In a burst of light, the sleek blue Legendary Pokémon emerged onto the field. As it did, it raised its head and let out a cry. “Kuuuaahhhhoooo!” The sound was packed with energy, and Adam felt his hopes rise again at the sound of it.
The crowd, meanwhile, was astonished to see this latest development. After a second of silence, amazed yells rang out. “Um…folks, if you’re having a hard time believing what you’re seeing, you’re not alone,” said José. “But that does appear to be the Legendary Pokémon Suicune that Adam has just sent out! We were wondering if he had a secret weapon as his sixth Pokémon, and it seems we were very right!”
Adam stared confidently at his opponent, the man he did not think was Lance, and was satisfied to see an astonished expression on his face. However, it quickly vanished in favor of a more neutral one. “A Legendary Pokémon…in a Master Ball?” His eyes narrowed. “How do I know you caught it legitimately?”
“A Master Ball isn’t enough to catch a Legendary Pokémon on its own,” Adam firmly retorted. “Suicune made the choice to join my team!”
His opponent’s mouth twitched. “Perhaps. But even so…” He adopted the easygoing confidence Lance often displayed. “A Legendary Pokémon is not enough to beat Scorpius! And we will prove it to you!”
Cheers greeted that statement. Did I really just become the fucking underdog? Adam couldn’t help but wonder. “We’ll see about that! Suicune, Aurora Beam!”
“Smash!” called his opponent, using Scorpius’s command for Brick Break.
The crest on Suicune’s head glowed as Scorpius launched himself into the sky. A brightly-colored beam shot at him, but he twisted his body to avoid it at the last second, then hurled himself at Suicune, bringing back a claw. Suicune leapt out of the way of the attack, and from there, their battle became a sight to see. Both opponents danced around each other, continuing their attacks and dodges, keeping up with each other in a display of skill only possible from a Legendary Pokémon and a Champion’s ace. Suicune’s Aurora Beam did manage a couple of glancing blows, but Scorpius barely reacted.
For a few moments, Adam couldn’t help but stare in awe. This was unquestionably a skill level beyond anything he’d seen on his journey. Then, he snapped back to attention and focused on trying to win. If they kept going like this, it could result in Suicune getting the upper hand, but if Scorpius scored a hit, that could turn the tides. Was there a way to shift things in his favor?
He considered the issue. Brick Break wasn’t the strongest move Scorpius could hit with, but it would still hurt. Then again…he’d seen Suicune’s ability to take strong blows during their training. And Scorpius had taken some damage from Deborah’s attacks already, meaning he already wasn’t fighting at a hundred percent. So maybe… “Suicune, don’t dodge the next hit!”
At first, it seemed as though Suicune wasn’t listening, as it made another couple of jumps to avoid Scorpius’s attacks. But then, Adam saw it plant its feet, and as Scorpius turned his attention in its direction, it showed no signs of taking evasive action. Instead, as Scorpius prepared another attack, Suicune’s only focus seemed to be on firing a rainbow beam of energy directly at his chest. The blast made contact just as Scorpius brought a large arm down on Suicune’s body. Suicune flinched at the hit, but Scorpius was blasted backwards, the powerful Ice attack causing significant damage even to a fighter of his caliber. “And both fighters take a hit!” said José. “Is this where Adam turns things around? Or was Scorpius’s attack enough to sufficiently slow down Suicune?”
But as Scorpius struggled to his feet, Suicune diverted its focus from him and looked at Adam with an intense, piercing stare. As had happened before, Adam could sense the meaning in its eyes. And this time…
He swallowed. Well, fuck, here we go, I guess! “Hey! You want to know why I’m really here?” he yelled across the battlefield.
Presumably-not-Lance brushed him off. “I’m not taking my focus off the battle! Scorpius, you can make it!”
Scorpius got to his feet, but Suicune sent another Aurora Beam at him—this one was clearly less powerful, but it still set him back. After an encouraging nod from Suicune, Adam continued. “I’m here to tell everyone the truth!”
