have been a giggle of joy, and turned it into a condescending laughter.

Batwood peered out from the tree foliage he was hiding in and spotted his prey. Two men, wearing black uniforms embellished with antagonistic red R's on the front. They were arguing over something, but he wasn't sure what. Not that it mattered to him.
"Stop, evil-doers!" he shouted gruffly, gliding down to the forest floor. The two grunts stared at him, wide-eyed. He landed and sent out a Pokeball, "I choose you, my young sidekick!"
Atlas burst forth from his Pokeball, wearing a black slip of cloth with eyeholes over his face to conceal his identity, as was custom for sidekicks to do.
"Scraggy~" he growled, intimidatingly.
Within a moment, the nearest grunt sent a Pokeball hurling at him without hesitation, and the other retreated to watch the battle from a distance.
The opposition was a Zubat, fluttering about like a... well, like a bat.

It wasn't until after he instinctively sent out a pokémon for battle that Stockwell got a good look at his opponent. "Bwahahaha!" He laughed bending over slightly and slapping his knee. "Would you get a load of this guy?" Stockwell shouted over to Lanikai. "Oh man..." He trailed off as he wiped an eye.

"Anyway, Zubat- confuse ray!" Stockwell said getting serious, this joker was still out to get him, probably to release his weighty catch of pokémon and Stockwell wasn't about to let that happen.

Zubat sent off a confuse ray which luckily hit it's mark, "That ought to help get this battle finished up pretty quick."Stockwell grinned. Victoriously Zubat fluttered about on the spot waiting for it's next command.

Atlas took the Confuse Ray head on, but remained upright. Confusion was a dastardly ailment; he could only try his best to take orders and not foul them up.
"Young sidekick, avoid taking unnecessary damage! Use the sneaky Substitute attack!" Batwood ordered heroically.
Atlas clenched his fists through the confusion and separated into four Scraggy's. Now even the Zubat would have trouble following orders correctly.
Batwood grinned. All he had to do was wait for the Zubat to make a mistake now, and he'd win hands down. Of course, that was easier said than done with Atlas confused. "Excellent! Now wait for your foe to make a move, young sidekick!"