The man on the other side of the battlefield shot Adam a look, one that he would describe as a stop-doing-that look. It could easily be interpreted as the Champion reprimanding a challenger for trying to divert attention from their battle, but that wasn’t what Adam saw. He saw a dark warning, a threat. But he had to keep going. Doing his best to keep his arm and voice from shaking, he pointed a finger and said in a loud voice, “You’re an imposter! The real Lance was murdered by Team Rocket in Mahogany Town, and you’ve taken his place!”
A few shouts from the crowd followed his declaration, but overall, the mood was more subdued than what he’d expected. The supposed imposter’s frown deepened. “That’s a ridiculous accusation and a poor attempt to distract me from this battle. Are you really so desperate and unsporting that you’d resort to a cheap trick like this in an attempt to win?”
Adam clenched a fist. Unfortunately, his opponent had a point; he had nothing to back up his statement with. But then why had Suicune told him to reveal it? Or had he misread the Legendary Pokémon’s gaze?
Just as he was wondering that, however, Suicune moved, bounding over not to Scorpius, but to the man commanding him. And before the latter could register what was happening, a jet of water hit him in the face, sending him stumbling backward as he yelled in surprise and brought up his hands to the point of impact.
Adam’s jaw dropped. “Suicune, what…” He recognized it as the small jet of water that Suicune had been practicing; had its purpose been to use on a human all along? But what good would that do? Attacking a Pokémon trainer in an official match meant an automatic disqualification. Any chance that Adam had of taking the Championship had just gone down the drain.
There were more shouts from the audience, and they sounded angrier than the ones from after he had accused his opponent of being an imposter. The voices of the commentators rang out, as well, and they clearly weren’t impressed, either. “Oh, what was that?” said José. “That didn’t need to happen!”
“That’s a real shame,” said Chet. “Adam might’ve been struggling, but he was still putting up a good fight. But that’s going to end things on a sour note.”
The accused imposter straightened up, one hand over his right eye, his left eye glaring daggers at Adam. “So this was your plan? Was this all some sick plot to humiliate me? I don’t know what I’ve done to make you think I deserve this, but it’s over for you! Call back your Pokémon and get out of this—”
Suicune moved again, nudging the man’s right arm so that it fell from his face. He shot a glare at the Legendary Pokémon, then returned his angry look to Adam. “Recall your Pokémon now or you will face criminal charges!”
But Adam wasn’t paying attention. A spark of hope had flared up as he looked across to his opponent. Now he knew why Suicune had shot that jet of water. Overall, Team Rocket had done a fantastic job of disguising their agent to look like Lance. Plastic surgery could reconfigure his facial features, his hair could be dyed and styled appropriately, and as for behavior, someone with plenty of talent could watch videos of him and learn to replicate his mannerisms. But one thing they couldn’t perfectly replicate were Lance’s striking blue eyes. The best they could do were contact lenses—one of which had been dislodged. Now, not-Lance’s glare, though his face was red from the water, was clearly with two different eye colors.
“Hey, Adam, what are you waiting for?” said José. “I know it’s not what you want, but if you—”
“Hang on a sec, José,” interjected Chet. “Look at Lance.”
“Look at him?”
“Look at his eyes.”
“What about th…uh, wait. Yeah, I see it…”
Murmurs from the crowd began to rise, and even though Adam couldn’t make out what they were saying, they sounded confused and concerned. And since people were looking and pointing at Lance and not him, it had to be because of the different eye color.
Not-Lance looked around worriedly for a second, but then he seemed to regain his composure. He waved a hand dismissively. “There’s no need to be concerned,” he said in a loud voice. “Legendary Pokémon work in mysterious ways, and we don’t fully understand them. Changing someone’s eye color isn’t out of the question, is it?”
Adam found himself saying his next words almost without his control. “How did you know that your eye color was different?” he called.
“What?” Not-Lance looked over at him. “I heard the commentators, how else?”
“They didn’t say anything about your eye color. Just your eyes.”
A flash of panic crossed the imposter’s face, but he quickly tried to cover it up. “Then…I must have overheard it from an audience member and mixed things up. After all, my mind isn’t in its usual place after I was just attacked by a challenger.”
He was trying to change the subject, but Adam wouldn’t let him. “You heard them talking at normal volume through that thick glass?” he said.
“It doesn’t matter!” said not-Lance angrily. “You have violated the—”
But a loud noise cut him off. He directed his gaze to Scorpius, who had voiced it and was looking at him with a curious expression: inquisitive, but on edge. And as not-Lance looked back, he was unable to keep the fear he was now feeling from his face. Scorpius noticed. It was not the expression that Lance would give him. It was not the expression of the man who had raised him and with whom he had built an unbreakable bond of trust. It was the expression of someone else—someone else who had taken Lance’s place and lied about being him.
With a furious snarl, he headed for the imposter, moving quickly enough to close the distance before the latter’s shock could wear off enough to recall him. But before the hulking Pokémon could do anything else, Suicune made another move, darting behind Scorpius and firing another Aurora Beam at his back. The already-weakened Dragonite tottered, then fell forward, his upper body pinning not-Lance to the ground.
Several shouts went up from the crowd, but a flash of light drew attention, and one voice rose above the rest. “Nobody fucking move or we destroy the place!”
Adam looked, his eyes widening. A man had released a Weezing into the crowd and was glaring at everyone around him. As he watched, more people rose in their seats and released Pokémon—Graveler, Electrode, Donphan, Gyarados. Team Rocket had agents in the audience? he thought, horrified.
People started screaming. Some tried to flee, but the Rockets sent attacks in their direction, forcing them down. “The stadium is being held hostage!” yelled José. “We need help!”
“Anybody tries anything, we unleash destruction!” yelled one of the men.
Adam looked around in a panic. The glass wall meant that he couldn’t send his Pokémon to do anything about the situation, and even if he could, it would risk the Rockets making good on their threat. How could they get out of this?
As he thought this, he saw another movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned to see Suicune calmly walking towards the center of the battlefield. “Suicune, if you’ve got something in mind, now would be a great time!” he said in a low voice.
Suicune stopped after several steps. Then, it threw back its head and cried out. “Kuuuuueeeehhhhhh!”
Almost immediately, two answering cries came from outside the stadium…and before Adam’s eyes, the Legendary Pokémon Raikou and Entei jumped in. They landed on the other side of the glass, exuding power that Adam could feel even from his position. As other heads turned to them and mouths dropped, they moved. Darting with almost unbelievable speed, they made for the Pokémon that Team Rocket had released and shot bursts of fire or bolts of lightning to take them down as quickly as possible. And after knocking out the Pokémon, they would pick up the members of Team Rocket in their mouths and hurl them against the glass, dazing them so they couldn’t do anything for the next few minutes.
For their part, Team Rocket was caught completely off guard. By the time any of them had recovered from the surprise enough to take action, it was almost over, and while they were scrambling to do something, Raikou and Entei finished their job, taking the last of them out of commission.
As Adam watched in amazement, he heard a noise from closer nearby. He turned to see Scorpius’s unconscious body disappear in a flash of light, as not-Lance got up and ran as hard as he could for the exit. Adam made a movement in his direction, hoping to stop him, but both he and the imposter had forgotten that Suicune was still with them. The Legendary Beast ran faster than either of them could ever hope to and had blocked not-Lance’s path within a second. As his eyes widened in horror, Suicune’s mane and ribbon-like tails lifted up, and a gust of wind slammed into the imposter. He flew several feet before crashing to the ground, where he lay still, groaning faintly.
The stadium went quiet. Nobody seemed to know what to do. Finally, José’s voice came over the speaker. “Um…security, please round up everyone in the crowd that just threatened us…maybe those of you with Pokémon can help make sure they don’t escape or try anything else? Everyone else, please just remain calm while the authorities get things sorted out. As for those of you at home…um…we’ll be right back after these messages.”
